Context:
“There would be no celebration tonight if it weren’t for the commitment of our keyboard warriors,” Alex Bruesewitz, who advised Trump on his social-media strategy, announced to the room. The honorees represented a hodgepodge of special interests. The list featured long-familiar pundits, including Ben Shapiro, as well as people nobody had heard of even three years ago, such as Riley Gaines Barker, a 24-year-old former college swimmer whose sole issue is fighting trans people in women’s sports. Bryce Hall, the 25-year-old boxer with 23 million TikTok followers who once dated Addison Rae, was at the bar, downing shot after shot of tequila. He wondered how many would be too many in the case that, as he had been told might be possible, he got a few minutes with Trump later in the night...."
The article came out on January 27th. Riley Gaines got what she'd fought for on February 5th. Is she a "sole issue" character who now fades from view? I see she framed it this way (on February 4th, on X):
Things could've been so different. Gender insanity was the final straw that brought a lot of moderates to the side of common sense. Specifically, I believe it was the issue of men in women's sports.
If your "sole issue" is a wedge issue, you're not as obscure as New York Magazine would like to paint you.
"Barker" refers to her husband Louis Barker. He was born in England, and they met at the University of Kentucky, where he was also a swimmer.
Posts
62 comments:
An EO is never the end of an issue. Unless the Republicans can pass this into law the next D party president can snuff out this common sense issue with a (counter) stroke of a pen.
Laws can, of course be reversed as well. But the process is tougher, takes consensus and exposes lawmakers to the realities of public sentiment.
@JAORE True, but on this one, it's not going to change. The Democrats aren't that dumb, and people are not going to return to the extreme position that got rolling during the Biden administration. It's "an 80/20 issue" as they say, so there won't be pressure on the Dems to pass by that way again.
I think the Dems are quietly glad that mean old Trump stomped all over their dream.
Maybe no one heard of Riley Gaines even three years ago, but by 2023 enough Progs had heard of her that a mob put her in fear for her life while speaking as an invited speaker at San Francisco State. In my opinion SFSU needs to be disaccredited as an object lesson to university administrators everywhere about giving over their campuses to violent mobs.
I had to beat my way into Cross Country, from which females were banned, in 1981. Testified in Albany. Still, we got no uniforms from the school district, and without uniforms, we were pulled off the finish line. Why not pull us off the starting line? To humiliate us more. I once scored third in a statewide meet and was pulled off the finish line for having no official uniform. In 1982. 1982, I couldn't compete in my sport. Adidas Jim Crow, remembered by nobody. Defended by no fancy civil rights lawyer. Or law professor. And now they are all defending men pretending to be women to destroy girls in a different segregation.
What are you doing about it, feminist Althouse?
@Althouse, you overestimate the common sense of Democrats. You’ve forgotten how to learn.
Jaore, Real women should boycott all sports where fake women are allowed to pasrticipate. That is much more powerful than relying on the EOs which go back and forth.
Althouse, I just read on Breitbart that the Minnesota State High School League, the governing body for high school sports, was going to defy the EO Trump signed on tranny participation in girls' sports.
@Tina, my sympathies. I suspect I’m a bit older than you because apparently your state at least had a girl’s cross country championship. Sixty years ago it was thought that girls were too delicate for sports. How many of my classmates could have been champions? Sad to think of it.
The trans craze is a USAID fabrication, a destabilization tool it uses in foreign countries to rip apart the social fabric. It appears that almost all the great sexual “liberation” movements are Astroturf creations of USAID. The referenced article appears in a publication that is undoubtedly funded by USAID. Obama encouraged and allowed USAID social destruction tactics in the U.S.
Fighting trans people…? It should be fighting trans women in women’s sports. The same guardrail needs to be put up for women’s academic or professional awards, beauty pageants, “first woman” acclimations, etc. This man-acting-as-woman must be limited to their own personal life and must not infringe on any woman’s life dreams.
