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Why Trans Athletes aren't the Threat We've Been Told
37 Plays2 months ago
Trans athletes have become a lightning rod in public debate about sport. Headlines warn of “unfair advantages.” Politicians speak in urgent, alarming tones. Entire policies are being built on the idea that trans people pose a threat to sports, especially when it comes to women’s and youth sports.
But what if that story isn’t true?
In this episode, we’re joined by Ellie Roscher and Dr. Anna Baeth, co-authors of the new book Fair Game: Trans Athletes and the Future of Sports, for a grounded, compassionate conversation about how a tiny number of athletes became the centre of a global moral panic, and what’s really driving it.
Together, we explore:
• Why so many people feel genuinely torn about “fairness” in sport
• What the science actually does (and doesn’t) tell us about trans athletes
• How fear spreads faster than facts
• What these bans mean for kids who just want to play
• And how trans, cis, and non-binary athletes are all being shaped by policies built on myth
Ellie and Anna bring both rigorous research and deeply human stories into the room. They help make sense of a topic that often feels overwhelming, and invite us into a conversation that’s less about sides and political slogans, and more about who gets to take up space in the world.
📖 Fair Game: Trans Athletes and the Future of Sports, with foreword by Chris Mosier
Available now: https://a.co/d/hkn9BBU
If you’ve ever felt unsure about this topic, worn down by the noise, or quietly wondered whether the story you’re being told is missing something, then this episode is for you.
Recommended
Transcript
Critique of Binary Sports System
00:00:05
Speaker
sportts is still this boring two bucket system that doesn't work and it doesn't reflect reality. And non-binary athletes are just putting their bodies in the middle of it and saying, my body is not the problem.
00:00:23
Speaker
The lack of an imagination in the system design is the problem. Think about who else has been banned from sport in the past. and banned from a lot of different social systems. For a long time, it was non-white folks. For a long time, it was not cis men, cis women in particular. And when I look at how that turned out, wasn't great.
00:00:48
Speaker
Separate has never been equal. And now is a moment where we can decide and get imaginative about how we focus our efforts on inclusion and embodied men.
Myths About Transgender Athletes
00:01:03
Speaker
Today we're diving into one of the most high stakes and frankly misinformed discussions in the public sphere, the inclusion of transgender athletes in sports. Headlines, political rallies, and social media feeds are flooded with emotionally charged narrative that trans athletes are coming in droves to steal medals and do harm. A myth the authors of our featured book reveal is a moral panic.
00:01:28
Speaker
But what are the facts? What's the real science and performance advantages? And what are the true underlying threats to women's sports? And most importantly, what does this debate mean about young athletes, both cisgender and transgender? I'm thrilled to be joined today Ellie Roescher and Dr.
Introduction to Authors and 'Fair Game'
00:01:47
Speaker
Anna Baeth, the authors of the incredibly timely and rigorous book, Fair Game, Trans Athletes and the Future of Sports.
00:01:55
Speaker
Their work weaves together critical research with the moving first-person stories of trans athletes to provide a compassionate, fact-based look at how we can build a fairer, more inclusive sports world for everyone.
00:02:09
Speaker
Let's get right into it. Ellie and Anna, thank you so much for being here. I'm really excited to have you all. Please share a little bit more about yourselves and how you come came to address this topic. Sure. Well, thank you so much for having us. um I'm Dr. Anna Baith. i use she, her pronouns. um And how did I come to this book? um So as I was finishing ah my PhD, my focus of my doctorate was really on women in sport and women in sport leadership. And like many graduate students, I was looking for employment.
00:02:48
Speaker
after finishing my degree and was hired by LGBTQ rights organization. And as soon as I was hired, um this happened right around the time that a lot of conversations around trans athletes began.
00:03:04
Speaker
And so I started getting a lot of questions about trans athletes. And I'll be blunt in saying i didn't have answers. I didn't know what to think about it.
00:03:16
Speaker
And so I spent five years studying trans athletes, trying to really get to the bottom
Goal of 'Fair Game' Book
00:03:23
Speaker
of what's going on. And in that process, um I had a lot of conversations with a lot of different people about what I was finding.
00:03:32
Speaker
And what I realized was um as compelling as i think the data is, it wasn't quite landing. And then I met Ellie. I'll pick it up from there. So I'm Allie. I'm thrilled to be here. Thank you so much for having me. um I teach writing and yoga in Minneapolis, which is also where I write. And kind of the narrative lead on this project. I came to this because I was a high school teacher and I had trans students.
00:04:02
Speaker
And they were at different moments in their coming out journey. They had different levels of support from meaningful adults in their lives. And I learned a lot from being in their lives and from being an adult that they trusted with their stories. This was years before we started seeing all these bans and restrictions. And so when I was flooded with that, I was mad and confused and had some mama bear energy. The trans folks that I had come to know and love needed my support. They deserved access to play. They deserved access to movement spaces, just like everybody
Challenges for Trans Athletes
00:04:40
Speaker
else. um
00:04:42
Speaker
And I met Dr. Baeth through gender equity work. That's one of my passions. And we we were, Dr. Baeth's research is really the best around and her kind of data and information wasn't shifting the conversation like we wanted it to. So we thought, what if we came together and we put we put together something that has both amazing, rigorous information and research with the compelling stories of trans athletes. And so we were seeing in the media that we were talking about trans athletes without talking to them.
