Gaines for Girls with Riley Gaines - Wrestling with Gender Identity in Women's Sports

00:00:00.000 hey everybody welcome back to the gains for girls podcast when you think of the gender ideology

00:00:11.500 movement and how it affects sports you probably think of someone like leah thomas right like a 1.00

00:00:16.580 very mediocre man uh swimming on the men's team who ultimately decides to switch to the women's

00:00:22.180 team to become a record smasher uh and understandably so you probably think of this

00:00:27.960 because we have thousands of examples of virtually the same scenario uh every sport every level every

00:00:34.020 division every state this is happening but what you probably don't think of is how this adversely

00:00:39.840 affects women in a totally different scenario um today's guest she is an activist in her own right

00:00:46.000 uh defending the lives of the unborn but more importantly she's a mother uh her daughter was

00:00:51.480 faced with a scenario which i am so excited for you guys to hear about today uh so make sure you stay

00:00:57.260 and watch the podcast with brandy meeks well brandy thank you so much for joining the gains for girls

00:01:03.280 podcast uh we got connected a few weeks ago about an issue that i'm super excited to talk with you

00:01:08.980 about today um this is of course an issue that's required you to take a firm stance uh but this is

00:01:15.200 nothing new to you so before we get into to all that i want you to be able to share a little bit

00:01:20.160 about your background as an activist in a totally different realm okay all right so it it is related

00:01:28.140 in some ways right but also um just very much complimentary so i am the president of an organization

00:01:34.000 named vitae foundation and we focus on research about life-saving issues we do emotional research

00:01:41.560 specifically and then we take those findings to create messaging strategies and share those with

00:01:46.600 other um people within our circles of influence and also the pro-life community because we want

00:01:51.960 to defend life um and we believe that we have to love people enough to tell them the truth

00:01:56.880 specifically about abortion and so that is primarily the work that i'm in on a day-to-day basis

00:02:03.400 and um and have also had the privilege of being able to step out into some other um activism work

00:02:09.440 as well recently you're traveling you're all over the place you understand um the toll that just that

00:02:17.020 alone the travel takes on you um but you're right in saying you know i i kind of preface by saying these

00:02:22.960 are two totally different realms but you're right in saying they really are similar i think a lot of

00:02:27.860 these cultural issues that we're really seeing um they do overlap in a lot of different ways um but as

00:02:35.060 i mentioned you've been faced with this new issue of course the gender ideology movement and all of its

00:02:41.200 adverse effects um but but really in a different way than most people think when they think about

00:02:47.220 this issue especially as it pertains to sports and so i would love if you could give a little background

00:02:53.140 as to as to what i'm referring to here absolutely so first of all i want to state and i know you feel

00:03:00.460 the same way i love all people right that's why i that's why i do the work that i do day in and day

00:03:06.380 out is because i want equality for all people i love equality i love equality for all people and

00:03:11.340 that includes our young women that are participating in sports and so recently um i had something come

00:03:17.320 across my radar and honestly um i didn't really want to do it right i didn't really want to step into

00:03:24.940 it because like you shared i already had so much going on um in my day-to-day life and i have a

00:03:29.340 couple places that i can escape to to not have to be on for those things and have a little bit of um

00:03:35.260 just a little bit of privacy and that's usually like in the gym working out and then also um getting

00:03:41.100 to watch my kiddos wrestle um and that was something that that we encountered um about a month ago as we

00:03:48.900 were entering entering into the state wrestling tournament my daughter qualified for the state

00:03:54.260 wrestling tournament it's actually i believe the fifth year in a row that we've had someone from

00:03:58.460 our family that had qualified for the state wrestling tournament and the weekend before

00:04:02.640 i received um a message from a friend who said hey um i'm actually probably one of the most liberal

00:04:10.860 friends that you have right on social but i want to give you a heads up about a situation because it

00:04:16.160 might affect your daughter and i it immediately kind of gave me pause right like what what are we

00:04:21.460 talking about here um and as i looked into it i could see that there was a school that was in the

00:04:27.500 st louis missouri area that was bragging on the fact that there was they called him they called the

00:04:34.020 student a he um but that he had recently won the girls district wrestling tournament and i'm like

