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SMNTY Interviews: Dr. Anna Baeth · Stuff Mom Never Told You

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Hey, this is Anny and Samantha. I'm welcome to Stuff
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: I'll Never Told you, prodiction of by Heart Radio, and
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: today we are beyond excited to be joined by educator, coach,
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: scholar and author of the book Fair Game, Doctor Anna Bath,
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: or Bath as you introduced yourself before we started. Welcome
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: to the show. We're so happy to have you.
• 0:36
  Speaker 2: Thank you. I'm very excited to be here.
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: Yes, we already kind of had a We should have
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: been recording much earlier because we were just chatting before
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: we started. We have a lot to cover, so can
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: you give our audience a broader introduction. You've done a
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: lot of yourself.
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: Sure. Yeah. So I'm doctor Anna Bathe I use shere
• 0:59
  Speaker 2: her pronouns. I am a scholar, I'm a researcher. I
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: was a two sport college athlete and after graduating from college,
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: went on to be a collegiate coach and eventually to
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: get a PhD. And while I was doing my PhD,
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: I was studying women in leadership positions in sport. And
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: as I was finishing my graduate degree and I was
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: looking for a job, I was offered a position with
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: an LGBTQ rights organization. So this was about I guess
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: this was six years ago. So I started working in
• 1:43
  Speaker 2: this space, and I really didn't know a whole lot
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: about the topic of trans athletes in particular. But all
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: of a sudden, I was in a position where I
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: was in charge of research for this organization and I
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: was getting a lot of questions, a lot of questions
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: about trans athletes, and at first I didn't really have
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: an answer, and so I spent five years doing a
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: lot of my own research. I was being told a
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: lot of different narratives, I was being pulled in a
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: lot of different directions, and I thought, no, I need
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: to figure out what I think about this. I need
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: to do my own research and figure out what I
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: think and what I believe to be true. And so
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: that has culminated in this book.
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: Yes, and Samantha and I have both read it, and
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: it is wonderful and is so needed, and it's so succinct,
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: and it just really articulated a lot of things me
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: personally that I've been needing to be articulated in a
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: clear way that I've felt it. So it's just such
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: a timely, timely read and very very important. So can
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: you tell us about the book and the process of
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: writing it, and what it was like to have it
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: come out right now, I.
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: Would love to Well, it's important to say this was
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: not done alone. I have my co author Ellie Rocher.
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: Chris Moser, who wrote the FOURD to the book, has
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: been an amazing advocate for trans athlete rights for it
• 3:35
  Speaker 2: seems like forever. Really, I met Ellie many years ago
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: and she was aware of my work and we had
• 3:43
  Speaker 2: been talking about it. And as I was thinking about
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: trans athletes and getting all of these questions about what
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: was going on, I started to really try to put
• 3:54
  Speaker 2: more information out there and say, hey, you know, here's
• 3:57
  Speaker 2: what we're talking about in terms of numbers, here's what
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: we know. Oh, here's what we don't know. And I
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: found that it just wasn't landing. People weren't people were
• 4:11
  Speaker 2: I mean broadly just disregarding the data and the science.
• 4:16
  Speaker 2: And Ellie and I talked a lot about it and agreed,
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: you know, part of the problem here is we're doing
• 4:21
  Speaker 2: a lot of talking about trans athletes without talking to
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: trans athletes. And so the impetus for the book was
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: really to say, hey, we want to introduce twenty transathletes
• 4:34
  Speaker 2: to the world. You know, most often when people talk
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: to me about this topic. You know, whenever I say
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: I work in sport, women's sport, if I say I
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: work in gender and sport, the question invariably is, what
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: do you think about trans women in sport? My first
• 4:49
  Speaker 2: response is, well, have you ever met a transathlete? And
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: I realized that most people also had an opinion about transathletes,
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: but it never met a transathlete. And so when we
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: wrote the book, it was really like, hey, we want
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: to introduce these twenty trans athletes. And of course we
• 5:05
  Speaker 2: wrote it three years ago, and now we're in a
• 5:08
  Speaker 2: pretty different political moment around this topic. And it turns
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: out that the twenty athletes we interviewed now, of them,
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: only one legally can compete in the United States, and
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: so the conversation has really shifted. The book was stories data,
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: and now it's somewhat more political, more politicized. I would say,
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: I don't know if that answers the question, but that's
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: how we did it.
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: No, No, it does. It does answer the question, and
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: I think going to that point of being politicized, this
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: is such a political lightning rod issue and as you
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: point out in the book, trans athletes make up one
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: percent of sports participants, but it, according to conservative politicians,
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: they must make up so much more, like such a
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: bigger issue than that. There are hundreds of bills banning
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: trans athletes that have been introduced. As you said, now,
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: that's such a disheartening number. Only one can legally compete.
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: Of the people you interviewed, why do you think this
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: is such a hot button issue in our politics?
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: I wish I had a clear answer to that. You know,
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: I do find it really curious because for a long
• 6:39
  Speaker 2: time people would ask me about this, and I was like,
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: why are we even talking about this? I mean, like,
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: we are talking about a handful of athletes. So if
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: we're going to talk about sport in general, and we're
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: going to talk about gender and sport, we're going to
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: talk about women in sport, we have many or fish
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: to fry. Right. Why it's such a topic is because
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  Speaker 2: people have made it into a topic, and particularly because
• 7:08
  Speaker 2: conservative politicians have made it into a topic. Right. I mean,
• 7:12
  Speaker 2: when we look at the media in twenty twenty one,
• 7:16
  Speaker 2: there were more conservative politicians quoted in the media talking
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: about trans athletes than there were trans athletes quoted talking
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: about sport or their experience. That is mind blowing to me. Right,
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: Why there's such a focus, You know, I can speculate
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: that it's to get elected, that it's to get votes.
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: There's money behind it. I mean Riley Gaines is an
• 7:43
  Speaker 2: classic example of that. She has made a lot of
• 7:46
  Speaker 2: money off of talking about this topic. But I think
• 7:51
  Speaker 2: ultimately this is a lot about distraction. It's a lot
• 7:56
  Speaker 2: about talking about sport without talking about the real issues
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: in sport. And I think it's about controlling bodies. Yeah,
• 8:11
  Speaker 2: I mean it's not lost on us, right that this
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: is happening on the heels of overturning Roe v. Wade. Right,
• 8:20
  Speaker 2: we're talking about who has control over whose bodies and
• 8:24
  Speaker 2: in what ways.
• 8:26
  Speaker 3: You do a great job.
• 8:27
  Speaker 4: I mean in the book that you are all right
• 8:30
  Speaker 4: about the fact that the usage of trans women versus
• 8:33
  Speaker 4: transmit which is a little different context, and how this
• 8:36
  Speaker 4: all links to violence and policing not only trans bodies,
• 8:39
  Speaker 4: but cis women's bodies as well. And that is the
• 8:42
  Speaker 4: biggest part, because you also go in to talk about
• 8:44
  Speaker 4: the people who gain the most here are the conservative
• 8:47
  Speaker 4: politicians who are talking about using this asset of platform,
• 8:52
  Speaker 4: and you kind of already mentioned, but can you talk
• 8:54
  Speaker 4: more about that? Because I think this is where we
• 8:56
  Speaker 4: talk about. This is the intersectionality of it all, Like
• 8:59
  Speaker 4: no one really wants to talk about the bigger picture
• 9:01
  Speaker 4: and think that when they say we're protecting young girls
• 9:05
  Speaker 4: or women in general, is not actually about that.
