The Megyn Kelly Show - The Trans Athletes Debate, From All Angles: High School Girls Suing, Medical Experts, and More | Ep. 101

Episode Date: May 12, 2021

Megyn Kelly is joined by Chelsea Mitchell and Alanna Smith, two students involved in a lawsuit over trans athletes competing in girls sports, and their lawyer, Kristen Waggoner of Alliance Defending Freedom, as well as Joanna Harper, PhD researcher at Loughborough University, and Dr. Gregory Brown, professor of Exercise Science at University of Nebraska Kearney, to discuss the status of the lawsuit in Connecticut, what the media has left out about the trans vs. cis high school athletics story, what the right solution for trans athletes might be, the scientific advantages of males identified at birth over females identified at birth, the scientific difference between adolescents competing and professionals competing, the key factor of when hormone therapy is started for trans athletes vs. social transitioning, what studies reveal about trans athletes competing against cis athletes, the importance of having productive conversations about trans athletes and women's sports, and more.Follow The Megyn Kelly Show on all social platforms:Twitter: http://Twitter.com/MegynKellyShowInstagram: http://Instagram.com/MegynKellyShowFacebook: http://Facebook.com/MegynKellyShowFind out more information at:https://www.devilmaycaremedia.com/megynkellyshow

Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show, your home for open, honest, and provocative conversations. Today, the trans athlete story from all angles. Girls who filed a recent lawsuit to stop the trans girls from running in sports. Scientific experts on both sides of the debate. They're amazing. And more, next. Hey everyone, it's Megyn Kelly. Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show. Today on the program, the trans debate. As I mentioned a second ago, here's what we're going to be talking about. In the state of Connecticut, three young athletes, teenage high school athletes, filed a lawsuit trying to object to the fact that trans girls had been allowed to compete against these three girls in female athletics. And the trans girls were winning

a lot and taking titles that these girls felt were rightly theirs. They feel that the feminist community, at least parts of it, have not been standing up for them and that these girls and their families have been left to their own devices to try to stand up for their places on these track teams and in other sports. This is an issue that's covering college athletics at the International Olympic level and, of course, now in the high school level as well. And people don't know what they're doing. I mean, if you look at the case law all over the states, it's all over the place. Even the actual laws passed in various states. Just pulling up my notes here. Okay, there are bills aimed at limiting or prohibiting trans women in sports in 20 states. Bills have been passed in places like Florida and West Virginia. We got an executive order out of the South Dakota governor. Meanwhile, the NCAA is refusing to hold championships where these restrictions are.

But then there's 16 states like Connecticut that allow transgender high school athletes to compete without any restrictions. No hormone therapy required, nothing. You can transition in a week or a month's time and race in the other league, right? From the boys league to the girls league. And that's actually what happened in Connecticut leading to this lawsuit. Now, our plaintiffs today, we've got two of the three girls with us, have just suffered a defeat. This federal district court threw out their lawsuit saying, everyone has since graduated from high school, so we're

not going to deal with this, which is really punting the ball down the road because this is going to keep coming up over and over. So I think this court just didn't have guts. Um, and it's on appeal and we will see once we get a ruling on the merits, ideally how the courts are going to come down on this issue. Should it be allowed? Are there really meaningful biological differences between cis girls that refers to girls who are born girls and identify as girls the rest of their lives, and trans girls. That means children who are identified as male when they're born, but later come to believe that they've been misidentified and that in fact, they are girls

and they want to live their lives as girls. So it's a sticky issue and nobody has all the answers, but we're going to have a great debate. We're going to have these girls on with their lawyer, and then we're going to have two experts on this issue come on. And man, it's a great debate. They're so respectful. One of our panelists is herself trans and a runner and has been studying this issue for a long, long time. And she'll have somebody on the other side who believes you can't erase biological differences, no matter what you do, the hormones, all of it. And that these two sort of groups of athletes need to remain separate. Otherwise, it's just unfair. I loved this show. So anyway, we're going to get into it. We're going to mess up the terms. You're going to follow along with us. I did my best to be respectful, but clear.

Mediocre success, probably, but I leave it to you to decide. But we're going to start now with the young women who filed a lawsuit. Chelsea Mitchell, Alana Smith, and the woman representing them, Kristen Wagner, from Alliance Defending Freedom. But first this. All right. So Chelsea, Alana and Kristen, thank you so much for being here. Thank you. Thank you.

Let's just start with a personal story. OK, I'm going to start with you, Chelsea. You are how old now? I'm 18 years old. OK. And you are in college. You're a freshman at William & Mary? Yes, that's correct. All right, so first of all, how'd you become such a track star?

Like what happened? What drove you to get into track? Well, I've been an athlete all my life. When I was little, I played soccer and basketball and softball. But when I got to middle school, I did track, middle school track, kind of just as a social event. You know, I always thought I was kind of fast, but it didn't really become serious until high school. My older sister was captain of the track team. So I decided to kind of give it a shot. And yeah, I kind of quickly realized that,

you know, I was kind of good at running. So this is a dumb question, Chelsea, forgive me, but just because you're a good runner, you're fast runner, I guess wouldn't make you necessarily a good long jumper, right? So like, how does, if you run track, do you necessarily develop all of those skills, like the whole track and field ability? No, not necessarily. I mean, I think for long jump, I'm also a long jumper. Um, speed definitely does help you a lot because you know, you're going out. Um, but for a lot of other events, um, you know, whether you're fast or you can jump high, you know, it's definitely not, it's not as easy to just kind of like rearrange your events. I mean, definitely athleticism helps, but yeah. Okay. So you go into high school.

You are at Canton High School in Connecticut. And right from the get-go, were you on fire? Like, were you winning? Was it clear you were head and shoulders above most of your competitors? I don't think it was like fire, but I definitely, um, you know, started out, I broke my school record in the 55 meter dash and 300 meter dash. The first meet that I went to, um, I broke the school record. So it was definitely, um, kind of right off the bat, we were like, oh, there's something special there.

Um, and she'll definitely, definitely will go far with those times. And now if you are anything like most families, at some point, your parents are like, you might be able to do this in college. Like this could work out pretty well. Every parent is like, could she play in college? Could he play in college? You know, which is fun and helps admissions and potentially scholarships and all that. So how soon in your high school career did that possibility occur to you guys? I mean, my freshman year was kind of just,

you know, for fun. I was still kind of figuring out the sport. Definitely my sophomore year was kind of when I started realizing that I might be good enough to be able to run Division I track. Okay. And I'm going to bring in Kristen now, who's your lawyer, because when I look at the stats alleged about Chelsea in your lawsuit, in their complaint, I'm like, oh my God. Like the one that jumped out at me was she won the MVP award for track

every single season of her high school career. But that's the least of it. She did. She won three state open championships in the 55 meter, the 100 meter, and the long jump. And she won eight total state championships in a number of events. She has 20 conference championships, holds a number of meet records. And as you said, MVP. And she's the only female athlete in her school history to win a state or a New England championship. So if you think about it, there's the state of Connecticut, and then there's the

whole New England regional championship that's even broader. And she won that as well. All right. So maybe I'm feeling hormonal today or something, but that just gave me the chills. I just got the chills. It's just so cool. I love hearing about young women's success. And it's just super fun to think about you coming into your own and what that must have felt like. And I don't know. I mean, I guess I should ask you, Chelsea, what did that feel like to just be winning and dominating and, you know, putting in as the years went on in high school I kept getting better and better and I kept achieving like really high marks and to kind of see that come full circle was really cool I remember my freshman year like seeing the females win the 100 meters at states and just like thinking that was so cool and they were so fast. And I was like, oh, like, I just want that to be me. Like, I hope I can do that one day. And like, so to be able to do that and to reach those marks

was definitely just like kind of mind blowing to myself and definitely was like my biggest accomplishments in high school. And it's really, it's a lesson. Hard work can get you where you want to go. I And it's really, it's a lesson. Hard work can get you where you want to go. I mean, it really, it can hard work can get you where you want to go. Um, all right. So what was the first year that the trans girl athletes started competing and was it in your school or the two? Cause I know the complaint speaks of two trans girls in particular. Were they in your school?

No, the two transgender girls were not from my school. They did start, one of them started campaigning against me my freshman year of high school and the other started running against me my sophomore year. Okay, their names are Andrea Yearwood and Terry Miller? Yes. Terry came in later. Yes. Terry, as I understand, started running as in the girls leagues as of the 10th grade. Yeah. Terry actually competed on the boys team the first three seasons of high school. And then her sophomore year of high school, she decided to join the girls team. So this is where it starts to get very dicey because, you know, according to your complaint,

I'm reading here in the winter of 2017, spring of 2017 and winter of 2018 seasons, then male athlete Terry Miller competed in boys indoor or outdoor track events and did not advance to any state class or open championships in individual events. So Terry was not doing so well when running in the boys league. Is that fair to say? Yeah, I think that's fair. And then it goes on to say just weeks after the conclusion of the winter 18 season in which Terry had been running with the boys, Terry abruptly appeared competing in the girls events in the spring of 18. So the same year in the spring of 18 outdoor track season. So was that the first you knew of Terry or you saw Terry in races and meets that you were going to be competing in? Yeah, my first time competing against Terry was one of the first meets of my outdoor 2018 season.

And I was aware that Terry was a biological male identifying as a girl. And how old were you guys at this point? So your sophomore is what, 15, 16? Yeah, I believe I was 15. Okay. And forgive the indelicacy of this, but it's part of what we're discussing. Did Terry's body look like the body of a boy or a girl? Or was it really neither at that point? I don't think it was necessarily very obvious or like striking. Like it wasn't like I lined up and I was like, oh, there's like this huge man beside me or anything like that. It wasn't necessarily that obvious, but I definitely do think there are like some differences

between females and males that can be easily spotted if you're looking hard enough. For sure. Right. And was this a thing? So like you saw Terry at an interschool competition since Terry didn't go to your school. Was it like announced? Did you know this was coming? My coach had kind of talked to me about it the day before and said that they had mistakenly entered a boy into the girls category. However, since we had kind of encountered this the year before with Andrea, when I talked to my mom later that day, she wasn't so sure that it was a mistake and thought that this might be another

transgender runner in our kind of league. Okay. So Andrea was the first you competed against. Is that correct? Yeah. And what year did you see Andrea for the first time? Your, your freshman year then? Yeah. I competed against Andrea at the state open my freshman year. And how did you do like, well, how did that come out? Well, um, I placed seventh in the a hundred meter dash, um, at the state open as a freshman. Um, however, top six advanced the new England final, um, Andrea placed third. So if Andrea had been in the race, I would have,

um, you know, gotten a medal and advanced the New England championship as a freshman. However, because of it, I did not. OK, so you're already sort of spotting a potential issue here. And did you have to race or compete against Andrea more that year as a freshman? That was the only time my freshman year I did compete against Andrea my sophomore year in indoor at States. I believe I placed fourth in the 55 meter dash where Andrea won the title. And Andrea, how had Andrea been running on the boys team prior to that, you know, to running on the girls team as a, as a freshman and a sophomore. No, I think Andrea, um, came into high school identifying as female. I don't think that she started on the boys team as Terry did.

