When Fiona Shaw donned the costume and mannerisms of Shakespeare's King Richard II, London's theatre community had a collective conniption fit.

What was Shaw's crime? She didn't alter Shakespeare's text or play a hip '90s Richard, complete with motorcycle and Hell's Angels jacket. She didn't tamper with his character, gleefully ignoring the "king" part and playing Richard as a delicate, dangerous femme fatale.

Shaw, a woman, merely performed the part in drag.

So what's all the fuss about? Men played women's parts in ancient Greek theatre, Elizabethan theatre, and even in modern day films; it is not only accepted dramatic practice, but is often exploited as a comic device.

While the London theatre world may seem self-contained and irrelevant to American politics, Fiona Shaw's battle with an unfair double standard mirrors the revived struggle between the Virginia Military Institute, the Citadel, and several prospective femal e cadets.

VMI and the Citadel both contend admitting women to their programs would grossly compromise their standards and compel them to create gentler alternatives to rigorous cadet routines. And while they recognize a portion of their funding comes from the gove rnment, they claim that they should somehow be exempt from laws which guarantee equal opportunity - even for women.

In a country which promotes ideals of freedom and opportunity with an almost zealous fervor, support for VMI should be flimsy and tenuous at best. What surprises me most about VMI's case is that it is still an issue, still being argued and debated over di nner tables and within the chambers of the appeals court circuit. The issue of "separate but equal" educational facilities was resolved decades ago with the Supreme Court's landmark decision in Brown vs. Topeka Board of Education, and the court's more rec ent ruling in favor of Shannon Faulkner reaffirmed that access to public facilities cannot be denied to anyone. Mary Baldwin college, the gentler alternative to VMI, lacks the prestige and rigorous training which is central to VMI's program and is hardly a viable option.

VMI's claims that admitting women to the school would threaten the integrity of their program is both degrading and outrageous. Rather than examining the facts - that Mary Baldwin college is an exercise in cooperative learning and not a credible military leadership program, and that the presence of women will only benefit VMI male cadets who will be working with women as colleagues and superior officers in military careers - they hide behind chivalrous declarations, claiming they act out of "concern" on b ehalf of women who can't hack it in a hostile environment.

A military school cannot admit any cadet who performs physically at a substandard level. Offering lower physical standards is demeaning to women, suggesting that they cannot compete with men on equal turf; it also creates a frustrating situation for men who resent their female colleagues, believing that they were admitted through favoritism and legal sleight of hand, not merit.

The first and most vital step in creating equal opportunity is establishing uniform standards and requirements, not relaxing those standards for women. And everyone who can meet those requirements - man or woman, gay or straight, earthling or alien - can be admitted, period.

Equal opportunity for women doesn't guarantee equal outcome, and many women who are eventually admitted to VMI will drop out - just as many male cadets do. Yet anyone who can meet the requirements has earned the right to participate in the program.

Nearly half a century has passed since minorities were routinely excluded from public schools and military institutions, yet today women still battle these public institutions for something as simple as the right to go to school.

Until the courts reject VMI's petition to deny entrance to women: Long live Queen Richard.

Jessie Fillerup is a music education junior.