Gender Inequality within School Sports

In the US, the sports carried out by the schools, which are funded by the government, prohibit sexism, the main legal basis is the Chapter 9 of 1972 Education Act Amendment. Covered sports court will be divided into physical, confrontational sports and non-physical confrontational sports movement in dealing with related cases. In a public school, for confrontational sports, usually the opposite sex is not allowed to participate when there is only men's or women's team in school (Hensel 19). For non-confrontational sports, when there is only men's team in the school, the women's team is allowed to participate in men's team, when there is only women's team in the school, the men's team is not allowed to participate in men's team. When there are men's and women's sports teams, male and female athletes shall enjoy equal opportunity and treatment. American pursues gender equality in school sports field, which is abandoning the prejudices formed on the basis of biological differences, especially social sex based on admitting the objective existence biological differences of men and women, such that men and women have equal opportunities and ultimately substantive equality is achieved. Though much effort has been made to equal the rights to play between male and female, the progress is rather slow due to lack of financial stimulation and little desire from public education institution.

So far, there are still a few countries in the world prohibit women to participate in sports competitions, and the whole minority male athletes participate in international sports in these countries, there are some countries in recent years also allowed women to participate in sports, but their status simply plays a supporting role, they cannot enjoy the same opportunities as men. While race sometimes also came into play since difference race might have different strength and the public policy is to create as many opportunity as possible to demand different type of talent. With the latest development of race conflict all around the global and thousands of scholars believing that education as the key to solve the conflict. Giving students the equal opportunity to play on the court could contribute to the equality of the entire society. Even the countries vigorously promote gender equality in the field of sports, gender equality conditions is not satisfactory, in the United States, due to various reasons, in the government-funded school sports areas, development imbalance between men and women sporting events exists for long, which constitutes a sexism. In this paper, sexism in American school sports is regarded as an example, and by summarizing and concluding relevant judicial precedent, the regulation of sexism and how to protect the rights of students in sports are explored.

The referee standards of US courts on sexism in school sports field under normal circumstances, the lawsuit instituted by America against sexism in school sport field has three legal basis: first, Equal Protection Clause of the US Constitution; the second the Chapter 9 1972 Education Act Amendment of United States; the third is Equal Right Amendment approved by partial states (28).

The main applicable law is the Chapter 9 of Education Act Amendment, which normally came into effect on July 1, 1972, the core provisions of the chapter is as follows: in the United States, any person cannot be rejected to participate in because of sex, or any person cannot be rejected to benefit from it, or discriminated, in any education program or activity which accept federal aids (31). When US courts are in dealing with the related cases of sexism in school sports field, it is divided into the physical confrontational sport and non-physical confrontational sport.

Physical opposability sports

The physical opposability sports mainly include boxing, wrestling, football, hockey, soccer, basketball, in some cases, baseball and American football are also listed as the confrontational sports of the body. The non-physical opposability sports are other sports events in addition to physical opposability sports. For these two different kinds of sports, in the analysis and identification of sexism, completely different analysis paths are taken.

The physical opposability sports in physical opposability sports, for a charge of sexism, the defendant generally use physical fitness as due diligence defense, and they think that women as a group, because of natural physical conditions, such as playing together with men, there is insecurity, but also it is unreasonable. But the plaintiffs argue that although being related to men, in general, women are at a disadvantage in the physical, but it cannot conclude that all women are physically weaker than men, because people's individual differences are great, not all of the female body conditions are poor, and not all the male bodies are very strong.

If it is generally considered that women are weaker than men on physique, and women are prohibited to participation in antagonistic sports events of men, then for some women, it is unfair, and there is overcorrect suspicion, which violates the equal protection clause, especially in special case, the reason may have disruptive effects.

