Celebrities Push to Let Boys Compete Against Girls in Sports

Hollywood celebrities and retired athletes are pushing to let biological males compete in women’s sports.

The ACLU recently released a 30-second video featuring nine celebrities urging the U.S. Supreme Court to strike down laws protecting girls’ sports. The ad aired as justices heard arguments in two key cases that will determine whether states can keep boys out of girls’ athletics.

The ACLU ad claims politicians are “fixated on keeping transgender student athletes out of sports” and setting unfair “limits” on children. But the real issue isn’t about keeping anyone out of sports—it’s about fairness and safety for female athletes.

Letting men compete in women’s sports reverses 50 years of advancements for women and effectively erases women’s athletics.

It hampers their ability to compete for athletic scholarships and hurts their professional opportunities as adults.

Female swimmers, powerlifters, cyclists, sprinters, volleyball players, and others have seen their sports radically changed by men who claim to be women. In some sports, it can even be dangerous.

Concerned Women for America estimates that more than 1,900 male athletes who claim to be female have taken first place medals away from women and girls.

Most Americans agree that athletes should compete according to their biological sex — not their gender identity.

In 2021, Arkansas passed Act 461 by Sen. Missy Irvin (R — Mountain View) and Rep. Sonia Barker (R — Smackover) preventing male student athletes from competing against girls in women’s athletics at school. This good law protects fairness in women’s sports in Arkansas.

Right now the U.S. Supreme Court is considering laws from West Virginia and Idaho that are similar to Act 461. If the Court rules against these protections, it could affect states like Arkansas.

That’s why Family Council joined dozens of state policy organizations and more than 200 state legislators in a legal brief in the case last September.

Our friends at Alliance Defending Freedom are heavily involved in standing up for fairness in women’s sports, and they recently published a video highlighting some of the girls who have been harmed by school policies letting boys compete in girls’ sports. You can watch that video on YouTube.

Articles appearing on this website are written with the aid of Family Council’s researchers and writers.