Why does Title IX Matter?

Women have been fighting for ages for some kind of middle ground when it comes to many different aspects of life, sports being one of them. The presence of women in sports creates issues on the binary gender social roles that society currently abides by. One judge, while ruling on a case involving a girl suing for the right to play on an all-boys team, ruled against her on the argument that “sports build character, and we don’t need that kind of character in girls,” (Oliphant, 1975). Societal roles such as these, or the boxes that men try to put women in such as “the homemaker,” or that women are to be seen and not heard, are some of the systematic ways that females have been kept at an inferior level within this country since and even before its establishment (Oliphant, 1975). These attitudes are reflected clearly within the arena of sports and the roles of females within it, as can be seen through a case study of the female athletics following Title IX at Trinity University. Through this, it can be seen that Trinity, among other athletic departments, was not progressive or inclusive, but reactionary with its attempts to adapt to the Title IX laws, and still kept female athletes at an inferior level even after these equality laws were put into place. From the investigation on the reactionary nature of Trinity’s implementation of female athletics, it can be seen that Title IX allowed for the long road to the institution that is current female sports on Trinity campus.