I am also a women's college alumna. I fully expect a lot of comments in this thread to blast the whole notion of women's colleges. ("Waah! I thought feminism was about ending discrimination -- yet women's colleges discriminate! Waah!") So as a preliminary matter, I would note that most women's colleges were founded when places like Harvard, Yale, and Princeton were not open to women, and indeed, when a regular college education was not generally available to women. Given that the scope of women's abilities is still a hotly debated topic and that editorials are still published to the effect that women are dumb, it seems reasonable for these single-sex institutions to maintain the same mission of nurturing women's intellectual capacities in an environment relatively free from cultural ideas about the relative abilities of the genders.

As an alumna, I would like to see my college and others like it serving all individuals who may be affected by the experience of being female. This would include women who transition to become men. These transmales are presumably effected by the experience of growing up female. This would also include men who transition to become women. These transfemales clearly identify as women and will be considered female in their lives going forward. Both categories of students can benefit from the unique atmosphere of a women's college. I would be proud and happy to have my institution serve them.

and their role as cradles of misandry needs to be studied more. It is obvious that any idea of gender that includes male gender indicators (or whatever the goddam term would be called in all your gender classes) is negative. Man=bad. Then we wonder why society is so screwed over and why men feel trapped.

For all our classes on the philosophy of gender -- a general education requirement, of course --

ALL OUR CLASSES?!? How many damn classes like this do you need? Of course, the curricula, theories, concepts, biases, all of this, were developed by females in a vaccum, without any significant male input-- at least from males who were not already aping what the females wanted to hear.

Then we wonder why BS writes the things it does, based on an attitude that seems entirely too anti-male.

The whole thing is a circle jerk someone needs to put a microscope to, to begin laying out the arteries and veins and power dynamics and where they affect the US courts and government and media.

I get extremely offended by concepts like piles of militant anti male women getting together to trash talk train their younguns through four years of indoctrination, then sending them out into the world to pretend they like guys.

I have yet to see a comparable all male school that trains men to do the same to women.

But back to the original point, it is obvious women just hate anything that reeks of men-- even going so far as to try to destroy women who identify as men merely by their outer appearance and attitude.

Talk about your tempest in a teapot... How many of these "transmales" can there really be?? Five, six?? Man, slow week, or what?

"So as a preliminary matter, I would note that most women's colleges were founded when places like Harvard, Yale, and Princeton were not open to women, and indeed, when a regular college education was not generally available to women.

Certainly that is not the case now, in fact women make up the vast majority of students at most accredited colleges and universities.

Given this widespread gender disparity, it is time for bogoted women's colleges to stop their hateful discrimination against men.

Apologists such as yourself should stop discriminating as well.

This story interested and disturbed me for several reasons.

First, I don't understand why he didn't just apply to Columbia. I went to school at the co-ed counterpart the school Rey started out at. I recall women from Barnard as being quite integrated in the student body of Columbia as in we shared dorms, work study, classes, etc. I guess he was trying to make a statement, but it doesn't seem courageous to me.

Second, this brings me to my broader point - Rey seems like a prototypical, white, wealthy youth who is trying to rebel and create for himself minority/underprivileged existence. To me, as a so-called minority who grew up non-wealthy, this attitude, which by the way is common among the trendier set, is insulting, annoying, patronizing, infantile, foolish, wrongheaded, and dopey.

Third, why are women trying to pigeonhole themselves? I'm hardly a girly girl - i.e I was mistaken for a boy as a child, I had/have mostly male friends, I didn't know how to apply make up or even care to until I was like 20. Does this make me a man? No. It just doesn't. It makes me a unique human being. I don't understand why its good to encourage children, and at 18 you're a child, to choose, CHOOSE, a gender if they are uncomfortable being a "girly girl." Being a woman doesn't mean acting uber-feminine.

That said, I would never deny someone the ability to transform into a different or more correct gender. Good luck to Rey.

I disagree that it will require a delicate balance to accommodate transmale students.

Sure, I can understand that a woman student might not feel comfortable sharing a room with someone who is now male. This seems like a very easy conflict to resolve. The college can either provide a single room, place 2 transmale students together (assuming there are 2 transmale students), or perhaps can find another roommate who is not disturbed by living with a transmale students.

As for the larger question raised in the article about women students who feel betrayed in their expectation of being educated alongside women only, I say, "Piffle!" Accommodating transmale (or transfemale students) will not change the character of these institutions. Most of these schools have had cross-enrollment with co-ed schools for decades now. You always have a couple guys in your classes, plus someone's boyfriend is always semi-living in the dorm surreptitiously. A few transmales in addition to the men from other colleges will not make a difference, and accommodating them will fulfill the broader mandate of these schools.