Okay. Um, so that now you start running against Terry and how'd you do against Terry who, who had gone through more time living as a boy and going through male puberty than Andrea had? Well, to be honest, I it was not even like a competition, especially my sophomore year. You know, I think the first time I raced against Terry, she ran like a low 12 second 100 and I was barely under 13 seconds. It was just a huge margin of time. And as the season progressed, none, not myself nor other girls could come even close. It was over half a second difference between Terry's time and the rest of the girls competing. So how did that feel for you? It was really frustrating, especially because,

you know, I was seeing myself improve a lot and get up to like the higher ranks in the state and just like place so far back from what I should have placed was definitely really hard. And, you know, just knowing that I could have been, you know, state runner up, but I wasn't, was definitely hard. And I just tried to kind of block it out and push it away. But it was always kind of in the back of my mind that that's what I lost. What was the dynamic at the meets, you know, when you'd see Andrea or you'd see Terry? You know, I'm sure you weren't the only girl having this frustration.

So what was it like between you and them? It was pretty tense. I mean, I don't think anyone meant it to be that tense, but it just kind of happened. Um, I remember at one meet, um, there was a bunch of cameras following Andrea around because they were filming a documentary and just having that kind of atmosphere, um, while you're trying to compete and trying to focus on your race was definitely not, not right. And it w it just wasn't a good atmosphere for any of us girls. I think it was very stressful and very, um, kind of just hard to be in that atmosphere for such a prolonged amount of time. I know at this time, your mom, Christie was starting to get, you know, involved

in, in trying to address this. And, and she has said that she tried to reach out to all the authorities involved. And this is a quote, not a single person was willing to engage in a reasoned discussion about this issue. Even feminist groups like the National Women's Law Center have sided with biological males on this issue rather than the young women they claim to represent. And she just kept getting told, quote, your daughter has the right to participate, but not to win. What do you make of that argument that you had the right to participate, but not to win? I don't agree with it at all. I mean, we have legal protections put in place so that girls can have equal opportunities. And to kind of hear our own lawmakers kind of dismiss female athletic

abilities and say that our chances to win and to compete don't matter. It's really hard to hear, especially because we see all of our male counterparts, you know, getting to succeed and win and, you know, get all the press and stuff. And we don't get that. And it's kind of really frustrating to hear other people dismiss women like that. But now here's where, here's what the other side will use against you. And I mean, the other side of the lawsuit, you've beaten them. You've, you've beaten, I think, both Andrea and Terry. And they'll say that proves it can be done and that there's no inherent advantage to trans girls. And, you know, undercuts your argument that it's unfair to allow them to compete in the girls league. Yeah, those times that I won were very isolated incidents. Both of them were

in the case of a false start where the top seeded biological male had been disqualified from the race. My senior year when I beat Terry, Andrea, who was was seated fifth in the nation for the girls, 55 meter dash had false started in the prelims, um, and therefore could not run against me, um, for the championship. And so I am very confident that if Andrea had raced against me, um, that I would have been beat by a significant margin and not have won that title. And also it's about the girls that should have meddled or should have advanced to the next level of competition because their opportunities matter as well. And so it's more about how the average male can dominate an elite female. It's not necessarily, oh, these one or two times.

I mean, I raced against them, I think, over 30 times in my high school career at big championship meets. And so those one or two times, I'm very grateful to have had those opportunities to succeed and win, but they were very isolated incidents. Megan, she also actually, she actually lost four state championships and two New England titles amid those, you know, 30 times that she had to compete against the males. So Chelsea's too modest to say that, but, and she would have been ranked the fastest girl in all of Connecticut, except for the fact that a biological male took that position. What, what did that do to you? You know, your mom, your mom talked a bit about, you know, publicly, she said that you felt sick, you would feel physically sick before these races. Is that so? And why? There was definitely a really big mental aspect to racing against them. I think a lot of track athletes can agree that track is a very mental sport as well as physical. So it wasn't just that I wasn't fast enough to race against them. It was that I was already coming into the race knowing that I couldn't win and that I wasn't going to be able

to beat them. And so I already had this huge mental block on me and I couldn't relax. I couldn't focus on what I actually needed to do in the race because I was so blocked by this idea that I had no chance to beat them. Right. I mean, it would be, that would of course get in your head. I can't imagine because while all this is going on, sadly, you're being called a transphobe, right? Like your mom for pushing back, you guys for filing the lawsuit, the knee-jerk reaction of anybody who's been advocating on behalf of the trans community is you are transphobic and this lawsuit is transphobic and you've got a race in this under these conditions how is that affecting you it was definitely hard um you know it took me a while to kind of come public with the lawsuit and um um, DOJ complaint. Um, but you know, when I did, I kind of just

tried my best to push that aside and kind of just focus as much as I could on racing. Um, you know, of course people are going to say what they want, um, about, you know, the lawsuit, but I tried really just not to focus on that and just kind of focus on my race, which obviously, you know, like I said, huge mental block, but I tried my best to just block it out. What, what year of your high school career was the lawsuit filed? My senior year. Okay. So, but I mean, it was tense before that, then you filed a lawsuit and it goes forward and we'll get to what happened with that in a minute with Kristen. So do you feel, I mean, you wound up at a great school, you're running track for William

and Mary. Do you feel like in the end you were hurt by this? I do. And in relation to like college recruiting and scholarship opportunities, I do think that I would not really be able to measure how much my college recruitment was impacted by, you know, having biological males in my race. You know, the one race where Terry Falls started and I was able to win the Connecticut State Open in the 100 meters, I ran, you know, a huge personal best um I qualified for the championship division at

nationals I went on to win the New England 100 meter title I was named Connecticut state athlete of the year like there were so many opportunities that came up this one race and I only was able to like run that time and win that race because the biological male that had continuously beat me was disqualified and wasn't in that race. And so I don't know what would have happened if I hadn't had to race against them all those years, what other times or other opportunities could I have gotten if they weren't there. And also a lot of college coaches, um, you know, they want to see their athlete win. And if they, if they don't see you cross the finish line first, um, that's, you're not the first person that they're going to divert their attention to.

What do you make of the fact that, or so I read that neither Terry nor Andrea is running track in college. Is that true? I believe it's true. So how do you square that with where you are and how dominant they were in high school and the theory that that's winning and having the advantage is what attracts college coaches and recruitment? Yeah. I don't know their personal reasons for not running track. I do think that it's hard for coaches, you know, to, I think the recruiting process for transgender athletes is obviously different from that of a biological female. A lot of the cases that I know of in college are from athletes starting on the male's team and then transitioning to a female. So they're already there. Um, but definitely, you know, I'm definitely grateful for like all the opportunities

that I've, um, gotten in college. Yeah. All right. Let me bring in Alana. So Alana, you're still in high school. What, what year are you in right now? I'm a junior. You're a junior? You're young. How old are you? I'm 17. Okay. So you, same sort of story, right? You were running and you were winning. I mean, what I read is that you won the 400 meter at the 2019 Outdoor Northeast Regional as a freshman. And you were doing really well.

I mean, your wins go on and on. But what was the first year you had to compete against somebody who was a trans girl? So I competed against them my freshman year. It's my first year of high school. And I really only competed against them at the bigger meets like States and the New England regionals.

And those were obviously the meets that really mattered and really meant something. So it was really frustrating to know that like me and all the other biological female athletes weren't getting the spots that we deserve, especially because it was at these meets that really mattered. And did you personally lose to Andrea and Terry? Yes. I ran against both of the athletes and the 100 meter and the 200 meter.

And they beat you? Yes. What do you make of it? Because some people have said in response to all of these complaints, everyone has advantages. You know, like, I think the other side and this said LeBron James or somebody said LeBron James, his kids are going to have a big advantage when it comes to size and access to elite training and trainers. And, you know, if you have really tall parents, you might have longer legs, which, you know, that's sort of what they say. Like everyone has advantages. So you can't you can't sort of get a totally equal level playing field. I think that the advantages that biological males have over biological females is just, it's,

it's a lot. Like for example, I have a twin brother and he plays sports, but he doesn't run track, but he can still beat me in a race. And I think that just shows how big the differences are because, you know, I'm one of the fastest girls in the state of Connecticut and in the New England region. Yet my brother can still beat me, even though he doesn't run track. Now, did your mom read an op-ed in the New York Post? I think so. Yeah. Okay. Just making sure. Because I read it and it was amazing. And it was like pretty spectacular. And one of the things that jumped out at me in that op-ed, it was funny because I read part of it on the air and I was like, I want to talk

to them. Like I want to book them. Because she made one of the points. I mean, she made a lot of great points, but she was like, before, you know, you, you rip on me as sort of white privilege, doesn't understand. She said, you know, my child is a person of color and has overcome obstacles and made it and has been making it as a track and field star. And this isn't fair. I mean, is that because, you know, we hear a lot about the importance of encouraging diversity and so on. I don't know. It's tough to unleash white girl privilege on you. But what's how has that played into your story, if at all? Yeah, I think it's really it's honestly kind of funny when people say that this is about race, because like you said, first of all, I'm a person of color. And second of all, it's not really about the transgender athletes. It's about the CIC policy in Connecticut. And it's just about making sure that we can protect women's sports and keep women's sports, women's sports.

