In Training Rules, a documentary about homophobia in women's collegiate sports, filmmaker Dee Mosbacher gives herself an added degree of difficulty by focusing on the case of two women, neither of whom was available to interview.
Jennifer Harris appears briefly to read a letter from her attorney explaining that she can't comment in accordance with the terms of the settlement of her suit against the Pennsylvania State University ( PSU ) and Rene Portland, who coached the Lady Lions basketball team from 1980 until her resignation in 2007.
( Full disclosure: I'm a Penn State grad and a member of the Penn State Lambda Yahoo group, but I never played women's basketball there. )
Harris' claims that Portland systematically discriminated against players who were or appeared to be lesbian, or just didn't look "feminine" enough, are substantiated by a number of players going back to Portland's earliest days at PSU. They include Cindy Davies, Lisa Faloon and twins Chris and Corinne Gulas.
It's said that Portland's "training rules" were "No Drinking, No Drugs, No Lesbians." Once she tagged a player with the L-word, the rest of the team was forbidden to socialize with her. If Portland didn't throw the woman off the team the social ostracism was enough to make her quit. This could destroy the future of a woman who was dependent on an athletic scholarship to remain in school.
Portland's "no-lesbian" policy first came to light in an interview she gave the Chicago Sun-Times in 1986 and got more attention in a Philadelphia Inquirer story in 1991. The university turned a blind eye because the team had 23 winning seasons out of Portland's first 24.
Even when sexual orientation was added to Penn State's nondiscrimination policy in 1992, Portland was allowed to carry on as usual. Because athletics bring in a lot of alumni dollars, coaches are allowed to set their own rules.
Activists discuss lesbophobia in women's sports in general, where ponytails are practically mandatory, and point out that Portland must have received votes from some lesbians to have been named Coach of the Year twice in national voting.
I don't believe the film mentions that Harris is not lesbian-identified, but it does bring that out about Courtney Wicks, who played for the Lady Lions in 1996 and '97. When Harris decided to stand and fight she joined forces with the National Center for Lesbian Rights to bring the federal suit, which was settled out of court in February 2007. Portland resigned the following month.
Dee Mosbacher shoots and scores with this documentary that's newsworthy as well as praiseworthy.