H 32°, L 7° | Tomorrow: 
H 17°, L 4°It’s finally April, and for golf fans and corporate America alike, that means one thing: the Masters. Tiger Woods may have taken home his fourth green jacket a few weeks ago, but the fight over Augusta National Golf Club and its discriminatory and exclusive membership policies continue.
Golf’s first major has always been its most controversial. Augusta National was founded in 1934 by one of golf’s first superstars, Robert “Bobby” Jones. With the help of brilliant architect Alistair McKenzie and investment banker Clifford Roberts, Jones built a club where he and his friends could play a casual round of golf and escape from the hectic Atlanta lifestyle. Unsurprisingly, Jones’ friends were chiefly white Christian males — a legacy that has carried over to present-day Augusta.
No black golfer competed in the Masters until 1975, when Lee Elder was the first to break an unwritten barrier that had been in place for some 40 years. The club came under fire for its membership policies in 1990 and was forced to admit its first black member the same year. According to the Augusta Chronicle, three of the club’s 300 members are black.
While Augusta National may have made strides in admitting members of color, the club clings to its Dixie roots with regard to gender. While women are allowed to play the course, not a single woman has been invited to join the most prestigious of all American golf clubs.
Martha Burk, chair of the National Council of Women’s Organizations, has led a fierce crusade against the Masters and Augusta National Golf Club since 2003, when she cast the club’s all-male membership into the social and political spotlight, resulting in two years of sponsor-less television coverage. With the return of commercial sponsors, Burk has thrown down the figurative gauntlet to corporate America.
Burk’s current campaign against the Masters is one slightly modified from her original position. Instead of taking on the club’s chairman, the affable but stubborn William “Hootie” Johnson, the National Council of Women’s Organizations has chosen to take the fight to the boardrooms and the floor of the New York Stock Exchange.
According to the NCWO’s official website, letters have been sent to the CEOs of Exxon Mobil, SBC Communications and IBM denouncing their sponsorship of the event. The NCWO’s appeal to the consciences of these CEOs (all of whom happen to be members of Augusta) is impractical. The Masters provides arguably one of the best advertising venues to target the affluent white male demographic these companies so sorely desire. Pressuring multibillion-dollar corporations to abandon their profit motive is unfeasible, especially as Burk’s second campaign against Augusta has failed to draw the media attention of her first.
Instead, the NCWO’s campaign should focus on tactful and constructive strategies to usher in a new wave of members into Augusta’s ranks. Persuasion on a more personal level could serve to further Burk’s cause much more effectively than an attempt at public embarrassment. These conversations behind closed doors could lead to more egalitarian club policies toward women, at the very least. Early candidates for membership could include the charismatic Meg Whitman (CEO of Ebay) or Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice (a choice that could prove popular with the club’s staunchly Republican members).
In short, Martha Burk’s campaign is an admirable one, but unrealistic. The membership of Augusta National is as set in its ways and as powerful as any in the world. This is a club where Warren Buffet (Berkshire Hathaway), Bill Gates (Microsoft) and Sanford Weill (Citigroup) count themselves as members. A campaign of public shaming seems unlikely to work on these men or the sponsoring companies, who chose to gamble on the possibility of a public relations fiasco in choosing to advertise with the Masters at all. A focus on realistic strategies for change could serve to expedite Burk’s goals, which seem bound to be successful in today’s political climate.
Gabe Cohen ([email protected]) is a sophomore majoring in journalism.
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Blah, blah, blah.
Ok, you have a good point. It’s not right that Augusta National discriminates against women. But couldn’t you have said something about this BEFORE the Masters? Is your next article going to be about the different places UW students go for spring break?
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I presume your next piece will be in opposition to Curves, the womens’-only gym chain.
Yeah, right.
Did you know there’s a womens’-only golf club Toronto? Are you going to protest against that?
Doubtful.
There are plenty of clubs on campus that are ostensibly for minorities only. Are we going to see a piece that criticizes them?
Probably not.
It’s one club and one tournament. God forbid the evil white Christian men have their own club, right?
Get a life.
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Okay, I’m a white guy. But if I were a minority, I would just shrug my shoulders and say, “F#%* golf! That’s a white man’s game!” And then I’d go out and play hackey-sack with my friends.