CIAC is the Connecticut body that governs Connecticut sports? Yes. Okay. And so tell you, tell me like when you, when you saw, you know, these two athletes, and it was just these two, Andrea and Terry? Yeah. When you saw them at meets and up against you in races, how would you feel? I felt like I was already defeated before I even got to the line. Usually, you feel like you have the chance to win, even if you might not be seated first or have the fastest time.

You know that there's a chance that you can still win. But when running against the biological males, all biological females just knew that we didn't have a chance to win. And it's not really about winning, but it's about knowing that you got the spot that you deserve. Like if you get fifth place, and that's the spot that you deserve, because it's a level playing field, then that's the spot that you deserve. But knowing that, you know, I trained for 20 hours a week and knowing that I'm not I didn't get the spot that I deserved. It was really frustrating and upsetting to me. What do you make of their lawyers have said in the lawsuit?

Look, neither Terry nor Andrea is undefeated and neither have dominant dominant race times among high school girls nationally. You know that they're beatable by by the right girl, cis girl, you know, born a girl and identifies as girl her whole life. By the right girl, they're beatable. So what do you make of that? I just think that, you know, if you see these races, you see videos of biological males running against us, you can just see that they're so far ahead of us and that the majority of us just can't reach their times. And one time that Chelsea did beat one of the transgender athletes, it's because the athlete with the top time got disqualified because of a false start. So it wasn't, it was only fair because the athlete wasn't allowed to

run in the race and she was only able to win and she lost so many titles and so many chances to get the spot that she deserved. I know Chelsea's mom basically said, even when she wins, she loses now. Because if she loses to a trans girl, the other side uses it to say, see, your argument has no merit whatsoever. And I've been reading up about these cases now for a week plus. This is the first time learning that there was a false start in the race that Chelsea, like the media doesn't report that, right? Like it's just, look, it's possible. But I mean, I will say if they were ranked fifth nationally, then there are at least four girls who are doing, you know, better than they are.

Your point is simply, it's not that it could never be done it's that they have such an advantage that you can't say just because they lose occasionally the system is fair yeah so now have they graduated have they have the the two trans girls graduated out of high school yes they have and now you're back on a level playing field with all cis girls as of right now i am yeah so i feel a lot more confident in my races and I know that I'm able to compete on a level playing field but I do know that if a change isn't made then more biological males can start to compete in the female category and future girls might have to experience what me and Chelsea have experienced. How's that going for you? Are you doing you doing

well? Yeah I'm doing really well. It's been hard because of COVID. So our season is really short. And like, you know, there's a lot of times we have to This is a real problem, right? Because Joe Biden, as soon as he got into office, he came out with an edict saying you can't discriminate against anybody based on gender identity. And the answer that Jen Psaki gave was trans rights or human rights, period. I mean, that was that was just the answer. Trans rights or human rights. How do you respond to that? We believe that there's a spot for everyone in sports, but it's just about finding out where it's most fair. And in the track world, would you say they have supporters or is it I mean, what's the dynamic like? Yeah, I think that they do have supporters, but then there's also a lot of people who feel like they have to stay quiet about it so they don't get in trouble or lose their job or something like that. So I think

a lot of people are just afraid to stand up and say that it's an unfair situation. Were you afraid? I was nervous at first because I'm very shy, but I realized that I believe that this is right. And I love sports. And I know that I want women's sports to stay women's sports because I want to go far with track. And it's hard to do that if I'm competing on an unlevel playing field. Have you had a lot of fallout? Because I know you wrote a piece and you said, I'm quoting now, since the lawsuit has been filed, Selena, who's another girl who's part of it, Chelsea and myself and our parents have received, heard or read negative comments such as sore losers, transphobes,

white girl privilege, suck it up, train harder and more. We are not any of that. The complaint in the lawsuit are not about any of that. We are focused competitors who deserve a fair shot at victory, as do all female competitors across the country now and in the future. So have you received a fair amount of blowback from people who want to shame you out of this lawsuit in your position? Yeah, I have received some backlash, but it's mostly on social media from people I don't know, from people behind the screen. So all of my friends and my teammates and my family

and people in my community support what I'm doing. And, you know, I've even like run into people at the mall and places like that in Danbury. And they've said that they really support what I'm doing and they're glad that I'm standing up for female sports. So I think that's what makes me realize I need to keep fighting and keep sharing my story. Good for you. It's very brave. It's not easy to do when all the media dominates with any position other than theirs, right? That we need to support trans people, which we do. But the end of that message is in any way they deem appropriate, right? Even if it hurts girls like yourself, it's hard to stand up against that and say, I disagree. Like there are ways in which we need to,

there are places in which we need to draw lines and, and protect other people who also matter. I don't, it must be very frustrating to you to, I, to me, it's only, there's, there's only one dominant voice and it's trans rights or human rights and be quiet because you're going to get called nasty names if you don't. Yeah, it has been very frustrating, but I know that what me and Suna and Chelsea are doing is the right thing. And we just need to continue to fight for all female athletes. Up next, we're going to talk to the girl's attorney, Kristen Wagner, and talk to her about what the law is. What does the law say? What has the Supreme Court said? And where

is this likely to go now that they've lost at the trial court level? And then later, we're going to get to our expert panel on the physical differences before transition, after transition, and so on. But first this. Kristen, that's where you come in. You're an attorney with Alliance Defending Freedom, which is great and been filing for a long time lawsuits that, you know, the ACLU would never take. They're on the other side. They claim they support human rights. Once a long time ago, they did. Now it's just a political organization. But you, ADF steps in, files this lawsuit. And what was the basis of the lawsuit? Like, what's the claim? opportunities and experiences that should be every bit as real and authentic and competitive as

the opportunities that their brothers are experiencing. And I think what you've heard here is instead they're getting lessons in Connecticut on what it means to lose in an unfair manner. Now, how do we factor in the fact that now the Supreme Court has said you can't discriminate in employment when it comes to gender identity. Then we have a Joe Biden executive order saying in schools, Title IX, which is different from the hiring statute, in Title IX, you can't discriminate in athletics against somebody because of their gender identity. How can schools comply with that and say to trans girls that they can't run in the girls league? Sports has always been separated by biological sex because it's about the difference in our bodies and the physical advantages that men have over women. And the Supreme Court has actually

recognized that in a decision that was actually authored by Justice Ginsburg. And you referred to the Bostock decision, which involved gender identity and sexual orientation in employment. But even in that decision, the majority of the court recognized that it wasn't conflating sex discrimination with sexual orientation and gender identity. And I think something else I would put out about the extreme nature of the Biden administration's order in really betraying biological women is that even the Obama administration recognized that Title IX is different, that again, we separate sports because of physical differences. And when there are legitimate differences between men and women, the law should recognize those. And when we don't, it's actually women and

girls who are going to bear the brunt of that harm, like Alana and Chelsea. And so just to be clear for the audience at home, we've got Title VII that governs hiring, and you can't not hire somebody because they're transgender. The Supreme Court just ruled in Bostock. But we haven't had a Supreme Court ruling on Title IX, which governs the schools, not discriminating, you know, quote unquote, discriminating against transgender athletes. And but we do have an executive order from Joe Biden, which is, you know, less weighty than a Supreme Court decision. But it certainly seems like it might be going that way.

I don't know. I mean, that that case has yet to be litigated. Until until they do rule that way. You're still alive in terms of your lawsuit, but it got bounced. First of all, do you agree with my my legal assessment there? Have I gotten that correct? Yes, I agree with that, although I would I think that the Bostock decision, the Supreme Court employment decision that you referred to, even in that decision itself, it references that there are differences when there are differences in the sexes that those differences may need to be accounted for.

Okay. So you're still alive. You got your lawsuit going. You just got a bad decision in April on this case, but it wasn't, as I understand it, on the merits. The court was basically saying the lawsuit's now moot because the girls have graduated from high school. The plaintiffs have either graduated and or the two trans girls have graduated. Is that correct? Yes, you're right. We waited over 14 months from the time we finished briefing to get a substantive decision by this court. And then the decision wasn't substantive. He didn't even address the merits of the case. What court was it filed in? It was filed in federal court in Connecticut. Okay. And so there's, is there, you are appealing and you know, it's been a long time since I was in law school and practice law, but I do remember

that even if a case becomes moot, right, because the girls are no longer in high school, there was the old exception to mootness that was capable of repetition but evading review. If a case is capable of repeating itself but it continues to evade review because it takes so long for them to adjudicate this stuff, the courts might overlook the fact that a case is moot and hear it anyway. You're absolutely right. That's a great recollection. That is a doctrine that applies here. And in addition to that, I think it's noteworthy that Connecticut has not rescinded the policy in any way, shape or form. And for purposes of whether a lawsuit is moot, the court looks at what's essentially called standing. And if there is any means by which the court can provide any kind of a remedy, if there's anything they can do, even if it's partially to make it right,

then the case cannot be moved. So if you think about a situation like with Chelsea, there's no way the case is moved. Her records need to be set right. It needs to be made right, what has happened to her? And the court had the power to do that. So we're hopeful and confident that it will be reversed on appeal. Wait, so is that the remedy you're seeking? Correct the records, remove the scores of the trans girls and elevate your plaintiffs to the spots they otherwise would have had? That is part of the remedy. Obviously, for someone like Ivana, I mean, she needs to be able to compete on a fair playing field and know that this policy, which is violating federal law,

is struck down. For those track athletes that have graduated, like Selena and Chelsea, the remedy there is they should be given those state titles if they won those state titles. And they, in Chelsea's case, she lost four different state championships because biological men moved her off the podium. And I just want to be clear that I think this was pretty cowardly. Don't you think? Because the federal district court understood the exception that I just noted to mootness. And I think you tell me what you think because you're much more intimately involved, but it feels to me like they kicked it because they're afraid, because it's a very ginger, delicate issue. And they certainly didn't want to be the one handing down a ruling like the one you

wanted. It is deeply concerning and extremely unfair to these girls. I mean, if you think about the situation that Alana's in, the suggestion that the district court made that, well, if another athlete comes in and competes against her, she could just go to court and get a quick ruling. Well, we've already proven that's not true. You know, these athletes, these female athletes shouldn't be forced to have to wonder whether they have to go into court to protect their rights. And we know that by including biological men in women's sports, we're actually excluding women. Now, let me ask you a couple of questions that I asked the girls. What do you make of the fact that neither Terry nor Andrea is undefeated? And they say that neither has dominant race times

among high school girls nationally. They say plaintiffs, you guys, listed the best 2019 outdoor times for the 100 meter for girls. And the best times listed for Terry and Andrea don't come close to the best times on that list for the cis girls who are listed. So they're basically saying, look, they're not running in college. They didn't dominate nationally. They're not undefeated. And so if they had this inherent advantage alleged by the lawsuit, those stats would look very different. They'd be uncatchable and unbeatable.

