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The Supreme Court’s Anti-Trans Ruling Goes Well Beyond Sports

The ruling is about whether trans people have the same rights as everybody else—and the Court said they don’t.

Supporters of transgender athletes competing in women’s sports gather outside the Supreme Court.

I’ve come to understand that advocating for the fundamental humanity, dignity, and equality of transgender people, especially transgender women, is a controversial stance. I realize that there are a lot of people who otherwise support legal and social equality but think that there must be some way to carve transgender people out of our society and place them off to the side, with a diminished suite of rights and privileges.

These people are wrong. Bigotry must be fought everywhere and at all times. When that bigotry is enshrined in Supreme Court opinions, and thus grafted onto the Constitution, it must be opposed to the very last.

This is the situation we find ourselves in, again, after the Supreme Court’s decision in West Virginia v. B.P.J. The case revolved around laws in a number of red states that prohibit trans women and girls from participating in women’s sports. The court ruled, 6–3, along party lines, that the trans plaintiffs opposing these bans have no claim under the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment. The court ruled 9–0 that the trans plaintiffs have no claim under Title IX of the Civil Rights Act, which is supposed to prohibit discrimination on the basis of sex.

Put another way, the court ruled that transgender women and girls have no constitutional right to equality. It is a disgusting ruling.

And it’s not just about sports. It’s about whether transgender women and girls have the same rights as everybody else. It’s about whether they have the same rights as cis people, and about whether they have the same rights as transgender men. And the court said “no.”

The loss on the Title IX claim is shocking and wrong, but at least I can try to explain it. Title IX prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex, but it allows for there to be different treatment of the sexes. That’s why Title IX allows (and one could argue requires) schools to provide different sports teams for boys and girls. Title IX protects the idea of an “all girls” kickball team or a women’s hockey league.

Once you make that distinction, it has to be up to somebody to determine how to uphold the distinction. In that context, Title IX leaves it up to the schools and sports leagues and states to determine who fits in what category, when only binary categories are available. In West Virginia, they’ve decided that sex at birth is the critical determination, and the Supreme Court unanimously agreed that West Virginia is allowed to make that call.

Again, I........

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