Court: Boy Can't Join Girls' Gym Team
By RYAN J. FOLEY, Associated Press Writer
5 hours ago
MADISON, Wis. - A state appeals court on Thursday rejected a lawsuit by a boy who wanted to compete on his high school's girls' gymnastics team.
The District 4 Court of Appeals upheld a judge's dismissal of Keith Michael Bukowski's lawsuit against the Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association, which has a rule prohibiting boys from competing in girls' sports.
Bukowski filed the lawsuit as a junior at Stevens Point Area High School in 2004. He argued the WIAA rule preventing him from trying out for and competing on the girl's gymnastics team discriminated against him because his school did not have a boys' team.
Bukowski argued that the rule violated the equal protection clause of the U.S. Constitution as well as a federal law known as Title IX, which was meant to prohibit sex discrimination in sports.
In a 3-0 ruling, the court said Bukowski failed to show that WIAA, a nonprofit organization of public and private high schools that sets rules for sports competition, could be sued under either argument.
Bukowski didn't prove WIAA was an arm of the state that could be sued for the constitutional violation or that it received federal funding as required in a Title IX claim, the court said. The ruling backed a Portage County judge who came to a similar conclusion.
Courts have previously ruled that letting boys compete on girls' teams jeopardizes opportunities for girls. But Bukowski, who had competed in gymnastics at a local YMCA, argued the case was similar to recent examples of girls who were allowed to compete on boys' teams in football and wrestling.
Hundreds of students at his high school signed a petition backing his efforts in 2004 but courts rejected his attempts for a faster ruling that would have allowed him to compete.
Bukowski graduated earlier this year.
Principal Mike Devine said the school does not have a boys' team because of lack of interest and it was following the WIAA rule in refusing to allow Bukowski on the girls' team. He said the school recently hired Bukowski as an assistant coach for the girls' gymnastics team.
"We're glad to have Keith working with our kids right now. He does have some talent in gymnastics," he said. "Even though he couldn't compete with us, he's teaching our kids. That's a somewhat positive outcome for this."
Bukowski's lawyer, Jared Redfield, did not immediately return a phone message. There was no phone listing for Bukowski or his mother, Janine Olszewski, in the Stevens Point area.
-------------------------------------------------------
gotta love hypocrisy
What hypocritical about it?
---
AGuSTiN wrote:What hypocritical about it?
Girls can join boys teams but boys can't join girls team? thats what i got
But that's on a school-by-school choice. Does THIS school allow girls to join their boys teams?
---
AGuSTiN wrote:But that's on a school-by-school choice. Does THIS school allow girls to join their boys teams?
no its not....
Hell its gotten to the point where Girls are allowed to play boys sports even when they have a equivalent girls team...
Says who?
Title IX is to allow for equal participation in sports, meaning girls have the same opportunity to play in sports as boys as proportionate to their population in the school. That does not mean they get to play on the boy's team. It also doesn't mean they have to have the same sports.
It also does not forbid an educational institution allowing females to play if that institution chooses so. But that's a separate decision and has nothing to do with Title IX.
For this to be hypocritical, either that school has been allowing girls to be on boys teams, or Title IX has been used somewhere to get a female on a boy's team. I can't find a single instance of that anywhere on Google.
---
There's no information in the article regarding whether or not the school allowed girls to join boy's teams.
Transeat In Exemplum: Let this stand as the example.
When you take it to a court room, it leaves the hands of the school.
In the article the court denied his lawsuit. However, there are a ton where girls have sued to play on boys teams and won..thats where its hypocritical...
So in response to
Quote:
Says who?
The court, thats who
No one seems to address the underlying issue here. A boy is suing a school because he wants to be on a..... gymnastics team.
______________________________________________________________
ToBoGgAn wrote:we are gonna take it in the ass and like it, cause thats what america does.
Slo2pt2 (Projekt Unknown?) wrote:One my SON is ADHD N.O.S and Autistic Spectrum Disorder. I will nto medicate him he will battle throught this himself and learn to control it.
A lone boy in a girl's gymnastics team...sounds like a fetishists dream come true.
Personally, i say get rid of all gender bias in all of the sports. If you're good enough, you make it, if you're not, you're riding the pine.
Goodbye Callisto & Skaði, Hello Ishara:
2022 Kia Stinger GT2 AWD
The only thing every single person from every single walk of life on earth can truly say
they have in common is that their country is run by a bunch of fargin iceholes.
Quote:
Says who?
Just happened here in Winnipeg. Two girls didn't want to play on the Girls High School Hockey team, and wanted to play on the Boys team. They won their case, and were allowed to try-out.
They, in short order, were cut.
Once he launched suit he had to show that the body he was suing was even able to be sued. He also did not show that fedual money was funding the oganisation. Two requirements of the suit that were not met. Pretty cut and dried.
That said, if he had shown those requirements to be true, then I imagine he would have won his suit.
