Send This John Oliver Segment to Anyone Still Confused About Trans Athletes
It's the most thoughtful, fact-based explanation you'll find about what's really happening in women's sports
This weekend, John Oliver did something surprisingly rare in mainstream media: he dedicated 42 minutes to a thoughtful, well-researched segment on transgender athletes in sports that cut through the hysteria and political opportunism dominating this conversation.
I've written about this issue before. You can check out my thoughts here.
What makes Oliver's segment so effective is how thoroughly he dismantles the often-cited "evidence" used to justify banning trans athletes. For instance, that talking point about trans athletes winning "900 medals" that gets repeated endlessly on Fox News? Turns out it comes from an unverified website where anyone could submit entries, including poker tournaments and disc golf competitions. And that famous fifth-place swimming trophy that Riley Gaines has built an entire career around? She tied with Lia Thomas for fifth place. That's it. That's the entire controversy.
Perhaps the most revealing part of Oliver's segment is when he connects these sports bans to the larger political strategy at play. As the president of the American Principles Project openly admitted, conservatives "pivoted to the sports issue" after losing on same-sex marriage and bathroom bills because it got people "comfortable with talking about transgender issues." It was never actually about protecting women's sports - it was about finding a more socially acceptable way to attack trans people's existence.
Meanwhile, the same lawmakers who claim to care so deeply about women's athletic opportunities are remarkably silent about the actual issues plaguing women's sports: inadequate facilities, sexual harassment, unequal funding, and lack of media coverage. Kentucky legislators, for instance, rushed to override a veto to ban a single 12-year-old trans athlete from competing but couldn't be bothered to pass a bill protecting young athletes from sexual abuse because... they had dinner reservations.
If you know someone who has sincere questions or concerns about this issue, I strongly recommend sharing this segment with them. It's one of the most comprehensive and accessible breakdowns I've seen that doesn't fall into fearmongering or oversimplification. Oliver manages to acknowledge the genuine complexities at elite levels of sport while highlighting the cruelty of blanket bans that primarily harm children who just want to play with their friends. It's the perfect resource for anyone who wants to understand what's actually happening beyond the inflammatory headlines.
The full segment is worth your time:
Transcript:
We're actually going to start with our main story this week, and it concerns an absolute fixation of the right. Because even as the market crashed in the wake of Trump’s tariffs, Fox News spent a lot of time on this:
[VIDEO CLIP: FOX NEWS ANCHORS]
"A women's fencer is defending her decision to take a knee to protest her trans opponent despite getting disqualified for her forfeit. A female fencer who’s devoted years of her life to the sport was just disqualified. This is the civil rights issue of the hour: women’s sports. Here’s the story that everybody’s going to be interested in. A female fencer stands up for fairness in women’s sports."
Wait, that’s the story that everyone is going to be interested in? Are you sure about that? The story about fencing? And not the one that’s caused the stock ticker in the corner of your screen to go bright red like an inflamed hemorrhoid?
Also, I challenge those anchors to tell me one thing about fencing besides, “Lindsay Lohan did it against herself in The Parent Trap.” I don’t think you can do it.
The issue of trans athletes has become very important to conservatives in general, and Donald Trump in particular. He talked about it at length in his address to Congress and signed an order titled “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports,” which promised to rescind all funds from educational programs that allowed trans women and girls to compete. And at the signing ceremony, he ad-libbed the creepiest compliment possible:
[VIDEO: DONALD TRUMP]
“We’re defending the rights and safety and pride of the American people, including our great, great, great female athletes. What athletes you are, too — I tell you.” (Applause)
“And, you know, I’m not allowed to say this politically. It could end my career. They’re really beautiful people. These are beautiful people. But, you know, like everything else, it’s a little bit different today. You’re not allowed to say that, because if you call a woman or a girl beautiful, that’s the end of your career. But let’s take a chance on it, Mike. Let’s take a chance.”
Okay, to be completely fair to Trump, I will say his understanding of women’s issues is comparable to his understanding of foreign policy, domestic policy, trade, the economy, the concept of consent, human empathy, and all but one of his children’s names.
Trump leads every conversation with a psychosexual energy that makes The White Lotus look like The Teletubbies. Oh, I’m sorry—did the incest storyline bother you? Donald Trump joked about dating his own daughter on The View. He said that on a morning show. At least White Lotus has the decency to air in the evening, right here, on the Incest Network.
Trump’s order has already prompted the NCAA to institute a ban on trans athletes participating in women’s sports. But he’s not done. He’s also trying to pull $175 million in funding from UPenn for allowing one trans athlete to compete three years ago. And when Maine indicated it would resist his ban, he threatened to cut off all federal funding—despite the whole state apparently having a grand total of two girls competing in girls’ sports.
And I know you might be thinking, “Okay, but in Maine, two kids is like half the kids, right?” But it’s actually not! They’ve got more!