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: I think if we want to talk about protecting girls
• 9:12
  Speaker 2: and women in sport, then we need to talk about
• 9:15
  Speaker 2: what's actually impacting girls and women in sport. And of
• 9:18
  Speaker 2: course these issues are ones that impact a lot of people,
• 9:23
  Speaker 2: even though it's not in sport. I find it shocking
• 9:27
  Speaker 2: when people talk about trans athletes and the harms that
• 9:33
  Speaker 2: they don't talk about the rampant abuse that happens in sport.
• 9:39
  Speaker 2: I also find it curious when we talk about trans
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: athletes that there is such a focus on CIS women,
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: mostly because I think about you know, a lot of
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: what we talk about in the book is about imagining
• 9:53
  Speaker 2: a different future of sport, right, Like, let's think about
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  Speaker 2: what sport could be. And when we think about that, obviously,
• 10:03
  Speaker 2: you know, we're not just talking about trans athletes they
• 10:06
  Speaker 2: make up a very small portion of the population.
• 10:08
  Speaker 3: But we're talking about.
• 10:09
  Speaker 2: Creating healthy sports systems and systems where people can participate
• 10:15
  Speaker 2: and be themselves but also be safe. I think about
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  Speaker 2: that a lot when I think about men's sport too. Right,
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  Speaker 2: there's only been one study so far on the impact
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: of these conversations around trans women on CIS boys, but
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  Speaker 2: it really makes me wonder, what are we saying to
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  Speaker 2: young boys when we say, whatever you are, do not
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  Speaker 2: be a trans woman. What does it say when you're
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: saying to a boy, whatever you are, don't be a woman,
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: don't be feminine? That I think gets to the crux
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  Speaker 2: of it. A lot of this is about a reasoner
• 11:00
  Speaker 2: of masculinity in very particular ways.
• 11:03
  Speaker 4: Oh yeah, I literally when you talked about the linkage
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  Speaker 4: about the damage on CIS boys. It started because we've
• 11:10
  Speaker 4: had a big conversation over here in the last few
• 11:13
  Speaker 4: months and talking about the loneliness epidemic of men and
• 11:16
  Speaker 4: male loneliness and how it's kind of gotten to this
• 11:18
  Speaker 4: greater force of like, it's not necessarily true that there's
• 11:21
  Speaker 4: more loneliness than men. It's just that the violence that
• 11:25
  Speaker 4: happens and the impact overall is that when men are lonely,
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  Speaker 4: it impacts women because we are the ones who are
• 11:31
  Speaker 4: getting taken out on in general, and this level of
• 11:35
  Speaker 4: conversation that actually, when we talk about anti trans violence
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  Speaker 4: and rhetoric, we we're pushing on that toxic mexiculinity onto
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  Speaker 4: young CIS boys, and oh my god, that hits something
• 11:48
  Speaker 4: like y'all writing that is like this is this bigger
• 11:50
  Speaker 4: relate like language of the overall simple statement patriarchy hurts
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  Speaker 4: everyone and overall like how this really does damage the
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  Speaker 4: society as a whole, but it really is just as
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  Speaker 4: bad for SITH boys as it is for any other
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  Speaker 4: gender or any other part of any other marginalized community
• 12:09
  Speaker 4: in itself. Can you kind of expound on that, because
• 12:12
  Speaker 4: that was a deep statement that I feel like we're
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  Speaker 4: not talking enough about.
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, it's interesting when we look at states,
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  Speaker 2: and this was primarily the case before the last two years,
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: but when we look at states within the US that
• 12:29
  Speaker 2: had policies in sport and in their education systems that
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: were inclusive of trans athletes and trans kids, those were
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: places where cisgender girls also were thriving. So basically, studies
• 12:48
  Speaker 2: show if you have protective policies for trans athletes, then
• 12:54
  Speaker 2: all athletes are going to thrive. Cis gender girls, in particular,
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: in those states would report being happier participating in sport,
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: They stayed in sport longer, they had a healthier relationship
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: with our bodies, and expressed more confidence. And so this
• 13:11
  Speaker 2: is about policy, but it's really about how do we
• 13:15
  Speaker 2: create cultures where people can learn thrive be in their
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: bodies in ways that are healthy. Right, And so I
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: wish we had more data on how boys perform in
• 13:31
  Speaker 2: those spaces too, But it makes complete sense if you
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: have policies, if you're educating coaches, sport organization leaders, even
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: athletes and parents to be inclusive, you're going to create
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: healthier spaces for all athletes, including SIS boys. And I
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: would say CIS boys in some ways are the people
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: who need it the most, especially right now.
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I was struck by you mentioned kind of the
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: toxicity of the locker room talk, and I was like, oh, yeah,
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: still so pervasive. Something else that you tackle in this book,
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: because you tackle a lot of mists around this whole,
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: all of this discussion around trans athletes, and one of
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: the ones that I have often thought doesn't make sense
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: but people present as fact is kind of the scientific
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: one because I've always personally thought like, well, people just
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: naturally are different, Like I don't understand this, but they're
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: always is always presented as sis, women are weaker, men
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: are superior, and this fact and here the science and
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: in the book you talk about that and you point
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: out that a lot of the data is either faulty
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: or just not there. Yes, so can you discuss please?
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: Yeah? Okay, So I'm a sais woman, right, clearly have
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: a vested interest in sport. So the idea when people
• 15:21
  Speaker 2: say to me, well, like, all men are bigger, faster,
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: stronger than all women, I mean, first of all, it
• 15:28
  Speaker 2: kind of irks me, like, let's just put that out there.
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: But also it's not true, right, There are plenty of
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: examples of sports where women perform as well, if not
• 15:41
  Speaker 2: better than men. We're learning more and more about those sports.
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: Ultra running is a great example, and we talk about
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: that in the book But what we really know about
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: athleticism and physiology is there isn't great data, especially when
• 15:58
  Speaker 2: we're talking solely about bodies, right, But beyond that, I mean, okay,
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: first of all, it's way more complicated than that, right, sport,
• 16:09
  Speaker 2: What are we talking about when we talk about sport?
• 16:11
  Speaker 2: There are so many different kinds of sports that value
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: so many different parts of what it means to be
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: an athlete. So to broadly state that all men are
• 16:22
  Speaker 2: better than all women in all sports is ludicrous. Still,
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: when we look at the science too, and when we
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: look at the data, what we really know is physiology. Okay,
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: there are some variables that can have an impact in
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: certain sports, but what really broadly makes a great athlete
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: science is the data is very clear. It's who has money,
• 16:49
  Speaker 2: who has access, and who has the resources and support
• 16:54
  Speaker 2: early on in their lives to become an elite athlete.
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: That's Theottom line. And so when we look at who's
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: winning in sport, if we look at you know, who
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: wins Olympic medals, it is athletes who have had access,
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: and some do have genetic variations that make them better
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: at sport, Michael Phelps's case in point. But overall, the
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: people who have always won in sport are still winning.