Last night I was on a call with the officers and directors of my university's STEM alumni group. Their bitterness and resentment toward Trump and conservatives was similar to what you see in New York Magazine articles like this one. It's a tedious reminder of the daily cruelties perpetrated by junior high school cliques.
I do think Prof. Althouse is correct that at least some Dems are "quietly glad" about Trump's dream stomping. Every now and then, I've gotten a barely perceptible sense of a hint of a baby-step emanation of an embarrassed hesitancy by some of the card-carrying Democrats in the STEM group to embrace over-the-top advocacy for the trans agenda, or at least a willingness to accept that not all people nervous about the trans agenda are entirely dismissible as the worst kind of bigots. They're terrified to admit it, though.
Riley is awesome, btw. Good for her for standing in the breach. She and Rowling are two much appreciated warriors.
What I did was drop off the team. No adult was supporting me. I realized what a bunch of elite, Hugh Hefner screwing, fucked-up narcissists the "feminists" were, and I just ran for myself, the wind in my hair.
Lost out on the college scholarships, though. Could have used them because daddy wasn't well-off. Only grown girls with well-off daddies, communist/terrorist backgrounds, or some ethnic-based fetish were welcome into the club of feminists back then.
Or now, frankly. Gotta go to the back of the bus, way behind the trannies, and offer up your own daughters for ritual sacrifice, be it their genitals or sports dreams.
Thanks, Big Mike. As a former political organizer with a good Rolodex, I'll personally sponsor Riley Gaines to speak anywhere in metro Atlanta. I'll raise the money and turn out hundreds or a thousand to protect her. We could easily get her into the Capitol. We could shame the universities. She's welcome in Georgia.
We're courteous, you know.
I thought her sole issue was swimming. I got that impression not from reading third person descriptions of her from dime a dozen New York reporters. I got it from listening to interviews that Riley Gaines gave. She spent most of her life in competitive swimming. She worked hard to finally get a chance to win a Women's title in NCAA. Then the year she tied for the win, she was told the trophy and award would go to a man that the year before decided he couldn't win in the Men's division, so he called himself a woman by simply putting on a woman's swimsuit and tied the best Women in NCAA.
Even then, her first reaction was to call her former NFL player father, who wanted to come beat some sense into a few people. That's when she realized that would only result in losing her father, so she had to lead the fight to stop this madness. When people wouldn't respond to common sense and then began attempting to assault her for speaking out; she became a national spokesperson for the issue.
I suspect now that she has men out of Women's swimming. Riley Gaines will go back to competitive swimming. Perhaps not as a competitor herself but in coaching. I'm sure with her years of experience, she'll make a lot of money doing it.
Riley Gaines Barker, a 24-year-old former college swimmer whose sole issue is fighting trans people in women’s sports.
Reducing her to a single soundbite. Stay classy, New Yorker.
"Mother Theresa, whose sole issue is caring for the poor..."
I guess women's rights are a moveable thing.
Riley’s sole issue is keeping women’s sports for women. No cheating fake women allowed.
Tina, I posted my comment before reading yours. My point, I think like yours, is your issue was the right to compete fairly in what you loved doing. When they started manipulating the rules, then it became an issue.
I suspect most people our age grew up with women not just competing in their sports, but competing for the right to compete. I was a male child that didn’t understand the female issue. Over many decades, I thought the issue was resolved and that children like me were wrong. Why is it in 2024 that it was an issue again that women be allowed to compete in women’s sports?
The Professor is correct: this issue is finished. Ms. Gaines might wish to go into coaching or announcing but, having had a taste of the political life, maybe she'll want to bump AOC as the youngest woman elected to Congress.
That Hogg boy is a one issue wonder, and he is now the vice chair of the Democratic party.
RGB hadn't intended to be culture warrior, she just stood up when few others would. She can go back to her regular life or use her wit and charm to build her brand.
Remember. Only a bigot would be offended by the sight of a woman's penis!
“ Biff said...
