{"id":53,"date":"2013-12-14T22:33:12","date_gmt":"2013-12-15T02:33:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/?p=53"},"modified":"2013-12-14T22:33:12","modified_gmt":"2013-12-15T02:33:12","slug":"from-the-archives-augusta-national-women-and-social-norms-april-5-2009","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/?p=53","title":{"rendered":"From the Archives: Augusta National, Women, and Social Norms (April 5, 2009)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Augusta National, Women, and Social Norms<\/strong><\/p>\n

NOTE: Augusta admitted its first female members, Darla Moore and Condoleeza Rice, in August 2012. \u00a0Virginia Rometty was not invited to join.<\/em><\/p>\n

A\u00a0pretty big golf tournament<\/a>\u00a0kicked off this morning in Augusta, Georgia, at the\u00a0course Bobby Jones built<\/a>.\u00a0 This is one of the most prestigious major tournaments for professional players at perhaps the single most exclusive private golf club in the world. The club has no membership application process, and the only way to join is by invitation.\u00a0 Until 1990, Augusta had never invited a black person, and did so then only\u00a0after the three organizations that govern professional golf said it would no longer permit clubs which discriminate to host tournaments<\/a>.\u00a0 This was a pretty big deal, and the bid deal today is that the club still has no\u00a0female<\/i>\u00a0members.<\/p>\n

This could change very soon.\u00a0 This very tradition-oriented club has one that will force a decision on admitting women: it has always offered membership to the incumbent CEO of\u00a0International Business Machines.<\/a>\u00a0 IBM recently promoted a woman,\u00a0Virginia Rometty<\/a>, to that position.\u00a0 Augusta will now have to admit a female member or break this long-standing tradition, exposing the club as worried at least as much about the gender of its members as their positions in the corporate world or place in society.<\/p>\n

Sally Jenkins<\/a>\u00a0pointed out this in an opinion piece last Friday<\/a> in the\u00a0Washington Post<\/i><\/a>.\u00a0 But then she defended Augusta National as a private club which should be left alone to admit whomever its present membership pleases, and criticized\u00a0Martha Burk<\/a>\u00a0for attempting to shame the club into changing this policy.\u00a0 Jenkins characterized Burk\u2019s efforts as \u201cblackmailed social engineering\u201d and more offensive than the idea that Augusta might refuse to invite Ms. Rometty to join.\u00a0 Demanding that the venerable private club admit women, she claims, requires \u201csaying the same\u201d to the\u00a0Young Women\u2019s Christian Association<\/a>, the\u00a0Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays<\/a>, college sororities and African American fraternities.\u00a0 It\u2019s not clear why it makes sense to compare a o private golf club for wealthy men to these kinds of service organizations, and anyone who can donate fifty bucks can be a member of PFLAG.<\/p>\n

Jenkins rejects an argument for inclusion of women at Augusta that depends on \u201csome lame idea of sameness for the good of all\u201d and criticizes Ms. Burk for \u201cappointing herself the People\u2019s Deputy for Monitoring the Fruits of the Revolution.\u201d\u00a0 Martha Burk of course did no such thing \u2014 she never said that everyone is the same, nor that everyone should be treated equally by the club.\u00a0 Nor did she advocate some Communist idea that the People should destroy the Bourgeoise Private Club in the name of some revolution.\u00a0 After all, Burk did not demand admission of poor people, subsidized by the wealthy members, nor of collective ownership.<\/p>\n

No, Marth Burk pointed out that Augusta National Golf Club refused admittance of women because it clung to an outdated social norm that permits exclusion of certain types of people, in this case everyone except wealthy white males.\u00a0\u00a0 She then set out to change that norm by shaming the club into adopting a new one: that women are just as capable, and should not be shut out of important venues of social engagement solely because they have no penis.\u00a0 Augusta gives a very important collection of elites a place to gather, interact, relax, network, and make plans.\u00a0 That\u2019s fine, and they of course have a free association right to exclude women if they believe that no woman can effectively contribute to their discussions.\u00a0 But they have no right to protection from criticism for this, and those of us who object have a right to shame them for it.<\/p>\n

Jenkins must agree that this is the reason for exclusive clubs like this.\u00a0 She notes that the \u201cbest way to become a member is to shark your way to the top of a large American company\u201d and\u00a0goes on to say that if Augusta admits Ms. Rometty it will do so because the members \u201cwant to know what she thinks.\u201d\u00a0 But she doesn\u2019t explain, however, why the club has not extended membership invitations to any of the other females at \u201cthe top of a large American company.\u201d\u00a0 Women\u00a0run companies<\/a>\u00a0like\u00a0Kraft Foods<\/a>,\u00a0Pepsico<\/a>, and\u00a0Arthur Daniels Midland<\/a>, and these particular three all rate as having more influence than Virginia Rometty.\u00a0 If Augusta\u2019s members want to find some female corporate sharks they now have a target-rich environment, and if engaging powerful people is the goal, Ms. Rometty isn\u2019t even the fattest target, at least according to CNN.\u00a0 It\u2019s not clear, for example, why the membership values the input of Frank Broyles, who claims fame as a former football coach at the University of Arkansas more than it would that of\u00a0Irene Rosenfeld<\/a>.\u00a0 Maybe sharking your way to the top isn\u2019t all that important after all, if your chromosomes line up the right way.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m frankly a bit surprised to hear a woman who succeeded in a profession controlled by the same sort of paternalistic social norms \u2014 sports writing \u2014 argue that Augusta\u2019s record reflects a history of seeking expertise and capability rather than one of discrimination.\u00a0 I\u2019m more shocked at her suggestion that Martha Burk should not have pointed out the obvious: that the sole criteria driving membership policies at Augusta National has always been that wealthy white men get invited to the party,\u00a0 and the worthies who already enjoy the privilege of membership adjusted their criteria when pressured.\u00a0 Augusta members \u2014 including Bill Gates and Melvin Laird according to reports \u2014 simply do not want to include women.\u00a0 IBM may have forced their hand, and I have to wonder if anyone \u2014 perhaps her predecessor \u2014 thought of this when the firm chose her for the position.\u00a0 Until they make a change, however, others may rightly shame them.\u00a0 This is, after all, how social norms change, and a female sportswriter like Sally Jenkins should understand this better than most.<\/p>\n

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Augusta National, Women, and Social Norms NOTE: Augusta admitted its first female members, Darla Moore and Condoleeza Rice, in August 2012. \u00a0Virginia Rometty was not invited to join. A\u00a0pretty big golf tournament\u00a0kicked off this morning in Augusta, Georgia, at the\u00a0course Bobby Jones built.\u00a0 This is one of the most prestigious major tournaments for professional players […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-53","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=53"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":54,"href":"https:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53\/revisions\/54"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=53"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=53"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foggybottomline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=53"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}