• 17:20
  Speaker 2: It's the people who have the resources to be able
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: to be good at sport and to put time and
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: energy into it. So when we talk about, you know,
• 17:32
  Speaker 2: the science, when we talk about the physiology, sure, I'm
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: happy to talk testosterone. I'm happy to talk about you
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: know what impacts athletic ability, But if we really want
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: to talk about it, then let's talk about who has
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: the money to do it?
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: Yes, because it's it's there are so many systemic things.
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: And as you point out, because this argument is usually used,
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: it's why trans women should not compete, because then that
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: is unfair to cist women, whereas the other argument about
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: trans men, it's almost never made. But as you illustrate
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: throughout the book through these interviews, to be a trans athlete,
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: especially younger, you have all of these obstacles to go through.
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: You have all of these systemic things that are preventing you.
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: So of course it makes sense that you know, we
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: unfortunately don't see a lot of them in more spotlight.
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: But I don't know, that's just another thing that I
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: it makes sense to me that it would be more
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: about resources than it would be about I don't know,
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: testosterone or whatever it is.
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and I think it really raises the question of
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: Like the question that I think it raises is is
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: our sports system working? And you know, people don't necessarily
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: want to think about that, But the bottom line is
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: in this country, you know, the United States is one
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: of the few countries in the world that doesn't have
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: federal oversight of sport. We don't have a federal governing
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: body for sport like most countries, especially those in the
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: global North, and within our education system, what we've seen
• 19:23
  Speaker 2: broadly is physical education is being redacted across the country.
• 19:29
  Speaker 2: So the only way kids get access to their bodies
• 19:33
  Speaker 2: typically is through sport. And because sport isn't regulated, it's
• 19:38
  Speaker 2: sort of like the wild wild West. I mean, it's
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: really we are operating in a pay to play system.
• 19:46
  Speaker 2: So the only kids who get access to their bodies,
• 19:50
  Speaker 2: which I think access to your body, to be empowered
• 19:53
  Speaker 2: in your body as a human right, are the ones
• 19:56
  Speaker 2: who can afford it or who have families who can
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: afford it. That is a really big and sticky point,
• 20:03
  Speaker 2: and it raises some really big questions. But I think
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: a lot of the conversations we're having about trans athletes again,
• 20:11
  Speaker 2: you know, the irony is just so so deep that
• 20:16
  Speaker 2: we want to talk about trans athletes, but we don't
• 20:18
  Speaker 2: want to talk about pay to play. So that's, you know,
• 20:23
  Speaker 2: for me again, when we get when I mentioned the
• 20:25
  Speaker 2: distraction technique earlier, it makes me wonder, is this a
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: distraction from the realities of people not knowing how to
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: or wanting to address all the issues that we have
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: in sport broadly, right, You do.
• 20:39
  Speaker 4: A really good point into like in the conversation specifically,
• 20:43
  Speaker 4: I think it was Sue. I'm trying to remember the
• 20:45
  Speaker 4: story that I'm getting all confused where she talks about
• 20:48
  Speaker 4: who ended up beating men when she was able to
• 20:51
  Speaker 4: race against it as a like ginger neutral type of
• 20:55
  Speaker 4: I think it was ultra running.
• 20:57
  Speaker 3: I'm trying to remember all those stories.
• 20:59
  Speaker 4: And after that the league kind of had a problem,
• 21:02
  Speaker 4: was like, you know what, maybe we should we should
• 21:04
  Speaker 4: ginger these we should ginger these types of.
• 21:06
  Speaker 3: Sports so we have you know, fair play and all this.
• 21:09
  Speaker 4: And then the quote said the timing of the sex
• 21:11
  Speaker 4: segregation seems driven by a desire to protect men and
• 21:16
  Speaker 4: not women, And I was like, yes, because we've talked
• 21:18
  Speaker 4: about the beginning of Olympics and as well as the
• 21:21
  Speaker 4: Boston Marathon, and I know y'all brought that in its
• 21:23
  Speaker 4: examples of like not allowing women to participate in saying
• 21:27
  Speaker 4: this to protect them and they're too gentile and they
• 21:31
  Speaker 4: can't do this sports because they're not built for it.
• 21:33
  Speaker 4: But in actuality it feels more like, oh, but we
• 21:36
  Speaker 4: want to make sure that men have dignity enough to
• 21:38
  Speaker 4: beat them and so they don't want this.
• 21:41
  Speaker 3: Type of competition.
• 21:42
  Speaker 4: And I thought like that was a big statement in
• 21:44
  Speaker 4: itself as well, like kind of protecting men's pride over
• 21:50
  Speaker 4: actual sportsmanship.
• 21:53
  Speaker 3: And I just really like the hit.
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: Yeah, And I think it's I think it's complicated, right,
• 21:59
  Speaker 2: because as in some ways this book has brought me
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: more empathy for men than I ever expected, because I
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: do feel empathetic. I mean, I look at my nephews.
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: They're young, they're six eight, and I look at them
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: competing against girls just playing, and the fear that I
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: see if they are beaten by a girl in sport
• 22:31
  Speaker 2: in any way, it breaks my heart. And then of
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: course girls end up playing smaller or end up leaving sport.
• 22:41
  Speaker 2: But yeah, I mean protecting men again. This really it's like,
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: can't we think of something better? Can't we think of
• 22:52
  Speaker 2: some other way to teach boys about how they can
• 22:56
  Speaker 2: be the best versions of themselves with out having it
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: be a comparison to a girl or a woman or
• 23:05
  Speaker 2: to other boys. I mean that's a radical thought, and
• 23:10
  Speaker 2: for me, it's an exciting one and I think a
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: lot of what we talk about in the book too,
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: and a lot of our stance on this is Don't
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: get me wrong, I'm critical a sport, but I love sport.
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: Sport has changed my life. I love it, I love
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: being a coach, I love being an athlete, and I
• 23:27
  Speaker 2: want everybody to have access to a sporting system and
• 23:31
  Speaker 2: to their bodies that that's healthy and not based in comparison,
• 23:37
  Speaker 2: but the amount of money and energy and time that
• 23:39
  Speaker 2: we put into sport in this country, and even into
• 23:43
  Speaker 2: this conversation about trans athletes, what if we put that
• 23:46
  Speaker 2: into creating a better system of sport where boys weren't
• 23:51
  Speaker 2: afraid to lose to little girls? What would that do
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: for our country? What would that do for our worlds well?
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: And one thing that really struck me reading this is
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: that a lot of the people you interviewed were very, very,
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: very competitive, but plenty of them I don't say weren't,
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: but they just more wanted the experience of knowing what
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: my body can do, how far can I push myself?
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: And it was never about like going to the Olympics,
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: or never about like anything like that. It was just
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: I enjoy the sport. I enjoy feeling empowered in my
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: body and knowing what it can do. And I just
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: love that because I think so many times we get
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: lost in sort of this conversation of just professional athletes.
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: It's all about winning, but for some people you interviewed,
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: it was much more about like, I get to be
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: a part of a team now and I get to
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: see what my body can do now, and how powerful
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: that was. So can you talk about why that is
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: so important in the role of sports for trans gender folks?
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: Why can that be so powerful and important?
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: People participate in sport for a lot of different reasons, right,
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: And I think broadly the point that we are making
• 25:10
  Speaker 2: is simply trans athletes participate in sport for all the
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: same reasons that SIS athletes do, and most often it's
• 25:18
  Speaker 2: not because they're aiming to win an Olympic gold medal.
