This is not a very pleasant story. In the wake of Harvard canceling their men’s soccer season due to years of documented misogynistic behavior by the athletes on the team, Columbia has suspended the wrestling season after hateful group texts by members of the team were published on a student-run blog.
Via The New York Times:
Columbia withdrew from a meet on Sunday at Binghamton after the university announced it would have “zero tolerance in its athletics programs for the group messaging and texts sent by several members of the men’s varsity wrestling team,” messages that the university described as “appalling.” The team’s next meet had been scheduled for next Sunday at the New York State Championships at Cornell.
Screengrabs of the texts were first published last Thursday by Bwog, an independent, student-run Columbia news website. The lewd texts were sent over the last three years by wrestling team members through the messaging app GroupMe, Bwog reported.
Those screengrabs are still up at Bwog, if you want to take a look. It’s not a fun read, though. If the messages are substantiated, it would be difficult for Columbia to continue with the season, especially after the precedent set by Harvard. And that’s probably the right call.
