For Women’s Sports Week, former NCAA swimmers Riley Gaines and Paula Scanlan are sounding the alarm on threats to women’s sports and women as a whole.
“If these threats to women do persist, the integrity of women’s sports is lost,” the former competitive swimmers wrote for the Washington Examiner. “But even more importantly, women will continue being erased as a whole.”
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Gaines is a former 12x All-American swimmer at the University of Kentucky, an adviser at Independent Women’s Voice, and a vocal critic of biological males’ participation in women’s sports, such as Lia Thomas, who identifies as a transgender female. Scanlan is a former teammate of Thomas at the University of Pennsylvania.
The women’s sports advocates want to see an end to girls remaining silent due to “fear and bullying.” They are eager to see politicians treat the threat to women’s sports seriously instead of “burying their heads in the sand,” and they are desperate for women to be shown the respect their male counterparts get in sports, which are “a vehicle for so many women to develop critical life and leadership skills, to be part of something greater than ourselves, to find confidence, and to gain life-changing opportunities…”
In refusing to stay silent about “protecting girls and women,” something Scanlan said she had to overcome, the women’s message is clear: “Enough is enough.”
Along with Women’s Sports Week, Gaines and Scanlan are celebrating the 51st anniversary of Title IX, the federal policy that ensured equal athletic opportunities for both sexes, helping lead to the growth of women’s sports. To the former college athletes, it is this law that needs to be preserved amid threats targeting its very nature.
Gaines, who has become a face of “protecting the integrity of women’s sports,” is adamant that her advocacy is not anti-trans and is not hateful. “This is pro-woman. It’s about fairness. End of discussion.”
Scanlan, a Taiwanese and U.S. citizen, has underscored the need for America to “do the right thing,” as other countries around the world look to it for guidance.
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On Women’s Sports Week, to the former college athletes, there is no time more necessary to demand protection for women’s sports and to help women athletes who struggle with similar fears to know they are not alone. As the women write, “It’s time we hold the line and demand change.”