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: I mean, maybe they are, and that's great too, but
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: I think the impetus here and I think it's really
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: important to say too so when we talk to kids,
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: all of the studies for a very long time who
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: have where they've interviewed or surveyed children about why they
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: participate in sport, why they choose the sports that they
• 25:47
  Speaker 2: participate in why they stay in sport. The answer almost
• 25:53
  Speaker 2: always is because my friends are. Of course, that makes
• 25:58
  Speaker 2: complete sense to me. Right. So to then say, okay, well, actually,
• 26:05
  Speaker 2: all we're going to talk about is elite competition gets
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: away from the fact that, to your point, most people
• 26:12
  Speaker 2: participate in sport because it's fun, because they have fun
• 26:16
  Speaker 2: doing it, because it's enjoyable, because they get to be
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: with their friends, right. And that's true for most adults too.
• 26:23
  Speaker 2: And I think when we look at trans athletes in particular,
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: I mean most of them, I would.
• 26:30
  Speaker 5: Say, why would you put yourself in that situation if
• 26:35
  Speaker 5: you don't love it, if you're not enjoying it, if
• 26:37
  Speaker 5: you're not having fun in that space, particularly now, right.
• 26:44
  Speaker 2: So yeah, and then of course you know there are
• 26:46
  Speaker 2: all of these benefits to sport. Then we talk a
• 26:48
  Speaker 2: little bit about that in the book too. But the
• 26:52
  Speaker 2: bottom line is sport can be really good for people,
• 26:58
  Speaker 2: and it can be really bad for people, and we
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: have to name that, and we have to say and
• 27:05
  Speaker 2: I think the broader point of the book is to say,
• 27:08
  Speaker 2: let's make sport healthier, more fun, make it easier for
• 27:17
  Speaker 2: kids to hang out with their friends in the.
• 27:19
  Speaker 3: Sport let's give them time to play, right.
• 27:23
  Speaker 2: I mean, it's it's not complicated. It's not complicated, right.
• 27:36
  Speaker 4: One of the things I loved about your storytelling about
• 27:39
  Speaker 4: having the transit community to come out and tell their
• 27:43
  Speaker 4: stories are both the mixture of like the good experiences
• 27:46
  Speaker 4: and the bad experiences. But not only would the good experiences.
• 27:49
  Speaker 4: It was not just about the individuality, but you even
• 27:51
  Speaker 4: talk about the coach's reactions. The team makes reactions the
• 27:54
  Speaker 4: good and the bad. And I love that because oftentimes
• 27:56
  Speaker 4: in these stories we hear the pity porn of it all,
• 27:59
  Speaker 4: and I like that there's so much like we want
• 28:01
  Speaker 4: to see the trauma. But you make sure to balance
• 28:04
  Speaker 4: both of those narratives so that we can have a
• 28:06
  Speaker 4: point of view of what it looks like to have
• 28:09
  Speaker 4: great team advocacy and people who are supported, versus what
• 28:14
  Speaker 4: it looks like when they don't.
• 28:15
  Speaker 3: But you have that balance.
• 28:16
  Speaker 4: Why do you think, especially in this type of conversation,
• 28:19
  Speaker 4: it's important to have individuals telling those types of stories
• 28:23
  Speaker 4: and having those balances in this type of advocacy work
• 28:27
  Speaker 4: because essentially this is advocacy work because we know at
• 28:30
  Speaker 4: this point we're having to fight for a right for
• 28:33
  Speaker 4: an individual who just won't want to be healthy and
• 28:36
  Speaker 4: have fun.
• 28:39
  Speaker 2: Well, I think first of all the benefits of sport physiologically,
• 28:45
  Speaker 2: you know, we know a lot about that. Of course,
• 28:49
  Speaker 2: it can help with confidence, with empowerment, there's all of that.
• 28:56
  Speaker 2: But I think you know earlier you mentioned a lot
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: of conversations recently about social isolation, and I think it's
• 29:05
  Speaker 2: important to underscore that sport can be often is a
• 29:13
  Speaker 2: great space of community building, even if it's an individual sport. Right,
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: You don't do sport alone ever, and so for us too,
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: a lot of this is talking about how we counter
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: social isolation and how sport can be that, which again
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: raises a question for me of why in the world
• 29:38
  Speaker 2: would we take away somebody's access to community because we
• 29:43
  Speaker 2: want them to feel isolated, right? And why would they
• 29:49
  Speaker 2: Why would folks want us to feel isolated? A lot
• 29:52
  Speaker 2: of what we talk about too in the book and
• 29:55
  Speaker 2: well a little bit is people who don't have access
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: to their bodies or communities are much easier to control, right,
• 30:05
  Speaker 2: And so sport can be a counter to that. We
• 30:09
  Speaker 2: hope it is a counter to that. We want people
• 30:12
  Speaker 2: to be in their bodies, we want them to be
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: feeling what's happening in the world around us, because if
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: we're feeling it, then we're paying attention, right and most
• 30:21
  Speaker 2: often our bodies tell us pretty quickly what's going on
• 30:26
  Speaker 2: and what to trust and not to trust. So teaching
• 30:29
  Speaker 2: people that teaching kids that I think matters, but it's
• 30:34
  Speaker 2: also teaching people how to be in community together. You know,
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: I grew up playing sport, and I should say both
• 30:42
  Speaker 2: of my parents are from Montana, and so I think
• 30:45
  Speaker 2: that they always sort of imbuede in us a very
• 30:50
  Speaker 2: clear sensibility of how you should operate in the world,
• 30:54
  Speaker 2: which is you have to live in community. So when
• 30:59
  Speaker 2: I started sport as a kid, my parents always told me, Hey,
• 31:04
  Speaker 2: this is a space where you're going to meet people
• 31:07
  Speaker 2: who are not like you. This is going to be
• 31:09
  Speaker 2: a space where they're going to people be, people who
• 31:11
  Speaker 2: think differently than you, who operate in the world differently
• 31:15
  Speaker 2: than you, And this is a chance to get to
• 31:18
  Speaker 2: know them, to figure out how to work together. Even
• 31:22
  Speaker 2: if you don't like somebody, right, you're going to have
• 31:24
  Speaker 2: to work with them to be the best versions of
• 31:27
  Speaker 2: yourself and to help them be the best version of themselves.
• 31:31
  Speaker 2: And so again, I mean I think when we it's
• 31:34
  Speaker 2: not just about community. It's not just about the coaches
• 31:36
  Speaker 2: for supporting the athletes. Of course it is, but it's
• 31:38
  Speaker 2: also about how we learn to relate to each other
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: and have hard conversations.
• 31:43
  Speaker 4: Like you gotta be the first person I've met that
• 31:45
  Speaker 4: come from Montana.
• 31:49
  Speaker 2: It's beautiful. It's beautiful.
• 31:53
  Speaker 3: I'm trying to remember. I'm like, have all of the
• 31:55
  Speaker 3: people that have met haven't met anybody from Montana? That's amazing.
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that.
• 32:05
  Speaker 2: I was.