00:05:20
Speaker
So I was somehow savvy enough to backwards design my career where i get to sit at the feet of folks and ask them to tell me the long versions of their stories. So we got to sit with trans athletes and say, tell us Tell us what it's like to be you. Tell us what it's like to move in your body. Tell us what it's like to navigate a decidedly cisgender world and sports system. And their stories are so beautiful and powerful and really changed me for the best.
00:05:52
Speaker
Oh, wow. Well, that's so great to hear your back stories to better understand what's motivating you to come to this discussion, as many, frankly, kind of shy away from the discussion because it feels so big. And like, there's so many factors at play. But what I really like about your book is you just break it all down. in simple, plain language.
00:06:12
Speaker
You've got the stats, ah but you've also got the stories. And both combined really ah have this powerful effect on folks. so And hopefully can come to better understanding on this topic, one that is not so mired in confusion, um but more about, OK, what can we do together to make sports better? So this kind of rallying cry, which is fantastic. and I guess what I would like to start with is, um you know, the fact that you've you interviewed all of these trans athletes, I think was really important part of, because you're right, oftentimes it's about talking about rather than talking with And what I would love you to to kind of first describe is the realities that these um these athletes now face, where it's kind of where you started to interview compared to what is happening now.
00:07:05
Speaker
It's a totally different landscape. And ah my jaw dropped. And my jaw does not drop easily, let's say that, because as a trans person myself, And as an athlete, I see the realities that
Change in Athlete Participation
00:07:18
Speaker
many face, but there's been a decided shift ah that has real world implications. So I'd love to for you to kind of talk about what happened to the athletes and their abilities to play or not. It's a great question. And and it's an interesting one when I look back on on conducting this project, because when we started the project, um we were really thinking, you know, we're hearing from a lot of lawmakers. We're hearing a lot of stories in the news, again, about trans athletes. And yet most people couldn't name a trans athlete. And so we thought, okay, we need to start introducing the world to some trans athletes. And that was really the the impetus of the book,
00:08:07
Speaker
And um it's really shifted because when we wrote the book and we interviewed these athletes, we interviewed 20 folks, gathered their stories.
00:08:18
Speaker
When we first wrote the book, all of them were able to compete. As of today, only one of those 20 is legally able to compete.
00:08:30
Speaker
And of course it's it's an adult. um And so... I think the purpose of the the stories have shifted a little bit um to say all of what we heard from these athletes um who opened their hearts to us about what sport meant and didn't mean to them, the good, the bad, the ugly that anybody who's involved in sport understands, um it's just no longer a reality for the vast majority of trans folks in this country.
00:09:02
Speaker
And when we look at you know trans kids in particular, the numbers are shocking. um you know Last year, there were 13 times the number of trans athlete bands proposed than out trans kids.
00:09:18
Speaker
So um this really raises some questions for me, not just about you know what it means to interview, but what these stories will look like moving forward. Will we hear them at all?
00:09:30
Speaker
If they were already erased before these bans were in effect, what will it look like moving forward? So one of the things that we're talking about is the speed. This is happening really fast and speed can do harm.
00:09:45
Speaker
And that's that's what we're seeing. um You mentioned in your intro moral panic, and I think that's a really important phrase to keep on the table in this conversation. There has to be some pre-work for a moral panic to take hold.
00:10:00
Speaker
And so we're we're seeing the story that is not true, that trans athletes, it's unfair, it's unsafe for trans athletes to compete with cis
Debunking Safety Myths
00:10:11
Speaker
athletes. That story is not true.
00:10:14
Speaker
But the story is taking hold and gaining speed and momentum because there is this scarcity model in women's sports at the moment that where the story is tapping into the the fear of what women have worked so hard for in the female category of sports. And we're placing the blame and the work in the wrong place.
00:10:41
Speaker
Right. And so to see see the situation clearly and to be really, really critical and curious about how speed is working to the advantage of this untrue story and the harm that the story is doing very quickly that we're not we're not going to be be able to get ourselves out of as quickly. Right? So that you think about, we are unclear what women are capable of in the sports world. just but We haven't been given that much time.
00:11:14
Speaker
Right? Like we haven't been given ample opportunity and resources to see what the female athlete is capable of. We might never know what trans athletes are actually capable of because we see them for good reason pulling back and not opting into sport when I am convinced that their presence would make everything better.
00:11:40
Speaker
Absolutely. well Thank you so much for for kind of sketching that landscape of what the risks are actually versus what they're not and kind of being very clear and precise about the analysis to be able to understand the problem that allows for you know the the appropriate response. Right.
00:12:01
Speaker
And so but you did mention competitive advantage as a big sticking point, right? Where people can land on the more protective side and and kind of really want to constrain the definition um of categories of competition. And so I think the kind of thing that I want to pack a little bit to begin with, just because that's where most people are at, and especially if they have limited understanding on this topic, is competitive
Unclear Science on Advantages
00:12:35
Speaker
fairness. And it's a broader discussion, not just about gender. um There's all kinds of things at play when it comes to competitive fairness. But I'd just like you to kind of unpack or explain why the narrative that, especially trans women, they're often the focal point, although so we won't just talk about trans women, there's many more as part of the spectrum.
