This is a transcript for the below YouTube video I released as a trans athlete regarding the need for trans equality in sports, in response to NCAA’s new trans policy announced on January 20, 2022.
The Dangers of TERFs
This vicious predator has keen hunting senses, able to spot any potential sign of weakness in their prey. Once they’ve selected their victim, they’ll isolate and harass them, mercilessly wearing them down until they’re ready to strike. Attacks by this vicious predator, the TERF, are on the rise, and unless we do something soon, trans people will never feel safe to be in the water – or in any sport – ever again.
Hi, I’m Kayley Whalen, a transgender athlete, and in this video, I’ll be discussing why Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminists, or TERFs, and right-wing groups want to keep trans kids and trans athletes like NCAA swimmer Lia Thomas out of sports. And I’ll be asking and answering the question: which are more dangerous, TERFs or Sharks? So stay tuned.
Hi, I’m Kayley Whalen, a former women’s Flat Track Derby Association skater, swimmer and transgender athlete. Today, swimming and diving are some of my favorite activities, as is running, but it wasn’t always that way. Pools, beaches – being near the water was often a place of dysphoria, fear and violence, along with locker rooms.
Protecting Trans Youth in Sports
But this video is not about me. It’s not about swimming, and it’s not even entirely about sports. It’s just about every trans kid who wants to be a kid doing normal kid things, like kicking around a soccer ball, skating, shooting hoops, or, yes, swimming at a pool. You see, the conversation around sports right now is almost exclusively about the athletes at the highest level of competition, like NCAA swimmer Lia Thomas, but the vast majority of trans people who play sports aren’t doing it to win a medal. They’re doing it because it’s fun, a way to make friends, and a way to challenge themselves physically and mentally. Doesn’t it seem wrong to try to deny trans kids those things?
NCAA and Lia Thomas
But without further ado, let’s talk about the issue in everyone’s mind: NCAA athlete Lia Thomas from the UPenn swim team.
On December 5th, 2021, transgender women’s NCAA Division One athlete Lia Thomas won three events at the Zippy Invitational swim meet. While her times did not actually break any NCAA all-time records, she became the target of weeks of constant attacks in the media, claiming she had an unfair advantage against cisgender women swimmers.
At the time, Lia Thomas was competing according to what was the NCAA’s own regulations requiring her to have undergone a year of testosterone suppression as part of hormone replacement therapy. Yet the NCAA was largely silent as right-wing and TERFs attacked Lia Thomas, despite their stated commitment to nondiscrimination and this media panic that Lia Thomas was crushing the competition.
Well, on January 8th, she came in fifth place at a swim meet, although this induced a new round of panic because headlines read that another transgender person had won the swim meet, and this person was actually a transgender man who was competing as a woman because they had not gone under any kind of hormone replacement therapy and as such, were biologically equivalent hormonally to a cis woman.
The Need for Anti-trans Discrimination Protections in Sports
But nevertheless, Lia Thomas’s victories sent shockwaves across the Internet, including here on YouTube, and on January 19th, a coalition of 17 groups who advocate for the rights of women; the rights of students, teachers, and the LGBT community, including Athlete Ally and the National Center for Transgender Equality (here’s the names on screen) sent a letter to the NCAA asking that they clarify and strengthen their existing transgender nondiscriminationprotections in their Constitution.
Yet the very next day the NCAA, on January 20th, suddenly scrapped any and all transgender nondiscrimination protections in their existing policies, which sent shockwaves through the media, [and] emboldened TERFs and other transphobic groups who had been attacking Lia Thomas and the NCAA for weeks.
The January 2022 NCAA Transgender Policy
So what is the new NCAA policy?
A lot of people compare it to the Olympic policy and discuss how aligning it with the Olympic policy makes sense because a lot of Olympic athletes come from the NCAA. But the policy actually does not align with the Olympics.
As the LGBT organization Athlete Ally wrote about the NCAA’s decision: “The announcement States that the NCAA will align with the newest guidelines for transgender participation as outlined by the U.S. and International Olympic Committees (IOC) and follow a sport-by-sport model. The NCAA release points to the groundbreaking IOC guidelines, however the proposed policy deviates significantly from them by including no safeguards against harmful invasive procedures or treatment (such as mandatory surgeries or visual inspections of athletes’ genitalia); no mention how to work with National Governing Bodies (NGBs) to recognize and prevent harm; and continuing to place the burden on college-aged athletes to prove they do not have unfair advantages simply because of who they are; not complying with the World Professional Association for Transgender Health’s most recent Standards of Care; and indicating no direct stakeholder engagement from transgender and nonbinary athletes themselves.”
