Criticism of Muirfield highlights double standards over single-sex clubs
SIR – Muirfield golf club will no longer be allowed to host the Open Championship after members voted against letting women join (report, May 20).
I would like to point out that Muirfield is a privately owned links and its members are free to decide that they do not want women members. It is unfair for the Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews (R&A) to put pressure on the club and punish it for the decisions of its members.
There are many private womenonly clubs, such as Grace Belgravia and Trouble in London, as well as The Sorority, whose members include Ching-He Huang, the television chef, and Katie Derham, the BBC presenter. Why are these clubs not criticised?
The answer, presumably, is that it is their right to decide who their members are. Muirfield should therefore be allowed to do the same.
If politicians such as Nicola Sturgeon oppose clubs that are gender-based, then maybe they should change the law. There are 22 womenonly golf clubs in Scotland. Will Ms Sturgeon do something about those clubs as well? Iain Cameron Stange, Hedmark, Norway SIR – I have watched many great Open Championships at Muirfield, including those of 1987 and 1992, when Nick Faldo won.
However, I agree with the R&A’s decision not to hold any more Opens there – or at any other club where women cannot be members. Golf needs to welcome women players if it is to progress in the modern world. Barry Smith Loughborough, Leicestershire SIR – The members of Muirfield held a vote on whether or not to admit women members. Their decision, democratically taken, was to remain a men-only club. However, George Kerevan, the SNP MP, told BBC Radio Scotland that he hopes they will see sense and hold another vote.
This is SNP-style democracy. We all remember that, after losing the independence referendum, the SNP quickly began agitating for another. Donald Lewis Gifford, East Lothian SIR – Some months back, a prominent Muirfield member forecast correctly to me which way the vote would go.
However, he said the outcome would not be a vote against women but a vote against the Open, the staging of which disrupted members’ “normal” golf for weeks during the best golfing weather of the year. John Makin Oxshott, Surrey SIR – Jemima Lewis (Comment, May 20) might reject single-sex institutions, but many women do not.
For some, the ante-natal-class coffee gathering, the book club or the “girls’ night out” provide an opportunity to air small gripes about marriage and family life and put them into perspective.
Seeking women-only company for a few hours a month does not imply prejudice against those who are excluded. Most people enjoy mixed company most of the time; some enjoy single-sex company some of the time.
In a tolerant society there is room for all preferences – and those preferences can include spending a few hours in private, men-only dining rooms where diners can bore each other with golf stories. Sally Armstrong Edinburgh