Ivy League Parent Opens Up About Pain and Shock Met During Lia Thomas Controversy

This is just unspeakably sad for women’s sports. No amount of linguistic contrivance, surgical mutilation, hormonal suppression, or for that matter, wishful thinking, is going to change someone with XY Chromosomes into a woman.

Lia is taking advantage of 10 years of male puberty; it provides a far bigger boost in power-sports, the sprints, as opposed to distance events.
The gap bt males and females in the sprints is
13+%. Meanwhile, the gap in the 1650y is just 8.8%.
The gap in a punching motion is … 150%!! So of course Lia would gravitate away from the distance events that used to define her, where she has competed all her life, towards the shorter-distances and sprints.
It’s another reason why we say Lia’s participation in “WOMEN’s” sports is not fair.

We need to keep fighting. If you start a petition we can get some leverage. I’m so stunned by the ignorance and we must protect these girl swimmers. It’s like having a predator in their space.

I am a Women’s Swimming All- American, and graduated in 1991. My daughter is also a Women’s Swimming All- American, who will compete against a “Woman” with a penis who swam on the Men’s team for 3 years in college.
My own Mother spoke openly when I was a young girl about how unfair it was that Women couldn’t compete in sports. There were not many of any Women’s sports teams in college.
Women Sports Matter!
Please consider these Women who train so hard and every month get their period with cramps, nausea and diarrhea. They continue to train hard, but have a disadvantage to a transitioning man to woman who has never had a period and has had testosterone running through her/his body throughout the entirety of his/her life. We don’t condone steroids why is it ok to have a transgender swimming with elevated levels of testosterone swim against other Women in Sports.
Protect Women’s Sports! Women Sports Matter!

He’s like a school yard bully picking on girls!

What really needs to happen, is every swimmer should refuse to take part in protest, any race that is unfair, plain and simple! What Total BS! Some sports writer wrote that the swimmer in question, as a male team member in previous seasons, was just average and nothing special. So because you suck as a male, its ok for you to ruin other peoples swimming careers! To each his/her own but come on!

There needs to a parent or swimmer who shows some actual courage, who makes a stand who speaks up. Cowards never win.
Women being forced to compete against men. Its a cruel joke. Just last year Mr. Thompson. His giant shoulders,and penis were swimming against men.
Now we all pretend. Aiding and abetting the farce that Mr.Thompson has magically become a woman.

I’ve been speechless for weeks since hearing of this case. As a late transitioning trans woman myself I cannot defend Lia’s quick qualification for the women’s the team….6’3″ and look at those shoulders! C’mon, she fully developed a large male body. My larger trans feminine friends report after years of HRT it’s as if a lawnmower engine is trying to power a bus…and at age 61 I can identify with that, but it’s only an anecdote.
The only way to go forward is to accept the new crop of young transitioning trans girls that do not experience male puberty, as more likely candidates for competitive sports. My own daughter competed against mostly boys in her highschool wrestling career…weight categories kept things within reason.
I don’t have good answers for the sports issue.
I can say I have observed many different outcomes in physical development among my trans peers. And there is no consensus in what HRT methods to use. It’s nuanced. It’s case by case. In my more paranoid moments I suspect the worst possible choices of participant are thrust into test cases for new policy in order to sabotage it. The UK prison housing cases come to mind…
Let’s look at what Lia is supposedly stealing from cis women in this competition.
Are grants and placement opportunities automatically guaranteed to title and record holders?
I’m really offended when grade school and highschool kids are thrown into this controversy over fair competition in sports. For one, grade school kids haven’t developed at all yet. Very little difference. Very little at stake- except for learning teamwork and community ideals. And physical health.
Sports is the one stumbling block I keep tripping over. I don’t know what’s right. I don’t know what is fair. No where else does body size and strength bring such conflicts as this.
Lia will be young only once. It’s not her fault that she won the genetics pool and got 6’3″ and athletic. Or happened to be trans and only just beginning HRT. Allow her to participate….take these titles and records with a grain of sand, everyone knows who she is for goodness sakes. Keep a separate set of records books if you can’t keep track, lol.
Like, where IS ” the money” in women’s sports? Look at pro soccer and basketball for instance.
Is this motivation for a gender switch? I think not. I believe Lia is simply a determined athlete who is trans and stuck in a bind. Kudos for fiercely pushing ahead swimming, be it 50 percentile in men’s division, or top in women’s. The performance has been consistent, her body is honed to swim.
I don’t see companies lining up to pay Lia for endorsements, nor scholarships for her in reality merely above average sports ability. I hope all the publicity brings more interest and $$ into women’s sports. Heaven knows we have a physical fitness shortfall as Americans.
Lia is a fairly rare case I suggest taking as an honorary member of the team. All women should have far more opportunities to participate in amateur sports.
I expect disagreeable replies from all fronts…yet any damage at this point is all “what ifs” and has not happened. Lighten up! No one has picked your pocket. I acknowledge there are advantages to a male frame. I acknowledge certain privilege growing up male. In my world, I have made attempts to catch up interested cis women to the manly world of bicycle repair and all the little shop skills most handy types pick up as a matter of course. I try to relate the idea there is no shame being a beginner, that in fact most men are seriously ” unhandy” and fake it. You don’t have to be big to turn a wrench or learn technical terms… The non profit bike shop is part of an effort to promote cycling in general, an overwhelmingly male mode of transport and sport.
We need cooperation more than competition today.

Today, when you speak of minority rights, few people realize women are part of that category.
Women are still attempting to find their place in our society that allows them an equal footing to follow and achieve their dreams. That’s why Title IX was created.
But, now young girls have to defer their dreams because any man can find his womanhood at anytime and express it in anyway he finds appropriate. It’s up to him.
The girls need to wait for those decisions to find out where they fit in the scheme. This is old stuff for women. Women have been waiting for men to decide so they can make their plans, forever.
It is new, that young women wait for young men to decide when they will present themselves as women to the world and then, of course, lead the young women in anything they choose to do.

I fully agree! My daughter is only two years old but I am absolutely terrified that when it comes time for her to compete in athletics she might be competing against boys who are pretending to be girls. I know that sound cold but it’s true! If my son (currently 5 years old) started telling me that he wants to be a girl I would absolutely explore that with him. I would draw the line with allowing him to do hormone therapy or any surgery until he is out of my care. NOR WOULD I ALLOW HIM TO COMPETE ON GIRLS TEAMS! The idea that these people who have chosen to convert to women don’t have a competitive advantage is ridiculous. Lia Thomas was a mediocre competitor on the men’s league at best. Now she’s out there destroying the women. I competed martial arts and I could never imagine a man deciding to convert into a woman and then going in and fighting women. I would like to know where we draw the line as far as reality and fiction. Trust and believe that this is the kind of thing that I would fight a person’s parent over. If my daughter loses out on opportunities in college because a boy decided that he wanted to be a girl that is absolutely not fair. Another thing that drives me nuts is that this all makes me sound like a bigot which couldn’t be farther from the truth. I’m just a realistic person who used to champion for transgendered rights gay rights women’s rights basically for everybody to be treated equal, now the problem is transgender woman competing against women is not equal.