We have arrived at March media Madness, when left-stream media bigotry is all the rage and universities are judged by how friendly they are to LGBT causes.
You may recall that last year USA Today drew the wrath of conservatives by demanding that Oral Roberts University be banned from the tournament by the NCAA because its student handbook required Christian moral behavior. In 2019, the Deadspin blog prayed that Liberty University would lose in the NCAA Tournament.
This week, the Outsports blog lists some connection to LGBTQ news for every school in the Big Dance. Some of Cyd Zeigler’s entries are pathetically trivial, while others are downright mean.
For starters, the 10th-seed in the South Region, Loyola-Chicago got docked for its policy of allowing only straight Catholic couples to marry at the school’s chapel.
Another Catholic institution, Providence College “has had a series of fits and starts with efforts to elevate voices on various sides of LGBTQ acceptance,” Zeigler griped. This stems from a 2013 cancellation of Wayne State University philosopher John Corvino, who had planned to lecture on marriage equality. Providence nixed it because it would have defied the college’s fundamental principles.
Duke took a hit because, 13 years ago, a writer said, “Duke men’s basketball players seem to have been subjected to more homophobia than most. …" Outsports obviously has a long and bitter memory.
Davidson also gets whistled for a technical foul because, in 2020, a student named Mandy Muse said her homosexual experience there is “muted.”
Tennessee? Zapped for defunding its LGBTQ student center. Alumni later funded it.
Baylor took a shellacking from Outsports because women’s basketball coach Kim Mulkey is homophobic. Another the red state school Texas Tech is being sued by former women’s head basketball coach Marlene Stallings, who is LGBTQ.
Ed Orgeron is no longer the football coach at LSU, but the Tigers get slapped down because their former coach behaved “like a homophobic jerk.”
Those are the schools on the naughty list. Outsports appears to have dug up some dusty, ages-old files to come up with its nice list.
Though a Spokane, Wash., Catholic bishop objected, Gonzaga launched the Lincoln LGBTQ+ Rights Clinic, run by the university’s School of Law and Center for Civil and Human Rights, in 2020.
Arkansas made the winner’s circle because KC Cross is a queer, nonbinary person working in the University of Arkansas athletics department. He’s changing hearts and minds there.
Michigan State has had several homosexual cheerleaders. A member of the Alabama rowing team came out as homosexual. Boise State previously had a homosexual president for it men’s club volleyball team.
In 2016, Vermont women’s basketball team canceled its game at North Carolina because the state previously passed a “bathroom bill.”
Iowa State may have the topper of them all in Tina Hillman, a national champion shot putter -- as a “pansexual.”
That’s not the exhaustive Outsports list, but these are schools with great LGBTQ records and some that need work, Zeigler says. It’s typical March media madness season.