00:12:56
Speaker
but how often trans women are considered equivalent to cisgender men as like this oversimplification and what the current science suggests about any presumed physiological advantages for trans women's athletes, who have especially if they've undergone gender affirming hormone therapy.
00:13:15
Speaker
Yeah. So so the um science is clearly unclear. and There is really no research out there on transgender athletes. Now, there is some research on trans folks.
00:13:33
Speaker
There's really one study on trans folks in the military. um But the bottom line is the science doesn't really exist.
00:13:45
Speaker
We don't really know. and at this point, because of all of the policies that are happening in sport and trans folks pulling back from sport, we probably won't ever have a really solid study on this.
00:14:00
Speaker
Now, with all of that said, what I will say is when you look at the research that is most often cited in anti-trans sport policies, bans, that science is not compelling.
00:14:17
Speaker
ah Most often, again, we're not talking about trans athletes. Most often, those studies don't even look at trans folks. They often have really small sample sizes, and they'll focus on very particular components of athleticism, like testosterone.
00:14:36
Speaker
Now, this is all a little bit ironic for me because when you really look at the science, when you really look at the data and you ask, okay, who wins in sport across the board? Who's winning?
00:14:49
Speaker
What we know, it's very clear. People who have access to sport early on, people who have resources to participate in sport, to access the best coaches, the best facilities, and generally people who are born in the correct region of the world or the United States where they really have access to competition.
00:15:12
Speaker
All of those factors are what leads people to win. And I'm talking here about like at the the highest levels of sport, right? If we look at Olympians across the board.
00:15:24
Speaker
So I also just want to say that to say the people who have always won are still winning. Right. ah The people who have always won which weren't trans athletes, even when trans athletes were permitted to compete.
00:15:42
Speaker
um Those folks, people who come from well-resourced backgrounds, they're still winning. So I think this raises a lot of other questions about what we're talking about when we talk about fairness. um You know, we we often realize that people don't talk about money when they're talking about sport.
00:16:04
Speaker
um who Who even gets to access sport? And for that matter, who gets to access their body? Because in this country, in the United States in particular, we know that we are now living in a pay-to-play model where only kids from families who can afford it really get to participate in sport.
00:16:24
Speaker
And with a diminishing education system and frankly, diminishing physical education, the bottom line is what we're saying is only people who can afford it now can really be in their bodies in a way that is going to build confidence, build self-esteem,
00:16:42
Speaker
um just build recognition of of who you are and what your body is capable of. And that is...
00:16:53
Speaker
For me, one of the the main drivers of this book is to really say, let's get serious about allowing people to access their bodies in healthful ways.
00:17:03
Speaker
Yeah. It's so true that there is a class element that many people are have a discomfort with addressing or looking head on at. Maybe they've experienced them themselves in some way if they're you know um not a part of upper classes, but... um you know, the where do the resources go and how we support some and not others. the The kind of pinpointing trans folks allows for that distraction to continue versus like putting the spotlight where it needs to be so that more people can play. And i like how you say it, access to one's own body and the sense of belonging and confidence that comes with that participation, right? time and time again in the interviews that you did, I mean, that's a main theme is that like others, like cisgender folks, whether kids or adults, they need that. It's an important part of development if they want to participate.
00:18:01
Speaker
So it's really a ah travesty that that's occurring right now. So, and thankfully you're able to highlight that in, you know the book that you've written. So,
00:18:12
Speaker
And ah hopefully people can appreciate that, um especially with small populations, scientific inquiry is often difficult, right? It's like you said, the sample size piece, you know, there may be unanswered questions. And so how can we move forward without that piece um and not kind of go based on conjecture and think it's science? Yeah. I did want to shift ah to something that Ellie, you mentioned, moral panic. That's a big theme and it's really important to highlight that in the book or that you've highlighted in the book. And so this is kind of driving this surge, as you already mentioned in the anti-trans legislation.
Impact of Anti-Trans Legislation
00:18:57
Speaker
Given that trans athletes are such a small percentage of the population, ah probably less than a ah percentage point, right? What is truly behind these bans and what are the effects on legislation on actual mental and physical health of young athletes, both cis and trans?
00:19:15
Speaker
Okay, that's a big question. That's a big question. I appreciate it. um I appreciate it. Let me get us started and Dr. Baeth can jump in. So yeah where we we we know that sports are good for kids, right? Like they're good for our our physical health. They're good for our mental health. And so that's that that teacher in me that gets really upset when one person would decide that ah a certain child wouldn't have access to play.
00:19:45
Speaker
to exuberance, to joy, to collective movement, to belonging on a team. i started gymnastics when I was four years old. I don't have a memory of not being in my body. I don't have a memory of not being on a team, of belonging, of having a place where I belonged to a group of people and having a place where I belonged to my body, where I felt safe to drop in and play and inhabit my body. I think everybody deserves that. um I think one of my hunches, one of the things I think that's that's going on of like why this moral panic is taking hold, I will speak for myself, before running these interviews, my cis identity was pretty dormant.