Well, Title IX requires equal opportunities and a level playing field. And so to say that sometimes the girls win is not good enough under federal law. But even if it, even if that wasn't the case, we don't base our laws on exceptions. And 10 to 50%, there's a 10 to 50% performance gap between men and women generally. And I think, Megan, something that gets lost in this whole thing is, yes, we're talking about scholarships and medals and podium spots and championships and banners in the gym and banquets. Think of all the high school experiences that we have. But we're also talking for many girls about the basic opportunity to compete. Every time a

biological male is on a podium, it displaces a girl. But there's also a limited number of opportunities to even be on a team. And what about the notion that we're disconnecting thousands of hours of training from success? That's wrong. So I think it's a bigger issue than just, oh, once or twice out of 30 races, once or twice, Chelsea won. That's not the issue. That's really a red herring. What about the fact that the NCAA and the International Olympic Committee allow transgender women to compete on the women's teams? They say they have to be after a period of undergoing hormone therapy, which both of the trans girls

in this case did as well. They underwent hormone therapy. But they say as long as they do that, and they set sort of a limit, like a bare minimum that they have to be on hormones, they can compete. So how are we going to get high schools to go against what the NCAA and the IOC do? Well, first of all, I would say that the problem in the high school situation is, as we've heard, they are allowing biological males to compete as males and then immediately switch over with no testosterone suppressants at all. But we also know that the science tells us that testosterone suppressants does essentially next to nothing in terms of leveling the playing field. And that it, there's nothing that you can do. There's no amount of testosterone suppressants that is really going to significantly change muscle mass, bone density, even the size of our hearts and our lungs and, and the just basic physical autonomy and anatomy

that we have that doesn't change through testosterone suppressants. And let me ask you, because we're going to have the doctors come on and debate this, but there does appear to be a difference with prepubescent and post pubescent biological boys. So if you get a prepubescent boy who goes on hormone blockers and then starts taking female hormones, she has a far less greater advantage and she may have no advantage over girls like the plaintiffs in this case. Then somebody who was born male, lived as a boy, came into puberty, had the testosterone shoot up, developed the bigger muscles, the longer limbs, the bigger heart and all this stuff, and then decided to transition. Well, first of all, I would go back to those who have gone through puberty. There are no amount of suppressants that can undo the advantages and it's a safety risk. I mean, we've seen that in multiple sports already, but let's just talk about those who perhaps might have not gone through puberty and started taking

cross-sex hormones or testosterone suppressants. The study suggests that there still is a difference, but more importantly, as the UK highest court has just found, it's unethical to coerce kids to undergo life altering treatment that's likely going to result in sterilization. And when science actually tells us that 70 to 90% of these kids, if they receive appropriate treatment and counseling, they're going to live at peace with their bodies. So I don't think we want to have eight and 10 year old boys, which is the age we're talking about here. They're not competent to make a decision that they want for the rest of their lives to be a woman. That's harmful. It's interesting. In other words, it's creating another incentive for parents who more and more,

if they consider themselves like super woke or super progressive on some of these issues, more and more, they're not even going with a girl or a boy upon birth. They call them babies and and they let the child decide over time. But your point is this would be another incentive for a child raised like that to choose boy. If in fact they're a biological girl. Sorry, reverse that to choose boy, if in fact they're a biological girl, sorry, reverse that, to choose girl if they're a biological boy, because they might want to run on the other track team. I mean, that would be an extreme thing to do. But your point is, it's another incentive to use hormones that really can be very damaging to prepubescent children. Absolutely. And the longer we go,

the more we're seeing that. I mean, Sweden has just taken action, as I referenced, the UK High Court has said that kids can't give informed consent on this. And I think it also underscores the breadth of this ideology, because it's even being applied in the healthcare provider context. Alliance Defending Freedom has a case right now involving Alan Josephson, who was a division chair of psychiatry for adolescents and children at the University of Louisville. And he merely advocated at a Heritage Foundation panel that watchful waiting for prepubescent kids might be an appropriate response. And he was fired from his job. And we're seeing laws passed that are silencing healthcare providers who have ethical concerns about rushing kids into this life-altering treatment. So I think we need to just slow down. And we certainly don't want to create a situation

where some kid is thinking, I should go ahead and say, I want to identify as a girl so that I can participate in girl sports. Oh my God, this is so crazy. For our school, we just went through one of those educational sessions on how to keep your kids off drugs, off alcohol, and so on. It's very helpful actually. But one of the points the guy was making was keep in mind that the teenage brain is not fully developed, that the frontal cortex, which assesses risk, is not yet fully developed, whereas the middle brain really is much more developed, which responds to dopamine rushes, right? To like, yes, they're snapping for me.

Yes, they're clapping for me because I've said I'm trans. And the risks that might come with some of these crazy surgeries and hormone choices, they can't fully appreciate them before that brain is fully developed. So you can see honesty in the discussion when it comes to something like keep your kid off drugs, right? But it doesn't translate over to keep your kid from getting a double mastectomy or from choosing a hormone regime that will make her infertile before she hits 18. You're spot on. And instead of having those open discussions, those discussions are shut down by frankly, bullying and name calling and shaming and

silencing women in particular who are raising concerns. And I just, I don't think that we can, we can allow that because these laws affect even more than sports. Women's shelters are impacted by them. Walker rooms, dorm rooms. Um, as I talked about, professors are impacted by them, health care providers. It's just a much bigger issue that we need to we need to talk about. But in the meantime, ensuring fair competition is something that Title IX promises. And we want to hold the government's feet to the fire on it. What about the fact that that no women's groups are supporting you?

They never do. Well, I wouldn't say no, none. You know, that's been the the interesting side of this is actually the more I would say radical feminists do support us and have been some of our best allies. You know, the Women's Liberation Front, Save Women's Sports has also come in. And so those are women that, you know, personally, as a more conservative woman, I wouldn't agree with them on a lot of issues. But man, are we united on the danger that gender identity ideology presents to women, because it is significant in multiple areas. Well, you have people like Martina Navratrola, who, you know, was an icon in the sports community and the tennis community for blazing a trail for the LGBTQ community coming out, you know, back before it was all that fashionable.

And, you know, being a great example. And she sort of came out and said, this is insane. Are you really going to let a trans woman compete against, again, it's cis women is the, but you know, or you could just say biological women, um, in like professional tennis because they'll get killed. The, the biological women will get killed. And there are lots of examples of this. There was, there was, um, a case a long time ago, not that long, but like where Serena and Venus took up, somebody offered to compete against them saying, they said, we'll play anybody who's outside the top 200 in the male tennis world. And the guy who was 203rd said, okay, challenge accepted. Let's go. He killed them. It was crushing. They couldn't, they couldn't, it was like me playing against Serena. That's how it went. So, you know, it's quite obvious that she's right, right? That if this really elevates a meaningful way to professional athletics, the women can kiss their titles

and their money and their endorsements goodbye. Now that hasn't yet happened, but that's the risk. She got dismissed as a transphobe and spent sort of a long time trying to say, I'm not, I'm not, please let me make it up to you. But still she does have a group trying to say, can we talk reasonably about this? Can we be sensitive to people who are trans and still protect biological girls. And the trans community is still dismissing her group as transphobic, awful, can't talk about it. So let me ask you as a person of reason, what is the solution? Because I feel for these trans girls. I really do. They already have it rough, right? When you're trans, I mean, you got a lot to deal with. Where should they run? You know, like how should

they compete in a way that would be fair to all involved? I think the solution is to ensure that when it comes to sports, we don't separate sports because of feelings. We don't separate sports, you know, because of ideology or politics. We separate them because of physical differences. So I think the solution is that we can have co-ed teams and schools may want to move to having some co-ed teams in certain sports where there are not safety issues, but by and large, you should compete based on your biological sex. Again, because there's just no amount of testosterone suppressants that can change the physical advantages and the safety implications. You know, we've talked about rugby, for example, they're refusing to have those who identify as female and who are male compete at all because

they recognize that. So, I mean, I think that the safety issues are significant and the testosterone suppressants don't do anything really to minimize those issues. In addition, well, are there, are there safety issues? I want to, I want to get your next point too, forgive me, but are there safety issues in track and field where they're not, you know, it's not hand-to-hand combat, like wrestling on a mat or like rugby? Well, that's where I actually was going was when you look at even track, for example, the NCAA division two athlete, Cece Tepler, her performance times actually improved in several track and field events after a year of cross-sex hormones. So, you know, the, again, the idea that it takes away or makes a, makes a level

playing field is just not accurate. But Megan, I want to go back to the safety issues too, because so many of the sports, it does matter. And if you think we've had cases or instances involving volleyball, where girls have gotten concussions, obviously there's wrestling and weightlifting, there's swimming, there's cycling. We've had instances. My own daughter had instances in fast pitch and in soccer where a male is playing a catcher or a goalie. These are the real instances that are

happening across the country. And I think it's on us to ensure that girls have that equal opportunity, but they're also safe when they're playing sports or as safe as we can make them. That's interesting. That's difficult. Then it gets really tricky. Yeah, when you have to worry about natural physical advantages that make men stronger, certainly post puberty, I just feel like the case is very clear. But we're gonna ask the docs. And you have to worry about like fast pitch. That's a good point. I don't I feel like can't there be a way I don't know, let me ask Chelsea and a lot of this like, what do you girls think is, what should we do with trans athletes, trans girls?

It's never the trans boy who's the issue. It's it's 99.99% of the cases. The issue is when it's a biological male transitioning to female and wanting to play with the girls. What what should happen to them? How do we deal with them, Chelsea? There's a place for everyone in sports. It just is where is it most fair. And the most important thing is to protect the biological female category. You know, we're not saying that these transgender athletes can't participate in sports. We just want to protect the female category so that females have the same opportunities that their male counterparts do. Would it work to create, I mean, I realize there's not that many trans athletes, but So that females have the same opportunities that their male counterparts do. Would it work to create, I mean, I realize there's not that many trans athletes, but would it work to create a different category?

