Shame on Muirfield’s sexist old dinosaurs
IDON’T really want to go to Muirfield. I’m sure a lot of women feel the same. I suspect the club house probably smells of spilt brandy and unwashed socks, and is stuffed full of members who still regard Anthony Eden as a brash young upstart.
I imagine hordes of red-faced men in ill-advised chequer patterned trousers scoffing nursery-style lunches while discussing which port goes best with middle aged spread. It sounds awful.
But in 2016, that is not the point. That the members of Muirfield, one of Scotland’s most exclusive golf clubs, have voted to continue their ban on women is the sort of archaic, cloth-eared move that makes Cro-Magnon man look progressive.
Imagine if this had been a vote not to allow women, but Jewish people. Imagine if a man had stood outside this ancient and venerated Scottish institution and declared that no, on reflection, the Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers had decided against letting in members of the Jewish faith.
It would be an international scandal, and rightly so. It would be a shocking case of discrimination in a country that prides itself on being progressive and tolerant. So why, when it comes to women, should we put up with it?
When Antonia Beggs, operations manager at the 2014 Ryder Cup at Gleneagles, performed a similar executive role at the Senior Open at Muirfield a few years back, she had to eat in the kitchen with the staff while the male members of her team dined in the clubhouse, purely because she was a woman. When Scottish professional golfer Heather MacRae played at Muirfield she had to sit outside after the game while a member walked in with his dog. His dog!
Perhaps the good ladies of Edinburgh, upon discovering a dinner party guest is a member of the Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers, could exact a similar punishment and request they eat their dinner on the porch. With the dog.
I’m not sure many of us would mind as much if Muirfield were some tiny backwater with a mediocre golf course somewhere north of Auchenmiddle Piddle. But it’s not. Muirfield has been hosting the Open since the 19th century. It presents one of the finest challenges in world golf and has an international reputation. There is little to beat it.
And this is why the concerns around Muirfield are so important. Because it’s not just about golf, it’s about Scotland.
In a country where the leaders of the three biggest political parties are women, where the Church of Scotland has had three female moderators, and where one of our finest sportswomen, Catriona Matthew, is a golfer, to have a bastion of our national sport remain a men-only environment is deeply embarrassing. Not to mention the £100million dent it could make in our economy.
I plan never to set foot in Muirfield. But any woman who wants to should be able to walk its corridors freely. Not wait outside in the rain like a dog.