Title IX is big zero: swim gal
As trans athlete sets another record
Former NCAA swimmer Riley Gaines says Title IX “literally means nothing” after a trans New Jersey swimmer who competed on the men’s team for three years smashed a collegiate record for the second time in three months.
Gaines blasted the latest victory of Meghan Cortez-Fields, a senior at Ramapo College of New Jersey who on Friday finished the 200meter individual medley with a time of 2:08:20 — shattering the previous record in the NJ Athletic Conference.
“Male swimmer from Ramapo College sets another school record in women’s event. Now tell me again the strides women have made when society applauds a man for pushing us off our own podium,” Gaines wrote on X.
“Title IX literally means nothing at this point,” she added.
Title IX refers to the rules set in the Education Amendments of 1972, which protects people from discrimination based on sex in education programs and activities that receive federal assistance.
Gaines claims allowing trans athletes to compete in women’s sports is an affront to the protections laid out in Title IX for female students.
Opponents say trans students are also covered under the federal law.
Cortez-Fields first stirred up controversy last November when she set a new record and took first place in the 100-yard butterfly event in a Pennsylvania meet.
The fall season was Cortez-Fields’ first season competing on the women’s team after transitioning, which drew condemnation that led to the initial post celebrating her win in Pennsylvania being deleted from the college’s Instagram page.
Repeat critic
Gaines, who was among the first to raise outrage about the New Jersey swimmer, made similar complaints about her former rival, Penn swimmer Lia Thomas, whom Cortezthe Fields cited as an inspiration.
Gaines described Cortez-Fields’ success as unfair, claiming she had gone from a “less than mediocre male swimmer to a record smasher competing against women.” Gaines also mocked Cortez-Fields’ tattoo, a picture of “The Birth of Venus” but with male genitalia, and called trans athletes competing in women’s teams a “fetishized and sexualized movement.” Ramapo College has defended Cortez-Fields’ participation on the women’s swim team, noting that she was following the regulations set forth by the National Collegiate Athletic Association.
“We have done everything the NCAA says needs to be done regarding trans athletes competing on the team,” the school said, adding Cortez-Fields received death threats after the November backlash.