Harvard’s soccer team have been punished for rating women – sadly their behavior is all-too common
It’s typical locker room behavior
I started playing baseball and basketball at a very young age, and throughout that time, I’ve heard, and been a part of, some pretty messed conservations.
Members of my Little League teams started dropping casual f-bombs from around at age nine. In seventh grade, many players on my school’s varsity basketball team spoke very explicitly about sexual acts they would like to perform on the star of the girls’ team.
As high schoolers, both my baseball and basketball teams came to a general consensus that the volleyball team was by far the most attractive on campus – and I’m not proud of how we spoke about them.
And this morning, the first thing I saw on social media was an article shared on Facebook by a girl who used to play soccer with my sister.
The story explained how Harvard canceled the men’s soccer season over a scandal in which they rated female players. It detailed how Harvard men’s soccer players, starting in 2012, wrote lengthy reports on the physical attractiveness of individual players on the women’s soccer team.
The comments section was full of hatred for the players and praise for Harvard for punishing them so severely.
Reading those comments, my first thought was, “if only they knew.”
Don’t get me wrong – I have no problem with the way Harvard handled the case. Misogynistic behavior like this is unacceptable, and Harvard set a strong precedent by essentially saying, “we will not tolerate this.”
Sadly, if there were written reports or videos showing what was said in every middle school and high school locker room – next to no school would have men’s sports teams left.
The reality is that this behavior is incredibly common, and the Harvard men’s soccer team just happened to be caught.
We need to teach kids that this locker room talk is not OK from a younger age, otherwise it continues into high school, into college, even into presidential campaigns.
Sexism is fundamentally wrong. Unfortunately these Harvard players were participating in a locker room culture that is prevalent all over the country.
How many other emails like this have yet to be uncovered?