With over 85 National Governing Bodies for sports, that means trans people and our allies are going to be fighting for nondiscrimination protections and inclusive policies on dozens of fronts rather than the NCAA having a blanket policy. Equally scary is that this comes at a time when state legislatures are doing everything in their power to bar trans youth from playing sports not just at the NCAA level, but elementary school – like these kids around me in this park, just having fun playing soccer. Or, as they say here in Colombia, fútbol.
NCAA dropping nondiscrimination protections will further embolden the States to attack trans youth. And in 2021 alone, as I mentioned, there were over 30 separate bills proposed by state legislatures, several of which passed [bills] barring trans youth from sports.
Instead of this decision, the NCAA could have engaged with human rights advocates and medical experts in the field of transgender athletes who were already in touch with the NCAA and calling for additional research. But instead it was clear that the NCAA caved to transphobic pressure in the media.
You’ll notice Athlete Ally and the 16 other human rights groups who contacted the NCAA about their policy are saying that transgender participation in high level sports competitions should be based on medical research. They’re not trying to push for trans women who have not had any testosterone suppression to be Division One NCAA athletes. What they’re asking the NCAA, though, to do is protect the human rights of trans athletes; trans athletes shouldn’t be targeted by unethical strip searches, they should be protected from assault and bullying. And trans athletes shouldn’t be treated “guilty until proven innocent,” that they’re trying to get an unfair advantage simply because of their gender identity. Trans athletes should be treated with the same respect and dignity of other athletes.
So, yes, NCAA’s change in policy works against the goals of ending discrimination, and they’ve abandoned the groups who are already working with them, caving to the transphobic pressure of TERFs and groups like the Alliance Defending Freedom.
The TERF/Right-Wing Alliance
And I hate to be a downer right now, but the Alliance Defending Freedom and right-wing groups and TERFs far out match the transgender movement in terms of money, lobbying power, and access to the media.
The Alliance Defending Freedom, an anti-LGBTQ hate group, [which is] also anti-women, also anti-Civil Rights, reported nearly$70 million in revenue in fiscal year 2020. And it’s given tens of thousands, perhaps even millions of dollars, to Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminists.
As an example of what I’m talking about, on January 21st, right after the NCAA changed their rules for trans athletes, the conservative YouTube channel Newsmax platformed Alliance Defending Freedom lawyer Christina Holcomb as an expert on the trans issues. Yet her position is that trans women are “biological males” who should be excluded from women’s sports entirely, and perhaps compete on their own sports leagues (which I’ll address later). They give lip service to supporting trans people, but if you look at the Alliance Defending Freedom’s actual policy positions, their methods are to force trans people into conversion therapy – to force them to no longer be trans.
I’ve done a whole video (which you should check out!) about the harms of conversion therapy. And if you’re in conversion therapy or forced into conversion therapy, what to do?
According to every major medical association in the United States, the science is clear that transgender people exist. We’re part of human diversity, and we deserve trans-affirming health care and to be included in society. Trans people exist in nearly every culture. We can go into lengthy academic and scientific debates about what gender is, how gender is performed, and how gender is different across cultures. And I love those discussions – that’s what I do as a transgender traveler! I’m here in Colombia to learn about the local culture. But that’s not the discussion that organizations like the Alliance Defending Freedom are trying to have.
Myth 1: “Invading” Women’s Sports
Let’s just briefly look at one TERF argument used against trans athletes: the idea that cisgender men would claim to be women and undergo a medical transition to be able to dominate cisgender women in sports. Frankly, this idea is absurd. Medical transition involves permanent, unalterable changes to your body. Taking feminizing hormones also (pro tip) causes erectile dysfunction and possible sterilization.
And as countless women professional athletes have pointed out, women athletes get far less
attention, far less money, far less media coverage, far less respect than male athletes. Everyone knows who Michael Phelps is, but can you name a top Olympic swimmer who’s a woman without Googling them like Australia’s Emma McKeon? No, probably not.
And looking at basketball, considering there’s no “men’s football” or “men’s baseball” leagues in the United States, well, the women’s NBA average salary is $80,000, whereas the average NBA salary is $7 million.
To be crude: what guy would take drugs that would make him grow breasts and shrink his dick and stop getting erections just to make $50,000 on a rookie salary in the WNBA? And I’m sure if this supposed person wasn’t actually a trans woman and were “pretending” to be a woman, as soon as these hormonal changes set in, as soon as their body started changing, they’d experience intense gender dysphoria about having a feminine body that doesn’t match their masculine gender identity. Just look at all the stories by transgender men who experience dysphoria over their bodies.
One great Instagram and Tik Tok account I recommend by a trans man is PinkMantaRay, who talks about the trans-people-in-sports-issue and about what gender dysphoria is like as a trans man.
Myth 2: Segregation is Okay
So now let’s look at another argument that’s been put forward by TERFs and the Alliance Defending Freedom: that trans people should compete in their own leagues.