For example, there is only the men's soccer team at a school without a women's soccer team, a female student asks to join the men's soccer team and is rejected on the grounds that the girl bones may be more vulnerable to injury, but the truth is, the girl is nearly six feet tall, weighing up to 200 pounds, and she is stronger than most of the members of the men's soccer team, the court held the view that the reasons for the school are not established, it should be agreed that the girls participate in the men's soccer team (Johnson). This is the case before the promulgation of Chapter 9 of Education Act Amendments. After the implementation of Chapter 9 of Education Act Amendments, in particular, after the policy interpretation in Chapter 9 of Education Act Amendments issued by the Office of Civil Rights in 1979, the court generally does not tend to allow women to participate in the men's antagonistic sport events of body, because the policy interpretation of OCR has clearly explained this as an exception, firmly believing in the antagonistic sport events of body, refusing women to participate in the men's antagonistic sport events of body is legal, no violation of Chapter 9 of Education Act Amendments. The reason for this provision is to accept the due diligence defense of health of body, thinking that the women's health should be put in the top priority, and one of the important aims to participate in sports is to improve physical fitness, if the body is injured duo to participate in sports, it is not worth the candle (Cornell 231). If a value judgment is needed, because there are conflicts between maintaining good health and the opportunity to participate in sports, apparently a good health should take precedence.

Non-physical opposability sports

Women's safety and health are an important defense factor in physical opposability sports, in no- physical opposability sports, this defense factor is not applicable because there is no legal basis to allow to exclude the women out of the non-physical opposability sports, regarding gender as a reason.

But there are other two types of defense factors: first, men and women not only have some differences in the physiology, but also have some differences in the psychological maturity (Kim), if men and women are allowed to play together, which will bring irreparable damage to their mental growth, but also bring damage to the balanced development between the sexes (Johnson). It is thus clear that, this defense factor extends and develops in the conditions that the body health defense factor cannot be applied here, and this reason stresses the differences between men and women, but also ignore the individual differences within the group of women.

Second, from a technical point of view, if men and women are allowed to compete in the same field, then the men are likely to dominate therein. That is because the men are relatively more robust in the body, and the women's development space is likely to be squeezed, thus reducing their opportunities (Minh). This is not admitted by discriminated parties, they believe that the reason ignores the differences between individuals, and if men and women are allowed to compete in the same field, then women will be improved in a confrontation with men, which is conducive to women's development.

With the strong implementation of Chapter 9 of Education Amendment Act and the deeply ingrained equal concept of men and women, more and more schools build men sports team and women sports team in the same project. Even in such cases, the possibility of gender discrimination still exists. The United States, separate but equa1 has been strictly forbidden in the race, on gender issues, although the difference is allowed, but must be reviewed by the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution.

The separate but equa1 in the sports field which is gender-based has more particularity and rationality, compared with the separate but equa1 under the common circumstances, because the characteristics of sport, there shall objectively be some distinction between men and women, which also has been the practices recognized by international society (Kosofsky). But this “separate but equal" principle must be built on such a basis that such a distinction in itself is not illegal, as long as the two groups of men and women shall enjoy equal opportunity and treatment. Otherwise it would constitute a de facto inequalities to form gender discrimination.

Such gender discrimination mainly shows in the following four aspects: the first case, the plaintiff claims that the women's competition has lower quality with respect to men's competition, and they shall be allowed to participate in the men's competition thus improve their motor skills (Tongson). Otherwise it is equal to the surface, in essence, it is unequal. The court thinks that “separate but equa1" in the field of sports is legitimate, due to differences in athletic skills, women shall be not allowed to participate in the men's game. When we deal with inequality case, we sometimes have to dig deeper into the problem which is does this equality create further damage to the opportunity of these male and females, and the answer to this question is definitely yes.

In the litigation of O'Connor and education committee, the plaintiffs alleges that the behavior that the education committee of defendant respectively and separately establishes men and women sport team to increase the opportunities for women and men to participate in sports violates Chapter 9 of Education Amendment Act, asking to participate in competition of men's team competition, but it is refused by the school, the district court supports the plaintiff's request, but the appellate court thinks that the plaintiff's request is inappropriate, there is no legal basis.

