By
Chris Heide
March 13, 2008
Harvard University has a new policy in place that teeters on the brink of discrimination and constitutional violation. This policy has drawn considerable flack from Harvard students and off–campus critics: The University instituted a policy that denied men the use of one of its gyms for six hours a week to accommodate Muslim women.
According to an MSNBC article by Bob Considine, “Since Feb. 4, the Quadrangle Recreational Athletic Center at the Ivy League school has been open only to women from 8-10 a.m. Tuesdays and Thursdays and 3-5 p.m. on Mondays — allowing Muslim women, who typically cover their hair and most of their skin to follow religious and cultural code, to dress more suitably for exercising.”
Clearly, this rule has been instituted to provide female Muslim students the opportunity to both work out and honor their religious and cultural practices. Undoubtedly, it was not designed to deny male Harvard students their right to use athletic facilities. However, it did just that. Harvard has decided to start on the proverbial slippery slope by instituting this policy.
On the surface, the idea simply has to do with the allocation of gym time to a certain group of students. On a deeper level, however, this situation illustrates a possible violation of freedom of religion.
The First Amendment of the Constitution protects American citizens from the imposition of religion just as much as it allows Americans to practice whatever religion they choose. It’s both freedom of and freedom from religion.
In essence, Harvard has instituted the policy to respect the religious practices of a particular group of students. In doing so, it has managed to alienate the rest of the student body. It has imposed rules based on a single group of students’ religious practices onto the rest of the campus. Interpreted in this manner, the Harvard policy would be in violation of the First Amendment. This policy is backward rather than forward-thinking.
According to the article, Hussein Ibish, the executive director of the Foundation for Arab-American Leadership, said complaints that the policy is unfair are unfounded.
“It’s about expanding the range of choices,” Ibish told Today co-host Matt Lauer Monday. “Women, for all kinds of reasons, don’t want to exercise in front of men. This modesty business sometimes comes from religion, sometimes from culture. … They just don’t want to be ogled by men when they’re working out.”
Everyone should feel comfortable while working out. It’s sad but true that, we live in a society where appearance and image are everything. Most people achieve their own interpretations of perfection through working out.
While there are some individuals who treat the gym like a proverbial meat market, most people use the gym to improve their appearance and maintain their health.
Ibish is a bit extreme to suggest that the use of a college gym, which all students at Harvard undoubtedly pay for, should be allocated soley based on religious and cultural practices; most gym-goers engage in “ogling,” innocent or otherwise. All individuals should be able to use a university-funded gym for whatever reason they choose.
Also, Michael Smerconish, a talk show host and author of Muzzled: From T-Ball to Terrorism – True Stories That Should Be Fiction, argued that the policy depicts “political correctness run amok again at Harvard,” according to the article.
“Six individuals out of 6,000 complain … and Harvard’s response is to institute a discriminatory practice where now half are closed out of the gym,” Smerconish said. “What does that veil say about the rest of us? It says our eyes cannot be trusted because we’ll leer at those women. Let them work out like everybody else.”
In the interest of political correctness and out of respect for the freedom of religion, there is no question that this policy should be abandoned.
[Reach columnist Chris Heide at opionion@thedaily.washington.edu.]
8 Comments
#1 Grant
on March 13, 2008 at 11:29 a.m.(UW Campus | Unverified Name)
In general, I agree that Harvard's policy is objectionable, but it is not a Constitutional issue. Harvard is a private institution, and therefore is not constrained by the Bill of Rights. Indeed, an attempt by the federal courts to intervene could itself be read as an infringement of Harvard's prerogative of setting its own policies on religious practice. If a similar policy were implemented at a state university, it could become an issue of constitutional litigation. A more pertinent question is whether the statute law of Massachusetts permits or prohibits Harvard's policy. Effort to convince Harvard to repeal this restriction on gym use should concentrate on the fairness and prudence of the policy, as well as Harvard's own commitment to liberal ideals, without invoking the tangled mess that is Constitutional jurisprudence.
#2 Joel Pierce
on March 13, 2008 at 12:10 p.m.(UW Campus | Unverified Name)
I wish that Mr. Heide understood that tolerating another's religion necessarily means working to accommodate the practice of that religion. Faced with the problem of wanting to provide a welcoming environment to its Muslim students while also wanting to have the gym be accessible to everyone, Harvard came up with what seems like a very reasonable compromise. These sorts of creative compromises in specific circumstances are what happen when institutions responsibly attempt to balance the needs, including religious, of all of their members.
Mr. Heide asserts that this starts the institution down a slipperly slope, undoubtedly imaging days where only the short people or skinny armed weaklings (such as myself) could use the gym. But this is to make the mistake of seeing a compromise designed for a specific situtation as setting a broad ideological policy. I am sure if Harvard found themselves sliding down Mr. Heide's slope, they would reassess their situation, take stock of the parties involved, and work out different solution.
As to Mr. Heide's other arguments:
~I am sure that the gym is at least partially sustained through the student's tuition and this does give them a right to have the gym open at times that accommodate their schedule. However, this does not mean that it should be open to them at all times any more than my tuition supporting Suzzallo Library means it needs to be open to me 24 hours, 7 days a week.
~The idea that freedom of religion means freedom from religion strikes me as bizarre. Taking another first amendment right, does freedom of speech mean freedom from speech? Am I legally protected from having to hear anything I disagree with and having public space used by speakers whose views do not reflect my own?