00:20:27
Speaker
I hadn't spent a lot of time thinking about the fact that I was cisgendered and and understanding how that privilege moves through the world. So going back to fairness, if we think about the, the, the, our favorite athletes, society's favorite athletes, as Simone Biles or Michael Phelps, right? We love that their bodies are unfair, that they were clearly, like clearly their body was designed to thrive at the sport that they're competing in. And I would argue that one of their competitive advantages is that they're cis, that they haven't had to navigate the society like trans folks have to do it. That's exhausting to constantly be thinking about your safety, to constantly have that vigilance. That that is that what we heard as refrain in the book is the exhaustion that goes with the vigilance of having to keep yourself safe, right? And so um in listening, I came out as cis. It activated my cisgender identity and then some some levers that I could push as a privileged bodied person um came into play. I think that i think that in society, we we've done a little bit better job of thinking about sexuality. We've done a little bit better job about thinking about gender, but we haven't done enough exploring of our own sexual identities.
00:21:52
Speaker
And so then, so some of these mistruths, some of these lies that are that are coming forward and in the media's story is taking hold because cis folks don't understand. It seems different. And instead of turning toward that discomfort, we're just moving quickly to to agree with something that's not true.
00:22:14
Speaker
true. um And so I think we need to do two things. Dr. Baith and I talk about letting simple things be simple in the fact that all kids deserve to play.
00:22:27
Speaker
We have to work for a world not only where every child gets access to play, but has the time to be a child and play. And then how can we develop sports where we stay in our bodies, we continue to inhabit our bodies so more adults are also have safe exuberant, joyful bodies that move, right? And play.
00:22:49
Speaker
um That's the simple part. The complex part is our bodies are complex. Our sexual identity is complex. There's so many things that go into what makes us who we are.
00:22:59
Speaker
um Sports are complex, right? So no two sports are the same. Competitive advantage does not look the same at any in any two sports at any two levels. So anytime you see these blanket bans, you have to get very, very curious because it might be easier.
00:23:19
Speaker
It might be more convenient to restrict all trans bodies. That doesn't make it right. And so there are ways to create pathways toward play at the different age levels, at the different stakes in the different sports.
00:23:36
Speaker
And we need to move toward that future where anybody that wants to play has that access. Think about who else has been banned from sport in the past and banned from a lot of different social systems. You know, for a long time, it was non-white folks. For a long time, It was not cis men, cis women in particular.
00:24:00
Speaker
And when I look at how that turned out, wasn't great. Separate has never been equal. And now is a moment where we can decide and get imaginative about how we focus our efforts on inclusion and embodied men.
00:24:19
Speaker
rather than exclusion Yeah, I think in in some sports, especially they're struggling with numbers. And so for me, i'm I'm always baffled when you have like really interested, especially youth at the beginning of the pipeline, why you don't want to cultivate that and like, sure, maybe there's things like you said, you have to figure out the pathways, but there's You can create um you could be so much more innovative and find different things that you might be surprised by. i know in the Olympics, they've started to do many kind of mixed gender categories, say in relays, and people find those really exciting, myself included, right? So there's just such an opportunity to say, okay, trans people want to participate and become athletes, you know starting from young, growing older. Why can't we figure out a way, you know, and instead of these blanket bans, which also, as I'm sure you've you talk about in your book, it complicates things for cisgender folks as well. Like you just alluded to, Dr. Bates, this is something that has happened in the past, but actually continues into the present as well.
00:25:27
Speaker
um Especially as some bands start to talk about you know sex testing or genital examinations, you know the kind of stuff that we thought was archaic, but is um you know being considered.
00:25:42
Speaker
And that that's not just for trans folks that will also sweep up certain cisgender women as well. So there's a lot there. And i think when at first glance, when people are just thinking in at this topic for the first time, um perhaps they want a simple answer, but then a lot more is revealed.
00:26:03
Speaker
I want to shift into safety because that's another big topic that we hear about a lot and is really important today. to be able to create safe space for no matter who somebody is, right? That that be a core tenant of all sport.
00:26:20
Speaker
And so I'm curious to hear more, and you certainly address it in your book about the fears, especially of trans women, um that, um according to some, which is actually a myth, that threaten, that they think threatens safety of cis women, especially when it comes to locker rooms and and other, you know, um spaces. What does the evidence show regarding this fear? And how do policies based on this fear end up increasing sanctioned policing of women's bodies and sports, sports
Safety Myths Debunked Further
00:26:51
Speaker
bases? Yeah, that there have been no instances of harm done.
00:26:57
Speaker
when we look at the history, um it's simply just, it's not true. um Now, that said, i think part of why these myths are so compelling is because um they're based in fear.
00:27:15
Speaker
And there are a lot of people, um myself included, and particularly when I first started doing this research, who are afraid for women's sports.
00:27:28
Speaker
And they have good reason to be. I mean, pretty much every presidential administration has really looked at and questioned whether we should keep Title IX, which is an educational amendment that mandates equal opportunity and should say equal resources, really, um for anybody in educational systems, including athletes.