This issue is an obsession for Republicans. Last year, they spent over $116 million just on TV ads featuring trans athletes. And the relentless focus on this over the years has had a meaningful impact. One poll shows that more than six in ten adults say trans girls and women should not be allowed to compete in girls’ and women’s sports, including at the high school and youth levels. Twenty-five states have now imposed bans on them competing in schools.
Even Gavin Newsom—pictured here as the villain in a Ryan Murphy production—recently said he thought trans athletes being allowed to participate in women’s sports is “deeply unfair,” without really elaborating on what he meant by that.
And for trans kids impacted by these bans, who just want to play sports with their friends, it’s been hard. As this 15-year-old girl in New Hampshire explains:
[VIDEO: TRANS GIRL]
“It’s been stressful and difficult. Um… it’s been annoying. I felt very annoyed and upset that this has been happening, and that it’s been happening toward a vulnerable community—like the trans community.”
Yeah, and honestly, “annoying” is an understatement there. “Annoying” is what you say when your friend is late, or your Wi-Fi is spotty, or when you’re a chicken minding your own business and suddenly you’re on the news. Hanging out eating dirty snow with seven or eight close friends, and then—boom—all of a sudden, the AP is doing a close-up of your feet.
That is annoying.
Now, I know people have strong opinions on this subject. In our post-election show, I said:
“There are vanishingly few trans girls competing in high school sports anywhere. And even if there were more, trans kids—like all kids—vary in athletic ability. And there is no evidence that they pose any threat to safety or fairness.”
After that show aired, J.K. Rowling herself issued the single longest tweet I’ve ever seen in my life, in which she claimed, among other things, that I am “happy to watch females suffer injury, humiliation, and the loss of sporting opportunities to bolster an elitist post-modern ideology.”
And honestly, it feels a bit weird to catch that much heat from the creator of Harry Potter, especially when I clearly look like what would have happened to him if they’d just left him in that cupboard for the rest of his life.
Now, I stand by everything I said in that episode. But I will concede that this subject is more complicated than “people should just use the bathroom that corresponds with their gender identity.” And since trans participation in sports seems, for some reason, to be at the center of our politics right now, it felt like tonight might be a good time to talk about it at real length.
And in doing so, we’re going to try and explain a few things:
What the facts can actually tell us about trans athletes regarding competition and safety;
Where much of this seems to be coming from, because it didn’t crop up out of nowhere;
And where things might be going.
Let’s start by acknowledging: many people do have good-faith questions about this, even if they’re asking them a little clumsily. Here’s an example of one of those questions about fairness—coming from a less-than-ideal source:
[VIDEO: LANCE ARMSTRONG]
“Let’s say Serena’s in her prime...”
“...and a trans—you know, and who knows, we’ll make up the person, right? So, you know, that’s something. Let’s not make up the person. Let’s say that Rafa Nadal, you know, has some issue, or—you know, wants to transition and just—and wins the Wimbledon final. Or, you know, somebody wins the 100-meter dash at the Olympics. I just—I think that’s a—I think that’s a net negative.”
Now, clearly…
...when it comes to questions of right and wrong in sports, Lance Armstrong might be the last person you'd call—just after the 1919 Chicago White Sox and the ear chunk that Mike Tyson bit off.
But to be fair, I can see how, at the most elite level of sports, an instantaneous switch like that would confer an advantage. The thing is—it hasn’t happened. And for what it’s worth, in tennis, the WTA already has guidelines for trans inclusion, requiring athletes to maintain strict hormone levels for at least two years before competing, with processes for dispute resolution if necessary.
So they’re already thinking about this. And I presume they’ll continue to do so.
The thing is, hypotheticals like that circulate constantly—and often center around someone transitioning solely to gain a competitive advantage. But, as this trans researcher points out, that is an absurd proposition:
[VIDEO: JOANNA HARPER]
“Trans women don’t transition for sports. No—no one has ever said, ‘Oh yeah, I think I’d like to be a woman so I can do well in women’s sports.’ When you go through a gender transition, you lose so many things in life.
My own mother said she never wanted to speak to me again. I lost friends, family, got divorced...
You’d go through all of that just to win a medal in sports? No.
Trans people transition because it’s the only way that we can live happily.”
Right. No one says, “I’m going to transition just for the sake of sports.” The same way no one says, “Could you please send me more messages about two-factor authentication?” Or, “When I walk down the aisle, I’d like a solo violin cover of Bawitdaba by Kid Rock.” That is just a made-up person.
Still, let’s engage with the underlying premise of that question from the world’s most famous sports cheater: that those assigned male at birth are automatically going to have certain immutable physical advantages.
That gets raised constantly—which is why we’re going to spend most of our time talking about trans women and girls, even though, in five states, these bans impact trans boys in schools, too.
