If someone, anyone, can pinpoint the moment when Tiger Woods was designated the bastion of social equality and the undisputed champion of women’s rights, please tell me. And let Tiger know too, because he’s probably more dumbfounded than I am.

The New York Times wants Tiger to sit out the Masters.

The Times is a flawlessly written, wonderfully run publication. It’s arguably the best daily newspaper in the world, and the arguments for the others aren’t very strong. But they really dropped the Nike golf ball on this one.

I’ve heard of groups putting their heads together, but the members of the Times’ editorial board must have held a feverish round of Gus Ferrotte-style noggin-knocking before they penned their Monday editorial concerning the admission of female members to Augusta National Golf Club.

We all know the deal: Augusta, home of the Masters, has 300 male members and zero female members. The National Council of Women’s Organizations doesn’t take too well to this. They decide to wage a war against Augusta to get rid of the goose egg.

Simple. Even makes sense. Women deserve equal rights, in the world and on the golf course. Augusta’s refusal to admit a woman, especially in the face of the hyper-publicized debate, seems old-fashioned, unnecessarily stubborn. Maybe even foolish.

But that’s their prerogative. It’s a club, and clubs have rules. Like the rule the National Council of Women’s Organizations has against admitting male members (hmmm).

But that’s neither here nor there, which are both places Tiger would rather be than where he is right now.

The Times suggested that a statement needed to be made about Augusta, and for some inexplicable reason, it felt that Tiger should be the one to make the statement.

“If the club that runs the Masters can brazenly discriminate against women, that means others can choose not to support Mr. Johnson’s golfing fraternity. That includes more enlightened members of the club, CBS Sports, which televises the Masters, and the players, especially Tiger Woods,” the editorial said.

The Times went on.

“A tournament without Mr. Woods would send a powerful message that discrimination isn’t good for the golfing business.”

A tournament without Woods? It happens. All the time, actually. A major tournament without Woods? That’s an oxymoron, or something. And bad for business.

Which is the NCWO’s point. Tiger sits, Augusta’s TV ratings drop to the level of “Two Guys, a Girl and a Pizza Place” reruns and maybe Augusta opens its eyes.

Good logic, but fatally flawed. Why? Because Tiger doesn’t care. And he won’t sit. Ever.

Even if Tiger thinks women should have equal rights, even if he thinks a non-male member at Augusta might not be a bad idea, the last thing he would do is opt to play his self-titled PS2 game while Lefty gets a crack at his first major, while Els and Leonard and Monty finally get to wipe that permanently present Tiger-induced sweat off their heads and win his major.

Tiger is in the business of winning. The Times’ proposal is like the Microsoft anti-trust suit to Tiger’s domination of the links. Tiger’s got plenty to play for. Over a cool million in prize money. Another notch on his belt-o’-majors. And he still hasn’t nailed down that Grand Slam in a calendar year.

It’s selfish of the NCWO to expect Tiger to skip the Masters for them when all they have done for him in the past year is egotistically drag his name into every Augusta debate this side of the 18th.

The Times wants Tiger to sit, to make a statement for some women he’s never met who right now are sitting in their offices and not practicing their putting in the hallway. He won’t do it, never will, because he cares a lot more about winning than anyone ever in golf, and winning anything becomes quite a bit tougher when you’re not playing. And there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that.

Tiger is a golfer, the best ever, and that’s it. Not a spokesperson, not a mouthpiece, and certainly not a fire-starter. He shouldn’t be expected to be a politicking pundit or a lightning rod for controversial issues that don’t directly effect or concern him. Being the best doesn’t make you accountable for everyone else’s problems. It’s too bad the Times, which had a rare moment of misjudgment in its string of continued journalistic greatness, doesn’t realize that.