Like so many other laws and regulations, Title IX has had serious negative consequences that nobody (probably) foresaw. In this essay, economics professor William Anderson looks at the manifold harm it has done.
The law was supposed to make things equal between men and women in college sports. It has done that, although mostly by compelling schools to cut down on men’s sports. What is has also done is to unleash zealous federal bureaucrats to meddle in a sexual assault cases, in ways that are blatantly unfair. Apropos of those bureaucrats, Anderson includes this statement by Yale history professor Edmund S. Morgan: “When any group of people become sufficiently intent on attacking a particular evil, they are likely to discard as obsolete and ineffective any ground rules that society has developed for the peaceful or fair achievement of social objectives.” Oh, how true that is.
Anderson’s conclusion hits the bull’s eye: “Title IX has enabled federal bureaucrats to micromanage the affairs of American institutions of higher education to the point where confrontation has conquered civility and propaganda has replaced anything that once resembled learning.”