It is obviously true that, on average, cisgender men and post-pubescent boys have some specific athletic performance advantages—though the relative size of that advantage also depends on the sport and the event. In swimming, for instance, male athletic performance advantage is roughly 13% in the 50-meter freestyle, but less than 6% in the 1,500-meter free. Which is still clearly significant.
But in general, there’s a lot of overlap in the average performance ranges of men and women. Basically, it’s not the case that any man is going to be stronger or more athletic than every woman—which is sometimes what gets implied here, including by Donald Trump, who brought Riley Gaines, the former college swimmer who’s become one of the most prominent voices on this issue, on stage to say this:
[VIDEO: DONALD TRUMP]
“Just to show you how ridiculous it is—look at me.
(AUDIENCE LAUGHS)
I’m much bigger and much stronger than her. There’s no way she could beat me in swimming.
Do we all agree?”
I don’t agree—but I would like to see it. I would like to see the 78-year-old former president try to swim in water against a former Division I swimmer. I’d like to bear witness to that event—and whatever happens afterward as a result of it occurring.
But crucially, when it comes to trans athletes who’ve medically transitioned, studies of cis athletes are not necessarily relevant. A lot of medical gender-affirming treatments, like hormone therapy, have a meaningful impact on body and hormone composition.
So the question then becomes: what do those impacts mean for athletic performance?
We spoke to scientists on all sides of this issue, and the one thing they actually agree on is that, in part because the number of trans athletes is so small, the body of research specifically about them is extremely limited.
There are a bunch of studies comparing specific anatomical features, like muscle mass, in women who transition—but which don’t directly speak to their impact on athletic performance. We were only able to find twelve studies that actually tested trans adult women’s physical fitness in a lab or other performance scenario.
Eight of those had a sample size of less than twenty, and two were of a single athlete.
And look, I don’t have any scientific experience, even though I look like a cross between a scientist and the profoundly sick mice he’s studying, but you probably shouldn’t draw broad conclusions off a sample size of one.
Those twelve studies generally find that medically transitioning does impact trans women’s performance—but they disagree on how, or by how much.
That researcher you saw earlier actually published the only longitudinal study to date of multiple athletes, studying the impact of transitioning on eight long-distance runners. She found that after at least a year on hormone therapy, their race times turned out to be more athletically similar to those of cisgender women than cisgender men—but she herself will tell you the study was limited, and its conclusions were nuanced.
Here she is explaining what we do and don’t know at this point:
[VIDEO: JOANNA HARPER]
“It is undoubtedly true that trans women will maintain advantages in some sports—probably not so much in endurance sports, but in size and strength sports.
Trans women will also have some physiological disadvantages.
Our larger frames are now being powered by reduced muscle mass and reduced aerobic capacity, and that can lead to disadvantages in terms of quickness, recovery, endurance—things that maybe aren’t quite as obvious as being bigger and stronger.”
Right. Bigger and stronger bodies are not automatically advantaged in every scenario.
I mean, put The Rock in a pure barre class and see what happens. I mean, we know what would happen: he’d take a video of himself, caption it “Mad respect to these mamas. Everyone go see Moana 2,” try to use it to sell his tequila, and then eat 13,000 pancakes and drink a cow. We know what would happen.
But the degree of difference here matters—because we already expect a certain amount of difference in athletics. Taller basketball players are expected to compete against shorter ones. Faster soccer players compete against slower ones. Michael Phelps was allowed to compete with other swimmers despite being part dolphin.
And crucially, none of the studies I’ve mentioned so far bear much relevance to what these new laws target—which is youth sports, usually of all ages.
And the research there is even more scant.
We have no research about how being trans or undergoing gender-affirming treatment impacts athletic performance in teens. And when it comes to kids before the onset of puberty, I could talk about studies showing subtle performance differences between boys and girls—but I’d argue when you’re talking about seven-year-olds, as a practical matter, that’s a point where lots of school sports are already co-ed anyway. And a key difference between competitors on a field can come down to whether a kid was born in October or April.
And at this point, you might be saying, “Well, I don’t need to wait for scientific research. This is all common sense, and I know what I’ve seen online.”
But a lot of what you’ve seen may not be quite what you think it is—both when it comes to trans athletes’ impact on competition or safety.
And let’s start with competition, because there’s a big number that tends to get thrown around. Listen to this:
[VIDEO: FOX NEWS AND NEWSMAX ANCHORS]
“A shocking report from the United Nations states over 600 female athletes have lost close to 900 medals to transgender opponents.”
“Female athletes have lost nearly 900 medals to transgender athletes.”
“You have the United Nations study come out not long ago about 900 medals for females that ended up going to transgender athletes.”
Yeah. 900 medals. That is a go-to statistic. It was even cited on the floor of the Senate during debate over a trans sports ban—and featured prominently in J.K. Rowling’s latest tome.