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: I mean, this is one of many thoughts I had
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: when I was after I finished the book. But it's
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: so true that, you know, being in sport does you
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: have to learn how to navigate with people, how to
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: work with people you might not agree with. But I
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: think you also have to learn how to lose. You
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: have to learn how to lose gracefully. And a lot
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: of these when I see a lot of like anti
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: trans athlete rhetoric, I feel like some of it is
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: coming from a place of you never learned to do that,
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: so you actually didn't learn what the sport should have
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: taught you.
• 32:45
  Speaker 2: You know. Part of what I love about sport is
• 32:49
  Speaker 2: that often when you are competing with somebody or against somebody.
• 32:54
  Speaker 2: They are going to see the best versions of you
• 32:57
  Speaker 2: and the worst versions of you, and you're going to
• 32:59
  Speaker 2: see the best version of them and the odorst versions
• 33:01
  Speaker 2: of them. So there is sort of this inherent trust
• 33:06
  Speaker 2: in some ways that comes with participating in sport, and
• 33:09
  Speaker 2: I think that's also something that I really wish we
• 33:13
  Speaker 2: had more of. I love the idea of being truly
• 33:19
  Speaker 2: vulnerable in sport, and sport frankly, I think is one
• 33:24
  Speaker 2: of the spaces where most men feel like they can
• 33:28
  Speaker 2: be vulnerable. Yeah, just interesting.
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: I think we did talk about that in our Male
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: Only this epidemic because it's one of the few things
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: they would do, like as in a friend group or
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: even if it's just watching sports. So yeah, that is interesting. Well,
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: I know this is a big question. We've talked about
• 33:52
  Speaker 1: it before on our show. But before we move into
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: the future of what we could maybe build better, this
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: didn't come out of nowhere, you do discuss the history
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: of gender segregation in sports and how it sort of
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: led us to where we are right now. And you
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: know some of the organizations you mentioned how they are
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: trying to change, But can you talk a little bit
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: about the history for a second.
• 34:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I guess I should say first, I don't think
• 34:26
  Speaker 2: we can talk we can have this conversation without also
• 34:29
  Speaker 2: talking about race. When we look at the history of sport,
• 34:33
  Speaker 2: it's pretty clear, right, like people have been excluded, separate
• 34:38
  Speaker 2: but equal was a refrain, to be clear, that did
• 34:45
  Speaker 2: not work out well, both when it came to race
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: and when it came to sex or the separation of
• 34:54
  Speaker 2: men and women. When we look at the history of
• 35:00
  Speaker 2: binarid sport, a lot of people talk about how Title
• 35:05
  Speaker 2: nine was written so that women could have a separate
• 35:08
  Speaker 2: space of sport and could be protected in sport. That's
• 35:13
  Speaker 2: actually not why Title nine was written, and that's not
• 35:17
  Speaker 2: really how binaried sport began. So Title nine, this educational amendment,
• 35:23
  Speaker 2: was passed and enacted in the early nineteen seventies, and
• 35:27
  Speaker 2: the impetus behind it was we want to give the
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: underrepresented sex more resources in education systems. So actually a
• 35:40
  Speaker 2: big part of this was about allowing women to get
• 35:43
  Speaker 2: into law schools and medical schools. But the history is
• 35:46
  Speaker 2: more complicated than that. Regardless, sport was sort of a
• 35:50
  Speaker 2: byproduct of that. Right, people weren't necessarily considering sport at all,
• 35:57
  Speaker 2: but it turned out most federal education systems or education
• 36:01
  Speaker 2: systems that receive any federal funding, which is almost all
• 36:04
  Speaker 2: schools in this country, then needed to comply with Title
• 36:07
  Speaker 2: nine and not applied to sport. So all of a sudden, girls'
• 36:13
  Speaker 2: sports programs were getting money where girls were given access
• 36:19
  Speaker 2: to sport in ways that they had never had been
• 36:24
  Speaker 2: and there ultimately was a lot of tension between men's
• 36:29
  Speaker 2: sport and women's sport. Actually, the NC Double A and
• 36:36
  Speaker 2: really the people who were spearheading men's American Football and
• 36:40
  Speaker 2: the NC Double A are the ones who push for
• 36:44
  Speaker 2: binary sport. Because a lot of women started participating in
• 36:49
  Speaker 2: sport and they started to gain a lot of traction
• 36:53
  Speaker 2: really quickly. There were a huge number of spectators, a
• 36:56
  Speaker 2: lot of money going into women's sport pretty early on,
• 37:01
  Speaker 2: and ultimately there were people who said, we don't like this,
• 37:08
  Speaker 2: we don't feel like there's enough money to go around,
• 37:11
  Speaker 2: so we're going to contain women over in this corner
• 37:14
  Speaker 2: of sport so that men could maintain their rights to television, radio,
• 37:22
  Speaker 2: and other forms of income related to sport. So again,
• 37:29
  Speaker 2: I mean there's a lot there, But I think when
• 37:38
  Speaker 2: we talk about when we talk about trans women, a
• 37:43
  Speaker 2: lot of times people will say to me, it's unfair
• 37:46
  Speaker 2: because they're taking away opportunities from CIS women. And I
• 37:50
  Speaker 2: think we need to talk about that fear because I
• 37:53
  Speaker 2: hear it all the time. You hear it from certain
• 37:58
  Speaker 2: politicians and anti trans women advocates. I think that fear
• 38:06
  Speaker 2: is valid to say, I'm afraid that somebody is going
• 38:10
  Speaker 2: to come in and men or men might come in
• 38:12
  Speaker 2: and take over women's sport, And that fear is valid
• 38:16
  Speaker 2: because men have done that in women's sport. They still
• 38:24
  Speaker 2: try to, but trans women aren't men, right, So again,
• 38:29
  Speaker 2: I think it's this. It's a curious transference of our
• 38:34
  Speaker 2: fear of scarcity and our fear of what causes scarcity
• 38:42
  Speaker 2: in certain systems that's being transferred over to trans folks.
• 38:50
  Speaker 2: Women's sport is scarce, right, There is a scarcity mindset
• 38:55
  Speaker 2: whenever we talk about this, and it's because women's sport
• 38:59
  Speaker 2: is scarce. It's underfunded across the board. We don't get access,
• 39:04
  Speaker 2: we don't get sponsorships in the ways that men's sports do.
• 39:07
  Speaker 2: We never have. Still to this day, almost all institutions
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: are out of compliance with Title nine. But that scarcity
• 39:17
  Speaker 2: didn't come from trans athletes. So what if instead of
• 39:22
  Speaker 2: talking about trans athletes, we talk about how to make
• 39:26
  Speaker 2: sport less scarce for women and for men and for
• 39:30
  Speaker 2: trans athletes. We's start there.
• 39:34
  Speaker 4: Yeah, you do talk about the scarcity model in this conversation,
• 39:38
  Speaker 4: and again this goes overall to all things intersectional, when
• 39:41
  Speaker 4: we talk about glass ceiling, for work, job, career, all
• 39:45
  Speaker 4: of that, it holds. But the one thing that has
• 39:49
  Speaker 4: worked as the boogeyman, the underlying idea is that if
• 39:55
  Speaker 4: we can hold limits for those who are marginalized, then
• 39:59
  Speaker 4: those who have already won or are already on top,
• 40:02
  Speaker 4: can remain on top. Which again is that conversation, and
• 40:06
  Speaker 4: you talk about it, and you're very open in your book
• 40:09
  Speaker 4: about how you came to this point of understanding, of
• 40:12
  Speaker 4: letting go of your own fears and because of the
• 40:14
  Speaker 4: scarcely amount realizing where the problem was, has begotten where
• 40:19
  Speaker 4: the problem lies. It's kind of that same level of
• 40:21
  Speaker 4: conversation about billionaires when we talk about people not having
• 40:24
  Speaker 4: jobs and such, or are like.