You know, there's the boys league, there's the girls league, and then there's the trans league. I think that that would be a more fair solution than the solution that we have right now, which is to allow biological males to compete in the biological female category. Would it work, Alana, if you let the trans girls compete against you in the races and the other, you know, related track and field events, and then put an asterisk behind their time or their win so that you trying to get a scholarship into college would say, yes, I came in third. I lost to two trans athletes just so they know and they can make a

decision about what that means about your time. Personally, for me, I think that that would still affect my mentality while I'm racing. I would still feel like even though their times aren't necessarily going against mine, that I would still feel like it's unfair. And I would still like see those athletes in front of me and kind of realize how far ahead of me that they are. And I would still feel like I'm in like the same solution. I mean, the same situation as I was before. Plus, it doesn't give you that feeling of crossing the finish line first, you know, and like being the winner. I mean, at least this is what I imagine that feeling is like, I never did it, but it must be wonderful. Is it wonderful? Yeah, it's really great.

I don't know. It's like, it's such a difficult situation. And I do feel like I mean, you girls are now just recently out of high school. Are you Alana in high school? Are you at a high school that is as encouraging of people to consider whether they're trans as we have here in New York City? Like at our schools, they're really, it's almost like they're begging you to consider it as an option available to you. Well, I go to a very diverse school, my school,

and it's very big. My school is almost like 4000 kids. So it's very diverse and like a lot of different people there. So I think that you definitely are encouraged to like be yourself and express yourself how you'd like to. The point I'm getting at is, do you think we're going to see more see the trans community grow? I do think so. And especially in sports, because since the policy that we have now is unfair and allows biological males to compete in the female category, I think that if a change isn't made, then definitely more transgender athletes will start to pop up in the females category. I'll end it with you, Chelsea, rounding back to the administration that now just simply says about girls like you,

basically deal with it because trans rights are human rights and you're on the wrong side. What do you say? I would say that, you know, women's opportunities matter. And I think they have been kind of dismissing this issue by saying trans women are women, um, and they're just ignoring the biological, um, reality, um, that trans women have a advantage over biological women. And it's really frustrating to hear them dismiss our stories, um, and say that, you know, there's no issue and that we haven't been harmed because we have. And, you know, I hope that our lawsuit can kind of write what has been wronged. Well, I admire you, both of you girls. I admire your moms too. I'm like, it's pretty strong. And as I said, a lot of it was your mom's piece in the post where I was like, this is the first

thing I saw that I was like, whoa, wait, what? She really brought it home. So good luck. And you know what? Win or lose, I think this whole process of standing up for what you believe in and challenging something you think is unfair is a worthwhile process for you. And Kristen, good for you, too, because I know the crazy people at the Southern Poverty Law Center have deemed ADF a hate group. They've deemed everybody a hate group. Ben Carson is a hate group, according to them. But you guys keep fighting and you often win disputes that, you know, sort of these lawyers on the other side who always want to be seen as in the sort of correct PC position would never take. So good for you guys. I'm glad you're there and I'm glad you're doing such good work. Thanks, Megan. All the best. We'll stay following it.

Coming up, we're going to bring in our experts. Can puberty blockers and or cross-sex hormones undo the natural physical advantages of one sex over another? We're going to get into it in a very thoughtful, fascinating way. I always know I'm onto something when Steve Krakauer, our executive producer, sends me a little note in the middle of the interview. This is fascinating. And I got one on this next segment. So you're going to love it. And speaking of Steve Krakauer, he's here because he's always lurking. He's always listening. It's literally his job. And it does sound creepy so it was fascinating was it not i i know it really was i've never heard a conversation like that before it was timely and important and

and respectful and it was kind of perfect it's great it's like the conversation our show was born to have but this is not why i bring you in i bring you in for a feature here of the megan kelly show called askeded, where we try to answer some of our listeners' questions. They can be about the news. They can be about life. They can be about anything. So what do we have today? Yeah, Megyn, this was an interesting one. You know, we talk about the Apple reviews a lot, but we haven't actually asked a question that we got in the Apple reviews before. But we wanted to today because we thought it was a really interesting one. This is from Kaylin in the Apple reviews, who says, first of all, that you have been a role model for her and she appreciates

your strength and intellect while maintaining your beauty and femininity. I feel like a lot of women think to be empowered is to be extremely masculine, she says. She said she read Settle for More and About Your Divorce Before You Met Doug. Her question is this. She says she's in a relationship with a very sweet, extremely kind-hearted man. She finds him physically attractive as well as his kindness attractive. But intellectually, they do not sync up. She says she's really intellectually stimulated when she's with him. In fact, she finds herself frustrated when she attempts to engage in a political or philosophical discussion.

And so she wants to know, is it crazy and careless of me that she wants a partner that can meet with her intellectually? And she says it's a capricious comes down to your values. Like when you think of your top values as a woman and what you want in a man, and this can work the other way around too, what are they? Because they're different for everybody. Not everybody would put intellectual match in the top five. Some people would put that at number nine, right? And they would put good partner, good potential father, funny, good earner, whatever it is, higher on the list. So let's say your guy has got those top five I just mentioned, and intellectual firepower is farther down the list, and it's not really one of your top, top priorities, then I think

you've got your answer. You don't need that. Everybody makes sacrifices. Nobody, notwithstanding we see in the movies, nobody's got all 10 of the top 10. Nobody's got all 20 of the top 20. We make compromises, right? Like what's really important to me? Like this one's a deal breaker. This one's not. And so you've got to figure out where that ranks. If it's number one, he's probably got to go. Like. I don't think we can compromise on number one. If you look at the list of top 10 things you want to meet and the person's missing

three, six, and 10, I think you could make that relationship work. You know what I mean? But if the three he's missing are one, two, and three, you got to move on. That's not going to work long haul. And I just think like one of the things that drew me to Doug for sure. Yes, he's very good looking. Um, but was the fact that I think he's smarter than I am. Uh, and I love that. I don't feel intimidated by that. I think it's a turn on. So, and, and that kind of turn on can last until we're old and gray, right? Like if you marry somebody for looks, forget it. They don't hold, just look around. Um, unless you're some, you know, like weird person like Paulina Porizkova or, uh, who's the other one who's constantly posting the bikini photos of herself, Elizabeth Hurley.

Anyway, normally the looks go and, but I don't know. So you got to figure that out. If, if intellectual stimulation is what you really want, if that's in your top, you know, three or five and you're not getting it, it may be a tough come to Jesus moment for you. I will say that as somebody for whom that was definitely a requirement, it's wonderful to have. It's wonderful to sit across the dinner table from somebody and be able to have enlightened, interesting conversation from which you learn, right? You're not always the information giver, you're the information getter. And whose base of knowledge is totally different from your own, right? Like

Doug's not in news. Doug is an author. His love is literature and history. And he's just so much better informed than I am on so many other subjects. So he learns from me and I learned from him and that's, what's really exciting, right? Like that's what gets things like fiery. I mean, that's maybe that's just saying we're a couple of geeks and that's what turns us on. But I think beauty fades. I think funny is forever. So that's a great thing to have. But it sounds to me like you already know the answer, like you already know what you want. And you probably wouldn't have fired this into somebody like me, having read my book, if you didn't want me to say it's important, right? We tend to seek out the advice from the people we know are

going to give us the answers we want. So probably this whole exercise has already answered your question even before I uttered a word. And maybe my words have confirmed it for you. But do some soul searching and get really honest about what the long term looks like for you and the person you're with now, because it's a lot harder once you've really committed. It's a lot harder to undo once you've walked down the aisle. I really believe the true moment you get married is when you mail out the invitations. That is the true moment you are married. Very few people feel comfortable undoing it after that happens. They should feel comfortable. You should not go through with it just because you mailed the invitations. Um, but it's so much easier to undo now. And, and just another story

on this. I remember talking to my lady, Amy, my therapist, when I was, um, getting divorced from Dan and saying, you know, like, well, I don't want to say this cause it's mean. I don't say that because it's mean. And she's the one who helped me realize saying your true feelings is not mean just because the other person won't like them. Right. Meanness is saying something with the intention of being cruel and landing a blow. That's that's communicating. In your case, I this isn't working for me because I don't think we're intellectually matched. It's not to say you're smarter. He's dumber. It's like, we're not matched. We're not interested in the same stuff. We don't fire off in the same way. That's not mean. That's honest. And some things can be fixed and some things cannot, right? If it's like, you need to read the newspaper more because we have to be

able to talk to the, about the news. Okay. Somebody could do something about that, but like, we're not built the same intellectually. And I think you should be more interested in life than you are. Well, I don't know that that's fixable. Anyway, I hope that's helpful in some way. I love that you read the book. I love that you took the time to share something so personal with me and took the risk of sharing it with our listeners, too. And hopefully this has been marginally helpful for you and maybe somebody else out there.

Lots of love, Caitlin. Good luck with it. And if you too would like an appointment with Dr. Megan, you can just email in Steve. Yes, questions at devilmaycaremedia.com or apparently you could just ask him in the Apple reviews. Yeah, I'm still reading the Apple reviews. I love reading the Apple reviews. Okay, up next, we are going to get to our experts on this issue. And these two have done their homework. Let me tell you who's coming.

We're going to have Dr. Gregory Brown, who's a tenured professor of exercise science at the University of Nebraska Kearney. Dr. Philosophy from Iowa State, majored in health and human performance emphasis in biological bases of physical activity. Very reasonable guy. He's got real hesitations about whether you can undo the advantages of biology. Also joining us is Joanna Harper. Joanna Harper is a transgender woman who is a medical physicist and actually an advisor to the International Olympic Committee. Competitive runner too. So she's got firsthand experience with some of this. And these two, Joanna and Greg, have an awesome debate, which I promise you, promise you, you will love. It is next, right after this.