Lesson: Do your homework BEFORE you get to court.. Especially the second time..
PAX
I think this guy has every right to join that team. To whom ever said that it was a fetish or what not, its not that case. I think that if he was really wanting to join the team to do gymnastics and not to join just for the attention then he should be able to. On the other hand I have no respect for people who do things like this for just the attention. I wrestled for 12 years of my life and couldn't stand it when things like this would happen. There are girls out there that really want to and really strive to achieve and there are others who did it just to be the 'rebel' and i cant stand that.
Yet again, the poster says this is hypocritical, but not an ounce of evidence to support that claim. No one's provided proof. I think PAX-is-not-my-name made it pretty clear, this ruling had nothing to do with hypocrisy.
You guys go off on all kinds of tangents but none of them are relevant TO THIS CASE. You can't lump everything together, folks. If I tell my kids their bedtime is eight, and my neighbor's kid stays up till 8:30, that doesn't make HIM an hypocrite.
---
hell id try and join too, gymnastic chicks have great bodies. id be all for after practice showers
What? Gymnastics chicks look like 11 year olds!
---
Right up my ally
But one of the things with school sports (at least where I went) was that there had to be an equal number of sports for each gender
Fall
Boys
Football
Cross Country
Girls
Volley Ball
Cross Country
So...like the school said, if there wasn't any interest, then you can't make up a team for one person, plus there would need to be another sport for the girls.
i dated a gymnast
and they ARE as flexible as you would imagine
i believe there is federal law which overrides any state or school policies, stating that you can not discriminate based on gender among many other things.
the only way you can sneak out of that is if your a private or non profit org. in which, a school is not.
this law is why girls in many states have been granted the right by the courts to join mens teams.
he should have been allowed to join.
Creative Draft Art Media Forums
Nathaniel O'Flaherty wrote:i believe there is federal law which overrides any state or school policies, stating that you can not discriminate based on gender among many other things.
the only way you can sneak out of that is if your a private or non profit org. in which, a school is not.
this law is why girls in many states have been granted the right by the courts to join mens teams.
he should have been allowed to join.
Prove it. What's with everyone in this thread just making assumptions. Prove. It.
At this point, I don't even care if you do, I just want to see someone put the work in and instead of these lazy ass assumptions. I didn't expect it from you Nathan.
---
http://www.dol.gov/oasam/regs/statutes/titleix.htm
If anyone is interested.
Morally, If there is a vacancy on the team, and a person of either gender is able to fill it competently and competitively, let them in.
Transeat In Exemplum: Let this stand as the example.
Quote:
What's with everyone in this thread just making assumptions.
Because a post like this opens up a broader discussion than just discussing fact and whether or not the sporting association named could be sued or not.
Okay, so the WIAA can't be sued.
Does that mean that he still shouldn't be allowed on the girls team?
The hypocrisy comes from the fact that girls are allowed to play on boys teams, but not vice versa. Now, the article doesn't mention whether or not the WIAA specifically allowed girls to play on boys teams or whether it was some other agency in some different part of the country.
I think the original poster (who's name I just can't remember
) was referring more to whether boys should be allowed to play on girls teams, as it seems that more and more girls are being allowed to play on boys teams. I think, and true, I'm making an assumption, that he meant to open up a discussion using this case as an example. I don't think he was discussing whether or not the WIAA could be sued or not.
So, no, the tangents don't apply to the specific case regarding the WIAA being sued. But I don't think anyone cares about whether they can be sued or not
.
But, I think you know that, you're just being difficult
.
AGuSTiN wrote:Nathaniel OFlaherty wrote:i believe there is federal law which overrides any state or school policies, stating that you can not discriminate based on gender among many other things.
the only way you can sneak out of that is if your a private or non profit org. in which, a school is not.
this law is why girls in many states have been granted the right by the courts to join mens teams.
he should have been allowed to join.
Prove it. What's with everyone in this thread just making assumptions. Prove. It.
At this point, I don't even care if you do, I just want to see someone put the work in and instead of these lazy ass assumptions. I didn't expect it from you Nathan.
whats the deal?
i didnt know i had to research each case and then cite what laws they referenced.
I wasnt just guessing, we were just recently discussing broadly the subject in my poly sci class under the civil liberties unit.
there IS a law that states that gvnmt associations are not supposed to be discriminatory in any way. this is from multiple different amendments and or laws depending on what kind of discrimination your talking.
if it is a private org they can do whatever they wish. the example given was a leader of a boy scouts group who was found out to be gay. the boy scouts banned him there after. he sued and it got to the supreme court, and lost because they are a private organization and can associate with whoever they wish, i believe it falls under the freedom of association act.
--------
i was not commenting on facts or researched rights related specifically to this case, i replied generally with broad knowledge of similar cases and memory of other sports team cases from the news. and from that information it seems like this boy should have been allowed to join.
Creative Draft Art Media Forums
