'Like a Bad Joke': Rival Speaks Out Against Transgender Weightlifter in Tokyo Olympics

(AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko, File)

On this Memorial Day, as we honor brave Americans who paid the ultimate sacrifice to preserve liberty and the freedoms we hold dear, Joe Biden and the Democrat Party are determined to turn the greatest fighting machine in the world into a giant gender-fluid social experiment, while the same “party of women’s rights” enthusiastically supports biological males kicking the hell out of biological females in women’s sports.

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But now, a female weightlifter participating in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics is speaking out against competing against a transgender “female” and saying what needs to be said.

As we reported in early May, New Zealand transgender female weightlifter Laurel Hubbard lived his first 35 years on the planet as a man but is now competing in this summer’s games in Tokyo as a “repackaged” (pun intended) 43-year-old female.

Belgian Olympic weightlifter Anna Vanbellinghen says enough is enough. Vanbellinghen broke her female teammates’ silence in an interview with Inside the Games, telling ITG that dealing with transgender issues in female sports is “impossible” anyway, but Hubbard’s participation in Tokyo as a “female” weightlifter is “like a bad joke” to women athletes.

Vanbellinghen first stressed her support for the transgender community.

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“First off, I would like to stress that I fully support the transgender community and that what I’m about to say doesn’t come from a place of rejection of this athlete’s identity.”

The Belgian realizes the “legal frame” for transgender participation in sports is “difficult,” but says common sense must not be cast aside in the process.

“I am aware that defining a legal frame for transgender participation in sports is very difficult since there is an infinite variety of situations, and that reaching an entirely satisfactory solution, from either side of the debate, is probably impossible.

“However, anyone that has trained weightlifting at a high level knows this to be true in their bones: this particular situation is unfair to the sport and to the athletes.

So why is it still a question whether two decades, from puberty to the age of 35, with the hormonal system of a man also would give an advantage [in competing against women]?

Joe? Kamala? Nancy? Chucky?

“For athletes, the whole thing feels like a bad joke.”

The common sense of Vanbellinghen’s argument could not have made more common sense.

“I understand that for sports authorities nothing is as simple as following your common sense, and that there are a lot of impracticalities when studying such a rare phenomenon, but for athletes, the whole thing feels like a bad joke.

“Life-changing opportunities are missed for some athletes — medals and Olympic qualifications — and we are powerless.

“Of course, this debate is taking place in a broader context of discrimination against transgender people, and that is why the question is never free of ideology.

“However, the extreme nature of this particular situation really demonstrates the need to set up a stricter legal framework for transgender inclusion in sports, and especially elite sports.

Because I do believe that everyone should have access to sports, but not at the expense of others.”

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Jerry Wallwork, President of the Samoan Weightlifting Federation, which has had athletes competing against Hubbard since she transitioned in 2017, told Inside the Games he believes changes need to be made at the top of the International Olympic Committee.

“I was one of the people who opposed it [having Hubbard in Olympic qualifying] greatly back in 2018. […] “The decision came from the top [an International Olympic Committee (IOC) sub committee] which approved participation of transgender athletes in women’s weightlifting.

“Changes must be made from the top, from the IOC. “More research should go into this issue, or a separate category must be established for transgender lifters.”

“Especially in contact sports and power sports like weightlifting, Wallwork stressed — again, common sense — “there is a disadvantage for female athletes against transgender athletes.”

And that brings us back to the beginning and the hypocrisy of the left.

Of course we’re champions of women’s rights. Um, except in women’s sports —where we believe, um, the rights of transgender athletes to kick women’s asses is one step higher on the left-wing totem pole.”

And these people wonder why we laugh at them —  through the anger.

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