Last night I was on a call with the officers and directors of my university's STEM alumni group. Their bitterness and resentment toward Trump and conservatives was similar to what you see in New York Magazine articles like this one. It's a tedious reminder of the daily cruelties perpetrated by junior high school cliques.”
The latest issue that has university STEM people mad is the reduction of allowable overhead costs for government research grants being cut from 30% to 15%. It doesn’t impact the amount of money for the actual research, just the overhead expenses, which are mostly administration. For non-university research organizations, overhead is limited to 10%.
No mention of William Thomas --- er I mean Lia Thomas - the male swimmer who beat Riley?
Will Thomas was on the mean's swim team for three years prior to his being allowed on the women's team. When he switched to the women's team - he was allowed to undress in the women's locker room - exposing his 100% still very male body parts. Some of the women complained... and they were told by the powers that be (the leftists in charge of the university) to shut up, stop complaining and get therapy. Yes.
That's right. Get therapy. Also - because many of the women on the swim team were uncomfortable with Will (Lia) Thomas in their space in the women's locker room - they would undress in a toilet stall --- or some place else.
(Congressional hearing notes on the way. )
F the Leftist New Yorker.
No mention of William Thomas --- er I mean Lia Thomas - the male swimmer who beat Riley?
Will Thomas was on the men's swim team for three years prior to his being allowed on the women's team. When he switched to the women's team - he was allowed to undress in the women's locker room - exposing his 100% still very male body parts. Some of the women complained... and they were told by the powers that be (the leftists in charge of the university) to shut up, stop complaining and get therapy. Yes.
That's right. Get therapy. Also - because many of the women on the swim team were uncomfortable with Will (Lia) Thomas in their space in the women's locker room - they would undress in a toilet stall --- or some place else.
(Congressional hearing notes on the way. )
F the Leftist New Yorker.
Ann - please bring back the more modern way to post comments. Where is the delete button? ugh.
Google sucks
Will Thomas was a mediocre male swimmer. When placed on the women's team - without the women's consent - he won.
Will Thomas is an asshole. I think it's perfect that this issue belongs to the corrupt-Democratic left. They like to cheat, too.
Kamala Harris, whose sole issue was abortion, whatever became of her?
Perhaps they are using "sole issue" to imply obsessed and unbalanced. In fact, someone who lives a normal life until something intrudes on it may be more balanced and normal than someone who carries around a quiverful of causes and grievances. Perhaps "sole issue" implies shallow, but again, "grounded" or "centered" or "based" may be better ways of understanding someone who isn't obsessed by a multiplicity of causes and movements but focuses on the one real issue that impinges on their existence.
Bear in mind that the writer is Brock Colyer, roving reporter guy in a dress, so he has reason to diminish, demean and malign Riley Gaines. I could play devil's advocate for a minute, though, and say that Brock and Dylan Mulvaney and Will.I.Stil.Am Thomas are turning the feminist revolution of the 70s around. Women entered what were considered men's fields, and now it's the boys taking over what used to be girls' spaces.
@danno Minnesota has ongoing court cases in powerlifting as well. https://www.mncourts.gov/mncourtsgov/media/Appellate/Court%20of%20Appeals/Special%20Releases/OPa230373-031824.pdf
Former UPenn Swimmer Paula Scanlan Slams Treatment For Public Opposition To Swimming With (Will) Lia Thomas
It's only 5 minutes long. Please watch.
In the end Will Thomas still lost to a woman. Good for her.
Anecdotally. I remember I lost out on top honors in a senior project, not because my work was sub standard, I got an A, but because the other persons paper was two pages longer than mine.
"@JAORE True, but on this one, it's not going to change. The Democrats aren't that dumb"
Looks like Althouse is going to be holding the Dems' beer the next time they are in the White House. I think the next time we get a Democrat president that Trump EO will be rescinded on day 1.
April Apple- the delete button is back to being the trashcan icon under ones comment.
I do miss the ability to reply directly to a comment though.
