We have written extensively about the “Protect Women’s Sports” movement over the last couple of years. On the surface, it sounds like a noble cause. How can anyone not get behind a movement to protect women’s sports?
Then – one looks at many of the purveyors of the movement and sees that it is more astroturf than the playing surfaces of many baseball and football stadia from the 1970s to the 1990s.
Among the many things that women’s and girls’ sports need protecting from are overly abusive coaches – many of them male. For example, consider what recently was caught on camera in New York State. The Empire State recently held its high school state basketball championships – and the coach of the losing team was caught on camera yanking the ponytail of one of his players.
The coach – deservedly – was fired for doing what he did. Usually when a coach is caught on camera engaging in this sort of abusive behavior, it is not the first time something like this has happened. It just so happened that it occurred following a state championship game – and those are shown on television.
Noticeably enough, the “Protect Women’s Sports” troublemakers apparently had their faces on the sides of milk cartons when the video got out and it went viral on social media. When those individuals should have been the loudest, all we heard was a horde of crickets.
The silence was deafening. Apparently, “Women’s and girls sports do not need protecting from male authority figures who engage in either physical or emotional abuse or sexual harassment” is part of the fine print for the “Protect Women’s Sports” movement.
Nope – it is clear this astroturf movement only has one aim – to “cleanse” women’s sports of transgender athletes – or anyone that they even deem to be trans.
For example – prior to UCLA’s Elite Eight matchup with LSU in March Madness, some loser on Twitter (who we will not give the dignity of naming) posted a video of Bruins star big Lauren Betts conducting an interview. She was asked about how her performance in March Madness is earning her comparisons to Elena Delle Donne and Brittney Griner – two of the greatest frontcourt players in basketball history.
The keyboard tough guy transphobe apparently had enough time to tweet from his mother’s basement that Betts is 6-foot-7 and speaks with a deep voice. Betts is not even trans.
So…let us get this straight. It is not enough that these losers – who apparently have too much time on their hands – want to erase the trans community from sports (and society at large). The transphobia of these individuals runs so deep that they are placing the “trans” tag on anyone who they deem does not fit their hegemonically induced idea of what a woman is.
Apparently, one can only be a woman if one is around 5-foot-7 or 5-foot-8, speaks in a high-pitched voice, has the look of an Olivia Dunne and is – ideally – white (preferably with bleach blonde hair but brunettes and redheads are also applicable).
Women’s sports – especially more diverse women’s sports such as basketball – have been dealing with transphobia and homophobia for virtually as long as it has been in existence. There have been countless instances of BG being called a man by these keyboard warriors because she too is tall and speaks with a deep voice.
The obvious irony is that these same individuals would want Griner to sign something of theirs if they ever met her in real life so they could sell said signed memorabilia to make a quick buck or two.
By the way – Griner not fitting their idea of what a woman should look and sound like is the real reason why they leveled the “she deserved it” attacks at her when she went through the Russia ordeal three years ago. If that was Dunne imprisoned by the Kremlin instead of Griner, they would have swam across the entirety of the Atlantic Ocean – even if those waters were extra-choppy, shark-infested and at sub-zero temperatures – to save her.
The Betts video illustrates how much transphobia is really misogyny in disguise – and how transphobia harms all women (not only those who are transgender). For a crowd that has shown time and time again that they believe women should be confined to the home (specifically the kitchen, bedroom and baby’s crib), they sure do have opinions on what a woman should look and sound like.
This is a crowd that has gaslit themselves into believing that there is a massive influx of trans athletes in women’s sports – only because they have predisposed notions as to what a woman should look like. These individuals are not genuine supporters of women’s sports – never have been and likely never will be.
And as much as women’s sports leagues – including the WNBA – have tried to shy away from this reality for purely financial reasons, these leagues will have to wrestle with this uncomfortable truth sooner instead of later.
These are simply folks who are using the growing popularity of women’s sports to force-feed a regressive political agenda that is antithetical to the whole concept of women even participating in athletics.
It is literally the same energy as individuals in the 20th century – and even before then – who believed women engaging in strenuous athletic competition was not “ladylike.” It is literally the same energy as those who believed that Title IX was the “Lesbians’ Bill of Rights” – only re-packaged for the 21st century.
By the way, notice how the “Protect Women’s Sports” crowd has focused all of their attention on transgender women playing sports? One wonders why they do not have the same energy for…transgender men (even though we are not here for that brand of transphobia either).
Then…there is the reaction many of these same individuals had to the Nike ad that aired during the Super Bowl which highlighted women athletes – all biological women. A’ja Wilson, Caitlin Clark, Sabrina Ionescu, JuJu Watkins and Sha’Carri Richardson were all among those who made appearances in said ad – a homage to when Nike did a similar ad in 1998 which was an all-male ad.
It was called part of the “woke agenda” by those who claim they want to protect women’s sports. And it even had someone in that ad in Clark who these individuals have been desperately attempting to latch on as someone who will be the “savior” of women’s sports.
It goes without saying that their support for Clark is fake and is based more on her “looking the part” as opposed to her being the outstanding basketball player that she is. But – on one hand, they claim to want to “protect women’s sports” but an ad that showcases biological women athletes is part of the “woke agenda.”
These people do not want to “protect” women’s sports – they want to pillage women’s sports. Transphobia is only the beginning – and it is rooted in homophobia and anti-Black/anti-Brown racism. The same crowd who believes that women’s sports are full of transgender athletes is the same crowd who never wanted (and still do not want) girls and women playing sports (their own daughters included) because they believe it turns straight women and girls either lesbian or bisexual.
The big exception, of course, is cheerleading because their regressive culture teaches them that it is a woman’s place to stay on the sidelines and cheer while the men do all of the work. Cheer, unsurprisingly, is another sport that is loaded with male sexual predators. And while they may have scored victory last November, that is not changing the fact that there is a fundamental culture shift as it relates to women’s sports.
The irony is that it is women’s basketball – a sport which they have derided as being full of “men” because many of its participants are Black – which is leading this culture shift. Look at the names that have become household figures in the women’s sports realm – many of whom have been on the national stage throughout this year’s rendition of the Madness. Betts. Paige Bueckers. JuJu Watkins. MiLaysia Fulwiley. Hailey Van Lith. Madison Booker. Flau’Jae Johnson. Olivia Miles.
A woman is not trans simply because she may put up 30 points and 17 rebounds in a basketball game. A woman is not trans if she scores three goals on the soccer pitch. A woman is not trans because she may slug three home runs in a game on the softball diamond. A woman is not trans simply because she may complete a 40-yard dash in under five seconds.
And what parents (many of them suburban and rural) also need to fathom with is a woman or girl is not trans simply because they outplayed, out-hustled and out-muscled your “precious little princess” on the basketball court, softball diamond, volleyball court, soccer pitch, etc. Maybe said precious little princess simply needs to spend a bit less time scrolling through TikTok videos and a bit more time hitting the weights.
But even if that woman is trans, she (or if the pronouns are they/them) belongs. Because at the end of the day, transgender women are women – and transgender women are human beings.
One more thing – for these individuals in the “Protect Women’s Sports” crowd to do this, they would have to acknowledge the fallacies of the culture they grew up in and recognize the humanity of transgender individuals. They would also have to recognize that women present themselves in all shapes and sizes – which would translate into another realization of the shortcomings of the culture they grew up in.
A key to understanding why those in the “Protect Women’s Sports” crowd move the way that they move – is that a good bit of them do not even recognize their own humanity. How can they be expected to love and accept the humanity of those that are different from them – when they do not even love themselves.
The password is therapy.