00:04:43.820 that's odd and as i looked into it further this student was in my daughter's weight class in her

00:04:51.900 bracket and was set to wrestle my daughter if she made it through her first round my daughter and

00:05:00.580 if the student made it through their first round so there was a high possibility the student um was

00:05:06.620 i believe 53 and 4 on the year up until this point and why that matters is that that's a pretty

00:05:11.560 impressive wrestling record right and so it's pretty good chance that the student was going to make it

00:05:17.020 through my daughter did make it through as well um and and then this is where this is where you know

00:05:24.300 it got a little bit messy because we were trying to understand is this student wrestling their biological

00:05:31.020 gender what is the situation and so as i began digging into it a little bit further this was an 18 year

00:05:39.360 old biological woman who is transitioning to be an 18 year old man and while we're not looking at 0.91

00:05:49.600 medical records the important thing to keep in mind is that this means there's a possibility of taking

00:05:54.920 testosterone hormone therapy which essentially are performance enhancing drugs okay so this is where the

00:06:01.440 caution starts to come in to think like this could be a problem and then additionally while we're not

00:06:07.760 looking at the student's medical records the student is bragging to other young women that is uh that are in

00:06:16.720 the wrestling circles that the student is taking testosterone to transition so we have that um and then additionally

00:06:26.240 if you look at progressive pictures of the student you would be inclined to think that they are taking

00:06:33.040 testosterone here is where the problem ensues right this is where we have we've exposed a loophole along

00:06:41.120 the way and now we've got to close the loophole when you're looking at this this is much different

00:06:46.000 than what you would typically think of right you we in your case right you have somebody who is is posing

00:06:52.000 as a woman that is competing against women with an unfair advantage because it is a man in this situation

00:06:58.240 this is a biological woman who maybe seems to be taking performance enhancing drugs to be a man 1.00

00:07:08.000 that is still competing against their biological gender right and so that's where we start to have 0.95

00:07:14.880 um start to have issues with that again of course i didn't want to tackle the issue if i'm being

00:07:19.920 transparent but when it steps into this situation it's it's like we can't we can't turn our heads from

00:07:25.920 and i asked my daughter i asked her i said what do you want to do right because again like this is the

00:07:30.880 one place that we can kind of check out and and just compete and she said mom we have to do something

00:07:36.720 you you know people that can help us do something and so that's that's where we are that's where we are

00:07:41.280 today well i commend you for of course bringing this issue to light because like mentioned uh we don't

00:07:49.520 tend to think of it this way but virtually what we're seeing across the board in every state every sport

00:07:55.760 every level every division it's that women are getting the short end of the stick in every 1.00

00:08:01.360 scenario um males who are self-identifying as women of course compete with the women but females who

00:08:08.560 self-identify as men also compete with the women and i don't think a lot of people realize this but

00:08:13.520 this is something i explained to you um kind of before of course joining the podcast but at that

00:08:21.200 national championships where of course we competed against leah thomas again a six foot four male who

00:08:28.960 identified as a woman who we were told we fully had to treat as a woman at the same national

00:08:33.760 championships we had another athlete who was transitioning but this athlete is a female who

00:08:40.320 began to self-identify as a man who we were told we fully had to treat as a man um izzy now goes by the name

00:08:48.000 of isaac uh swam for for yale uh ended up placing fifth in the nation in the hundred freestyle which

00:08:55.440 let me just for for perspective here for optics purposes okay it's the finals of the hundred

00:09:00.800 freestyle top eight swimmers in the entire country um and you've got again a six foot four man in a

00:09:07.680 women's swimsuit with a bulge next to a woman wearing only a speedo with nothing covering 1.00

00:09:15.360 her top had clearly undergone um had a double mastectomy but nothing covering her top i'm 0.89

00:09:22.480 sitting there watching this brandy and i'm like no it's me i'm the crazy one it literally must be this

00:09:28.800 is the twilight zone um but anyways izzy now identifying as isaac ended up placing fifth in the

00:09:35.200 nation in the hundred freestyle which is an incredible achievement to be top five in the

00:09:39.120 country um now she is competing with the men at least her senior season she did finished dead last 0.95

