The cone of silence…
On Monday news reports revealed that the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights will launch an investigation into what may be the largest case of discrimination against women in recent history. The charge: colleges impose a higher admissions threshold for girls than boys.
Tuesday, I searched for reaction in the websites of the American Association of University Women, National Organization for Women, the National Women’s Law Center and the ACLU’s Women’s Rights arm. This would seem like a natural topic for these groups. After all, few events in a daughter’s upbringing match the emotional fervor of the college search, and discrimination against women is what these groups are all about.
Alas, not a word. Really. No celebrations, no analyses, no voices of outrage, no offers to assist the investigation — not even a single sentence alerting their followers to the announcement.
The AAUW had something about “sexualizing” Halloween,” a valid topic. But isn’t removing college roadblocks for women a core issue for this group?
At the NOW site there was talk about net neutrality and abstinence-only sex ed — but nothing about the investigation. At the Law Center, I even dove into the ”gender equity in education” section. Nothing. Surely the ACLU is throwing its resources into the fight against academic discrimination. Once again, nothing.
Strange? Maybe not. Read this for further explanation. (The commentary I wrote for the Chronicle of Higher Education is password protected, but some bloggers reproduced the entire piece, which makes it available through a Google search.)
This comment is not about bashing feminists – my liberal leanings haven’t changed much since the 60’s. Rather, it’s a comment about political myopia. Campus gender imbalances may be an inconvenient fact for feminists, but pretending the elephant is not in the room is a strategy that rarely works out.
Tags: feminists admissions
