Former Kentucky swimmer Riley Gaines was among more than a dozen college athletes who filed a lawsuit against the NCAA on Thursday, accusing it of violating their Title IX rights by allowing transgender woman Lia Thomas to compete at the national championships in 2022.
The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Atlanta, details the shock Gaines and other swimmers felt when they learned they would have to share a locker room with Thomas at the championships in Atlanta. It documents a number of races they swam in with Thomas, including the 200-yard final in which Thomas and Gaines tied for fifth but Thomas, not Gaines, was handed the fifth-place trophy.
Thomas swam for Pennsylvania. She competed for the men’s team at Penn before her gender transition.
Thomas was the first openly transgender athlete to win a Division I title in any sport, finishing in front of three Olympic medalists for the championship. By not making the final, the lawsuit mentions that Florida swimmer Tylor Mathieu, who was not a plaintiff, was denied first-team All-American honors in that event.
Other plaintiffs included athletes from volleyball and track.
Many sports throughout history were only segregated by gender once and because a woman fought to participate and beat the men.
This is all about the bruised egos of bigots. If they’d come 5th against a cis woman they’d be annoyed at themselves and try to do better next time, but coming 5th against a trans woman hurts because they see trans people as inferior (yet also superior, sound familiar? that’s because it’s one of the points from the fascism checklist), so them coming 5th is clearly her fault, and she must be persecuted to give her, and other trans people, the message that they aren’t welcome.