So today, about 200,000 women’s athletes compete in College sports. Joanna Harper, a researcher and medical physicist, estimates that about 50 are transgender, according to a 2020 New York Times article. Currently there are 358 colleges and universities classified as Division One for the NCAA, meaning that about one out of every seven colleges has an NCAA Division One athlete like Lia Thomas. Hardly enough to form a sports team.
So as you can see, these arguments that trans people should have their own leagues, or that there’s this epidemic of trans people invading women’s sports is totally bogus. And the idea that we should be on our own sports league – not only is it impractical, it’s wrong. It’s segregation. It’s trying to claim separate but equal is okay for transgender people after we already said that that’s not okay on basis of race. I’m not saying that race and gender are the same thing. They have very unique histories. White supremacy is a dominant force in American politics, and I don’t ever want to compare anti-Blackness to anti-Trans. But at the same time, the history of segregation shows us that separate but equal is wrong.
Creating a Moral Panic
So as I discussed in a previous video, “The TERF to Fascist Pipeline,” right-wing groups like
the Alliance Defending Freedom, which are spearheading attacks on trans youth and trans athletes, are also working hard to dismantle Civil Rights protections won by Black Americans, as well as civil rights protections for women, gay, bi, and lesbian people, and all marginalized groups in the United States. Ultimately, the Alliance Defending Freedom, the Heritage Foundation, and right-wing groups are drumming up false outrage about trans women invading women’s spaces and “dominating” women’s sports to drive people down the path of hatred, starting with entry-level transphobia, to Antisemitism, to anti-Blackness, Islamophobia, white supremacy, and, yes, fascism.
Specifically for Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminists, they’re ultimately not concerned about competitiveness. Instead, their champions, like Helen Joyce and Jennifer Bilek, are in line with the book Janice Raymond’s “Transsexual Empire” that wishes to “morally mandate” trans people out of existence.
Supporting Trans Youth
We know that the best way to support trans kids is to give them access to health care, let them participate in activities with peers that match their gender identity. This includes participating in sports, because we want kids to have that experience of having community, camaraderie, friendship, self esteem. And yes, we can talk about competitiveness on high levels like the NCAA Division One. But we’re going to go into a very dark direction if little kids who just want to kick around a soccer ball or fútbol, as they say here, can’t do that.
We have an example of a young kid in Virginia who’s a trans girl who was denied access to a locker room during an active shooter drill. Again, this was a matter of safety. It wasn’t even about sports. But because of this panic about trans people in locker rooms, this kid, if there was an active shooter in the school, she wasn’t allowed to take shelter in a locker room like other kids.
TERFs vs Sharks
So earlier I asked the question: which are more dangerous, Sharks or TERFs? Let’s look at the facts.
This Reef shark, which I swam with in the Caribbean, is not going to harm you.Nor is the Whale Shark, a Nurse Shark, Basking Shark, or most species of sharks, for that matter. The rare shark attack will come from only a select number of species like Tiger Sharks, Bull Sharks, and White Sharks. Yet this hype in the media about shark related deaths is absurd, just like the hype about trans women dominating sports.
There were eight reported deaths related to shark attacks in 2021 around the world, meaning you have a one in a billion or .0000001% chance to die from a shark attack.
So now let’s look at TERFs and people who want to exclude trans kids from accessing healthcare and sports. Statistics from the Trevor Project’s National Survey on LGBTQ Mental Health for Youth found that 60% of trans people had engaged in self harm over the previous year, and 40% considered attempting suicide. And the Trevor Project found in a separate report that 85% of trans youth felt that attacks in the media, like we’ve seen on Lia Thomas, harmed their mental health.
So these legislative attacks on trans kids, these attacks in the media on Lia Thomas and other trans athletes, these have negative effects on kid’s mental health. These kids are engaging in self-harm and there’s a risk of attempting suicide. In fact, according to the 2015 US Trans survey we know that 41% of trans people had attempted suicide in their lives.
So compare a 41% attempted suicide rate to a one in a billion chance that you’re going to die from a shark attack. I believe based on these facts that TERFs are far more dangerous than Sharks. In fact, for years the blog TransAdvocate made this connection with their tongue-in-cheek reporting on TERF week with in-depth coverage of TERFs mirroring Discovery Channel’s Shark Week.
So before I leave please take a moment to like, subscribe, and share – but also, more importantly, find ways you can support trans youth and athletes because they need our help. With the new NCAA regulations, we’re going to have to be lobbying 85 different National Governing Bodies of sports. And that’s going to be a hard fight, but it’s a fight we have to take on because it will literally save transgender lives.
Thank you to all my patrons and everyone who supports these videos. I couldn’t do it without you. So if you can take a moment to check my Patreon out at Patreon.com/KayleyWhalen
I make these videos as a public service, as a transgender advocate, and your support would mean a lot. So to subscribe, visit Patreon.com/KayleyWhalen and share this video – and keep advocating for trans youth. Thank you!
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