But we got curious about that number, so we looked at the report. And it turns out, first, it wasn’t produced by the UN. It was submitted to it by a special rapporteur, who herself said its findings do not necessarily represent those of the United Nations.
And if you go online to the footnote it cites and click on it, you get sent to this website: SheWon—where anyone could submit an instance of a cis woman losing to a trans woman anywhere in the world, in any competition, big or small.
The author of that report insisted to us, “I did not rely only on this source.” But I will say—the numbers she cites match what was on the site back then. And they included competitions all the way back to 2001, and down to the level of a fun run in Topeka, Kansas and an Irish dance competition, as well as activities where gender confers no advantage—like poker.
Also, over a hundred entries on the list are in the field of disc golf.
Which, if you’re unfamiliar, involves frisbees being thrown into this thing—some kind of Guantanamo for birds.
And as if that weren’t enough, the way they got to that 900 number has to do with how they counted the wins. Because on the list, one trans woman finishing first counts as three denied medals. The logic being: the second place finisher should’ve come first, the third should’ve come second, and the fourth should’ve come third.
And look, some will argue it doesn’t matter how minor the competition—those women were still unfairly deprived of their rightful place. But even some of those women don’t feel that way.
This one, a disc golfer, has publicly stated she’s “happy to see trans people in disc golf.”
And an amateur cyclist named Kristen Chalmers is actually on the list twice—because, for some reason, a single race she lost is on there under two different spellings of her name. She came in third behind two trans women, but she’s made it clear they are her friends, and she has no problem competing with them:
[VIDEO: KRISTEN CHALMERS]
“I think that it would be ridiculous to say that my life is being ruined by getting third in this.
It would be ridiculous to sacrifice other people getting to have fun in a sport that they love on the weekends just so that I could say I was the state champion.”
Yeah, you can tell she’s not upset because:
She’s giggling through that interview; and
That is a very happy-looking photo.
I have—this is true—never once smiled that freely in my life. Look how joyful they are. That looks like an ad for cycling, or for having friends, or honestly, just for mud.
So for all the talk of how trans women are so dominant they’ll spell the end of women’s sports, the number people keep citing to prove that has, I would argue, a pretty big thumb on the scale.
And even the famous individual cases are sometimes missing a lot of context.
You may have seen this photo of two trans high school runners in Connecticut coming first and second at a state track meet. They were the subject of a lawsuit claiming, among other things, that their participation wasn’t just unfair—it threatened to deprive their competitors of scholarships.
But you should know: one of the plaintiffs actually beat one of those girls twice, just two days after the suit was filed. Also, most of the plaintiffs ended up getting scholarships—while these two did not.
But the most famous example is probably Lia Thomas.
As you probably know, she’s a swimmer who initially competed on the University of Pennsylvania men’s team—including one year while undergoing hormone therapy as part of her medical transition, per the NCAA’s rules at the time.
She made national headlines after she won the NCAA championship in the women’s 500 freestyle. She got a good time in that race—her best of the season. Although it was also a full nine seconds behind the record set by Katie Ledecky.
It was also the only race she won at that meet.
She came in eighth in the 100 freestyle. And in what’s weirdly her most consequential race, she tied for fifth in the 200 freestyle with Riley Gaines, who catapulted to conservative stardom off the back of that race.
And I will let Riley herself tell you the story of how Lia Thomas and the NCAA wronged her:
[VIDEO: RILEY GAINES]
“I look up at the board—before I even looked at my name, I looked at Thomas’s name, and I saw the number five. And I look beside my name, and there’s a five. The NCAA official looks at Thomas and myself and says, ‘Great job, but you guys tied, and we only have one trophy. So we’re going to give this trophy to Lia.’
Thomas held the trophy for fifth place. Gaines held the one for sixth.
They told me when pictures were being taken, Thomas had to have the trophy, which just reduced it down to a photo op.
I felt so belittled. I felt so betrayed.”
Okay. So a few things there.
First, that’s a story about how Lia Thomas prevented Riley Gaines from getting fifth place… instead of fifth place.
Second, those trophies look absolutely identical.
Third, yes—it was a photo op in the sense that everybody arranged themselves for the purpose of taking a photo.
And while we’re talking about photo ops—I don’t know, man, you were on stage at CPAC so an objectively drownable man could announce that he’d beat you in a race. That’s about as photo oppy as it’s ever going to get.
So just so we’re clear—Lia Thomas didn’t take anything from Riley Gaines. In fact, you could argue she gave a lot to her, as Gaines later decided to forego dental school in order to become an activist and speaker. She now has her own advocacy center and has personally lobbied multiple state legislatures for bans—all to address the “threat” posed to women’s sports by a woman who swam exactly as fast as she did, to the literal hundredth of a second.
So from the 900 medals, to the scholarships these girls did not get, to the most famous fifth-place finisher in human history, the competition argument is already a lot weaker than it tends to get presented.
