Tour pros next in Augusta lobbying effort (Hootie Responds)

AP ^ | Sept. 3, 2002 | AP

[jern]

Tuesday, September 3, 2002 Burk says players 'need to take a moral stand'

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ESPN.com news services

The fight between the Augusta National Golf Club and Martha Burk, the chairwoman of the National Council of Women's Organizations (NCWO), grew even a bit more testy on Tuesday.

Appearing on the Dan Patrick Show on ESPN Radio, Burk said that her organization will begin targeting PGA Tour players in a bid to force Augusta National to allow women members.

The players "need to take a moral stand," Burk told Patrick.

"I think Augusta will eventually see that it will be in the best interests of their club ... to do the right thing and allow women members," she later said in the interview.

Through a club spokesman, Augusta National chairman Hootie Johnson issued a written response to Burk. It said:

"1. This is not a legal issue. The Masters has a constitutional right to its private membership.

"2. Martha Burk tries to equate this to the Shoal Creek racial issue in 1990, but they are totally different. In America, there are women's colleges, the Girl Scouts of America and women's health clubs throughout the country. In Canada and overseas, there are women-only golf clubs.

"3. The Club possibly will have a woman member in the future, but it should be the Club's decision, not the decision of an outside group that knows little about the Club or Tournament. In Ms. Burk's initial letter, she placed a deadline on the Club to have a woman member (2003), and discussed the sponsors of the Tournament.

"4. The winner in this sponsorship issue is the viewer. There will now be 12 ½ hours of commercial free golf coverage.

"5. What is presently happening is a corporate campaign. The National Council of Women's Organizations is targeting anyone associated with the Masters.

"6. The reason we chose not to ask the sponsors to participate in 2003 was to spare them the inevitability of a continued corporate campaign that could have included protests and boycotts.

"7. Dr. Burk is now telling individuals what to watch on television. In three online polls conducted this weekend, nearly 90 percent of respondents said they would continue to watch the Masters on CBS. Over 4.3 million women watched the Masters last year.

"8. The Masters and Augusta National are different. One is a private club, and the other is a world-class sporting event that is completely inclusive.

"9. The Masters is being used as a symbol. Several other Clubs do not allow women to play or even to enter the grounds. Women play at Augusta National regularly, and there are no restrictions on tee times. Women played over 1,000 rounds at the Club last year."

Last week, Burk said that she will talk with CBS about its televising of The Masters, which will be commercial-free next year. Johnson announced that The Masters will drop its sponsors -- IBM, Coca-Cola and Citigroup -- to shield them from any controversy over the club's all-male membership.

Augusta National has not had a woman member in its 69-year history. It has had black members since 1990.

[clintonh8r]

But what does the absence/presence of a certain set of gonads get you?

You tell me. It's women who seem so bent on getting both sets....

[doug from upland]

THE LOVELY MS. BURK

[TBall]

Because the women will get in the club and after a few years they will start to bit-- about everything. The male members will become fearful and will constantly alter their natural behavior to avoid offending the female members and getting a letter of reprimand.

[alisasny]

Just wondering..why would you want to play at this club when you are not welcome? I would love to play major league baseball too but..hey...I stink at baseball and I am female.

[Petronski]

But what does the absence/presence of a certain set of gonads get you?

Why does it concern you, or this womyn's group, how its members are, er, gonadally equipped?

[Oldeconomybuyer]

MEMBERSHIP IN THE NATIONAL COUNCIL OF WOMEN'S ORGANIZATIONS

NCWO, composed of more than one hundred women's organizations representing more than 6 million members, is open to the head of an organization that fits the following criteria:

• a freestanding women's organization with its own board of directors and leaders representing a national constituency and perspective;
  
• the organization's membership is composed predominantly of women and its broad purpose includes promoting public policy and legislative strategies affecting women;
  
• the organization is not one whose primary purpose is to elect candidates from a single party;
  
• the organization is not a "for profit" organization.

DECISION-MAKING

Decisions in NCWO are made by simple majority vote by the Council at its regular bi-monthly meetings, where each dues-paying organization has one vote. When the Council is not in session, the Chair is authorized to speak for the Council if the policy issue is clear. If it is not, she confers with the Steering Committee, an 8-member body that, while not creating policy, acts on and carries out issues previously decided by the Council. The Steering Committee publicizes and implements Council decisions or actions.ANNUAL DUES

Dues are decided by the Council at a meeting, and must be paid as a condition of maintaining membership in good standing.

BENEFITS OF MEMBERSHIP

NCWO member organizations are enriched by the continuing opportunity to interact and network with leaders of more than 100 women's organizations. As NCWO has grown, the value of this interaction, resulting in policies, positions and actions that have helped women nationwide, has become increasingly important. The voice of each organization is heard, and each organization can benefit from the support of many other organizations.Other direct benefits include:

• listing in the Council's NCWO Leadership Handbook, which is widely distributed to the media, Congress, federal agencies and more;
  
• listing on the NCWO website, www.womensorganizations.org;
  
• the opportunity to serve on interest task forces;
  
• use of the NCWO Blastfax capability (for a small fee) to send information to all NCWO member organizations;
  
• participation in many NCWO special events and projects.

Organizations that apply to join NCWO must:

• support the NCWO Policy Agenda
  
• submit a membership application
  
• agree to pay annual dues
  
• have their application approved by the NCWO Steering Committee

The membership process, from application to completion, usually takes no more than two months, allowing for time for the NCWO Steering Committee to meet and discuss the application. Applicants will be notified as to the outcome of the membership application review.