Yancy - I don't see any trash can icon.
Yancey --
In Trump 45, it was the accusation of being 'crazy', no 'incompetent'. Now the buzzword is 'cruel'. Too bad the worldwide propaganda network isn't as helpful as it used to be, now that the wiring is showing.
Still no trash can in my browser, Firefox. Can't delete a comment.
I see the icon just to the right of the time stamp.
@Danno "..Jaore, Real women should boycott all sports where fake women are allowed to ..."
More than anything else, I wanted to see a swim meet featuring Thomas, to see all those girls on their starting podium, simply stand there after the signal, with their arms folded as Thomas swum his race all alone. That act, and those pictures, would have fixed the issue once and for all, I think. What would a University's woke administrators do? Cut the women and replace them with less-capable swimmers, who would lose by even more? Replace them with men? It would have been impossible to pretend that one fake-female swimmer was due more consideration than a team full of girls, in the face of such shaming. Alas, the solidarity wasn't there.
I think Riley Gaines will further postpone dental school and run for political office soon. She might well be someone's congresswoman before long.
“Notorious RGB”?
Rosa Parks, a 42 year old secretary whose sole issue was disrupting seating arrangements in public transportation....
In time it will be clear that Riley Gaines is less obscure than New York Magazine.
David Hogg, absolutely a "sole issue" antigun prog, just got voted Vice Chair of the Democratic National Committee.
Beam, mote, eyes. Pot, kettle, black. Glass house, stones. Pick your epigram.
She's been posting about her husband's inability to get a green card without getting the covid vaccination. That might be a second issue.
No trash can for me. at all.
"The Democrats aren't that dumb ...". The Democrats weren't that dumb. But then the Gay Marriage travesty showed them how susceptible college-educated white women are to victim porn, and now they are mutilating children. I don't think they're done yet. There's dumber to come.
Larry J said...
"The latest issue that has university STEM people mad is the reduction of allowable overhead costs for government research grants being cut from 30% to 15%."
It's a major issue for a lot of the top tier research universities, where indirect cost rates usually are in the 60-70% range. When I was in grad school a long time ago, my school had an indirect cost rate for NIH grants that was over 70%. More recently, it has been well into the 60s.
I think a lot of scientists can agree that 60-70% rates are too high, especially when reminded of the administrative bloat such rates support. Regardless of what the "right" rate may be, going from 60% to 15% will be a huge disruption to legitimate campus research, since the bills coming into the universities aren't going to stop soon and still have to be paid. Even if we assume everyone is good and working toward noble ends on all sides, researchers are going to have a very, very bumpy ride until the dust settles.
Personally, I think this is a negotiation tactic, and the typical indirect cost rate will settle around 30%, with some accommodations to allow higher rates in exceptional cases. I also expect that the days of 65% indirect cost rates are over, at least until the next time a Democrat is in the Oval Office.
"Alas, the solidarity wasn't there."
Too much "But muh scholarship!" and not enough "I am woman- hear me roar!"
Bing for taking the trash out.
Every chance I get, I repeat the comment I made here years ago. It's NOT transgender WOMEN getting into women's sports. It's transgender MEN getting into women's sports. Don't call them transgender women. They AREN'T women; they are MEN.
If a woman wants to compete with men in men's sports, then God bless her, and I will vote for her.
Riley didn’t have to step in this fight and certainly didn’t have the fu money of Rowling. She is brave and makes her parents and all of us proud that there are young people like her coming of age.
She was supposed to quietly defer to blatant injustice. After all, she's only a girl.
Riley Gaines also got assaulted when she spoke at SFSU. The gutless SFSU administration didn't do anything about that either.
So Barker was born in the U.K., and met Gaines at the U.K.?
Sorry, the juxtaposition reminded me that I often initially think the 'wrong' UK when I see the abbreviation UK in a headline. Having lived in England and also in three neighbouring states to Kentucky I still usually think "country" before "university".
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