Modern sports are not exempt from controversy — just consider the evolution of equipment and rules, race relations, and politics. But nothing has threatened the future of sports more than transgender integration.
Allowing biological males to compete as females against young women and girls destroys the fundamental concept of what makes athletic competition, specifically girls’ and women’s sports, fair. Allowing an unfair advantage to one class of participants is abhorrent and inexcusable, delegitimizing the integrity of the competition. It is no easy task to reach the high school or collegiate level in any sport, male or female. I know because I was an NCAA Division I swimmer at the University of Minnesota.
I consider swimming a gift. It offered a place where I learned many of life’s lessons: being a graceful winner — and a more graceful loser — the value of hard work, perseverance, working through adversity, and team cohesion. All of these qualities helped build my character and eventually led me to a commission as an officer in the United States Marine Corps.
But if I knew the sport I loved was rigged against me in the form of obsequiousness to wokeism masquerading as fairness, I might never have participated.
This is why the legislation introduced in the Minnesota House is so important. Not only does H.F.12 preserve girls’ sports, it also preserves the dignity and safety of young women and girls who are navigating the insecurities of adolescence and the journey to adulthood. In a time where vagueness is used to shield partisan political narratives and words are weaponized threats against common sense, this cuts to the issue of what matters: keeping girls’ sports fair and safe.
The House bill is a commitment to young women athletes that they deserve a fair playing field in competition as well as locker rooms and training facilities where they can have privacy without fear of a male’s intrusion in a place where girls are the most vulnerable, as my colleague Bill Walsh has explained.
To be clear, ensuring athletes participate in the sport that aligns with his or her sex assigned at birth doesn’t remove anyone’s right to participate in sports. It simply ensures the sanctity and safety of young women athletes. Local CBS affiliate WCCO recently reported on DFL Rep. Leigh Finke’s stating, “It is very clear in our Minnesota Human Rights Act that we do not separate out and remove trans people from our lived experiences of society,” and “I cannot overstate what it feels like to be a member of a community who is seeing our rights removed.”
But no one is taking away trans people’s rights to compete in sports. They are simply relegated to participating as the sex they were assigned at birth. And we are talking about high school sports and athletes. Speaking from experience as a high school athlete, state champion, and a woman, I can attest that this time in a female athlete’s life is crucially formative.
For many, it is the last chance to compete in a formal setting. For others, like myself, it can set the tone for a future in collegiate sports. There is no way to describe the sacrifice that these athletes — and their parents — make for the opportunity to play the sport many have dedicated years of their lives to, except to say that it is a sacrifice and a labor of love. Friendships are forged and dreams are made.
Of course, personal growth is a benefit of participating in sports. I learned the value of hard work, perseverance, determination, fortitude, and how to be a humble winner and graceful loser. But primarily, athletes want to compete, and compete to win or lose fairly. Allowing males to compete against females is preventing competition in a fair environment — one which these young women trained and sacrificed their whole lives to reach. Fairness is the starting point of athletic competition.
So, here we have young men who identify as women allowed to play sports against young women and girls. But identifying as a female doesn’t make you biologically a female. And this has had tragic consequences for girls across the country.
For example, at a Sept. 1, 2022 high school girls’ volleyball game in North Carolina, 17-year-old Payton McNabb suffered a traumatic brain injury, partial paralysis, and a brain bleed after a boy playing on the opposing girls’ team spiked the ball that struck McNabb in the head. This scenario has been repeated with tragic outcomes for young women at high school sporting events across the country.
Subjugating girls to the whims of political ideology that denies basic science and biology is an affront to common sense and decency. After decades of advocating for equal opportunities in sports, including the chance to compete, build camaraderie, and form lifelong bonds with fellow female athletes in a safe environment, Atty. Gen. Keith Ellison, the Minnesota State High School League, and any opposing legislators are now placing girls at a disadvantage, and in physical danger, by opposing this bill. If they truly cared about building better futures and opportunities for Minnesota’s young women and girls, they would pass this bill. If they were honest about protecting female rights and ensuring their safety and well-being, they would support this bill. If they believed girls should be offered the same level playing field as boys and to compete against each other with fairness and in good faith — the same thing previous generations of women and girls fought for for decades with the passage of Title IX — they would support this bill.
They know the right thing to do. Now is the time to stand up and do it.
Rally for Girls’ Sports
One last note: If you want Minnesota to protect girls’ sports, please come to the Capitol steps this Monday, March 3, at 11:00 a.m. to rally alongside Riley Gaines, 12-time NCAA All-American swimmer and girls’ sports advocate.
That afternoon, the House will vote on a crucial bill limiting girls’ sports to biological females only, a commonsense measure that would ensure the safety, fairness, and protection of young girls across the state.
In addition to Riley Gaines, you’ll hear from House Speaker Lisa Demuth (R-Cold Spring), Representative Peggy Scott (R-Andover), Senator Julia Coleman (R-Waconia), former Minnesota Viking Jack Brewer, and prominent attorney Ryan Wilson. I hope to see you there.