00:27:52
Speaker
Now, what we know is There's a lot of fear because there's a lot of scarcity in sport and in women's sport in particular. When we look at women's sports,
00:28:05
Speaker
um there is a lack of financial resources, sponsorships, ah access opportunities. There's still fewer girls participating in sport right now in this country than there were boys participating in this sport when Title IX was passed in 1972.
00:28:25
Speaker
Right. I mean, women are still far behind or the women's category of sport. So um that fear is justified. But the reality is trans athletes are not causing scarcity in women's sports. It's, again, the same systems and people who have always created scarcity in women's sports. And so i think when that scarcity mindset, when that fear mindset is triggered, people make decisions, even if they're not actually solving the problem.
00:28:56
Speaker
And I think one of the points we really try to highlight in the book is all of this fear, all of this manifestation of fear is way, way more harmful than trans athletes. When we talk about safety, we're talking about a couple of different things. One is like collisions, right?
00:29:15
Speaker
With the same as fairness, like, let's get clear. We love collisions. who we yeah we we love We love sports where it is a safe place to knock into each other and then help each other up. all of a sudden are we getting a little bit more protective of cis women, right? Like there's this there's this underlying um feeling that women are inferior to men that I don't appreciate.
00:29:46
Speaker
in that part of the conversation about safety. um I am stronger than folks are giving me credit for, and I gotta get a little fired up about that, right? If I'm in a sport where there's a collision, I'm at i'm in, I'm asking for it, let's go. i don't need somebody else's protection, thank you very much.
00:30:06
Speaker
The other thing we're talking about is things like locker rooms. And I have a feeling that this elicits the fear because very, very few of us have had good experiences in locker rooms. So similar to the fairness thing, let's talk about sports being fair. Then we got to talk about money. Let's talk about sports being safe. Well, then we got to talk about cis men.
00:30:24
Speaker
Come on, let's get real clear on who's doing the harm to whom, right? And if locker rooms feel unsafe, if you say unsafe and my female body clenches a little bit because of body memory, I have to get super clear on who is creating a culture where I feel unsafe. And in my story, it is cis men, not trans women.
00:30:49
Speaker
So that shift is doing so much harm because it's blaming the wrong people, but it is also taking my eye eye off the prize, which needs to be working on actually making sports safer, right? And these folks who are saying that banning trans athletes will make sports safer for cis women and girls have absolutely no track record of caring about women and girls.
00:31:16
Speaker
None. And we got to get a little bit mad about that. So when cis women and trans women are being divided so we can't come together and fight like hell, let's get clear on who's winning by separating us and come back together and do the work to make sports safer for everybody.
00:31:39
Speaker
All kids, right? All girls and women. and There's so much to do. um And so we believe in asking these questions, like how do we make sports more fair? How do we make sports more safe? We're like, we've we've committed our careers to those questions.
00:31:58
Speaker
um And if you enter into this intelligent conversation with us that has actual stories and actual research in it, then we're going to move some things. Then it's going to get exciting.
00:32:11
Speaker
Oh, yeah. Absolutely. It's so true. And oftentimes what we talk about is this kind of who to what translation. Oftentimes people are very focused on who, you know, and have particular attributes, ah you know, to that. But when you start talking about what, it becomes way clearer, right? Right. In certain sports, there' you know people with you know long torso bodies are going to have more of an advantage, right? Or tall people versus you know weight versus whatever the the category of thing is.
00:32:43
Speaker
That can be really helpful because we do need to have conversations, like you're saying, both of you. It's just like how you have the conversation that makes a big difference. And if we're only pinning it on one group of people, we're missing the point, we're distracted, similar to what you're talking about. And we have not identified the the problem very well in a way that will help advance all of our inclusion and our abilities to to participate in sports. So it's it's such a good point. And i hope people will eventually get there. I think there's also something to be said, and I don't know if this came up in your interviews, but I'm just curious more generally. I've been trying to like pilot things because sometimes it can feel scary to do something differently.
00:33:28
Speaker
Right. And so there are some sports that you allude or you mentioned in your book that have gone beyond gender.
Experiments in Gender Inclusivity
00:33:35
Speaker
And it's not to say that's the only solution. Right. I'm not suggesting that all sport de-gender immediately, yeah. But, you know, there's safe places where that can be explored to see what is the result. Oh, nothing or oh something interesting.
00:33:50
Speaker
So, yeah, I don't know if you want to highlight some of the sports that you have come across that have started to wrestle with all of this. OK, so a couple of things we can talk about um the low stakes and high stakes.
00:34:03
Speaker
We can talk about age and we can talk about sports. right? So I was watching my fifth grade child play on a mixed gender soccer team.
00:34:14
Speaker
And these bodies are pre-puberty and um gender and sex dissolved, right? Like it was it was just bodies running around playing sports on a field. I think we have to be really clear about that. And that's what we're talking about, about nuanced policy and different pathways to play, right? If we're talking stakes, one of our um Trans athletes in the book talked about how after being a D1 athlete, now post-collegiate career, Monday night is the worst night of their week because it's the only time during the week that they're misgendered because they're playing on a mixed gender pickup rec adult soccer.