• 40:25
  Speaker 3: M, it's not those who you're stealing jobs from? You
• 40:28
  Speaker 3: can we talk about that.
• 40:30
  Speaker 4: We're not gonna talk about that, but I'm just saying
• 40:31
  Speaker 4: that that's kind of that top point.
• 40:33
  Speaker 3: But how does that like, how did you come to
• 40:36
  Speaker 3: that point of understanding?
• 40:37
  Speaker 4: This is where it is, This is the fear, This
• 40:39
  Speaker 4: is the basis of why we are scapegoating trans people
• 40:47
  Speaker 4: in general in this moment, and why this is only
• 40:50
  Speaker 4: the beginning for a larger conversation.
• 40:53
  Speaker 2: Well, I think for me it was a journey. You know,
• 40:58
  Speaker 2: Ellie and I talk a lot about her journey in
• 41:01
  Speaker 2: this too, And Ellie was right off the bat like,
• 41:06
  Speaker 2: this is not right, that's it, like, let's figure it out.
• 41:11
  Speaker 2: And for me it was much more complicated. And I
• 41:14
  Speaker 2: think part of that is because a lot of my
• 41:16
  Speaker 2: own identity and my career was tied up in women's
• 41:20
  Speaker 2: sport in a very particular way. But for me, you know,
• 41:24
  Speaker 2: I what I was being told, essentially, I think, is
• 41:30
  Speaker 2: what a lot of people have been told. If we
• 41:34
  Speaker 2: allow trans athletes to enter women's sport, that's a slippery
• 41:40
  Speaker 2: slope and what does that mean for competition and women's
• 41:45
  Speaker 2: sport broadly? I did a lot of research, As I said,
• 41:49
  Speaker 2: I mean it took me years of looking at the
• 41:52
  Speaker 2: research and having a lot of conversations with trans athletes
• 41:57
  Speaker 2: and sis athletes to get to the point where I
• 42:00
  Speaker 2: could say, yeah, no, that's this just isn't right. It's
• 42:05
  Speaker 2: just not right. But I raise that too because I think,
• 42:11
  Speaker 2: you know, early in my career, when I was hired
• 42:14
  Speaker 2: by this LGBTQ rights organization, it was sort of positioned
• 42:19
  Speaker 2: to me like you're either four trans athletes or you're
• 42:21
  Speaker 2: against them, like there are two camps, and I just
• 42:26
  Speaker 2: I think that's also a false narrative that we need
• 42:28
  Speaker 2: to address. Right. First of all, there are a lot
• 42:31
  Speaker 2: of people who are in the middle. But beyond that,
• 42:33
  Speaker 2: I think it's also the fact that we're human beings
• 42:38
  Speaker 2: who can learn, and who can be curious, and who's
• 42:42
  Speaker 2: you know, thinking can evolve. And for me that did happen.
• 42:47
  Speaker 2: I was pretty intimidated by this topic overall, and as
• 42:51
  Speaker 2: I learned more, I mean, now my convictions are very clear,
• 42:55
  Speaker 2: but I think it took a lot. And something I
• 42:59
  Speaker 2: talk talk about in the book too, is it actually
• 43:04
  Speaker 2: took something pretty extreme, which was my dad died sort
• 43:10
  Speaker 2: of out of the blue, and as soon as that happened,
• 43:14
  Speaker 2: you know, they say that grief concentrates them now on love,
• 43:20
  Speaker 2: and for me, that was definitely the case. I realized
• 43:24
  Speaker 2: in this moment of grief. If I really focus on
• 43:28
  Speaker 2: what I love, I could set my fears aside and
• 43:34
  Speaker 2: I could see everything much much more clearly. Now. My hope,
• 43:38
  Speaker 2: of course, is not that everybody has to have something
• 43:40
  Speaker 2: that extreme, But the point is, if we can put
• 43:45
  Speaker 2: our fears to the side, what do we really think
• 43:48
  Speaker 2: about this? And why am I privileging my fear over
• 43:52
  Speaker 2: somebody else's.
• 43:54
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's kind of a daunting thing. But you did
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: discuss how we could build a better system that may
• 44:13
  Speaker 1: be of sports that is more inclusive, and what that
• 44:18
  Speaker 1: could look like. Could you talk about that.
• 44:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah, of course we've talked a lot, and it's been
• 44:26
  Speaker 2: a little bit sad, it maybe a little depressing, But
• 44:31
  Speaker 2: the bottom line is, you know, I think this is
• 44:34
  Speaker 2: a wonderful moment for sport because in some ways it's
• 44:39
  Speaker 2: allowing us to really interrogate what's going on in sport,
• 44:43
  Speaker 2: what's working and what's not working, and when we can
• 44:45
  Speaker 2: get curious and imaginative about sport. I think there's a
• 44:50
  Speaker 2: lot of possibility and a lot of what we talked
• 44:53
  Speaker 2: about two is the idea that what if we didn't
• 44:57
  Speaker 2: fear trans athletes, but what if we look to trans
• 44:59
  Speaker 2: athletes and said, hey, what could the future of sport
• 45:02
  Speaker 2: look like? Right for the people who are most marginalized
• 45:08
  Speaker 2: in sport, arguably, to ask them what could a future
• 45:12
  Speaker 2: of sport look like? What they suggest is brilliant and beautiful.
• 45:20
  Speaker 2: One example I want to give, and this is a
• 45:24
  Speaker 2: little bit dark again, but I think it really highlights
• 45:27
  Speaker 2: for me one of the ways that we could reconsider
• 45:31
  Speaker 2: trans athletes involvement in sport. So I have a friend
• 45:37
  Speaker 2: trans woman who was a very high level rower in
• 45:42
  Speaker 2: international rowing. She left her home country. She went to
• 45:48
  Speaker 2: Canada and was rowing in elite Canadian boats on the
• 45:55
  Speaker 2: women's side, and I asked her about some of her experiences.
• 46:01
  Speaker 2: She told me a story of one of her coaches.
• 46:06
  Speaker 2: So she was competing in Canada. Team Canada hired a
• 46:11
  Speaker 2: new assistant coach for the women's team. This young man
• 46:15
  Speaker 2: came over from some other country and the first time
• 46:20
  Speaker 2: he walked into their space, she said, something doesn't feel
• 46:25
  Speaker 2: right about this guy. And her teammates all said, no,
• 46:30
  Speaker 2: that's just kind of men coaches, that's sort of like
• 46:32
  Speaker 2: how they are around women athletes. Turns out, of course,
• 46:38
  Speaker 2: two years later, allegations came out about him abusing athletes.