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Umm, Gabe, the fight is over. The bitch lost.
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Ok, is the re-run from 2 years ago? Otherwise stfu
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I’m with the above poster. I think its ridiculous and outdated to have such rules on admittance. But at the same time why do these nice women and minorities want to surround themselves with white bigots? Have you ever seen how boring golf is? You should be happy you don’t have a walk in the park ruined by a game of golf. Who cares about the rednecks who run the south.
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“Okay, I’m a white guy. But if I were a minority…”
If? pay attention to reality. If not now, you soon will be a minority.
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I think it’s perfectly proper to have an all-male club. THere are, after all, all-female clubs. Your problem is that you don’t like that they are a successful all-male club. It flies in the face of what you believe is possible in such circumstances.
Augusta is a private organization. They are free (FREE!) to do whatever they want, and they happen to possess a beautiful golf course, home to a famous tournament. Why anyone should spend more than 30 seconds thinking about it is beyond me. How about concentrating on gaining equal treatment of women in some place where women are actually discriminated against, like, for instance, the entire middle east?
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Nope - only all-female clubs are permitted under the rules of the All Men are Pigs school of thought(control).
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The Curves controversey was avoided. Now we can go to Cuts and take showers with our fellas and spot our pals without hot hot ladies around to ruin everything. No girls allowed. At Cuts I can feel more like a man while my good buddy tightly wraps my weightbelt around my waist and whispers encouragement into my ear. Then he high fives resin onto my hands so the hard weight bar doesn’t slip. When I do my 20th rep with my veins popping out of my taut arms and ripped legs he’ll tell me “that a boy. you’re my boy!! That’s a big boy!!” Guys who let girls around aren’t real men like my dudes and I.
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“If? pay attention to reality. If not now, you soon will be a minority.”
why do comments like this always make me freak out when I see guys with buzz cuts and gun racks. VIVA LA WHITEFISH BAY!!
Ease up whitey. You had your moment in the sun and you elected a zealot.
I hope you had a moment of pride for you and your ilk when the Oklahoma City bombing was recently remembered on every tv station. Poor Tim was misunderstood huh? Go to Wyoming effhole. You’ll never be a minority there. You can oil your gun and camp with your pals and eat beans on a cold night with your friends and talk all of your trash. Keep each other warm in your camo and talk about the reckoning and judgement day. Sadly, you lost. Your hick ancestors moved to a melting pot. Take advantage of it or keep being a dope. You dope! Dopey ass dope-ity dope. Idiot and moron. peace
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there does seem to be a lot more “woe is me” white guy whining in madison than most cities i’ve lived in. must be liberal backlash, because madison is also one of the most whiny, unrealistically liberal cities i’ve lived in. but if i hear one more dumbass say “if your so against discrimination then why do you disriminate against racists” i’m bouncing
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it’s not exactly discrimination if you are against someone’s actions or behavior based on their own ignorance. Racism is based on race, right? Ignorant effers. Dopes! MORONS! Stupid goons! Hicks! Southerners! People who don’t read what I read! Non fans of New Order. People who won’t date me!! Eff ALL OF YOU!!
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What a freak.
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EFF YOU!
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“…guys with buzz cuts and gun racks. VIVA LA WHITEFISH BAY!!”
Only an idiot who’d never even been near Whiefish Bay could write this! Must be fresh off the plane from NYC or Berkley.
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What’s wrong with men having men’s only clubs? I really don’t get it. Sometimes men just wanna go someplace where they can blow off steam about their wives, girlriends, etc. and just relax, smoke cigars, and swirl brandy - oh yeah, and maybe play a little golf. What’s the big deal?
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sorry, VIVA LA OCONOMOWOC TOMAH GREEN BAY STOUGHTON GENOA CITY NORTHERN ILLINOIS MANITOWOC OOSTBURG PULASKI MISHWAUKEE and for the record, I’m from the greatest city in the world. It starts with a Chi- and ends with a -we have the best MAYOR IN THE WORLD!!!!! Mayor Daley will kick your dying grandmother’s ass! BIG BEND CLINTONVILLE DELAVAN DARIEN MILTON and wherever else white people have taken over.
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If? pay attention to reality. If not now, you soon will be a minority.
