By Elizabeth Troutman |
Female athletes will rally to “save women’s sports” from biological male athletes on Thursday.
Current and former NCAA female athletes, coaches, and parents will bring signs and chants outside the 2024 National Collegiate Athletic Association Convention in Phoenix, Arizona, to ask the organization to stop discriminating against female athletes by allowing males to compete in women and girls’ sports.
“Female athletes work our entire lives to compete in sports, only to have the NCAA destroy our even playing field. This devalues female athletes and women in general,” said former NCAA swimming champion and Independent Women’s Forum ambassador Riley Gaines. “Sex-based categories are important for competitive sports just like age classifications and weight categories. We are asking very little of the NCAA. Maintain the fairness necessary for competition and safety.”
The theme of this year’s rally, sponsored by Our Bodies, Our Sports, is “We Won’t Back Down,” reflecting the group’s determination to compel the NCAA to revoke its Transgender Student-Athlete Participation Policy.
The policy allows transgender student-athlete participation for each sport to be determined by the national governing body of that sport. As a result, males who identify as females can participate in women’s sports if they suppress their testosterone for at least one year and achieve levels set by the governing bodies of their particular sport.
Hormone injections do not eliminate the male athletic advantage over females, according to a review of the scientific literature by the Independent Women’s Law Center and the Independent Women’s Forum. Without any male athletic advantage, the participation of males in women’s sports takes away opportunities for women to compete, IWF and IWLC say.
Gaines will be joined by fellow swimmers Paula Scanlan and Kaylee Alons, and volleyball player Macy Petty, to continue to call on NCAA President Charlie Baker to meet with them to hear how they were hurt by men in women’s sports.
“Shame on Charlie Baker for continuing to enforce this discriminatory policy,” said Jennifer C. Braceras, vice president for Legal Policy at Independent Women’s Form and founder of Independent Women’s Law Center. “The NCAA may not be bound by Title IX, but the schools that make up its membership are, and the NCAA has an obligation to help its member schools comply with equal opportunity mandates, not subvert them.”
The athletes, coaches, parents, and sponsor organizations will deliver a new demand letter and petition to the NCAA signed by thousands of female athletes from across the country after the rally.
This event is the fourth Our Bodies, Our Sports event. Previous events include the 2022 rally in Washington, D.C., to mark the 50th Anniversary of Title IX, the 2023 rally at the NCAA Convention in San Antonio, TX, and the 2023 rally at the USA Cycling National Championships in Knoxville, TN.
The Tennessee rally succeeded in pushing Union Cycliste Internationale to bar biological male athletes from competing in the women’s cycling division.
Elizabeth Troutman is a reporter for AZ Free News. You can send her news tips using this link.