• 46:45
  Speaker 2: And you know, my friend just said, yeah, I've been
• 46:50
  Speaker 2: pointing this out the whole time. And the reason I
• 46:53
  Speaker 2: can point it out is because growing up and participating
• 46:56
  Speaker 2: in men's sport, I had never seen that, right, and
• 47:02
  Speaker 2: so immediately I knew this isn't this isn't right, this
• 47:06
  Speaker 2: isn't normal. And to hear all of the women say, yeah,
• 47:11
  Speaker 2: it's a little bit weird, but fine, it's normal, right.
• 47:16
  Speaker 2: I mean, that indicates so much to me about first
• 47:20
  Speaker 2: of all, how men are treated in our sporting systems,
• 47:23
  Speaker 2: how women are treated in our sporting systems, but also
• 47:27
  Speaker 2: what would it look like if we had people who
• 47:32
  Speaker 2: could help us navigate creating healthier sport on both sides, right.
• 47:39
  Speaker 2: I mean that's one sort of silly example, but I
• 47:44
  Speaker 2: think or one serious example. But some other examples, of course,
• 47:48
  Speaker 2: are like, it's not complicated, make sport free, get every
• 47:54
  Speaker 2: kid in sport. If you want to talk about fairness
• 47:56
  Speaker 2: in sport, the first stup you can take is to
• 47:59
  Speaker 2: give everybody free access to sport. Right. We give a
• 48:06
  Speaker 2: lot of other examples, of course, but I think the
• 48:10
  Speaker 2: bottom line for us is we want this to be
• 48:13
  Speaker 2: an invitation. While everybody's talking about sport, while people are
• 48:16
  Speaker 2: talking about trans athletes and sport, even people who maybe
• 48:19
  Speaker 2: don't have a vested interest in sport. Let's talk about
• 48:22
  Speaker 2: how we can utilize this moment to figure out how
• 48:25
  Speaker 2: to make sport a better social system for all people.
• 48:29
  Speaker 2: The end, right, the end.
• 48:31
  Speaker 3: I love it.
• 48:32
  Speaker 4: I'm over here in the amen choir going mm hmm,
• 48:34
  Speaker 4: that's right, Amen, Amen. But it is this conversation of
• 48:40
  Speaker 4: when it comes to intersectionality, when the most marginalized community
• 48:44
  Speaker 4: gets equity, then everyone are on equal playing fields, and
• 48:48
  Speaker 4: that benefits everyone. And it's just quite just this level
• 48:52
  Speaker 4: of simplicity that it's not talked about enough. But at
• 48:56
  Speaker 4: the same time, that is the most difficult thing for
• 48:59
  Speaker 4: a lot of people to understand and to even visualize.
• 49:02
  Speaker 3: Honestly, even those who hope for it.
• 49:04
  Speaker 2: I can't.
• 49:04
  Speaker 4: I couldn't imagine what that actually looks like, which makes
• 49:07
  Speaker 4: me sad.
• 49:09
  Speaker 2: Well, you know, I did want to ask you both.
• 49:12
  Speaker 2: I meant to ask you before we started, but I've
• 49:16
  Speaker 2: listened to your podcast and I'm curious what your personal
• 49:20
  Speaker 2: relationships are to sport. If you're willing to talk about it, Annie,
• 49:27
  Speaker 2: go ahead.
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: I was very competitive kid. I grew up playing a
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: lot of different sports. A lot of it was for fun.
• 49:39
  Speaker 1: When I was asked to actually compete, like at a
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: I got really good at gymnastics and I got asked
• 49:46
  Speaker 1: to go to a competition, and I quit because I
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: had like a fear of proving, I guess, proving the
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: stereotype like oh, she's not actually good. And then when
• 49:56
  Speaker 1: I got older and I became uncomfortable with my body,
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: I quit. I pretty much quit, but I loved it,
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: Like I thought it was so fun and competitive and
• 50:09
  Speaker 1: just I loved it until all these We.
• 50:13
  Speaker 2: Did have a creepy, creepy coach too.
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: By the way, all these other things kind of encroached
• 50:18
  Speaker 1: that I was told, like you can't be too good,
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: or no boy will want to date you, which good riddance.
• 50:26
  Speaker 2: I think that could.
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: Care less than get. But at the time I was like,
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: oh no, so I did do what you said earlier
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: of kind of making myself smaller, And then eventually retreated
• 50:39
  Speaker 1: all together. And when I got older, I got much
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: more into like things I could do by myself, which
• 50:46
  Speaker 1: I guess is kind of sad, But I got into
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: like knife throwing and stuff.
• 50:50
  Speaker 2: She do too.
• 50:52
  Speaker 3: And Arrowstually, I don't know why I said like that.
• 50:56
  Speaker 3: I know what that is.
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, but I look back and it does make
• 51:00
  Speaker 1: me really sad because I think I would have really
• 51:05
  Speaker 1: enjoyed it. I had a lot of friends on the
• 51:06
  Speaker 1: soccer team. I think I would have had a great
• 51:08
  Speaker 1: time if I stayed. But I was just I was
• 51:10
  Speaker 1: so self conscious and so worried about how other people
• 51:14
  Speaker 1: would perceive me, particularly men and boys.
• 51:18
  Speaker 2: So I quit.
• 51:19
  Speaker 4: Yeah, for me, I grew up in a very rural town,
• 51:22
  Speaker 4: and so the accessibility part there wasn't a lot of
• 51:25
  Speaker 4: different sports. It was football, you know, It's one of
• 51:27
  Speaker 4: those like you got football, you got baseball, you got
• 51:29
  Speaker 4: basketball and running. And I'm also very grew up with
• 51:35
  Speaker 4: a lot of trauma. We love trauma around here, right,
• 51:38
  Speaker 4: And so that made me and that if I'm not
• 51:40
  Speaker 4: the best, then I shouldn't do it at all, Like
• 51:42
  Speaker 4: it's kind of that level. And so I didn't even
• 51:45
  Speaker 4: want to try if I didn't think that I could
• 51:48
  Speaker 4: be the best. Like at this level of anxiety of
• 51:50
  Speaker 4: performance anxiety as well as I had to prove myself
• 51:54
  Speaker 4: as existing, so proving myself in sports was even harder.
• 51:58
  Speaker 4: I as an adult. I really got too though, finally
• 52:01
  Speaker 4: started doing things like running, and I really did enjoy
• 52:04
  Speaker 4: doing like half marathons and such until my body was like,
• 52:07
  Speaker 4: you're too old for this. Stop it. It was really
• 52:11
  Speaker 4: nice and the commodity of like runners seeing each other,
• 52:13
  Speaker 4: like giving each other a nod type of thing, and
• 52:16
  Speaker 4: then doing the races was really fun. And I think
• 52:19
  Speaker 4: more of like I did cheer, so you know, but
• 52:22
  Speaker 4: you know how that becomes very feminized, especially in a
• 52:24
  Speaker 4: rural town, in that it's not sport, it's not competitive,
• 52:27
  Speaker 4: and I'm like, I don't know, we compete. I don't
• 52:29
  Speaker 4: know what you mean, but but stuff like that. So
• 52:32
  Speaker 4: it was very small opportunities because as I grew up,
• 52:35
  Speaker 4: I was like, man that existed, I would have loved
• 52:37
  Speaker 4: to try that because it seemed like I had a
• 52:39
  Speaker 4: lot of anger issues and I would have loved to
• 52:41
  Speaker 4: try some would like you know, those sports that help
• 52:44
  Speaker 4: you get out. That meditated a little bit. So it
• 52:47
  Speaker 4: was a It's an interesting story in that level of again,
• 52:50
  Speaker 4: what is accessible?