So what about safety?
Well, first: in plenty of sports—like track and swimming—there is no safety threat, because they’re not contact sports. But in others, like basketball and volleyball, there clearly is some amount of contact, either with another body or with a ball.
But even there, the big anecdotes that get thrown around tend to be more complicated.
The most famous example concerns Peyton McNabb, a three-sport high school athlete who was hit in the face by a spike during a volleyball match. She suffered injuries, including a concussion, and started speaking out against the policies that allowed the trans player who spiked the ball to play.
The video of her getting hit often makes the rounds in these debates, and she told her story to the North Carolina state legislature before they implemented their ban. She also attended Trump’s address to Congress and appeared in a video about the incident produced by an activist group for which she and Riley Gaines are now ambassadors:
[VIDEO: PEYTON MCNABB]
“A couple years ago, I was severely injured in a high school volleyball game by a male on the opposing team, leaving me with permanent injuries that the doctors don’t know if I’ll ever be able to recover from. Because of my career-ending injury, I was no longer able to perform the way I had in the past.
Progressive gender ideology being pushed so harshly is exactly the root of why this was allowed to happen to me.
If it wasn’t pushed so harshly, this could have been 100% avoided.”
Okay, I’ll say this: unlike holding up a trophy with a “6” on it for 40 seconds, a concussion is genuinely traumatic.
Though for what it’s worth, she did go on to play softball in the spring and did pretty well, judging by her school posting this image about her making the all-conference team, and a local paper noting she helped her team to a 5–0 start.
And I’m not saying she wasn’t injured or that it didn’t have some impact on her performance. But a lot of the groups heavily pushing this story seem to be overselling it—including choosing to title that video “Kill Shot: How Peyton McNabb Turned Tragedy Into Triumph.”
Because “Kill Shot” is not a good title for a teenage girl who is very much alive and talking to a camera. “Kill Shot” is either a movie where Keanu Reeves and Ana de Armas—opposing spies and devastating marksmen—fall in love, or a hunting reality show that gets canceled after its host, Donald Trump Jr., is mauled by a moose in heat.
And that’s not the only volleyball-related story that’s been oversold.
Last year, there was a controversy over a trans player for San Jose State University. Other teams forfeited games rather than compete with her, and one of her own teammates joined a lawsuit to stop her from playing.
But watch as this story mentions something at the end that puts a bit of an asterisk on that teammate’s argument:
[VIDEO: NEWS SEGMENT]
“When asked about how and why she felt unsafe, Schleser said:
‘The height that the person can jump is so much higher—and honestly, higher for a man. It’s insane. And then the strength behind the ball when they’re swinging is also just so much more powerful.’
But—her transgender teammate’s stats don’t appear to give the Spartans a dramatic upper hand. The San Jose State women’s volleyball team is ranked 119th nationally.”
Wow. You must be in a very competitive league, since it sounds like you’ve got one of the Avengers on your team. And yet somehow, you’re still only ranked 119th.
That lawsuit initially claimed that the player’s spikes were estimated to be traveling upwards of 80 miles an hour—a speed, by the way, that would make her as powerful as some of the hardest-hitting men’s volleyball players in history.
But when ESPN used camera calibration software to analyze video of five of her spikes—including ones that went viral for being “dangerous”—they averaged around 50 miles per hour.
Which is fast—but it’s also a full speed limit in the suburbs slower than what the lawsuit initially claimed.
And look—they’ve since amended that lawsuit, deleting the “80 miles per hour” line, telling us it was a mistake and that they meant to say “60” instead. Though notably, they only did that after ESPN published its report.
The point is: her spikes were nowhere near record-setting—which may be why she didn’t rank in the top 150 in hitting percentage in the NCAA.
And look—some trans kids are going to injure their opponents the same way any kid will. And concussions are horrible—though they’re also not uncommon in youth sports, with between 1–2 million happening every year.
Even in the wake of Peyton McNabb’s injury, two coaches whose teams had played against the trans player for the previous four years spoke up at a school board meeting to say they were happy to keep doing so. One reportedly told the meeting:
“Every time a student plays, there’s an inherent risk of injury,”
and that she’d seen cis girls hit the ball harder than the one in the video.
The other coach asked:
“If we’re slated to play a team with a player who is 100% girl, and she hits the ball harder than the player in question—should that game be forfeited?”
And that’s the thing: the standard can’t be “no trans kid ever injures someone,” because that’s an impossible standard.
And yes—if trans kids were injuring cis kids at much higher rates, then we could have a safety concern to address. But there’s no evidence that’s the case.
And at this point, it’s worth asking: what is really behind all this vitriol? Because again, I do believe that some speaking against trans participation are genuinely concerned about women’s sports. And the truth is, at the elite levels of competition, this isn’t a cut-and-dry issue.