00:34:55
Speaker
team Right. So when stakes are low, when adults are just looking to gather and move their bodies, can we be a little bit more inclusive and curious and open so that folks don't have to feel that othering when the stakes are really low?
00:35:13
Speaker
But then, yes, let's talk about some sport. And I love this idea of piloting. It would be fantastic if we could just burn it all down. That's not how it's going to work, right? So we do have to take little incremental steps toward, like, trans joy leading us into a different future of sports. um We saw Ultimate Frisbee, right? Like, this is a place in in part because of the culture that they've created, trying to stay outside of capitalism, trying to be where you're always... roughing yourself, right? Calling yourself out. There's a code of conduct that's really interesting. This is an interesting incubator for this test. And one of our ultimate Frisbee players in the book is a trans man who's having a better experience on a women's team than he had on a mixed gender team. Because in the women's team, they just said, hey,
00:36:03
Speaker
bodies, let's go. We'll figure it out. Right. And so he doesn't have to out himself in terms of gender to line up and say, who is he going to be guarding? Ultra running is another I'll highlight where the further you run, the less it matters what your gender and sex is. Right. So when you're trail running, it's like you versus the trail running.
00:36:26
Speaker
It's like you versus your own limits in a way that's extremely intense and compelling. This would be a really great place to drop sex categories and just have bodies running against the trail and supporting each other.
00:36:42
Speaker
Yeah. and i I just want to pull out one um example from some more high stakes sport, because um I think it really highlights the part of the confusion that that you mentioned at the the top of this podcast. um So when we look at the NCAA, we look at college sport, I want to talk a little bit about Division one women's basketball.
00:37:10
Speaker
So um this isn't, I don't think this is in the book, but um so the NCAA, for the last several years, they've been talking a lot about trans athletes.
00:37:22
Speaker
And um earlier in 2025, they did make the decision ostensibly to ban all trans women from sport. So all sports across the NCAA.
00:37:34
Speaker
Now, what I find interesting about this is when we look at women's basketball and most women's sport in the NCAA, there is a particular carve out for male practice players.
00:37:47
Speaker
So what that means is during a practice, men, college-aged men, are able to come and play and compete against the athletes to help prepare them for competition.
00:38:02
Speaker
So this really raises some questions for me because, first of all, there are more male practice players on one participating with one women's D1 basketball program than there are trans women in the NCAA. Okay, so why is it why is it that we do not allow trans women to participate in the NCAA, but we are allowing cisgender men to regularly compete against cis women at the highest levels of sport to help prepare them for competition. This is the same for, say, Katie Ledecky, who is
00:38:39
Speaker
possibly the best swimmer in history, trains with men. All right. So this really, again, um raises some questions for me about what precisely are we talking about? And is that piloting happening already in elite sport? We just don't talk about it because it kind of seems like it is.
00:39:00
Speaker
Right. This is like this very targeted, precise. You've got to have such um like exact language to just specifically exclude trans people because of all these other layers of, um you know, preparation for competition that are already at play and little discussed in the public discourse. Right. This happens also with gender affirming care bans too, right? They have to somehow exclude cisgender youth using hormone blockers, right? So it's just like this theme comes up over and over where it's like, okay, we want cis people to be able to continue doing what we are banning trans people from doing, you know? It's just like, it's bananas.
00:39:42
Speaker
and And what I find really startling is, of course, this affects the trans community. But it also affects a lot of cis people. So when we're talking about, you know, gender affirming care, access to hormones, I happen to live in a state right now where trans folks ah cannot get access to gender affirming hormones.
00:40:06
Speaker
Now, what this means for me as a cis woman who also needs hormones, I can't access them.
00:40:15
Speaker
So, you know, again, I think what we're what we're really talking about here is bodily control. And who's controlling whose bodies? And whose bodies are also being controlled by proxy of that.
00:40:29
Speaker
Right. Yeah. And this concept of we either rise together or fall together and that's becoming clearer, although not as clear because sometimes there's like a ripple effect, right? It hurts trans people first, but then emanates out from there. And then you see the impacts maybe a few years down the road and you're like, oh crap, that's not what we wanted.
00:40:51
Speaker
Well, the train's already left the station, right? We have to bring race into this conversation really explicitly here, right? um And It can be brought in at every moment in this conversation, but so important when we're talking about maintaining the female category and who loses in that. We have to look at the history and see whose bodies are seen as disobedient um and and identified as having to be socialized back into the norm. And this is very close because my cis body is perceived as obedient.
00:41:30
Speaker
I'm small. I wear my hair long. I'm white. You know, so as a gymnast, as ah as a female gymnast, I am left alone, even though if we're talking about maintaining the female category by period tracking, I would have lost that test.
00:41:49
Speaker
But I pass. I can move through our sports system with ease because my body is perceived as obedient to our feminine ideals.