00:09:48.320 every single time uh got nowhere even remotely close to qualifying for men's ncaa championships um

00:09:56.640 while being an all-american on the women's side uh not to mention in the olympics uh the canadian

00:10:02.480 women's soccer team had an athlete by the name of quinn who identified as a boy competing on the

00:10:07.680 women's olympic soccer team of course we can ask the rhetorical question of oh you know why is that 0.65

00:10:14.480 but you and i both know the answer um it's because these these athletes as as proven would never and

00:10:22.080 will never be able to compete at the same level against the men um but enough of that you mentioned

00:10:29.680 a loophole um i imagine you're referring to missouri law uh so state law so were they prepared

00:10:37.760 for this scenario because of course they have a piece of legislation in place um that ultimately

00:10:42.880 protects sports on the basis of sex or so we thought um ultimately what this bill does is is

00:10:49.600 really the main the meat of it is prevents men from entering into to women's sports um you guys are

00:10:55.520 fortunate to have a wonderful attorney general um some really awesome leaders in your state

00:11:01.040 but was missouri law prepared for this scenario i think so and i and i do want to commend them because

00:11:07.040 they did a great job trying to protect our young women they truly did and and that's another thing

00:11:14.160 like we're here right here in the state capitol where this is happening right and so very grateful for

00:11:19.440 for um their attempt to do that but again you can't rationalize with irrational people and we're

00:11:26.240 dealing with a very irrational population that um that are causing these issues so they didn't see

00:11:32.720 this coming i mean it's really the first case of its kind when i was talking with attorneys around

00:11:37.040 the country as we were looking at ways to be able to prevent this from happening when when we reached

00:11:41.840 out to the state high school association to misha they their response was um is your are you

00:11:48.640 is she afraid that her daughter is going to lose that was their compassionate response to us right

00:11:54.560 they are instead protecting their situation right because they are saying that the state statute

00:12:01.440 nullified their previous policy that they did have in place they had a policy in place up until this

00:12:07.360 point that said if someone if a woman is transitioning to be a man and has has gone public with that that

00:12:15.520 they are required to provide whether or not they are taking hormone therapy to do that okay it was 0.88

00:12:22.960 never between a man and a doctor or a woman and a doctor at that point it was in the state handbook

00:12:30.240 right now they are saying oh she afraid her daughter's going to lose for the record my daughter did not

00:12:37.600 lose she beat the student eight to zero that is not a prideful thing that is me being grateful that my

00:12:43.760 daughter stepped into this because a lot of people were telling us like hey pull out let's 0.90

00:12:48.800 let's um you know let's uh forfeit this this match and i just couldn't do i couldn't do that for her 0.75

00:12:55.280 dreams um this was not something she wanted to do she wanted to hit this head on and she did a great job

00:12:59.600 her skill out um outperformed the muscle mass that was obviously in place with the other student but 0.89

00:13:06.800 going back to the loophole what we're dealing with is the fact that you have to wrestle your

00:13:13.440 biological gender okay that makes sense that's rational but for someone who is transitioning they

00:13:19.360 no longer have to disclose to the state high school athletic association whether or not they

00:13:24.960 are taking hormone therapy to do it that is the problem right that is the situation we're dealing with

00:13:30.560 and i know that we're dealing with it here it might be the first of its kind but it will happen in

00:13:35.520 other places that is why my daughter wanted us to take a stand that's why i'm doing this today

00:13:40.240 we do have um senate bill um 1440 that is currently um has been sponsored by senator mary elizabeth coleman

00:13:50.080 i would encourage you that if you were in missouri you have family that's in missouri anybody who has

00:13:54.880 a pull in missouri to reach out to your legislators and tell them that you are in support of this anti-doping

00:14:01.440 bill what this does is make sure that that again that we expose and close the loophole for young

00:14:07.520 women in missouri this will allow um this will ban any kind of hormone therapy and allow for young 0.99

00:14:16.320 women to be protected should someone decide that they want to become um want to transition to be a male

00:14:24.240 and are born a biological woman and let me just state again this is not about the student that's not about

00:14:29.120 the person this is about the policy that's in place to be able to protect our young women um

00:14:34.000 college wrestling for for women is one of the fastest growing college sports right now and it's 0.95

