Lately, reported incidents of female objectification have dominated social media platforms and news reports. Back in 2012, the Harvard men’s soccer team created a “scouting report,” which evaluated female soccer recruits on their physical appearance and sexual appeal. The women were unknowingly assigned nicknames, numerical values for their “attractiveness,” and hypothetical sexual preferences or positions. This disturbingly lewd document recently resurfaced in an email chain amongst team members, and its existence was revealed in the Harvard Crimson a few weeks ago. Media and press jumped on the scandal immediately.
If it wasn’t already evident before this incident, “locker room talk” and objectification of female athletes, and women as a whole, is repulsive and completely unproductive. Following the Amherst men’s soccer team’s response to Donald Trump’s “locker room talk” leak, this is a troubling step backwards. The Amherst Men’s soccer team aimed to prove that team’s mentality doesn’t always go hand in hand with objectification of women, and in fact never should. The Harvard men’s soccer team, conversely, is sending the message that sexism and misogyny is still prevalent on college campuses.
Some of the women listed in the 2012 “scouting report” came forward to speak their minds in an article for The Harvard Crimson. They explained that their greatest concern is not for their own reputation or image, but for the normalization of female objectivity and misogyny on college campuses. Harvard responded swiftly to the situation after the “scouting report” story gained great attention on campus and in the media. The Harvard Men’s Soccer team was scheduled to play two more games this season, but now the team must forfeit these remaining games and decline any potential participation in the championship or tournament games. Harvard Athletics is also taking it a step further by partnering with the Office of Sexual Assault Prevention and Response to take steps towards ending this sort of rhetoric on campus.
Hopefully the reaction from the women targeted by this “scouting report” paired with the response from Harvard’s administration ends the objectification of women on Harvard’s campus.