The second scenario is that although there are male and female sports teams, but they do not get equal treatments (Cornell). The setting of women's sport teams has not made the institution meet the requirements of Chapter 9 of Education Act Amendment, and there must be equal treatments, the equal treatments including but not being limited to the provision of equipment, competition and training schedule, travel allowances and usually allowance, game retiring room and other ancillary facilities of match, medical conditions, accommodation, meal conditions, logistical support and so on. Without this substantive equality, even there are men and women sports teams if the woman is not allowed to participate in men's sports team, it is unconstitutional. In Aiken and Lieuallen lawsuit, the plaintiff is the team member of female basketball team of University of Oregon, she claims that the treatment that given by this school constitutes sex discrimination in violation of Oregon law in transportation, administration, coaching, and race level, the state ORS659.150 prohibits sex discrimination in any educational program funded by the state budget (Klein).

In the administrative processing procedures of pre-litigation, the University of Oregon is affirmed violating the provisions of ORS659.150, and higher education consultant of Oregon is suggested to order the University of Oregon to change discriminatory practices (Hensel), but the consultant believes that the school's practice does not violate state law, the former uses court.

The court holds that the decision of the consultant is wrong to require the consultant to re-evaluate when evaluating, the practices of this school shall be considered whether bad influences on the women to participate in sports have or not. The third scenario is that, although the presence of men and women sports teams, but the men and women are taken different contest rules. This situation occurs more in basketball. Generally it believed that men and women are taken different competition rules are taking into account physical differences between men and women, who are the person should be. However, women believe that this arrangement constitutes discrimination (Nakamura). More serious is that some women are trained in accordance with the rules of the male, then for female athletes training in accordance with the rules of women are unfavorable, because in general, the rule applies to men are relatively more demanding, more intense. Court has wavering position in such cases, in the related body confrontational project cases, some courts believe that sport organizations do not have any reason to specify men and women to stipulate different competition rules, and the reasons put forward by the defendant is very far-fetched, that the tradition so rules, so distinctions are made. But some courts judge that sports organizations can adopt different rules, the reason in not whether discrimination has been constituted or not, but the plaintiff has failed to exhaust administrative remedies. In non-physical confrontational projects, the court generally believes that sport organizations may establish different rules for the men and women, based on physical and mental differences of both sexes. The general trend is that, in sports, the competition rules of both sexes have been basically unified, so the number of such cases has been few.

Another scenario is that although there are men and women sports, but their playing time is not the same. Before the year 2000, the US Court tolerated that the schools scheduled men and women athletic contests at different time, such as in one case, a sports organization would arrange men's swimming competition in the summer, while the women's swimming competition would be arranged in the winter, on the grounds that if the pools used for training was not enough, if the men's and women's swimming competitions were arranged at the same time, the court upheld the decision of the arrangements of the sport organizations. In the case of senior high school joint association of Virginia in 2000, the Court changed the attitude towards such cases, the senior high school joint association of the plaintiffs scheduled men and women competitions at different time (Hensel), on the grounds that the level of competition was not the same for men and women, this reason had not been recognized by the court, the court held that the behavior of the sport organization violated the equal protection clause, which should be corrected.

After the verdict of this case, the arrangement of the men's competition and the women's game at different times has gotten less and less reception. Through analysis, we can see that the strict protection of United States for sports rights, the pursuit of equal educational opportunities. Of course, we must also recognize the objectivity of gender differences, that is men and women differ in the physiological and psychological aspects, especially in the field of sports, because of differences in male and female body, the appropriate distinguishment and differential solution are legal and reasonable, when inspecting gender discrimination in the field of sports, this factor must be fully taken into account, based on specific cases. We can also see that the US pursuit of gender equality in the field of school sports does not ask absolute identity of men and women, but abandoning the prejudices formed based on biological differences, in particular, social sex, making men and women have equal opportunities and eventually reaching substantive equality.