An interdisciplinary resource for news, legal developments, commentary, and scholarship about Title IX, the federal statute prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sex in federally funded schools.
Friday, November 16, 2007
Anti-Title IX shirts at Slippery Rock
The VP of Financial Affairs for the Slippery Rock University Student Government Association (SGA), Michael Combs, showed up at a meeting wearing a t-shirt that read "End Title IX." The meeting the included a presentation by the VP of Student Life about the recent lawsuit between some of the women's teams and SRU and her support for the teams. The article does not offer much context and only that Combs wanted to raise awareness about how Title IX has affected men's teams. Members of the field hockey team confronted Combs about the shirt and its potential negative repercussions on the whole SGA, but it does not appear that any further discussion occurred. (You can see pics of the shirt at the above link.) More information on the situation can be found in the letters to the editor where two of the lead plaintiffs in the case against SRU write in to express their disappointment in the presence of multiple t-shirts at the SGA meeting. (Suggesting that Combs was not the only SGA member supporting one) and providing some necessary clarifications on Title IX that the article failed to bring up.
"I was thinking of screen printing End Title IX (italics for change from blog entry) on a t-shirt but I was worried that I might be arrested under some provision of the Patriot Act that impinges on my right to sartorial free expression."
ReplyDeleteRecognize the source of that quote from a few months ago? Sartorial free expression only is good when it's on your blog and your viewpoint, I guess. Otherwise it's 'backlash.'
I never said Combs did not have the right to wear the shirt.
ReplyDelete