00:42:03
Speaker
And that makes me really, really mad. And because I can move freely and ah and am deemed obedient, it's my job then to to fight back, to be disobedient in other ways, to divest from that agreement. I do not want these cis men saying they're protecting me. I don't need their protection. Thank you very much. And i do not want my female category policed to make sure everyone around me is also appropriately female. There is so much to talk about when we look at which female bodies get put under the microscope and which don't and how much harm that is doing and what kind of culture that creates for, honestly, for everybody. We're talking about how that harms both cis and trans girls. But I think about my boys growing up in the sports system and what they're learning about sex and gender as
Challenges for Non-Binary Athletes
00:43:01
Speaker
well. yeah
00:43:02
Speaker
Absolutely. And thank you for bringing that in, because that often gets overlooked in all of this. And it's a really important puzzle piece to this whole thing. And ah that, you know especially racialized folks, they are under such a microscope because they ah are not deemed as fitting in and have to jump their own hoops, right? um And that's even a setting aside when those come together, transs plus, you know, black, say to say black trans athletes, right? Then you're just like, next level intervention and and resistance from the system towards their bodies. And it's a travesty. And um um so, yeah, that's such an important part.
00:43:45
Speaker
One thing I wanted to kind touch on before we go to kind of um kind of ah a bit of a closing here although we could keep going for many more hours, I'm sure, um is we've we've talked to a lot about trans women and oftentimes there is like an over-focus on trans women. um And of course, we need to have a response for that and your book helps with that for sure. But I also don't want to lose sight of the fact fact that um sports, for the most part, are very binary. There's only men's and women's or boys and girls categories often. And that does leave non-binary athletes in a bit of a pickle. um And so I'm wondering, you know, what you've heard from athletes themselves and any of the research that you've done, what about non-binary athletes and and how can we help them? The the poor souls, you know, i feel for them. And always want to make sure we keep them in the conversation.
00:44:42
Speaker
Yeah. um I wish there were research to talk about, and and there isn't any. um I think, um you know, when I think about non-binary athletes, man, they are like the coolest, first of all. i in In most of my conversations with non-binary folks, um they talk about and and particularly for for folks who have had the opportunity to and compete on both sides of this binary.
00:45:17
Speaker
um A lot of times they talk about wanting to compete in women's sport for no other reason than it feels much safer, either um because of the culture of that sport, because of the culture of the team, or because of the policies themselves.
00:45:38
Speaker
So um I don't know that I have have an answer except to say that what that points me to is to say we need to start fixing, adjusting, tweaking whatever is happening in men's sport where they do not feel safe.
00:46:02
Speaker
And I will say for me as as a cis woman, um I don't compete against cis men. for a lot of the same reasons, I think. um So that's the the first part of this. um I also think I can't wait for there to be more research and more conversations with non-binary athletes, because I also find that they often are the most imaginative because they've seen the full sporting landscape in ways that I never will, which is really, really incredible. um So I guess, you know, in some, i would just say I really hope we can continue to have non-binary athletes to support them and to if nothing else, listen to them. That's right.
00:46:51
Speaker
That's right. i You know, and i ah they've, in talking with them, they feel disappeared, as do trans men, by the way. um Fair Game would not exist without Chris Mosier, who's a trans man.
00:47:05
Speaker
And a fantastic athlete and a fantastic advocate. um He interviewed our trans youth for the book so that they felt safer having the conversation. And he wrote her. excited to talk to him because he's pretty famous. And they were like, oh my gosh, it's Chris Moser. Yeah.
00:47:24
Speaker
Because he's totally famous and he's the best. um We get excited about talking to him because he's famous and he's the best. But and he also wrote the forward for the book. um And he he's trying to be the adult that he needed when he was a kid.
00:47:38
Speaker
And so he's trying to get as visible as possible as a trans man. and is offended that no one cares. And it's again, again and it goes back to that hatred of women who they look at Chris and they' like, well, if you want to give that a shot, go for it. Good luck. Godspeed. That's so offensive to him and to me. right And so, yeah, I think we need to keep talking about trans men and non-binary athletes. And this is a aside this is ah an aside that'll come back to what I promise. In my previous book, I interviewed a bunch of people with interesting body stories. And one of One of the most fascinating interviews was with a woman whose quadriplegic doesn't have any movement from her neck down. And she just kept repeating as a refrain in her interview, my body is not the problem.
00:48:25
Speaker
It is the lack of imagination in design of society that is the problem. society It is so hard for her to navigate an able-bodied society that it's easy to for her to think that her body is the problem. And she it just she just keeps repeating over and over again, my body is not the problem. The design of society and the lack of imagination is the problem. And that's what comes to mind when we talk about non-binary athletes is that Sports is still this boring two-bucket system that doesn't work and it doesn't reflect
Advocacy for Inclusive Design
00:49:09
Speaker
reality. and
00:49:11
Speaker
non-binary athletes are just putting their bodies in the middle of it and saying, my body is not the problem. The lack of an imagination in the system design is the problem. And so right now what we see is those bodies that are standing as cogs in the boring system are being deemed the problem.
00:49:35
Speaker
And we need to shift back to reality and and see that their bodies existing is actually going to lead us into a future of sports. that has way more diversity, inclusion, safety, fairness.
00:49:51
Speaker
And excitement too. Like, as big as like i mean, hey, we've got a basis to start from, but we can keep going, right? Like just, well yeah I just, I sometimes am a bit baffled um because, you know, I've tried, i' i used to, i'm used to be part of Vancouver Frontrunners, and the Frontrunner system, which is this queer and trans running ah association.