But in many other cases, the opposition comes from a much more toxic place. It’s not just about denying trans women the right to play—it’s about denying them the right to exist.
Mike Johnson basically said as much after the House passed its ban on trans athletes, when he said this:
[VIDEO: MIKE JOHNSON]
“We know from Scripture and from nature that men are men and women are women, and men cannot become women.”
That’s right, Mike. As Scripture tells us: men are men and women are women… and God is His own son, and some mothers are virgins, and some mothers-in-law are pillars of salt, and daughters are sex partners, and colorful coats are dream interpreters, and brothers are murderers, but also backup husbands, and babies can be for splitting in half, and water is wine.
Now, the anti-inclusion camp objects to being called hateful, bigoted, or intolerant—usually right before or right after saying something most people would consider qualifies.
Here’s Riley Gaines doing just that:
[VIDEO: RILEY GAINES]
“I don’t want to be considered a bigot or a transphobe or all of those labels. There’s no hate in my heart.
But me, myself personally, I don’t actually think this person is a woman. I don’t actually think this person is a female.
Therefore, when I say ‘she,’ I feel like I’m going against my moral compass.”
Yeah—but it turns out there’s a lot of distance between “I don’t want to be considered a transphobe” and “I don’t want to be a transphobe.” Even greater than the distance between you and first place in that race you make such a big deal about.
The thing is… this current uproar is rooted in a very intentional political strategy by the right to find a new issue after losing the war over same-sex marriage.
Conservatives’ embrace of this issue came after the failure of so-called “bathroom bills” around the country, which were widely criticized.
The president of the American Principles Project—a socially conservative advocacy group—has openly said:
“We pivoted to the sports issue, and it’s been wildly successful.”
He even explained the reason for that, arguing:
“What it did was, it got opponents of the LGBT movement comfortable with talking about transgender issues.”
And he’s kind of right about that—because it does seem like, right now, you can basically say anything you want about trans people, as long as you tag on “in sports” at the end:
“I don’t think trans women should be allowed in sports.”
“I don’t think trans women are women… in sports.”
But it is noticeable just how fast the “in sports” part can drop off once people feel that permission has been granted. To the point that some leading voices in this movement are now circling back to bathroom bans—an issue that, a decade ago, people felt was a bridge too far.
Last year, for instance, Peyton McNabb tweeted a video of herself confronting a trans woman, with the caption:
“A man using the girls’ bathroom at Western Carolina University. Unreal.”
Which is really nasty. And for the record: ambushing strangers just minding their own business is not what girls’ bathrooms are for.
Girls’ bathrooms are for gassing each other up, making best friends in 30 seconds, complimenting tops, tucking in tags, and zipping up dresses—while one girl says, “OMG, that lipstick looks so good on you,” and the other says, “30% off at Sephora right now.” And the first girl says, “Like, now?” and the second goes, “Yeah, I went yesterday,” and the first one’s like, “You’re my hero. I’ve been looking for a nude that works with my blotchy skin tone,” and the other says, “Girl, stop it. I would kill for those freckles. You know people are buying them now.” And the first is like, “You’re right—we gotta be loving ourselves,” and the second one says, “We absolutely do.”
That is what girls’ bathrooms are for.
I am told. I have no idea.
Put your fucking phone away and build some community, Peyton.
And the reason this has been an easier sell for the right is that it’s possible to frame all of this as being about protecting women and girls.
Although—if that’s truly the aim—there’s reason for them to feel a lot less safe thanks to these bills. Because in practice, they can encourage adults to police the bodies of literal children.
That has happened.
In Florida, a trans kid was kicked off a team after an investigation which resulted in a report about her that was more than 500 pages long—and included investigators asking three girls on her volleyball team if they’d ever seen her undressed.
And in Utah, the parents of a girl who was not trans were horrified when a local member of the State Board of Education felt empowered to do this:
[VIDEO: NEWS SEGMENT]
“Utah State Board of Education member Natalie Klein posted this picture with the caption:
‘Girls’ basketball...’ The couple described their daughter—whose image news outlets blurred—as a tomboy.‘She cut her hair short because that’s how she feels comfortable. She wears clothes that are a little baggy. She goes to the gym all the time, so she’s got muscle.’
They said their family is rallying around their daughter. They had a message for other families experiencing bullying:
‘I want all the kids to know that it’s okay to just be who they are.’”
That is awful. And I hope it goes without saying—but random adults should not be publicly interrogating the gender of children on Facebook.
People shouldn’t be on Facebook at all unless they are:
A. locked in a bidding war for a barely used set of end tables, or
B. trying to figure out if a family friend died or if they’re just intimately posting about praying.
Those are the only two acceptable uses of Facebook left.
But obviously, the bulk of the damage here is being done to trans kids.
Because one thing we do know for sure is that, for all kids, the benefits—physiological, social, and emotional—of participating in school sports teams and athletics are wide-ranging. And to hear trans kids themselves tell it, participation can be especially important to their sense of community and self.
