After Atalanta

 Most semesters I start off my ethics course with an article about the connection between sports and character building. It inspires debate, requires an assessment of data, and sets the tone for the course in which I am asking my students to check their preconceptions in order to effectively engage in a process of moral reasoning.  We discuss definitions of character and how those definitions are often shifted or ignored when considering actions and decisions that happen in the context of sports. While many students will start to see that sports are not automatic character builders, that mere participation does not make someone a better person, they will take exception to the idea that unethical things done "in the heat of battle" does not make one unethical or speak badly of sport itself. In other words, the drive to win sometimes makes people do unethical things, but that's kind of just the nature of sports.  But doesn't an ethical person, by virtue of being ethical...

 Last weekend, BYU fans directed racial slurs against several Black women on the Duke volleyball team. It seems that Rachel Richardson experienced the brunt of it including a threat from a white man in which she was told to "watch her back" on her way to the bus. She is the athlete who has spoken up about the violence.  BYU responded late and poorly, but this was an all-around failure by all coaches and officials.  It has been pointed out t hat BYU's response reflects their ignorance. Others have thrown up their hands in a "it's BYU--what do you expect?" kind of way.  ALL institutions should already be doing this work. That Heather Olmstead, BYU coach, said that after talking to Richardson (and others) that she now "understand(s) areas where we can do better" is offensive. Stop asking Black people to educate you about racism. AND ALSO how do you not understand that yelling racial slurs is a problem? This is not an area to be worked on--this is an ...

 Mariah Burton Nelson and Donna Lopiano, long-time women's sports advocates, have found "a fair and inclusive solution" to the "problem" of trans athletes--specifically trans women (because trans men are apparently inherently disadvantaged despite all that testosterone, the very substance that a mere blink of an eye ago everyone said meant everything in terms of advantage).  They (presumably with their more visible/vocal and polarizing colleagues Nancy Hogshead-Makar and Martina Navratilova) have created the Women's Sports Umbrella. The umbrella, they claim, allows for anyone identifying as female to have a "team" experience. But if an athlete was assigned male at birth and transitioned after the age of 12, that person cannot compete alongside women. Well unless it is an individual sport in which case fine but the scores/times do not get included with the "real women's" scores, they get put into the trans category. (But rugby and othe...

There are so many anti-trans bills passed by and pending in state legislatures here in the United States that I cannot even begin to address them all except to say this has been a concerted movement targeting trans youth for several years now and it is horrifying. The bill in Utah is my focus today. All the bills are horrible and saddening and enraging, but this one...is all that and more. This one demonstrates the consequences of the anti-trans "save women's sports" movement. The bill, which originated in 2021, bans children from participating in sports consistent with their gender identity. It was passed in March 2022, the governor vetoed it, t he legislature overrode the governor's veto.   Governor Cox, a Republican, expressed some compassion when explaining his veto of the bill. He cited that fact that Utah had four transgender children playing school-sponsored sports at the time. (I would argue that the number does not matter, but will save that post for another ...

 [this is cross-posted. Original post is at Title IX Blog. ]  I virtually attended last week's  NCAA annual Inclusion Forum  which was celebrating Title IX but also included issues of BIPOC inclusion and athlete mental health (among others). There was a panel on Thursday afternoon headlined by former Harvard swimmer Schuyler Bailar about trans athletes.  When the conference was announced, I was curious about how the organization would approach--or even if they would--trans athletes given the recent seemingly abrupt change in their policy (January 2022-- curiously  amidst the growing visibility of Penn swimmer Lia Thomas). They moved from a not ideal but not totally horrible policy in which hormone levels (specifically testosterone) governed participation, to a  we-are-cowards-kowtowing-to-the-misnamed-fear-mongering-save-women's-sports folks policy  in which trans athletes are treated as cheaters constantly having to submit to surveillance. Additi...

  This perhaps make me an outsider in the LGBTQ+ community. Even before the concept of rainbow-washing was a thing, I was not especially drawn to companies/entities that displayed a rainbow flag. How did I know if it was genuine? What did the display of the flag even mean in terms of actions taken (or not); what did support/allyship look like?  And so, I am not particularly disturbed that some players for the Tampa Bay Rays chose not to wear rainbow patches and rainbow logo hats during their recent Pride Night. Five players said it conflicted with their religious beliefs . While, yes, their discourse of conflict with beliefs and not judging/being welcoming is contradictory, that is not new when it comes to this issue.  The patch/hat was an opt-in for players. Now we know more about the five players who chose not to participate. They don't support LGBT rights because they feel it conflicts with their religion. Ok.  I am more interested in what the players who chose to...

After a 6-year hiatus which I spent being on the academic job market, getting a TT job and getting tenure, I have returned to After Atalanta. I am excited about phase 2(?) of AA and getting back to more public scholarship. I have kept up a sporadic presence at the Title IX Blog , which I am solely in charge of now (yikes!), but am trying to be more consistent. Since so many of my current interests (trans policies, labor, ethics) fall outside Title IX or are only tangentially related, I wanted to come back here.  I am not sure what form posts will take. Likely, some of them will resemble what I had been doing. I am planning one on the new Ohio law t hat allows anyone to question the sex of any female child playing sports. "Verification" would be done via genital, penetrative exams.  But I imagine briefer "quick take" posts as well. Things too long for Twitter (I will be using @titleixblog for After Atalanta content as well) but definitely worth mentioning. (I have so...