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I am a middle school student from West Virginia. I am also an athlete. I play women’s basketball and belong to the women’s track and field team. And I, along with other female athletes and even Olympians and champions like Martina Navratilova, submitted a brief to the court to protect women’s sport in my home country.
Overall, there are 78 female athletes, coaches, sports officials, and parents of female athletes, including middle school girls from West Virginia. We all, like the other 14 report filers, believe that girls’ and women’s sports can only survive if they are exclusively for women, and the laws that ensure their survival in my state are upheld. I think it should be.
Track and field, especially basketball, is one of the most important things in my life. Besides training, I go to the gym with my teammates on weekends. Lift and do a speed drill. When I get home, I often go running to boost my endurance. I want to be one of the best players on the court. It’s going to take a lot of work, but I’m happy to do it, not just for me, but for the team.
The case in my hometown, like other states across the country, is about whether boys can play in girls’ sports if they identify as girls. If I allow it, I will lose my dream. There is no way I can be one of the best players if I have boys on the court with me. That’s why I was so relieved to hear that West Virginia has passed legislation to protect women’s sports (including junior high school girls’ teams) and our right to fair play.
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Sadly, not everyone thinks girls deserve a level playing field.
When the West Virginia law was passed, the ACLU sued on behalf of boys who identified themselves as girls. After looking at all the arguments and science, a lower court upheld the law. But then an appeals court temporarily suspended the law without giving a reason, allowing the sued boy to play on an all-girls team.
You might think this is no big deal – middle school girls like me don’t really care. But we do care… a lot.
Even in middle school, boys, on average, have a biological and physical advantage that neither my teammates nor I can beat. They are faster, bigger and more powerful. They can jump higher and have longer endurance. In athletics, that’s all that matters. The best players on the team spend the most time with the ball. They pass and receive more. They come to take shots.
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A friend of mine has an older sister who plays on a co-ed team, and she noticed that the girls on the team played less time than the boys. If a boy suddenly joins my basketball team, I will need a chance to succeed away from the girls.
Things like this are already happening across the country and even in West Virginia. In fact, only middle school girls were forced out of their homes when West Virginia’s law was put on hold. 100 times or more with a boy. These are her 100 chances that a girl like me missed – forever. You will never get them back.
When the boys started playing for the girls’ teams, my favorite team would be gone. Ultimately he has two men’s teams. One is a boy who calls himself a boy and she is the other boy who identifies as a girl but dominates and controls the girls’ team.
Girls can get seriously injured when boys play on girls’ teams. We give our best every time we go out on the court and play. It means our bodies are pushed to their limits. When you introduce bigger, stronger, heavier, faster players into the mix, suddenly you become more afraid of getting hurt.
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Just having a boy on the court scares me. It changes the whole dynamic of the girls out there. Anyone who has a sibling or has played on a coed team can get this. Running into another girl at full speed can hurt, but you can usually shake it off and continue playing. Hitting the boy at full speed can lead to serious injury. Allowing men to play on women’s teams not only changes women’s sports, it destroys them.
None of this is fair. Allowing the boys to take over the girls’ team means that no matter how hard I work, I can never be number one on my team. It must also be discouraging for girls of all ages who have worked hard for a fair shot.
That’s why I want you to stand up and be heard now. I want a fair chance to compete and win for myself and for others. I can only hope that our voices are not ignored.
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