[Lowcountry]

Your questions are good and I'm not sure if anyone has the right answer because there are probably no members of Augusta National on this board. To that end, let me just say that I think it is about accommodation.

When men form a private group it is because they want to enjoy a pastime without the eventual aggravation that women add to most any venture. For instance, if I want to pee standing up in the woods when I hunt, I'll just do it. If I take a woman with me, she'll probably make the hunt unbearable until I take her to a sit down potty. Now, heaven forbid we make a rule to put potties in the woods at my local hunt club, but let a few women in the club and there will be some changes.

Back at the lodge, we might want to sit around and scratch our "gonads", as you say, without trying hide it from the women. Now your response would be to have a room just for men so we could scratch, burp, cuss, talk about women and occasionally break wind. Next thing you know, the women want to come in that room too.

Sooner or later the women would create such a fuss that they would try to take over the club, change it into a garden club, and forbid peeing in the woods as that is a sexist method of relieving one's self. You could still cuss, but a strict limit of one four-letter word per week would be enforced. And you could loose your membership rights altogether for talking about women. No no no no.

I could go on with this and the final description of a men's club with women would be my house and that's why we join men's clubs in the first place - to get away from women for a while!!!

[clintonh8r]

Yeah, and Jesse Jackson's methods are OK, too. (I've noticed....even he hasn't touched this one).

[colorado tanker]

"Think about the name: The Masters." LOL! That must drive She Who Must Be Obeyed nuts!

So what would Burk change the name to? The Mistresses? The Dominatrix's?

[Rebel-without-a-pause]

Back at the lodge, we might want to sit around and scratch our "gonads", as you say, without trying hide it from the women. Now your response would be to have a room just for men so we could scratch, burp, cuss, talk about women and occasionally break wind. Next thing you know, the women want to come in that room too. Back when I was in the "Real Navy" we had "stag bars" so we could do just that, then the "Waves" wanted in. The stag bars were done away with and we had to go to sea to scratch, cuss, break wind, etc. Next thing you know they started letting "Waves" onboard ships. Hell! I retired!!!

[Texaggie79]

It's a country club thing, not a golf thing. Throughout history, men, just as women, have wanted someplace to go that is men only. Now there are only a VERY few amount of places that do that.

Do you deny that men and women act differently when not in the presence of a member of the opposite sex? It's in our biology.

[irish guard]

You are perfectly correct in your assumptions. It is Mewzilla that doesn't get it...oldeconomybuyer had it right when he said

>>>>>>This isn't about golf or the PGA tour, it's about radical feminists exploiting Augusta National to get media attention. It's the same as PETA putting up billboards with anti-religion hate messages<<<<<<<

[INSENSITIVE GUY]

What would anyone from the NCWO know about morals?Men have a RIGHT to freedom of association just as much as anyone else.This is NOT about rights but CONTROL.Women like this don't need any more rights,they need counselling.

[Frohickey]

But no-one has answered my question: how and/or why does a woman golfing as a member and not a guest ruin a guy's enjoyment of his game?

It doesn't. But when an outsider tells you what you should do, you resent it. Only members of the club can tell what the club should and should not do. If you are not a member, you do not have a say or stake in any matter involving it. Unless you are a potential member that is willing to say, drop a billion dollars.

[thinden]

4. The winner in this sponsorship issue is the viewer. There will now be 12 ½ hours of commercial free golf coverage.

hootie could have just as easily gone "pay for view" with the masters.

what would it pull? if hootie only came up with a couple million Masters crazed subscribers @ $19.95 (a cool $39,900,000.00), it would make the $7.5 million in corporate sponsorships look like chump change.

[B Knotts]

Is Burk a buck or a doe?

Or a wether, perhaps... :-P

[Helms]

Boy, if there ever was a case of Slippery Slope Thinking...

[Frohickey]

The hell they don't. What you fellas are missing here is that this all-encompassing women's organization has but one purspose -- to kick men in the balls. This isn't about membership at Augusta. It's about showing hubby who is boss come Saturday morning.

Well, if Mrs. BattleAxe wants to show who's the boss come Saturday morning, she can try and do so. But Mr. StickInTheMud can also decide to give Mrs. BattleAxe a divorce. There are younger fish in the sea, and marriage is a partnership. I bet Mrs. BattleAxe would relish the idea of going back to the dating market and find another young stud. Of course, she would have to compete with other younger, more nubile women for the young stud's attention.

(I just started reading Danielle Crittenden's book What Our Mothers Didn't Tell Us: Why Happiness Eludes the Modern Woman. A lot of it makes sense. It pokes many holes in feminist's illogic.)

[Trust but Verify]

I think the point is, this is a private club. it is their prerogative as to whether or not to have women as members. They have decided against it and are not going to have some sexually frustrated old BAG tell them otherwise.

Ms. Burk should get herself a vibrator and a life and leave the Masters and Augusta National alone.

[Stone Mountain]

But come on, just out of curiosity, how does a woman being a member instead of a guest affect your enjoyment of your golf outing?

Nobody here seems to be able to post a reasonable, non-condescending answer to this question. Why is that? Certainly a private club can discriminate against women if they wanted to, but I would also be interested in understanding why this is desireable.