November is set aside for transgender people to raise awareness about the discrimination and violence that the community faces. But have we forgotten the discrimination and dangers that biological females suffer too?
In August, Canadian powerlifter Anne Andres set a record with a final combined score of 597.5kg (about 1,317lb) for her bench press, deadlift, and squat performances. Andres’ total was more than 400lb higher than her closest competitor. Most people would find that unbelievable if not for one critical detail that so many are happy to ignore – Andres was born into a man’s body.
One person who did not ignore Andres’ sex status was April Hutchinson, an Ontario-based female powerlifter who took to X (formerly Twitter) to rally the weightlifting community to action.
“Any woman, man or federation that supports men lifting or competing with women is part of the problem,” Hutchinson said. “They should be ashamed. They are literally helping to erase women’s sports.”
Hutchinson took her wake-up tour to the Piers Morgan Uncensored show, where she slammed the Canadian Powerlifting Union’s (CPU) lack of action, calling it “disheartening and disgusting.”
It’s probably easy to guess how that criticism went down with the Liberal crowd. On November 7, Hutchinson was suspended from competing for two years by the CPU, due to multiple violations of the Code of Conduct and the Social Media Policy.
Before the decision was announced, however, Andres had also taken to social media in a teary-eyed tirade, comparing her pain and suffering to that of an African American being called “the n-word.”
“Let me just ask one simple and open question to those who are deciding to leave me to my own fate through their inaction,” Andres said. "If this other lifter was, say, going after an African American individual and calling them the n-word, which is essentially equivalent to calling a trans woman a man and referring to them as him.”
Martina Navratilova, the 18-time Grand Slam (biological) female tennis champion, weighed in on the conversation with much-needed common sense and sobriety.
“To put the argument at its most basic: a man can decide to be female, take hormones if required by whatever sporting organization is concerned, win everything in sight and perhaps earn a small fortune, and then reverse his decision and go back to making babies if he so desires,” Navratilova said.
“It’s insane and it’s cheating. I am happy to address a transgender woman in whatever form she prefers, but I would not be happy to compete against her. It would not be fair,” she added.
Yet, as unfair and ‘unsportsmanlike’ as it may have been for Andres to smash female weightlifting records, at least the biologically female competition was not being pummeled on the field of dreams, like some rugby players.
Yes, you heard that right. Rugby, one of the most aggressive contact sports in the world, is now allowing transgender females (biological males) to play against the females. For those who fail to appreciate why this is a terrible idea, there are two quick ways to wrap your brain around it. First, if God had wanted men and women to compete against each other on the field of broken bones, concussions, and sometimes even death, then we would see just as many women wanting to participate in male sports as we see men wanting to participate in female sports. But that is simply not the case. In fact, it is exactly the opposite.
Another way to prove that men and women were never meant to play against each other in sport is to simply ask the females who have had the pleasure firsthand.
“I had never been hit like that before, even at the competitive women’s level,” said a female player from Stoney Creek Camels. “There was so much more brute force. There are women who are bigger than him, but no girl hits like that. This is a strong human.”
This transgender female player who the anonymous member of the opposite team was speaking about is known as Ash, “a non-binary person who identifies as female – stands about 5-foot-10 and weighs up to 220 pounds,” as reported by the Toronto Sun.
Incidentally, none of the female players on the opposing team wanted to be named for fear of “not wanting to hurt anybody’s feeling and being labelled a bigot.” But apparently it’s totally fine to risk serious injury and possible death by being forced to participate in a contact sport against a physically stronger male. Will they regret ‘hurting somebody’s feelings’ when they are handicapped for life?
It doesn’t take much imagination to see a train wreck quickly approaching. Those teams in women’s sports that don’t field transgender players (and are on a major losing streak) are going to quickly understand that they are at a serious disadvantage and actively recruit trans players to help even the score. And it’s silly to pretend that there won’t be instances when the whole ‘trans’ part of equation is just pretense to get an unfair advantage – after all, cheating in sports is as old as sports themselves. Nobody likes to lose; worse, nobody likes to wake up in the morning with multiple bruises over their body. This is where things are going to get out of control, to the point where the whole concept of ‘female sports’ will become redundant.
In fact, it is already happening. Last year, University of Pennsylvania swimmer Lia Thomas, who has taken central stage in the debate about transgender inclusion in women’s sports, was beaten by Iszac Henig, a trans male swimmer at Yale University who continued to swim on the women’s team. The obvious question here is: Where is the safe space for biological women in sports? Tragically, what will likely happen is that hundreds if not thousands of young women will quietly opt out of sport altogether. Not only does that deprive these women of the experience that comes with sport, but it will deprive them of scholarship programs to university, or possibly even a trip to the Olympic Games. And they won’t even be allowed to complain about it.
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.