Joanna, let me start with you. As I understand it, there's a big difference between biological males who compete, who want to compete in the girls leagues before puberty and who do puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones without ever having gone through puberty versus post-puberty transitioners. Is that correct? It is correct, although I would strongly prefer that transgender women not be referred to as biological males. There is a strong indication that gender identity is at least largely, if not entirely, biological, and hence transgender women are never

entirely biologically male. So please don't use that term. Yeah, I got it. My plaintiffs in the first half of this show and their lawyer were trying to find a way of distinguishing between the cis girls and the trans girls. And it's really tough. I mean, the language, you can't be entirely sensitive without spending four sentences each time you say it. So I mean, no offense, and I've done plenty of segments where the language is precise. It's a short form just meant to encapsulate for the audience. So let's just go back. So there's a difference between people who transition pre-puberty and post-puberty in

terms of their physical advantages over cis girls. You agree? Absolutely. Okay. And you agree with that too, Greg? I would say we really don't know because there's just not been much research on long-term effects of the puberty blocking drugs. So we don't know how it affects the growth and development of a male individual who's transitioning to female

if they start at age eight or 10 or 11 or whatnot. So your position is there may not be as big a difference for somebody who prior to puberty, somebody, again, biological male or somebody who is identified male at birth, that there's not that big a difference potentially, even if that person starts on puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones before they ever hit puberty. You think it's still problematic for that person to run against girls or compete against girls? I do, especially given just the lack of science. So we don't know what the effects are of those puberty blocking drugs.

All right. So then let's let's just start with post puberty and see how that shakes out. Right. Joanna, is it do you think it's true that that most boys, most children who are identified male at birth have a natural physical advantage over most girls post-puberty without any outside intervention. Yes. Okay. So do you think it's problematic when somebody who's like 15 and has reached puberty decides I'm going to now run against the cis girls without doing anything, without taking any hormones? I would suggest it depends on what level they're competing at. Most children at that age or adolescents at that age are going out for teams largely because their friends are on the team. And they may want to win at the time of the competition, but they're not really that serious about sports. And for those people, I don't think it's problematic, but there are certainly high functioning athletes and any,

any trans girl who hasn't started hormone therapy and who is a successful athlete in the men or the boys competition prior to transitioning and all she does is social transition, yes, then I would say that's problematic. So how do we address that in your view? And I should say that you are trans yourself and you are somebody who's studied this. And so you've lived this in addition, and you're an athlete, so you've lived this in addition to studying it. So what should happen for that child who you just described to make it fair? Again, if we're talking about 15, adolescents go through puberty at very different rates, and they also become athletes at very different rates. But if we're talking about somebody who has gone through puberty and who is a successful athlete, then it's probably appropriate to require that person to be on

hormone therapy before competing in girls' events. And with a 15-year-old, that would probably mean GnRH agonist or so-called puberty blockers, because most clinics, most states won't allow transgender children to go on cross-sex hormone therapy prior to age 16. Okay. So it depends what the hormone therapy depends on the age of the child. So if it's mid-puberty or pre-puberty, then they should have to show that they're on a age of the child. So if it's mid puberty or pre puberty, then they should have to show that they're on a puberty blocker. In my opinion, yes. Yeah. Yeah. That's fine. I mean, I know you've studied this and you've researched a lot of other studies. So your opinion is why we have you, your expertise on this.

Okay. And so when they turn 16, should we be building into the law? You know, because the lawyer for the girls was saying we shouldn't be incentivizing. Trans girls to take cross sex hormones by by sort of requiring that, you know, for them to compete. She thinks that for a different reason than you think that. But what do you think of that? Right. If we say, and you stay on the puberty blockers, and then at some point you have to go on cross sex hormones, that creates an incentive for them to do it that maybe they, maybe they don't want, they don't want to do that yet. Yeah. And, and that is, is absolutely a problem. And, and I understand that, you know, at 16, this is a huge step to take. The difference in long-term effects between puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones is

enormous. And so there are some very serious implications, and they should be considered very strongly and suggesting that, you know, you have to go on these cross-sex hormones at 16 in order to play sports is problematic in some ways. But I think it should be recognized that there really are no ideal solutions to this. And again, if you're asking my opinion for high functioning athletes at age 16, yes, this should be required. Joanna, what happens to somebody? I mean, there must be a point at which the doctor says you can no longer stay on puberty

blockers, right? Because what happens to someone who's identified male at birth who isn't sure, who thinks they stay on them for several years. But it's certainly less than ideal to have an adolescent on these drugs, you know, for a long term period of time. It's uncertain exactly, you know, what sort of side effects that there might be. And so, you know, from a therapeutic point, it's probably more ideal to transition this child to cross-sex hormone therapy. But again, you know, if the child isn't ready, if the parents aren't ready, There are a number of other factors to consider besides what's medically ideal. It's so complicated. It's so complicated. And it's something that we really haven't dealt with. We're just figuring this out on the fly as we go,

which has led to objections and hurt feelings and stress on both sides. I get that. All right. So let's talk about, because I really think that the pre-pubescent child is a, that's a toughie. That is a toughie. So let's talk about the post-pubescent child, the child identified male at birth who decides that, you know, they think that they are trans and they want to live their life as a female. And now they want to compete in girls sports because that's pretty much, I think, what we're dealing with in the Connecticut legal case. Why? Let me ask you, Greg, why after being on hormones, because the lawsuit against them says that they just they they just like quickly decided to transition and sort of jumped into female sports. And their their side, the ACLU says that's not

true. They'd been living their lives as females for a while prior. And it wasn't spur of the moment that they had really been wrestling with it for a long time. Why shouldn't we let children like that compete in girls sports? Well, the bottom line is there are large differences in athletic performance between boys and girls. You know, if we look at it about 11 years old, the difference may be three to 5%. But then as we get into those later teenage years, as puberty has had more effect, we see differences of 10% where boys are 10% faster than girls. They're 20, 30, 40, 50% stronger in terms of throwing or weightlifting or those types of things. And so if they have not done anything to suppress that, then they are males competing in female sports, irregardless of what their identity is, because they are still biologically males. They've done nothing to alter their biology.

But don't most of these sports organizations, don't most of these sports organizations, Greg, require them to have been on some sort of hormone suppression therapy or something? It varies a lot from state to state, whether it does require them to engage in some type of hormone suppression or cross-sex hormone use. And it varies a lot from state to state. And it varies a lot on whether there's actually any enforcement of that, whether they do testing on it or whether it is just purely a written statement. It could be from a parent, it could be from a doctor, depending on the state and what the laws are. And so it gets really complicated as far as that goes. So in some states you can, you can just say, I am a girl. I identify as female and race away.

And you don't have to prove any time on hormones. I think that's actually what happened in the Connecticut cases, but in some states that's possible. Yes. Yes. In some states that's possible. Okay. So, but what about the, in the states where you do have to show some sort of hormone treatment, let's say for a year, right? That, uh, whether it's a 16 year old or a college athlete that, that decides I want to compete as a girl, I, I am a girl and I'm going to go on all the, you know, the cross-sex hormones to try to make that as close to reality or an actual reality as possible? Well, if we look at the research that's been published on this so far, we have a paper from 2018 that looked at female, sorry, male to female athletes. And after 10 months,

their strength was not reduced. They still had the hand grip strength that they had before they started the transition. And so a 16 or 17 year old boy is stronger. Just the average 16 or 17 year old boy is going to be stronger than 95% of 16 or 17 year old girls and even stronger than most adult women. And so they would still have that advantage in strength. If we look at this in adults, you know, 20 year old, 30 year old adults, a year of cross-sex hormones, two years of cross-sex hormones, the strength is only reduced by four to maybe 9%. And these are individuals that are going to be anywhere from 30 to 60% stronger than women. And so they'll still have an advantage even with the suppression of testosterone and the administration of estrogens.

What do you make of that, Joanna? Well, first of all, I believe that Greg misspeaks when he talks about transgender athletes. All of these studies were these studies from 2018, and there were more than one were on non-athletic transgender people. And there is a substantial difference between studying athletes and studying non-athletes. Certainly, if we are talking about cisgender people, we would never rely on a study of non-athletes to make any decision about athletes. In particular, when we talk about strength, several of these studies found that there is a substantial strength deficit that these trans women had compared to cisgender men even before starting

hormone therapy. And that's important to explain that the transgender women will have the same levels of testosterone, but there are sociological reasons why trans women would rather starve themselves to look like models than to put on muscle to be athletes. And so this is the population that these studies are looking at. And, you know, I did a review of these studies among other people here at Loughborough University, and there's some useful data that can be gathered from these studies. But it's very, very important to understand that these are studies of non-athletes and have very limited things to say about athletes. One thing I will mention, and I absolutely agree with Greg, that given the reductions involved, it is going to be absolutely true that trans women will have strength advantages over cis women, even after hormone therapy. Another reviewer of these studies, Hilton and Lundberg, suggested that trans women had a 17% grip strength advantage even after hormone therapy, which

sounds impressive until you compare it to the 57% grip strength advantage that cis men have over cis women. So it's less than a third of the strength advantage remains. What about that, Greg? I mean, that's pretty honest. She's saying, yes, there would be some advantages, notwithstanding hormone therapy and so on. But I think the next jump, who knows, but you can't ever shoot for complete perfection when it comes to equality on the, on the playing field. Well, you know, that's, that is a very true statement, but if we look at the difference between say a gold medal and a silver medal,

which is a lot of times around 0.5 to 0.6% difference in performance. If we look at the difference between a silver medal and a bronze medal, again, it's 0.6% difference. The difference between a gold medal and no medal is typically less than 2%. And so if we take a male individual with a 10 to 60% advantage over a female, I think most of us would say that that's unfair because they are male. If we take a male to female transgender individual and reduce their performance a little bit, and they still have, as Joanna said, a 17% advantage,

I'd say we still say that's an unfair advantage compared to what we would normally expect as far as competitive performance in sports. Go ahead, Joanna. So grip strength is only one aspect of athletic performance. And there was a very interesting study that came out of the U.S. Air Force last year where they looked at three fitness tests on transgender individuals. One-minute sit-ups, one-minute push-ups were two of these tests. And these are very interesting tests because both of these tests rely partially on strength, partially on muscular endurance,

partially on technique, partially on cardiovascular endurance. And in many ways, I think that these tests are a proxy for the team sports where strength is part of the equation, but not the entire equation. And this Air Force study found that after two years of hormone therapy, the trans women lost their entire advantage in push-ups in one minute, despite the fact, it's entirely possible that the advantage goes away despite the fact that the strength advantage doesn't go away. Let me ask you this, and you may know these studies, but just as a quick search suggested

that in 2019, the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology, it studied, it was only 11, but it was 11 transgender women, found that after a year of undergoing testosterone suppression, they experienced only a negligible decrease in strength of their thigh muscles, only a 5% loss of muscle mass. Then in 2020, Sports Medicine study found that strength, lean body mass, muscle size, and bone density are only trivially affected by testosterone suppression, suggesting that, you know, a lot of these other advantages don't go away just with, you know, by suppressing testosterone. So the, the 2019 study was a Swedish study. Um, and, and as you say, it is only 11 people. Um, the, the 2020 is probably the review

of Hilton and Lundberg that you're talking about. Uh, and again, these are all non-athletes. And so we would never take data from studies of non-athletes, of cisgender people, to say anything about cisgender athletes. I do acknowledge that given the numbers, there is definitely going to be a residual strength advantage for trans women. But as the Air Force study showed, that may not carry through to more complex sports where strength is only part of the equation. Well, if I may, a couple of things there. The study you're talking about from Sweden, that's Anna Witt's paper, where they were using a very sophisticated technique to measure muscle strength. It's an isokinetic dynamometer, which is very precise for measuring strength.