~Surely Mr. Heide cannot agree that having 6 individuals out of 6000 complain and having the University respond to their complaint is as noxious as the person he quotes makes it sound. Attention to the needs of the few against the needs of the many is the philosophic principle that binds together the Bill of Rights. This does not mean that the needs of the few should always win, only that as an inheritor of the American tradition of democracy, Mr. Heide should not be willing to let them be brushed aside so casually.
~Finally, I can't help but think that what makes this particular situation so charged is that the religion that is being protected is Islam. I doubt that this story would have gained traction outside of the Boston area if the requesters were Amish or Orthodox Jews.
#3 Shawn
on March 13, 2008 at 2:43 p.m.(UW Campus | Unverified Name)
Do Daily writers research their topics prior to publishing? A basic knowledge of the First Amendment would have enabled Mr. Heide to realize that Harvard, as a private institution, is not subject to the Bill of Rights.
#4 The Dude
on March 13, 2008 at 4:14 p.m.(Los Angeles, CA | Unverified Name)
Mr. Heide,
No such Constitutional standing of your so-called 'freedom from religion' exists, nor should it. That is nothing more than a smokescreen for unabashed oppression against religion or one's beliefs. For me a Christian, to believe that I should bestow a 'freedom from Islam' is absurd, or perhaps in a different realm, the 'freedom from Democrats or Republicans'. WHile we may not agree with one or the other, both have the freedom to do what they believe, but while I may disagree with one of the parties, I don't have the freedom from them. Mr Heide must be one of the most close-minded and intolerent anti-religious people i've ever encountered. He depicts that because he is non-religious, he should somehow be shielded from others' beliefs and religions. Hmm, Hitler believed in freedom too - freedom from Judiasm...
#5 Erik
on March 14, 2008 at 12:27 p.m.(UW Campus | Unverified Name)
It is completely beyond me how the accommodation Harvard has made for women can be argued as unjust and unconstitutional. Harvard's decision to provide women with more private time in one of the school's athletic facilities is an incredibly reasonable compromise that allows access of the school's facilities to a more culturally and religiously diverse range of students.
First, I would like to point out that although only six hours a week are allotted as women-only gym time, the article is written as though only a few scattered time slots have been left for public use. The article quotes Michael Smerconish stating that Harvard's new practice has left its male students "closed out of the gym," yet Hussein Ibish's support for Harvard's decision is labeled as "extreme." What's more, Harvard has several athletic facilities on campus other than the QRAC that have no time restrictions placed on them, including the Malkin Athletic Center which is considered the University's "primary recreation facility." The magnitude of Harvard's decision has been grossly exaggerated in this article.
Additionally, you claim that Harvard's decision is a "violation of freedom of religion," because it "alienate[s] the rest of the student body." This is completely ridiculous; the fact of the matter is that we live in a white, Christian-dominated society and taking steps to accommodate and support the beliefs of others should not only be an accepted norm, but it should be encouraged. Tolerance and accommodation of one set of religious beliefs in no way imposes those beliefs on the other students.
The fact that Harvard's decision should even be criticized is offensive and leaves me feeling frustrated, disgusted and embarrassed to live in such an intolerant nation.
#6 Kaasa
on March 14, 2008 at 3:20 p.m.(Seattle, WA | Unverified Name)
Erik clearly doesn't appreciate the irony of his disgust at living amidst such intolerance while decrying "the fact that Harvard's decision should even be criticized."
Grant, Joel, Shawn, and The Dude, meanwhile, seem to have forgotten that constitutional constraints do (and ought to) apply to private institutions, such as Harvard, that receive millions of dollars in federal money each year. And it's not a matter of a few hours' inconvenience here and there (the gym in dispute is a tiny one tucked away at a far corner of the campus), it's the principle behind it.
Joel says: "The idea that freedom of religion means freedom from religion strikes me as bizarre. Taking another first amendment right, does freedom of speech mean freedom from speech? Am I legally protected from having to hear anything I disagree with and having public space used by speakers whose views do not reflect my own?"
Well, first, yes, you are legally protected from having to hear anything you don't want to hear. Second, the issue isn't that public space is being used to accommodate a religious view some disagree with. The problem is that the accommodation of this particular religious view necessarily excludes an entire group of people.
The accommodation of diverse religious views is just fine up to the point when it begins to impose on the rights of others. Excusing a Muslim student early for Salah? Great. Making arrangements to take a test during office hours so that a Jewish student can observe Yom Kippur? A-ok. Designating an exercise facility off-limits to all men six hours a week? Nope.
#7 Kaasa
on March 14, 2008 at 3:38 p.m.(Seattle, WA | Unverified Name)
Oops. I misread The Dude's comment. I have three responses.
First: Godwin's Law.
Second: "That is nothing more than a smokescreen for unabashed oppression against religion or one's beliefs" = gigantic straw man
Second: Dude, the *entire* point of the Establishment Clause is protection from religion. It protects believers and non-believers alike from the madness that invariably follows when a single sect grabs the reins of state power.
You don't seem to understand what we mean by freedom from religion. It doesn't mean freedom from ever coming into contact with Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, Taoism, or whatever. It means freedom from being subject to religious dictates or constrained by religious prohibitions to which one does not subscribe. This Harvard policy does just that.
#8 Jon Miranda
on April 10, 2008 at 6:29 a.m.(Phoenix, AZ | Unverified Name)
This guy is right on the money. Just because you are a peivate entity does not give you a black check to discriminate. Let's say I do not like white people and I open a restaurant. Can I put up a sign No White People allowed? Of course not.
When women are excluded, it's sexism.
When men are excluded, it's defended.
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