00:50:15
Speaker
Great group. um And we did the the Pride run and were like, let's add a category, right? So again, back to that, like testing it out, seeing what it did like.
00:50:26
Speaker
seeing how it goes and and not being too um like caught up in all the details like, well, let's just run it and see how. And then we saw and we're like, okay, we can refine based on this. So maybe additional category might not be exactly fitting, but what else can we do? Right. And then we thought about different categories of of running times and putting those together and having them compete. Right. it's just like kind of getting outside of just, you know, the two bucket system.
00:50:55
Speaker
and um imagining what other types of exciting things can be put together. And I agree with you that non-binary folks are at the kind of core at that of that, given that they've navigated sometimes two, sometimes one of those categories and are instrumental to the future of sport, in my opinion, and yet are nowhere to be seen in any of the policies or very few references in policies.
00:51:21
Speaker
um And you're right about trans men too. We often do get overlooked. um We're seen as competitors. um But i will have I will say without bragging, i am very much a competitor against other cis men. So um yeah, and in a good way, in a supportive way, right? So yeah, I think...
00:51:43
Speaker
kind of drawing to a close here after having a really good discussion, like I said, we could keep going. There's so many other things that are addressed in your book. So very much invite folks to go and and um grab a copy coming out this week. and We'll put a link in the show notes, but ah just thought I'd have you close with what what kind of gives you hope going into the future. i know there's a lot to kind of be,
00:52:09
Speaker
tearing our hair out or fretting about. But I wanted to end on a high note. And just what are your thoughts in terms of what keeps you going on this journey?
Hope for Inclusive Sports Future
00:52:20
Speaker
I've, I believe in this, the power of stories.
00:52:24
Speaker
um And I also, we've also seen so many people be curious and have this sense that they're being misled and have this sense that they're not getting good information and want to catch up.
00:52:47
Speaker
And so it's it's those folks who are just getting started that are honestly giving me hope because, you know what, for a good policy, and we need 51%.
00:52:59
Speaker
So it's really, really easy to focus on the haters. And Baith and I talk a lot about how folks with intense hate, something had to have happened to them.
00:53:14
Speaker
That's the compassionate read, right? But we're looking for folks who want better information and better stories um and have this hunch that we could create a more beautiful future.
00:53:28
Speaker
that's more colorful, more exuberant, more joyful. um I think there's a lot of work to be done. And um numerically, we need folks to jump on and get and get involved.
00:53:42
Speaker
And I actually do get some hope with how many people are starting to kind of catch on to the patterns and be like, okay, I'm in Tell me what I need to know. And also like I'm a little afraid to step in it. I'm a little afraid to do something wrong, but I'm done saying nothing. Right. And so um i think together we're going to build a more beautiful story moving forward. I think similarly, my hope really recently has come from a lot of cisgender women who um have spent their lives fighting for women's sport, who are standing up and saying
00:54:22
Speaker
no We're not taking this. ah The same people who fought against women participating in sport in the 60s and 70s or the same the same rhetorics that were used are now being used against trans athletes and we won't stand for it.
00:54:41
Speaker
um And i I think I find a lot of hope in the fact that, um you know, initially when I started this work, I really thought, okay, there are people who are in this camp and there are people who are in this camp.
00:54:55
Speaker
And what I've realized is, um no almost everybody is in the middle. And um what I've realized too is when people are curious, they they come to our side. And, and one example of this, and I'm, I don't know that she'll appreciate me shouting her out, but, um, but, but my mom, um, when I started doing this work, she was like, I just, you know, i don't know. i don't know. And we had a lot of conversations and, um, she is a huge ally and advocate.
00:55:35
Speaker
And she, she claimed she doesn't know any trans people, but, um, She's not an athlete, but she she understands. She raised two little girls in the sporting system. She has a handful of grandkids, and she sees what's happening for what it is and is standing up to say, no, you will not do this to children in this country. That's amazing.
00:56:00
Speaker
i'm I'm so excited to hear that. Kind of across the generations, people are are are kind of taking another look and being like, okay, I might not have the complete picture. And I appreciate what you say too. It's just like, don't have to have all the answers to to show up.
00:56:16
Speaker
And others were very like, let's let's figure this out together, right? And there are open conversations happening, right? I think sometimes people think this is all locked in, locked down. We're not, you know, we've sorted it out some magical way. um It's more like, no, we want to we want to be able to do it, but we want to make sure that everyone can come with.
00:56:37
Speaker
And I think that's so critical. And so I'm, again, so thankful that you wrote this book. I know it takes a lot of effort to put a book together, especially well-researched and also to to talk to people and to do it in a thoughtful way. So I just um very much appreciate the book and encourage people to go and read it to share it with ah others, um to kind of spread the word about this so that people have the the the good the good information that will help this discussion to continue to move forward. So thank you again, both of you, Ellie and Anna. Really lovely talking to you here today. And we'll sign off from here. And again, the book link will be in the show notes. So go check it out.
00:57:22
Speaker
So thank you again. Thank you.