And so that is a technique that is frequently used in athletes and in athletics to determine if there are muscle imbalances and things like that. And so that's a very good technique. Also in the paper with the Air Force individuals, the authors acknowledge that perhaps the transgender individuals reduced their training to meet their perception of what they should be as a female and to minimize their maleness. And so that could also partially account for why they reduce their pushup sit-up performance. Oh, that's fascinating. Gosh, it's like COVID. Where to turn to the actual scientific answers to figure this out? I mean, I think, look, anecdotally, just talking to the two girls, sweet young girls who had lost to the two trans female athletes in virtually every single race and the only race where they didn't lose.

It was a false start by the trans girls. I think they would say anecdotally it's impossible. Like they couldn't do it. And if you just look at the natural advantages that cis boys have over cis girls to suggest it just goes away because of a year of hormone therapy hasn't been their experience at all. Right. So like this is what you're up against, Joanna. Right. Like there's like an anecdotal belief and it may be scientifically backed. Even you say to some extent it probably is that it isn't fair that you're that sort of cis girls are being kind

of screwed over in an effort to be overly accommodating to trans girls. And we must, we should instead be looking for a different solution that is more fair to both groups. What do you make of that? Well, again, in Connecticut, they weren't required to undergo hormone therapy. I have non-published data as of yet would be far fairer, the NCAA rules, for instance. And I would also suggest that four of the five girls involved with this lawsuit, two of the cisgender girls and both transgender girls have already graduated high school. Both cisgender girls were awarded athletic scholarships, one to William and Mary, which is a terrific school. And neither of the transgender girls were awarded athletic scholarships. So we know if they tried for them. I don't know for sure, but I do know that they were not tendered any offers.

And so certainly we don't know for sure, but I do know that they were not tendered any offers. And so certainly this idea that... We don't know the reasons, though, because we don't know the grades. You know what I mean? Like that, I see your point. I take your point. But we need more information to figure out why that happened. Like, what were the relative grades of the two trans girls and the grades of the cis girls?

And what did the trans girls do to try to, you know, be recruited and get attention? And did they want to go to, you know, certain colleges or not? You know, you never know. Um, that those, those still need to be answered, but I, I do think it's interesting. So, so this is, you're confirming then, cause you're familiar with the case that the trans girls in the Connecticut cases hadn't done hormone therapy. They just, it was a social transition. Um, no, I do not have the medical records of the trans girls and, and I have, uh, some suppositions and I have some inside information, but that's not the same as, as their medical records. And so let me put it to you this way. Copy. Got it. Point taken. But you are saying that if

it's just a social transition at that age in the, in the high school, cause that's obviously where puberty happens, late middle school, high school. Um, if it's just a social transition, there's no question that there's an unfair advantage by the trans girls over the cis girls. Again, with accomplished athletes, you know, if we're talking about people who are more testosterone won't make non-athletes into athletes, but it will make athletes better. And so in this case where, where both of these trans girls were athletes, yes, uh, I would suggest that, uh, it was unfair competition. So let's talk about the more advanced level of sports, right? Like you accurately point out the NCAA, the IOC, they're allowing trans, again, it's usually

trans girls or trans women competing against cis women that creates the problem because the truth is trans boys, trans men haven't typically been able to compete against cis men effectively. So what do you think? Let me start with you on this, Greg. Do you think it's fair at the college and the IOC level to, I think it's one year, right? One year of hormone therapy that they have to be on to show that they've suppressed the testosterone to the level of, you know, a cis woman, right?

So do you think that's fair? Well, I would say at this point, no, it's not. Because the research that we have in, and as Joanna has stated, these are not athletes, but the information that we have both on cisgender men compared to cisgender women and in these transgender individuals, if we look at grip strength, these transgender individuals, yes, they're in the 20th percentile of strength compared to other men, meaning 80% of men are stronger than them, but they are stronger than 95% of comparably aged women.

Right. So that's the real question. It's not really how they fare against cis men. It's how they fare against cis women, you know, women who are born female and identify as female their whole lives. How do they fare against them? Yeah. Yeah.

And so, you know, if we take that data and try and compare apples to apples as much as possible, it could be extrapolated that a trained male is going to outperform a trained female, even with testosterone suppression. And again, acknowledging that this is taking from non-athletes and extrapolating it to athletes. But if we are going to use that as our only standard of judgment, we need to reevaluate all of our rules that ban performance-intensive substances because most of those have not been tested in competitive athletes. What about that, Joanna? We try so much to prevent doping in sports, or at least on paper, we say we do. And because there is an understanding that levels of testosterone and so on could

provide an athlete with an unfair advantage that we need to cautiously guard against and yet you know it's it's the standards seem to slide a bit when it comes to this issue so um virtually all international sports federations require trans women to maintain female levels of testosterone for at least one year prior to hormone therapy. And so in terms of current testosterone levels, there are no advantages for trans women over cis women when it comes to international sports. There are absolutely legacy effects. But I would suggest that perhaps the best way to look at this is by population studies. And the NCAA is a great example. Ten years ago, they allowed trans women to compete against cis women based off one year of hormone therapy.

And that's no requirement for a specific testosterone level. And so it's a weaker rule than the international rule. But every year, there are more than 200,000 women competing in NCAA sports, given the size of the trans population, approximately 1%, we should be seeing over 1,000, maybe 2,000 trans women competing every year in NCAA sports if they were equally represented. And yet the number of trans women competing in NCAA sports is extremely small. We don't know precisely, but it's probably fewer than 50. So 10 years, two generations of collegiate athletes have come and gone with this rule in place. Trans women are in no way taking over. Trans women are hugely underrepresented in NCAA sports 10 years later. Greg? You know, I don't know the numbers, but I dare say that if we go to the 2019 Division II 400-meter National Outdoor Hurdles Championship

for women, there are probably eight women that would feel that they lost to a transgender athlete. And that was very meaningful to those eight women, cisgender women. And so again, we come back to the idea, is it fair for all or only fair if it displaces a certain number of the population? You know, you think about the natural event. I mean, I'm thinking about somebody and I know Joanna, you were a competitive runner. You think about somebody like Hussein Bolt, right? I'm trying to pick somebody who you just you can get the image in your head, like super strong, amazing world class athlete. And if Hussein Bolt said, I'm trans and I want to compete with the women and started

taking, you know, hormones, cross gender hormones for a year and got his testosterone down to the appropriate level, he would crush, right? Like, you, you don't dispute that way, you'd kill everybody, right? So like, that's the most extreme case. I do. Yes, absolutely. Well, because again, I have data from transgender sprinters, maybe not quite as good as Usain Bolt, that they do lose 10% of their speed. And so if we took Usain Bolt and made him 10% slower, he would not be the women's world record holder in the 100-meter dash. His time, his world record is very slightly less than 10% faster than the women's world record. And so, yes, I absolutely say, you know, let's do this as a thought experiment. And if Usain Bolt were to do this, he would not, would not, and I absolutely stand by this 100%, would not beat the women's world record in the 100 meter dash.

All right. Wait, let me ask you a follow up then. This is kind of a fun experiment because it gives you a visual. Right. As opposed to just like this untouchable image. Let's say The Rock, right. Dwayne Johnson decides to do weightlifting. But instead of being a great actor, he decides to be a weightlifter, and he's made amazing strides, and he's won all sorts of titles. And then he does the same thing and wants to go over as a trans female weightlifter against all the women, the cis women who have been doing all along. After a year of hormone therapy, he gets his testosterone levels down. So this is a different skill, right? This is strength and lifting and so on you're saying he wouldn't crush the female weightlifters well uh let's let's call this person roxy um and uh so roxy um would be a lot bigger and so we have weight categories in in uh sports like strength and so it probably wouldn't be right because Roxy would be way too big.

And so we would need to create a super extra heavy, large, super weight category. And there probably wouldn't be any cis women who would be big enough for that category. Isn't this happening? Wait, Joanne, is this happening right now? Didn't we just see this on an international in the Olympic competition? Not yet, but we probably will in Tokyo. There is a weightlifter, a New Zealand trans woman named Laurel Hubbard. The New Zealand Olympic team has not yet been named, but she will probably be named to the team. She was sixth in the world championship in 2019, her most recent high-level

international competition. Because of the Olympic rules that limits countries to one per country. She has a chance of perhaps finishing higher than sixth in the Olympics. She has an outside shot at a medal. But she's not going to win. But she's competing right now as a trans woman, as a woman in New Zealand. Yeah, absolutely. Well, around the world. But she doesn't win every time. She loses to cis women. Yeah, absolutely. As I said, she was sixth in the 2019 World Championships. That's a very good placing. Sixth in the world? How many athletes get to be sixth in the world? And just to be clear, she held a New Zealand record for 15 years, but she was never sixth in the world among men.

