Girls Gone Wild
Why are women athletes in college choosing to mimic the worst behaviors of their male counterparts?


May 25, 2006 - Once upon a time, the dream of the feminist movement was one of equal opportunity. They didnÂ’t want to be like men, just to have the same chances. There was an implication, a faith inherent in that aspiration, that not only could they perform the same jobs, master the same subjects and play the same games but that they would do it in a fashion that might be better for our society. The conceit was that they would imbue all they touched with a womenÂ’s sensibility, which would be more nuanced, more empathetic and, ultimately, more humane.

I confess that I more or less subscribed to that notion. I grew up in an extended family dominated by males and one didn’t have to be an Einstein to recognize our multitude of emotional shortcomings. Fortunately, the Starr men were just smart enough to marry up and improve the family gene pool. Still, trust me on this: by virtually any standard other than sports trivia, Scrabble and the ability to grill medium rare, I don’t measure up to any of the following people—my mother, my wife, my daughter.

But while I am certain I am right about those aforementioned individuals, the ascension of women hasn’t produced anything remotely as glorious as the feminists or I once contemplated. It turns out that power corrupts with no apparent regard for gender, that ambition can be indiscriminately corrosive, that competitiveness brings out the best in both men and women—and, apparently, the worst. There is plenty of evidence now that women at the helm of a nation are every bit as tough and bloody-minded as their male counterparts, that female soldiers can also defile their honor codes, that women corporate bosses can be petty tyrants and that women athletes will resort to steroids and abuse their bodies to excel in sports.

Most of my lofty hopes were punctured a long time ago. So I canÂ’t easily explain why photos of a recent hazing incident involving the Northwestern University womenÂ’s soccer team have distressed me so much. The pictures, images of drunken debauchery and sexual hijinks, were first broadcast at badjocks.com and created a Webwide outcry. My dismay is more than simply that I spent several years coaching young women in recreation-league soccer. More than the fact that Northwestern is my wifeÂ’s alma mater, a university with pretensions to perspective on athletics. More even than the fact that said university is waiting for me to cut them a small check honoring our annual pledge.

Perhaps womenÂ’s athletics remained one of my last illusions. I certainly have none about big-time menÂ’s collegiate sports. While I donÂ’t pretend to be immune to their entertainment value, I am convinced they corrupt the entire system. But I hoped that womenÂ’s collegiate sports might prove to be something better, something that perhaps reflected the legacy of the 1999 WomenÂ’s World Cup.

For me, like many in America, that summer proved to be one of love. The women on that unforgettable American team were not only winners, but exemplars of all the virtues that we once associated with sports. I spent months covering that team and felt privileged to share the experience close up. I have no doubt those ladies could be, on occasion, rowdy and even crude. But they didn’t develop a selfless team ethic—a one for all, all for one credo—through exercises in bondage and group French kissing.

But the women of Northwestern soccer must not regard those old fogies as suitable role models. Instead they appear to be mimicking the basest instincts of male athletes, embracing a pathetic notion that predicates acceptance on the willingness to share humiliating rituals. Indeed there is almost nothing that distinguishes this Northwestern affair from the seamy and demeaning antics of the Duke men’s lacrosse team at their team fiesta—except, of course, that at Duke it escalated into allegations of criminal behavior.

Still, up in Evanston, you got your girls in underwear drinking, you got your girls blindfolded with their hands bound, you got a lot of pictures that could be confused with the latest installment of “Girls Gone Wild.” It does not seem to matter that there is ample precedent that hazing can turn sour, even fatal. Or that while the hazing may seem a bit of a blur (hazy, in fact) in the evening’s stupor, it can prove emotionally scarring in the light of day. Clearly the anthem “I am woman, hear me roar” no longer resonates, having taken a backseat to the less stirring “I am woman, see me lap dance; I am woman, see me puke.”

There even seemed to be a slightly petulant quality to the Northwestern women’s soccer team’s “official” apology, referring to a “well-intentioned night of team unity and celebration.” How do blindfolds and tape reflect good intentions? And the players didn’t express regret about anything they actually did, only at getting caught at it with the resulting “negative attention, press and controversy.” There is a faction of modern feminism that would not be surprised or concerned by this behavior, that might even chide me for my expectations. They would see this as, if not admirable, certainly equal; CEOs will be CEOs and jocks will be jocks, gender be damned.

To try and make sense of all this, I turned to my friend Kate, who is like a daughter to me and almost a dozen years ago was captain of her college volleyball team, and who points out I might appear a little less naive had I read some of the “mean girls” and “queen bee” literature. Kate says those instincts are exacerbated by an environment in which physicality rules (“athletes bump into each others' sweaty bodies all the time,” she notes) and nudity (“we shower, we change together”) is no big deal. Moreover, on many of these teams players reside together and, thus, “eat, sleep, breathe each other all the time.” Perhaps no man is an island, but apparently every team is—and it’s far more “Lost” than paradise. “The older folks beat up on the younger folks, the younger folks survive, then thrive, then feel emboldened to do the same thing to succeeding generations,” Kate wrote in an e-mail. “Women haven’t been playing sports for quite as long and haven’t had a chance to reach their full meanness. But they are going to be mean, just as men are.”

That provides so much to look forward to—and just as my hometown is becoming a mecca for women’s college sports. The women’s basketball Final Four was held here last month, and this weekend Boston University is hosting the women’s lacrosse championships. One semifinal match, Duke against Northwestern, is a hecklers’ dream. The Duke ladies plan to wear sweatbands proclaiming INNOCENT, a reference to their male lacrosse brethren. Perhaps the Wildcat women will flash purple panties with NO BIG DEAL etched on them.

Still, the tournament should produce first-rate competition. And a ticket to SundayÂ’s final cost $8, or just about 10 percent of what I spent for a seat at Fenway Park to watch the Red Sox play the Yankees this week. It is a genuine sports bargain because these women do have game. I just wish it had turned out that they brought something more to the field than just that.

[/quote]