If I may belabor the obvious for a moment: We don't make public policy to accommodate tiny minorities unless fundamental rights are involved; we don't elevate those tiny minorities above their more numerous peers, and in making said public policy, we don't make decisions on emotional arguments. Or, at least, we shouldn't. And, of course, there is no room for boys and men in girls' and women's sports.
The Trump administration has acknowledged biological reality in policy, namely that any school or university that allows boys to play on girls' sports teams will lose federal funding. That's appropriate; some will find it heavy-handed, but the federal government has often wielded federal subsidies like a club.
Now, in New Hampshire, some teens - boys - are challenging that policy. There's a problem, though, with their arguments:
They are hyper-emotional horse squeeze.
Parker Tirrell, 16, enjoys her art classes, scrolling on TikTok and working at her new job at a pet store. But most of all, the transgender teen loves playing soccer.
Until last year, that wasn’t a problem.
“I was just living my life like any normal person,” said Tirrell, who has played since she was 4. “I was accepted. I had a nice, steady team that I played on all the time.”
Until last year, it was a problem. You see, Parker Tirrrell isn't a girl and isn't a "she." Parker Tirrell is a boy. He has an X and a Y chromosome and all of the physical realities of speed, strength, and stamina that go with that. That's the biological reality, like it or not.
Then came a cascade of obstacles, starting with a state ban on transgender girls in girls’ sports, and most recently President Donald Trump’s Feb. 5 executive order, “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports.”
Now, life is anything but normal. Tirrell, along with Iris Turmelle, 15, another transgender girl, are the first to challenge Trump’s order, six months after suing their own state over its ban and getting a court order allowing them to play.
"I just feel like I’m being singled out right now by lawmakers and Trump and just the whole legislative system for something that I can’t control,” Tirrell told The Associated Press in an interview. “It just doesn’t feel great. It’s not great. It feels like they just don’t want me to exist. But I’m not going to stop existing just because they don’t want me to.”
Iris Turmelle is also a boy. Iris Turmelle also has an X and a Y chromosome. Iris Turmelle also has all of the physical realities of speed, strength, and stamina that go along with that.
These are facts.
Here's another fact - every argument made to allow these two boys to play in girls' sports is emotional. Not one is based on fact. Look:
The order is one of a series Trump has signed targeting transgender and nonbinary people. The U.S. Supreme Court is looking at several cases, including one from Tennessee over whether state bans on treating transgender minors violate the Constitution. At least two other states have asked the court to review rulings that blocked the enforcement of state laws prohibiting transgender athletes from competing in sports.
Trump's orders are not "targeting transgender and nonbinary people." They are simply ensuring fairness by keeping boys from playing in girls' sports. Other than that, "transgender" or "nonbinary" people may do as they please, "identify" as they please, be it as a girl, as nonbinary, or as the Coalsack Nebula, and much good may it do them. And there is no equal protection under the law claim here, either; these boys are free, as is any boy, to try out for the boys' team.
Parker Tirrelle claims he is less muscular than some of the girls on his soccer team and cites that he wasn't able to get on the school's girls' softball team as evidence, but that's a canard. Even if it were true, and Parker Tirrelle was several standard deviations outside the physical norms for boys his age, that is not any reason to change a policy that applies to everyone, to address a deeply unfair practice wherin any boy who claimed to be a girl could go overnight from being a mediocre male athlete to being a champion "female" athlete.
There will, no doubt, be a prolonged series of legal battles over this issue. We can hope that sanity prevails, but we should be prepared for emotional arguments like those put forth here to persuade some judges. Girls and women should be prepared, as I have written many times, to deal with these matters directly by walking off any field where another team has a male member - or when their own team admits a male member. That's the only way this hideously unfair practice will end, for good and all.