And so, yeah, I absolutely acknowledge that she does better in women's weightlifting than she ever did in men's weightlifting. But she's not going to win in the Olympics. She's unlikely to medal. She's got no such shot at it, but but she's she's not going to win. She's going to medal she's got no such shot at it but but she's she's not gonna win she's gonna do well you know again how many people make the Olympics and and so does she have a strength advantage because of her former life yes is it an overwhelming advantage no what do you make of that Greg well I think one thing we need to consider here is that Laurel Hubbard is 43 years old and to be sixth in the world in weightlifting at age 43 is unheard of. That's pretty good. Yeah. Yeah. That's incredible. If we go back and look at the Olympics in 2016, 2012, the oldest weightlifters were 34, 36 years old, and that's both men and women. And so I think this demonstrates, again,

these legacy effects of being a man that Laurel Hubbard is experiencing and benefiting from when competing against cisgender women. What's the story? Because I heard you, Greg, on another podcast, and you mentioned the case of C.C. Telfer. What's that case? So that is the 2019 Division II 400-meter hurdle that I was talking about. And so C.C. Telfer competed for two years at Franklin Pierce University as a male, as Craig Telfer, and was 200th, 300th as far as national ranking. Still pretty good, still way faster than I could ever be and a very good athlete. But then Craig Telfer identified as female, took the year off for the transitioning, the hormone therapy, came back as CeCe Telfer, and then won the 400 meter hurdles at the national championship.

And so, you know, that's kind of unheard of for an athlete to go from 200 to 300 to first place. And, and because CC then is running as a female, you know, again, this is just based on the times and what we know. I don't know what CC's transition was as far as all the details was in compliance with NC2A policy. Yeah, I see. I see your point. Can I shift gears and ask you, Joanna? So are you comfortable talking about your transition and being a competitive runner and how that affected you, like what your experience was there? Yeah, sure. So I started hormone therapy in 2004. You know, I knew that when I reduced my testosterone, I'd be slower, but I, you know,

I thought it would be sort of a gradual thing and that maybe over a 10 kilometer race, I'd lose a minute or two. How old were you at this point? I was 46. And just by the way, you've now outed my current age. Apologies. I'm not friendly. But anyway, I was 46 at the time. And so I thought I'd get a little slower, but it would take a while. But within weeks, I was noticeably slower.

Within nine months, I was running 12% slower. And that's the difference between serious male distance runners and serious female distance runners. So I had lost that complete male advantage within nine months. And we've been talking a lot about strength, but the most recent review from those of us at Loughborough showed that in study after study, trans women go from male levels of hemoglobin to female levels of hemoglobin within three to four months of starting hormone therapy. So that's a complete change. There's no legacy effect.

And hemoglobin values are one of the most important values in endurance sports, not just distance running, but all endurance sports. And that's why I noticed this difference so quickly was that my hemoglobin levels changed very, very quickly, as do all trans women. And there's no legacy effect there. But as an individual, as a scientist, I was a medical physicist at the time working in healthcare care in the U.S. You know, I was intrigued. And so this led me down this path to become a researcher into trans athletes because of my own personal experience. So you lived 46 years identifying as male, I mean, or at least having been designated male at birth and appearing as a male. Forgive me for not having the right language on that. Yes, I certainly I knew that I was a girl, probably the same age that you knew you were a girl, Megan. But I hid it for years and years and years and was extraordinarily unhappy because of it. But, you know, I wanted a lot of things that trans people couldn't have.

When I was young, you know, trans people could not be openly trans and, you know, go to university and become a medical physicist. You know, that was something that, you know, I couldn't dream of. So, you know, I hid who I was for most of my life and was, you know, sad about it. But, you know, finally, I did decide that I need to make changes. I mean, good for you, because that must have taken a lot of guts at 46 to come out and say, like, it's not as you thought it was. And I got a story to tell you, especially at a time when even 10 years ago, there was a much bigger stigma on people who are trans than there is today. And that's a good thing. You know, I don't want anybody to mistake debates like this

for some wanting us to go back there, right? It's just everyone's trying to wrestle with what does this mean, right? Now that we're being more open, which is good and accepting of people who are trans. What does it mean for the way we've been living? Let me ask you another question, Joanna, because somebody there is a an openly gay progressive woman named Katie Herzog, who was on our show not long ago, who had a great line about the trans activists saying, get better people, right? Like she's not anti-trans. She just doesn't want to be harassed by these anti-trans activists who are so loud and so bullying, people just shut down. What are your thoughts on like how, how sort of, I don't know, antagonistic some of the trans spokespeople who I really believe do not actually speak for the

trans community writ large are in their approach? You know, I would certainly say it's extremely unfortunate that we have, you know, we have people who are on both sides of this chasm where, where, you know, there, there, as you say, there are trans activists, there are some people who are masquerading as caring about women's sports when they are, in fact, anti-LGBT people. And these two groups are standing on the opposite sides of a ravine and are screaming at each other, often on Twitter, and it's not productive at all. And I would blame both sides equally for this lack of productive discussion. Greg and I here, we clearly disagree, but we are engaging in civil discourse. And I would think that this is the way that it should be done with people talking rationally and reasonably. But unfortunately, in this argument,

it's not. And as I say, I blame people on both sides. Yes. Amen to what you just said. I mean, that's one of our mission statements here at the show is to try to have open, honest, and I say provocative conversations. My little seven-year-old says evocative. He's misunderstood. But that's one of the whole purposes of our show's existence is to try to have these conversations without yelling at each other and demonizing one another and so on. I mean, what do you think, Greg? Do you think that she's right, that there's a there's a faction opposing trans athletes in sports in the way we've been discussing because it's it's sort of cover for transphobia? You know, I don't know if I could speak on that. The individuals that I know, to my best knowledge, are not transphobic. They think everybody should be loved, respected, cared for. They just have a difference of opinion. And as Joanna and I are showing, this is the way it should happen. We can have a difference of opinion. We can be respectful. And we can even look at the same science and come up with a different interpretation of that science, but we can do it calmly and rationally.

I think that is important that we are able to have these good conversations and look at what are the facts and separate the facts from the hyperbole, I guess. So let me end it with this. Is there any solution to this conflict other than the status quo? Because the states are split. They're all over the board. Some states are banning trans athletes from running as the gender that they identify with. Some states are mandating that it be allowed. I mean, it's all over the place. And eventually I think the Supreme Court will rule. But, you know, let's take the Martina Navratrola group's suggestion of, you know, like, let's sit down and talk as grownups. Is there a way of creating another league for trans people? It seems to me as a layperson commentator that there wouldn't be enough. Is there a way of letting them run with the gender with which they identify, but still keeping it more fair for the cisgendered girls? I'll start with you on that, Greg. perhaps a possibility that maybe there's in individual sports, separate scoring of some

way. So transgenders are able to run with the gender they identify with, but their score is separate from the boys and separate from the girls. And there's the third category, but that probably wouldn't work when we look at team sports, basketball, football, even wrestling, you know, that then gets to be a real challenge. And I honestly don't know what the answer to that would be. I guess we need to hope that calm heads can prevail in school boards and in politics and then come up with a reasonable solution as they consider the information that's brought to them. What about you, Joanna? What would you say to somebody like our guest today, Chelsea? Chelsea Mitchell, who said she'd been winning everything.

She had 20 conference championships. She had a perfect record over four years. And it wasn't until two trans girls started racing against her that she started to lose and she lost repeatedly. And she said she knew she knew she was the queen of Connecticut, those would not be the rules that would be in play. But Chelsea is the girl I mentioned earlier who's now at William & Mary and she is losing regularly. And so, you know, I think it's unfortunate that Chelsea didn't win more state championships. I think she deserved it. And I'm sorry that it happened.

And as I say, if I were queen of Connecticut, it wouldn't have happened. But, you know, she is moving on with her life. She's she's at university. She's competing in collegiate athletics. But there's other Chelsea's coming up behind her. That's what she would say that she's they're saying they're filing a lawsuit, not just for themselves, but because there's going to be more and more of this, as you know. The the case in Connecticut was was certainly somewhat of an outlier. You know, California has the same rules as Connecticut and 10 times the population. And we haven't seen any cases in California.

And so, you know, it did happen in Connecticut and it could potentially happen otherwise. But for a number of reasons, I think that this is going to be a very small percentage of the time that we will see this. There was a trans girl in a neighboring state who again competed in track and field. She identified as trans but was not on hormone therapy. And she decided to continue competing with the boys because she thought that that was fair. And so, you know, this idea that we're going to see this all the time, it's just not going to happen. And do you think, I'd love to get you to weigh in on the notion of a third category, you know, like? As Greg said, Greg and I actually agree on something here, that perhaps in individual sports, we could do that, but it's not going to work in

team sports. If you have three categories, you've got 49.5% of the people in one category, 49.5% of the people in the other category, and 1% of the people in this third category. And so there's just not the numbers for team sports, maybe in individual sports. I'm so glad you guys came on and gave us this discussion. Thank you so much. I'm very grateful to you both. Well, Megan, thank you for the invitation. I appreciate this opportunity. This has been wonderful. It's nice to talk to you and nice to talk to Joanna. And I feel the same way, Greg. I enjoyed talking with you and thank you very much for inviting me here, Megan.

Absolutely. I hope we get to do it again. All the best to you. All right, so don't forget to go to Apple apple reviews and tell me what you thought of that debate loved it personally okay i'm i'm tainting the jury but you guys will figure it out go there and let me know uh do not miss our next show on friday because we have comedian ryan long i did not know ryan long until i started to see some of his more recent videos and i was like okay whoever this is i'm in love with. I really need to know him more.

And can we please book him? Because every time I see one of his bits, I laugh out loud. You're going to know who this is if you don't already. He did the one where it's like the guy who's supposed to be woke versus the guy who's supposed to be racist and how their language is identical. They agree on virtually everything. Totally clever.

And then he did that one. We played a clip of it of the modern therapist basically telling all these young people that they're not to blame for anything. It's really the world that needs to change and that, you know, their lack of drive and willingness to work hard is not to be blamed on them. It's really somebody else's fault. There's a million. He's got like 4.5 million views on how to break a man. He's got 4.2 million views on the woke versus racist thing and how the woke and the racist agree on everything and on and on it goes. So super

popular. You're going to love him. You're going to laugh. Let's have a good time. It's going to be Friday. See you then. Thanks for listening to The Megyn Kelly Show. No BS, no agenda, and no fear. The Megyn Kelly Show is a Devil May Care media production in collaboration with Red Seat Ventures.