We need to talk about a real and serious problem sweeping Maine that all politicians should prioritize.

For two years in a row, 2023 and 2024, a 17-year-old biologically female athlete won a state wrestling championship competing against boys, and beating multiple boys in the process. Now, I’m not going to mention her name, because I was raised better than to splash the names of minors all over the media, but since everyone is currently freaking out over gender and sports — we need to talk about this travesty!

Men’s rights are under attack by an agenda that is putting forward biological females and displacing males from their rightful place. Across the nation, high school and college male athletes have been pushed down a step, or off the podium altogether, by a biological female competing with them, as if they were equals.

Allowing biological females to compete in boys’ sports is taking away opportunities for boys, stripping them of medals and scholarships, and exposing them to greater risk of injury. It’s just science that biological females have an advantage over boys when it comes to wrestling. Females have wider hips, lower centers of gravity, and due to the presence of female hormones in the body, are more flexible and have a higher pain tolerance.

Imagine little boys who grow up from kindergarten dreaming of becoming a state champion athlete, only to have their dreams crushed, and Granby rolled, and headlocked. Male athletes are being forced into unfair competition, losing hard-earned opportunities, and experiencing emotional distress.

This isn’t about trophies; it’s about dignity, equality and mental health. When boys see their rightful victories erased, scholarships slip away and their voices are ignored, it sends a devastating message: They don’t matter. We must stand for fairness, safety and the integrity of male sports — before more boys are irrevocably harmed.

OK, OK, you got me. The previous paragraphs were facetious. Forgive me, I’m not an experienced satire writer. And I congratulate the young woman who really did win the state wrestling championship two years running. She seems wicked cool, super talented and generally nice, from the interviews I’ve seen.

I think it’s funny that everyone is losing their minds over the idea that if transgender girls in elementary and high school get to play on the same teams as their friends, women’s athletics will be destroyed forever. Meanwhile, this high school cisgender female athlete was whooping the boys left, right and center in wrestling — a masculine sport if there ever was one.

We tend to believe, as a society, that bodies considered to be male are inherently superior to bodies considered to be female. But they aren’t. A hundred years ago, people thought if women runners ran distances longer than 800 meters, their uterus would fall out. You’ll notice there aren’t a bunch of uteruses littering marathon courses.

I just think this whole moral panic where everyone is running around like a chicken with their head cut off pretending like allowing trans
girls to compete on the same teams as their friends and peers is somehow going to destroy women’s athletics is just silly.

It’s not the silliest moral panic America has ever had. My vote for that goes to “Millions of Satanic cults are sacrificing children every day and somehow Dungeons and Dragons is involved.”

But make no mistake, it’s a moral panic that was planted by right-wingers across conservative media. Now everyone is in a frenzy about the incredibly low stakes of letting trans kids in elementary and high school play on the same teams as their friends.

Maybe some people are really, truly, genuinely concerned about athletic fairness. But personally I think a lot of people puffing their chests out there are just bullies; people who are all hopped up on fake moral righteousness and outrage, and using it as an excuse to put down and attack children they don’t like.