[VIDEO: TRANS ATHLETES]
“I love track because I feel like I’m part of a second family. It’s like another bond that you experience.”
“This has helped me so much. Being able to be part of a sport and part of a team is such an incredible, amazing experience for me.”
“Without football, I don’t quite know if I would still be here. Because it’s given me a sense of belonging.
It’s taken away the spotlight on the fact that I am transgender.
And it’s just allowed me to be a boy. And it’s allowed me to be a kid.”
That is a really moving thing to hear. And if you’re experiencing a weird sensation after that clip that you can’t quite place—it’s because it was nice. It was happy kids talking about how they’re able to be themselves.
And you don’t usually get nice things on this show.
Which at this point is honestly mainly dense statistics and facts and occasional Pikachu porn.
Being trans can mean seeing your body as a barrier to living life as your authentic self—especially when you’re young, and especially in social situations.
And it’s not even necessarily about being good at sports. Because for all the focus on a handful of high-performing athletes, it is helpful to remember: lots of trans kids—like any kids—are fucking terrible at sports.
That teenager you just saw, Ember, was a backup catcher who said:
“I’m mediocre at best.”
And her mom goes even further:
[VIDEO]
INTERVIEWER: “How would you describe Ember’s, um, athletic prowess?”
MOM: “There really isn’t much.”
INTERVIEWER: “How about any home runs?”
MOM (laughing): “No. She’s never had a home run in her life.”
Wow. That is a supportive mom, making it very clear she will protect trans kids—but only to a point.
And I love the honesty there. Athletic prowess? That’d be a negative. Home runs? Hard no. I’m going to answer your question with a direct, accurate hit—something my daughter could frankly only dream of.
So yeah—Ember is not great at softball. But she wanted to play anyway. And she met all of her state’s requirements to do so, including undergoing at least a year of hormone therapy.
But as soon as she was approved, the state started moving to implement a ban. And when she testified against it, she dropped in a little extra piece of info:
[VIDEO: EMBER TESTIFYING]
“Others have said that I should just play baseball with the boys. In many ways, this would be easier. I wouldn’t have to go through the time-consuming and embarrassing process of submitting intimate medical details to the state.
Also, the boys at my school have two beautiful fields to play on. Most years, our softball team has to cancel half of our games because our old field has no drainage.
But the fact is that, for me, playing on a boys’ team would be a lie.”
Yeah. That makes sense. And you know—it says something that people seem more concerned about a trans girl on the field than they do about the field itself turning into a swimming pool half the time.
And I realize I’m taking a risk by saying the words “swimming pool” out loud, because if you say that phrase three times, Riley Gaines shows up, ties for fifth, and then deadnames everyone in a 50-mile radius.
Unfortunately, though, Ohio banned trans athletes anyway.
And that insistence on aggressively legislating around a handful of trans kids—while neglecting much bigger systemic issues around youth sports—just isn’t a one-off.
Take Kentucky.
Three years ago, they passed one of these bans—even though at the time, there was just one known trans athlete, a 12-year-old, competing in schools there. The governor, to his credit, vetoed it.
But the legislators would not let it rest, because on the second-to-last day of the session, they voted to override his veto, with one member doing so with real regional theater energy:
[VIDEO]
“Veto of Senate Bill 83—gentleman from McCracken.”
“Mr. Speaker, I move for final passage of Senate Bill 83, the veto of the governor notwithstanding.”
Yeah—they felt so strongly about protecting young female athletes, darkest-timeline Drew Carey here was willing to step in.
But the urgency on display there notably didn’t apply to other issues concerning youth athlete safety.
Because last year, an investigation revealed a long-standing pattern of sexual abuse in youth sports in Kentucky. It pointed out a bill that might have helped prevent that—this one—which would’ve made it harder for school personnel, including coaches who’d been accused of misconduct, to move from district to district.
It’s been called the most comprehensive bill to address the issue.
Unfortunately, it stalled out in the legislature for an infuriating reason: it made it through both chambers and only needed a procedural vote to be sent to the governor to sign.
But it just sat there.
And on the last day of the session, it still hadn’t passed. And then this happened:
[VIDEO]
“The members are hungry…”
“...and we quite possibly have considered the last bill of the session. However, I’m not 100% sure that that is the case. So out of an abundance of caution, we’re going to recess… until the call of the chair.”
Yeah. They fucked off to dinner.
And guess what? They never came back to vote.
So it seems this is how the Kentucky State House works: When there is one kid who wants to play field hockey, it’s Pearl Harbor. But when there’s a long-standing pattern of sexual abuse, it’s, “Sorry, we’ve got a 6 p.m. reservation at The Cheesecake Factory.”
