The NCAA Swimming Championship Was a National Scandal

At this year’s NCAA swimming championships, organizers allowed a biological male, Lia Thomas, to compete against female athletes on the basis of transgender status. And so, what should have been a moment of sporting pride — a celebration of some of the best female swimmers in the country — became a scandal.

Thomas, a fifth-year senior at the University of Pennsylvania, went by his given name of Will and swam for the men’s team until 2019 without issue. When competing against men, Thomas was a top-tier swimmer, though far from a national champion. But since Thomas underwent hormone-replacement therapy during the pandemic and was allowed to join the women’s team in the 2021–2022 season, the swimmer has dominated the female competition. At the NCAA swim championships last week, Thomas reached the podium in every event the swimmer competed in, an honor bestowed on the top eight finishers in the nation. Thomas finished first in the 500-yard freestyle (beating two Olympic medalists), fifth in the 200-yard freestyle, and eighth in the 100-yard freestyle.

The NCAA’s reasoning is that Thomas, having taken testosterone suppressants, is now biologically equivalent to the championship’s female athletes. It requires nothing short of magical thinking to come to such a conclusion. Menopausal women do not cease to be women after their estrogen levels drop. And neither do biological men cease to be biological men after their testosterone levels have been chemically manipulated. The sex-based advantages conferred on Thomas during puberty are as irreversible as they are obvious. It is literally impossible to change sex.