Megan Rapinoe slams ‘horrible’ IOC ban on trans women
Megan Rapinoe (Getty Images)
Megan Rapinoe has criticised the International Olympic Committee’s recent decision to ban trans women from competing in women’s Olympic events.
Speaking on the 3 April episode of her podcast A Touch More, soccer star Rapinoe called the ban “horrible” and criticised its title: “The Protection of the Women’s Category”
“I can’t even believe that they’re calling it this because it has nothing to do with protecting women,” she said. “I feel like two people, who played at the very highest level for every competition that you possibly could, don’t agree with this and never felt like this was an issue at all.”
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Rapinoe continued: “We already know that biology, as much as we want it to be just nice and clean and tight and perfectly in one category and another, it’s not. We know that. So, now what we’re doing is subjecting everybody, all women and all people who are identifying as women to this really invasive testing that only to me says like, ‘Oh we’re just trying to whittle it down to a certain type of woman.’ Is that what we’re doing? That’s really the whole game here.”
The wider conversation
She went on to compare the ban, as well as continued attacks on trans people in sport, to other LGBTQ+ rights like equal marriage.
“They sort of lost the battle on gay marriage and lost the battle on all these things so it’s just like, ‘We’re gonna have this whole campaign for all these years to just hate trans people,’ which is such a small percentage of the population,” she said.
“It’s actually on a single hand when we’re talking about sports. And just like thread the absolute tightest needle thread that you possibly could.”
Rapinoe also criticised the IOC’s insistence that the ban is based in science. “This will ultimately just prevent people from competing within the women’s category that they feel like they have an unfair advantage. It’s just really hateful,” she said.
“There’s been so few athletes that are trans or competing as trans and it’s so blatant on its face. It’s a total acquiescence to the Trump administration and to really right-wing conservative politics that really is just bringing down so much hate against such a small percentage of people who are just trying to live their life. It’s just horrible and I’m just sickened by it, really.”
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