And for those who’ve played girls’ sports, this sudden interest from lawmakers is a little hard to take—given that for so long, it’s meant putting up with constant slights and indignities. From worse playing fields, to smaller locker rooms, to creepy coaches no one will do anything about, to always having to play your games early while the 8 p.m. boys’ game gets treated like the main event.
I cannot tell you how many times multiple writers who worked on this story—and who played women’s sports—brought that last point up.
And now we seem to be hell-bent on adding to all that the fear that, if girls get too short a haircut or go to the gym too much, a stranger on Facebook is going to start “just asking questions.”
And look—this is the part of the show where I usually talk about what to do. But a lot of this is currently out of our hands.
When it comes to state-level bans, thankfully, court orders are blocking enforcement of them in all of these states. And courts are also going to have to weigh in on Trump’s executive order, which some states have admirably resisted.
None more memorably than Maine, whose governor had this standoff with Trump:
[VIDEO: WHITE HOUSE]
TRUMP: “I understand Maine... Is Maine here? The governor of Maine?”
(AUDIENCE MURMURS)
GOVERNOR: “We’re down here.”
TRUMP: “Are you not going to comply with it?”
GOVERNOR: “I’m complying with state and federal laws.”
TRUMP: “Well, I’m—we are the federal law. You better do it. You better do it, because you’re not going to get any federal funding at all if you don’t.”
GOVERNOR: “See you in court.”
Yes! You get it, Maine! You get it!
And you know what? I take back everything mean I’ve ever said about you, Maine. Like that you’re lobster-stuffed lighthouse perverts the rest of the Northeast loves to forget.
I still broadly believe that to be true—but I’m not going to say it out loud anymore.
Because that is honestly heartening to me.
As is the fact that when Republicans tried to pass a bill that would cause a nationwide ban on trans participation in sports, it failed in the Senate—after every single Democrat voted against it.
And it’s been inspiring to see some of these trans kids’ teammates coming out hard against the way their friends are being treated.
For instance, in Florida—where that trans girl was kicked off her team thanks to, again, an investigation that was more than 500 pages long—kids at her school staged a walkout in protest.
And one of her teammates went on the local news and didn’t hold back:
[VIDEO: JORDAN CAMPBELL]
“Her argument is about fairness in sports—how she probably could have helped us win in ways, or like…
It’s about fairness and equalness in sports. But like—how about fairness among humans?
Just us as humans?
Because right now, she’s not being treated like a human.”INTERVIEWER: “If she were here and you could say something to her, what would you say?”
“How much I love her.
And I—I’m always there for her. Genuinely. As a human. Like...
I do. Like, I love her so much. And she deserves to be treated just like everybody else.”
Yeah. She’s right. She’s completely right. She just encapsulated the argument I’ve been trying to make for over half an hour, but with a vibe that’s both more emotional and also substantially more chill.
So first—thank you for that, Jordan.
And second—sorry to everyone else, because now we’re going back to my energy, which we all know is significantly worse.
And look—for the final time, I will concede: there are degrees to which this issue is meaningfully complicated. But I’d also argue those complications are at the elite levels of specific sports.
And we can have conversations about what “elite” means and where exactly to draw that line. We can engage in good-faith debate about policies that balance competition and inclusion.
But it is ironic that, at the highest levels, some sporting associations are still being thoughtful and deliberate about this—while we are passing blanket bans for elementary schools.
Which is brutal, because you’ve seen how much sports mean to the kids who play them. Taking that away is not a harmless act. Not for those kids—or the many others you haven’t heard from tonight.
Some of whose stories we couldn’t even show you, because the environment for trans kids is so fucking toxic right now, they asked us not to draw attention to them for their safety.
So if you are someone who is saying, “This is just about the integrity of competition”—and for a lot of the loudest people pushing this, I don’t think it is—but if that’s the case for you, then I do acknowledge: we’re going to disagree about some things.
But the one thing I would ask of you is that you recognize the ugliness of how this issue gets discussed, and how it’s being cynically used by some to advance the eradication of trans people generally.
To get back to what they “know from Scripture”... that trans people are a myth.
You know—the same scripture that tells us the devil is an unemployed angel, and hair is for foot-washing or super strength, and two fish and some bread is a catering order, and boats are emergency zoos.
Thanks be to God.
And just to be clear: I’m not happy to watch women experience injury, humiliation, and a loss of sporting opportunities.
But that includes trans women and kids—and they seem to be getting hurt the most right now.
There are much bigger issues regarding women’s sports that we should actually be addressing. And maybe that could be what lawmakers prioritize.
Because for so many who are loudly claiming they’re going to bat for women’s sports—if I may paraphrase the single most honest mom of all time—so far, they’ve never hit a home run in their fucking life.
As I was watching this, I was thinking back to all the times you've written on this topic. I was really glad to see him dedicate over 40 minutes to the subject!
Good on him. Normie democrats of a certain breed seem susceptible to this line of attack, but I know he's widely watched.