• 52:51
  Speaker 3: Who has the money?
• 52:52
  Speaker 4: And also I grew up in a fairly not poor family,
• 52:54
  Speaker 4: but we definitely didn't have extra money, and I was
• 52:57
  Speaker 4: the youngest child so by the time it got to me,
• 53:00
  Speaker 4: the funds were a little more dry. So being able
• 53:03
  Speaker 4: to afford even recreational sportes, you know, trying to get
• 53:06
  Speaker 4: the uniforms and any of those stuff was actually a
• 53:09
  Speaker 4: lot of money. Traveling cost a lot of money for
• 53:12
  Speaker 4: even children's recreational stuff. So I was definitely less prone
• 53:16
  Speaker 4: to be in sports. I was a nerd that left
• 53:20
  Speaker 4: to read books instead.
• 53:22
  Speaker 3: Me too, That's the way I in that category. Yeah,
• 53:26
  Speaker 3: you still.
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: Though, you still exercise, and I did. I used to
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: run a lot too.
• 53:31
  Speaker 4: I forgot more than me. She went like marathons during
• 53:37
  Speaker 4: the week just for the heck of it.
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: Yeah, And then I said I wasn't a runner, and
• 53:41
  Speaker 1: the guy who was selling me shoes was like, did
• 53:42
  Speaker 1: you just tell me you run half marathon every weekend.
• 53:45
  Speaker 1: I was like yeah, He's like, you're a runner. Oh
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: got it, got it.
• 53:54
  Speaker 3: She still does the Pchtree road race. That's huge down here.
• 53:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I thank you both for for saying that. I
• 54:01
  Speaker 2: was really curious as I've been, you know, listening to
• 54:05
  Speaker 2: the podcast. You know, I think a lot like, okay,
• 54:09
  Speaker 2: so my objective in life trans athletes. You know, I'm
• 54:15
  Speaker 2: talking a lot about them right now. But the bottom
• 54:17
  Speaker 2: line is, I really want people to feel more confident
• 54:23
  Speaker 2: in their bodies. I think we live in a society
• 54:26
  Speaker 2: and a world that constantly, constantly tells us to not
• 54:34
  Speaker 2: trust our bodies, to not be in our bodies, to
• 54:38
  Speaker 2: not like our bodies, to not appreciate our bodies. And
• 54:46
  Speaker 2: I just, I truly believe that a more embodied world,
• 54:52
  Speaker 2: with more embodied people would be not just more free,
• 55:00
  Speaker 2: but more welcoming for everyone. And I think a lot
• 55:06
  Speaker 2: of what you just talked about and your own experiences
• 55:09
  Speaker 2: and sport, that's precisely what we need to solve all
• 55:15
  Speaker 2: of that. It should not be the case that somebody
• 55:18
  Speaker 2: says to you you're not a runner, right, I mean,
• 55:22
  Speaker 2: whether you're saying it to yourself, somebody got that story
• 55:27
  Speaker 2: in your head, right, Let's do better for everybody.
• 55:34
  Speaker 4: Yes, I think we need you around just to give
• 55:35
  Speaker 4: us the pep talk, let inspire pep talk.
• 55:39
  Speaker 3: In the end, we might just need you to come back,
• 55:42
  Speaker 3: you know.
• 55:43
  Speaker 6: I'm also like it's one of the few places where
• 55:46
  Speaker 6: I get to be like really silly, Like it used
• 55:51
  Speaker 6: to be the case that it was one of the
• 55:52
  Speaker 6: few spaces where I felt like I could be truly
• 55:55
  Speaker 6: competitive and not judged for it.
• 55:58
  Speaker 2: And now I'm like, it's one of the few spaces
• 56:01
  Speaker 2: as an adult where I feel like I get to
• 56:03
  Speaker 2: be like silly and I get to like mess up,
• 56:08
  Speaker 2: and I guess if somebody judges me, I'm like.
• 56:11
  Speaker 3: Whatever, you're not doing it. I'm doing it.
• 56:14
  Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, But like god, I just want that for everybody.
• 56:18
  Speaker 2: I want us to all have a space where we
• 56:20
  Speaker 2: can go and just like be, just be with ourselves.
• 56:25
  Speaker 1: Well, thank you, thank you, thank you so much for
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: being here. You have been a delight. We would love
• 56:31
  Speaker 1: to have you back. Where can the good listeners find you?
• 56:38
  Speaker 2: Social media of course, doctor Bay PhD on Instagram, LinkedIn.
• 56:44
  Speaker 2: Of course I don't use x I'll have a website,
• 56:51
  Speaker 2: And of course, you know, highly encourage folks to buy
• 56:55
  Speaker 2: the book. Most often we say too, even if you
• 56:59
  Speaker 2: don't read the book, hopefully there's somebody in your life
• 57:02
  Speaker 2: who you can give the book too. So maybe it's
• 57:07
  Speaker 2: you know, uncle Joe. Next year Thanksgiving. When you mentioned
• 57:12
  Speaker 2: that you are a women's sports fan and this topic
• 57:15
  Speaker 2: comes up, it's a great talking point. But of course,
• 57:19
  Speaker 2: also please feel free to follow Ellie, Ellie Rocher and
• 57:24
  Speaker 2: Chris Mosher and for folks who are really looking for
• 57:27
  Speaker 2: activations and ways to get more involved, Chris always offers
• 57:32
  Speaker 2: great device, great talking points and great action steps people
• 57:37
  Speaker 2: can take on his instagram, the Chris Mosher.
• 57:41
  Speaker 4: And the name of the book is Fair Game, trans
• 57:43
  Speaker 4: Athlete and the Future of Sports by Ellie Rocher and
• 57:47
  Speaker 4: doctor Anna Bit. And I'm going to put that out
• 57:49
  Speaker 4: there again because you know, I don't know if we've
• 57:51
  Speaker 4: said the title too many times. We need to say
• 57:53
  Speaker 4: it more. And it's a fantastic book. It's an amazing read,
• 57:56
  Speaker 4: and I think it's very important for today in context
• 58:00
  Speaker 4: is what well every day, but especially with everything going down,
• 58:04
  Speaker 4: and especially to note what is happening in this time
• 58:08
  Speaker 4: before everything is being silenced in a race.
• 58:11
  Speaker 1: Yes, if you would like to contact us, you can
• 58:14
  Speaker 1: or email is Hello at stuff wenever told you dot com.
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: We're also on Blue Skye Mom Stuff podcasts or on
• 58:19
  Speaker 1: Instagram and TikTok at stuff I've never told you. We
• 58:21
  Speaker 1: have a YouTube channel. We have some merchandise at copp Bureau,
• 58:26
  Speaker 1: and we have a book you can get where if
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: you get your books. Thanks as always to here as
• 58:29
  Speaker 1: superducer Christina Executive Prusin Maya and our contributor Joey. Thank
• 58:33
  Speaker 1: you and thanks to you for listening stuff I've Never
• 58:35
  Speaker 1: told you Instruction by Heart Radio. For more podcast from
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: my Heart Radio, you can check out the I Heart
• 58:38
  Speaker 1: Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your
• 58:40
  Speaker 1: favorite shows,