By JAMES REINL at dailymail.co.uk
One of transgender swimmer Lia Thomas‘ former teammates at the University of Pennsylvania has bashed the school for making female athletes undress beside the 6-foot-4 biological male ’18 times a week.’
Paula Scanlan, a former NCAA Division I swimmer, told lawmakers that university officials refused to hear complaints from the women athletes and instead said they should be ‘reeducated’.
Whether to let trans women compete in women’s sports is a frontline issue in America’s culture wars between progressives and conservatives. It played out in the House Judiciary Committee on Thursday.’
My teammates and I were forced to undress in the presence of Lia, a 6-foot-4 tall, biological male, with fully intact male genitalia, 18 times per week,’ Scanlan told the committee.
The university was gaslighting and fearmongering women to validate the feelings and identity of a male.’
Last year, Lia Thomas became the first trans woman to win an NCAA swimming title at the Ivy League U-Penn. Thomas had previously competed on the male team. She began transitioning in 2019 and joined the female team in 2021.
Scanlan, an advisor at the Independent Women’s Forum, said she had trained for 20 hours each week as a teenager to realize her dreams and compete in big races, but still didn’t stand a chance against biological males.
‘Lia formally had personal best times in every freestyle event that were faster than the women’s world records,’ said Scanlan.
Though Thomas only made the top 500 when competing in men’s competitions, her gender swap meant she ‘became an NCAA champion in the 500-yard freestyle, the first NCAA champion in our women’s team history program,’ she added.
Scanlan spoke about an opinion article she wrote for the student paper on the scientific differences between biological male and females only to find that, hours after it was published, it had been taken down.
‘This is representative of a greater issue — the destruction of free speech,’ said Scanlan.
read more