00:14:38.880 one of the fastest growing athletic scholarships for young women they will be robbed of these 0.71

00:14:43.200 opportunities if we do not close this loophole that is why it's so important this is not a

00:14:48.400 one-off situation this will continue to happen if we don't take a stand on this issue that's why it's

00:14:54.880 so important so i just again i want to encourage everyone to make sure that they reach out to

00:14:59.120 legislators and let them know how important this really is this is not just about uh anti-doping

00:15:04.160 for performance enhancing drugs this is about closing a loophole that is much bigger than just

00:15:10.160 not taking testosterone in order to maybe put on a little bit of muscle mass this is about keeping

00:15:16.000 biological women from doing it in order to still compete in a biological woman's sport 1.00

00:15:20.960 and you think to someone like lance armstrong i mean what do we call lance armstrong we called him a

00:15:30.080 cheater is what we call them um and i love the point that you brought up um about your daughter

00:15:36.160 winning people all the time they they misconstrue the argument here and they think oh well if this

00:15:42.560 person's not winning does it really matter yes it matters it's about the message that it's sending to

00:15:48.240 young girls we should be telling them that they're worthy of of sex based categories and that they're 0.93

00:15:54.320 worthy to be called champions they're worthy of safety in their sports they're worthy of maintaining

00:15:59.200 their dignity and and their feelings and identity being affirmed um rather than than having all of that

00:16:06.160 kind of diminished to affirm the identity and feelings of a male and to your point this isn't

00:16:11.200 you know this isn't us trying to say that this person um well as a christian myself um i don't

00:16:19.840 necessarily support transitioning um from a biblical standpoint but i think adults should certainly be

00:16:26.640 able to do what they want to do with with their their own bodies as long as you know it doesn't cost

00:16:32.480 my taxpayer dollars and i'm not forced to necessarily and isn't hurting somebody else's body like uh the

00:16:37.760 the unborn right exactly exactly um but every decision understand every decision has consequences

00:16:46.320 uh and so if this athlete um wants to transition and wants to go down that route a consequence of

00:16:53.920 that might be not playing in the sport category of your assigned sex your observed sex um so so yes

00:17:03.600 um i think it's also the juxtaposition here again thinking about the ncaa they've banned celsius

00:17:11.360 the energy drink uh because they say it's too much of a a performance enhancer celsius they said there's

00:17:17.360 too much caffeine so i guess you know why do you think they're scared to do what they know to be

00:17:23.440 right are you kidding me the ncaa um much broader than that the ioc uh even these these state laws that

00:17:30.480 are in place uh they know of course that testosterone and other drugs like it are

00:17:36.160 performance enhancing why do you think they're scared i think that they're scared because this

00:17:43.360 doesn't give students a place to land that might be transitioning and like you said if you if you want

00:17:52.480 to change your biological gender and um and participate in sports then you just that's just

00:18:00.640 not an option right you have to wait until you've graduated from high school to make that decision if

00:18:05.760 that's what you want to do and what you might find out there are a lot of people that regret that right

00:18:10.640 doing that as a young person anyway and so you might find out that they don't want to do that after

00:18:16.160 they turn 18 right after they are an adult and their brains are fully formed that might be the

00:18:20.880 consequence i think that the that right now what we're seeing is again our world is upside down

00:18:26.960 and people are clamoring just to try to make everyone feel seen and heard and they feel like

00:18:32.000 this will give this will prevent them from having a place to land anymore because to play sports

00:18:37.440 because they they have to participate in their biological gender and if they are to if they are

00:18:42.640 transitioning then they wouldn't be able to participate well then that like you said that's a natural 1.00

00:18:46.800 consequence right of of what they would choose and i think that's something we have to remember we

00:18:52.800 shouldn't punish our young women like you said that i mean i i want them to feel safe and i want

00:18:58.960 them to feel protected we fought for so long as women to have the opportunities that we have and we are

00:19:07.280 just allowing them to be stripped away from us and also i want to say um i've had a lot of people reach

00:19:12.560 out to me and say thank you so much for speaking up for our girls and that we need to really

00:19:16.960 encourage more women to do that but i also have to say men we need you helping to protect us as well

