Day: March 6, 2001

India Leather Exports Surge; PETA Threatens Renewed Protests

According to the The Times of India, exports of leather goods from India to the West continues to surge, approaching the $2 billion level in the most recent fiscal year. Mohd Hasham of India’s Council for Leather Exports told The Times,

The growth rate in the sector of leather and leather goods has gone up to 25 percent and could further rise to 31 percent. Though there has been a shortage of raw materials, the export figures are expected to go up to $2 billion from $1.59 billion from 1999-2000.

The announcement of the increase in exports coincided with an announcement by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals that it would renew its campaign against Indian leather goods if the Council for Leather Exports doesn’t keep its promise to “improve transport and slaughter methods by May 2001.”

PETA claims that the leather exporters have made no effort to improve the conditions of animals and promises a vigorous campaign if they don’t follow through. In it statement PETA said a new campaign against Indian leather would be “fueled by 12 months of bottled-up feelings and all the frustrations born of patience and hope that came to naught, that will make previous attempts to decry the Indian leather industry look like child’s play.”

Sources:

Leather exports to touch $2 billion. The Times of India, March 4, 2001.

US animal rights group to re-launch campaign against Indian leather. Agence-Frances Presse. March 6, 2001.

Will the Heather Mercer Case Help or Harm Women?

When Heather Mercer won a $2 million judgment from Duke University, it was hailed as an important victory for women’s athletics. Instead it will likely shut the door for women who want to follow in Mercer’s footsteps.

Mercer wanted to be a kicker for Duke’s football team. She was given a tryout by the coach, but since her range was about 35-yards in practice, while a Division I school needs someone who can kick 45-yard field goals during a game, her coach cut her.

Mercer sued and a jury agreed that she had been discriminated against based on her sex. So why isn’t this a clear victory for women?

Because of the provisions of Title IX as they apply to sports. Under Title IX, if a school doesn’t have a women’s team in a given sport it must allow women to try out for the men’s team, with one important exception — contact sports are exempt from this rule.

That’s right, the current law is that if you allow a woman to try out to be a kicker on the football team and then cut her, she could potentially sue the university for sex discrimination as Mercer did. If you just tell the woman point blank, sorry football is a contact sport and the university doesn’t allow women to try out for such teams, the student has no recourse whatsoever.

The federal appeals court that allowed Mercer’s case to go to trial explicitly upheld the contact sports exemption writing, “we hold that where a university has allowed a member of the opposite sex to try out for a single-sex team in a contact sport, the university is, contrary to the holding of the district court, subject to Title IX and therefore prohibited from discriminating against that individual on the basis of his or her sex.”

The obvious reaction from universities seeing what happened in the Duke case will be to institute policies, either written or informal, to refuse try outs to women who want to participate on a men’s contact sport team.

In the end, Mercer’s legal victory will end up diminishing rather than enhancing women’s sports opportunities.

Source:

Sidelined! Kimberly Schuld, The Women’s Quraterly, Winter 2001.

Mercer v. Duke University. United States Court Of Appeals For The Fourth Circuit, No. 99-1014, Decided: July 12, 1999.