Not by long shot! The USA is still overwhelmingly white. Just because you see a mixed bag in some of the country’s biggest cities doesn’t mean a damn thing. And I wouldn’t push it with the anti-white mentality either. It could still snap back in your face, poker-player!
We all want change, but some folks just go overboard with it, and THAT is where the backlash starts. From then on, people think twice about trusting you.
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“…and wherever else white people have taken over.”
That would sure include Chicago, where white dummycraps can vote for at least 20 years after they die.
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Vote early! Vote often! Come one dummycrap? come all!! If it weren’t for Chicago looking out for y’all you would have had Nixon 8 years earlier and no JFK. Thank all of those dead people who pulled the lever for JFK!! And for the record, some of those dead people were Polish, not white.
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“Mayor Daley will kick your dying grandmother’s ass!”
My Nana would whup his ass without breaking a sweat.
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So as we can see, the civil rights industry is no longer about equality, it’s about scooping up special rights.
All the chicks, spics, yids, slopes, wops, camel-fuckers, gooks, moolies, sluts, porch-monkeys, slants, skanks, ragheads, broads and negroids could open up their own clubs anywhere anytime; and many do.
And the crackers, honkeys and rednecks don’t care much. Not that it’d do any good anyway, because all the above groups “need” their exclusive clubs for “diversity” reasons.
Because it’s P.C.
Yet if the crackers, honkeys or rednecks dare have their own, well by God it’s a civil rights issue that needs to be protested.
I put the approximate year the “civil rights movement” went to the dark side at about 1989.
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This post shows just how dumb many students on this campus are. You are all really dumband/or naive. The world would be a better place without you. Please move to Texas and secede from the union. You can rename it Whitemale ville and all fight amongst yourselves. You can have a free market, racism, corrupton and go start all the wars you want. Thanks.
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“…move to Texas”
Are you nuts? La Reconquista is in full swing down there and I only give the anglos a fifty-fifty chance.
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You haven’t refuted anything I said.
Why do minorities and women get their own clubs while clubs for white men are strictly forbidden?
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If you want your own club, start it. It will be boring, like your ancestry. It will be exclusive and one track minded, like your world view. There is a club set up for white men. They wear hoods and burn crosses. Janesville has a crew. You can sit around and oil each other up and rip on ladies and anyone who isn’t like you and be guys. Just men. Like a prison yard. Get to know each other. Admire each other’s bodies. Love it. Enjoy it. God forbid a world with hundreds of cultures would allow you to enjoy some of them. Open that slack jaw and poor some moon shine down your throat. Hate is your constitutional right. You make this country interesting. A freaking punch line. You should be proud that you know so many racist terms. You must have grown up around a lot of compassionate and loving people.
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It really has to be that extreme with you, doesn’t it? You see no middle ground, do you. To you, if a bunch of guys, maybe even white guys, want to set up an exclusive “club”, then of course it will be the KKK and of course they’ll be racist, and of course they do it for the sole purpose that they hate everyone else.
Look at all the other “groups”, ethnic, gender, and otherwise that exist. Not even the official ones. I remember at Madison it was pretty common to see a bunch of black kids hanging out together. So what? Birds of a feather and all, we tend to gravitate some or most of the time to those most like us.
If the gays want to get together to be with like-minded folks once in a while, so be it. Same with the ethnic groups, the genders, the hobby enthusiasts, so on and so forth.
Your problem (or one of your many, many problems) is that to you, white men (and only white men) are forbidden from doing this. They are forbidden because in the past a group like the KKK existed (and in your flawed logic, all groups of white guys by definition must be like the KKK). All the other “groups” I’m sure you encourage to get together because, well, that’s different.
You’re pathetic.
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KKK in the past? Someone who says “the gays” and “it was pretty common to see a bunch of black kids together” and compares them to hobby enthusiasts is hilarious. I love you. You are the best. Besides dopes and low brow tomato cans who do you gravitate towards? Again, you are a punch line for the future. Like Colonel Klink from Hogan’s Heroes. Dummycrap.
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LOL. It’s obvious my point went zooming by your head, like so many others in your life.
By all means, keep going through life picking out individual phrases or words and extrapolating the worst possible meaning without attempting to comprehend the meaning of the whole statement. Future employers will be impressed with it.
Idiot.