00:19:24.080 yes we have voices and i am grateful for people like like you riley and i am grateful to have the

00:19:29.600 platform that i have and the abilities that i have been given and the network that we have but it is

00:19:35.120 bigger than that we need men to feel comfortable and not feel like that they they don't have a voice in

00:19:40.080 this they are dads they are uncles they are brothers they are coaches and we need you we need

00:19:47.600 you to protect our girls as well not from a sexist standpoint of feeling like we need men to to to

00:19:55.120 handle this for us no we need to work together to handle this and i just don't want men to feel like

00:20:00.480 their voices have to be quieted because i've heard from a lot of male coaches that have thanked me for

00:20:05.760 saying something because they feel uneasy about saying something in this situation and you know

00:20:11.200 what many of them are probably scared for their jobs and that's wrong right we should be able to

00:20:16.320 and we should be able to embrace our values and take a stand on this because again this is about

00:20:21.760 protecting protecting our girls and and it's not just from this standpoint we're talking about these

00:20:29.280 girls go into combat with each other right like it's not just like a track meet where you might run 1.00

00:20:33.520 beside each other this is a matter of they are they're wrestling this is a full contact sport

00:20:39.520 it is not safe right it's not just an unfair competitive advantage it is unsafe for students

00:20:46.560 to be taking performance enhancing drugs against someone who's not and unknowingly so this is this

00:20:52.560 is part of the issue as well and we need men to step up and women to and their voices be heard

00:20:57.600 of course um parents that's your call to action um certainly i i could not agree more we need to see

00:21:05.600 moms but we need to see dads i think that's been the piece that's that's really been missing we've

00:21:10.800 seen a big push for moms running for school board and different things but it's due time um that both 0.99

00:21:16.560 mothers and fathers are willing and coaches i mean you're right every leadership position should be

00:21:21.360 defending these girls um kids in general because i mean they're desperate for it um one more time

00:21:29.040 and that's our job right exactly our job exactly one more time can you plug the bill in missouri um

00:21:36.160 to to garner awareness make sure um if you live in missouri make sure you are reaching out to your

00:21:42.880 state senator your state representative um letting them know how you feel about it because again it's

00:21:47.840 important um if you truly care about the safeguarding of of children and women sure it is senate bill 1440

00:21:56.800 the way it reads it prohibits public and private elementary and secondary schools and institutions

00:22:01.760 of post-secondary education from being members of any statewide athletic activities association

00:22:06.960 that allows students to use performance enhancing drugs and just something to keep in mind again

00:22:12.080 it's going to be labeled as an anti-doping bill people are going to maybe be confused about how that

00:22:16.480 would connect to something transgender but now you know the story behind it and i think that's what

00:22:20.720 we have to keep in mind right is it's not just about making sure some kids don't take some testosterone

00:22:27.120 it is much bigger than that because again we've exposed a loophole now it's our responsibility to close

00:22:32.800 that loophole that's how we can do this that's how we can work together to do this so please do not

00:22:37.680 hesitate reaching out um to your representatives to um to our legislators to be able to hopefully get this passed

00:22:46.880 amazing well we thank you for your stand on this and and all of the issues that you have taken a stand

00:22:52.880 on um your voice and your platform are incredibly influential and desperately needed uh so we are

00:22:59.200 grateful for you brandy and we will be following along uh following what sb uh 1440 is doing how it's

00:23:05.600 tracking and what we can do to support it so thank you thank you thank you and thank you for your voice we

00:23:11.520 are so grateful to have you and you are fiery girl i love it each time i'm inspired a little bit

00:23:16.320 more to step out of my comfort zone and maybe be a little bit more fiery a little bit more like riley

00:23:20.960 well you're sweet brandy so thank you if you are living in missouri make sure you reach out to your

00:23:27.200 state senator your state representative and you are urging them to vote in support of this anti-doping bill

00:23:33.920 sb 1440. uh thank you guys for tuning in we appreciate you make sure you like subscribe

00:23:39.600 comment anywhere where you get your podcasts make sure to check us out at outkick.com and we will see

00:23:45.120 you again next time

Gaines for Girls with Riley Gaines - April 10, 2024

Wrestling with Gender Identity in Women's Sports

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