Is a boycott of women’s sport the only way to keep it?
Nearly two years ago, I wrote an article arguing that women should not be forced to boycott their own sport. My suggested solution was that elite sportsmen should step forward instead, since they have more power and are less likely to lose everything in doing so.
What happened, alas, is that elite sportsmen did precisely nothing — maintaining a cowardly silence. As usual, sisters had to keep doing it for themselves.
I’ve changed my mind. I don’t think every woman should boycott her sport, but I certainly think more women could. Recently, a few incredibly brave women have taken a lone stance against their sporting bodies, and, whilst they have been punished, they have also been successful in highlighting the injustice other sportswomen face every day in a vast array of sports.
Instead of becoming “transphobic” pariahs, they have become legends. We have taken these women to our hearts, because we know many women are hiding inside their own sports knowing the injustice of men on their teams or in their competitions and afraid of what will happen if they object.
Many of us saw the fencer Stephanie Turner drop to her knee, take off her mask and refuse to fight a man last week saying, “I’m sorry, I cannot do this. I am a woman, and this is a man, and this is a women’s tournament. I will not fence this individual.”
She was disqualified by USA fencing as a result of her brave act; however, she also received a “Courage Wins” award and $5000 from a group called “XX-XY Athletics”. Things are changing because of lone women performing unilateral acts of bravery against the men invading their sports.
This was swiftly followed by Abigail Thompson the disc golfer faced with a male competitor in her sport who refused to release her disc in the competition and yelled, “Females must be protected in our division. This is unfair. I refuse to play.”
The bravery of women is contagious. Women’s previously simmering anger, whilst watching men invade their sports, has reached boiling point — and I think we will see more of these acts.
The world can no longer look away from the unfairness of men playing against women in female sport
Those not involved in women’s sport have begun to pay attention. Rather than turning their backs on these women, they are supporting them. The world can no longer look away from the unfairness of men playing against women in female sport and few at this stage can say that they have heard nothing about it.
These two women were in the US, and arguably their political landscape has changed of late allowing them more freedom to object, but in the UK, where women’s groups have been active for years now, we have our own lone heroines. Objection to this unfairness doesn’t have to be against the backdrop of a huge nation like America, or with the political support of a powerful president.
Lynne Pinches is one of the UK’s own lone-wolf legends. In August 2023, she walked off a pool competition when she faced a man named Harriet Haynes in a women’s pool tournament. Pinches predicted a future where women would not be at the top of the sport, their places stolen by men pretending to be women.
Last Sunday, Haynes was one of three men in the pro series women’s event of Ultimate Pool. Ludicrously and in a display of extreme misogyny, the final featured two of those men, Haynes and Lucy Smith, whilst women were nowhere to be seen.
A group of women, including myself, had gone along to support Lynne Pinches, who would sit in the audience after excluding herself from the sport she loves, but when we arrived, Lynne had already been thrown out and was surrounded by several security guards. She was visibly distraught at the obvious injustice of it all. Inside, a smug Haynes was playing his way to the £1800 prize money.
A group of us went inside and protested Haynes in support of Lynne Pinches. We held up banners saying “He’s a Man” and “Save Women’s Sport” as he played. We were swiftly evicted from the building with some force. Men sat in the seats around the other matches doing nothing, and one even asked loudly and disdainfully, “Can’t you throw them out?”
I asked the man why he was doing nothing about the man playing in the women’s pool competition and he responded, “Well, everyone has accepted her now. She’s earned it.”
I pointed out that women haven’t accepted it. No man earns the right to be a woman.
I now think women boycotting sports, with other women supporting them, is essential
Men like him are too cowardly to stand up for women and simply want us to be quiet. I now think women boycotting sports, with other women supporting them, is essential and probably the only way this madness will end. Women like Lynne Pinches are heroic, but if other women don’t begin to act with women like her, it will be too late. Lynne told me:
When I conceded my head was saying one thing and my heart the other. Because it goes against everything you are taught in sport. Never give up. In my heart I knew that I couldn’t sit back and watch the sport I love destroyed. I suggested a mass boycott once afterwards. But you have to understand these players have jobs and sponsorship and they just want to play pool. I have no regrets. It’s been emotionally draining and very lonely at times even with support from around the world, the unfairness and watching you g women lose title opportunities pulls on your heartstrings. It’s a difficult watch. Was it worth it? If fairness, safety and privacy is restored for women in sports across the board then yes absolutely it will be worth it. Only time will tell.
Thankfully, the injustice on display at Ultimate Pool in Wigan reached the mainstream media — with predictable outrage following. If it wasn’t for the determination and resilience of Lynne Pinches, acting unilaterally to defend her sport for the women who would follow her, a small event in the North of England would have allowed two men to steal women’s places and few would have noticed. Other women pool players must support her. It is time, or they will have nothing left to defend and soon 16 men will take all 16 places in such tournaments.
The men involved in British pool won’t object to all this on behalf of women. Quite the opposite. A man named Zac Shepherd berated me today for spoiling the chances of the woman who played Haynes in a round prior to the final. It turned out that Zac is the Vice-President of the World Eightball Pool Federation, the body which together with Ultimate Pool are allowing men pretending to be women to play in their women’s tournaments. Women have to stand up, grab their handbags like Lynne did, and walk off before their sport is no longer their sport.
The onus to protect women’s sport isn’t solely down to the women playing it. That’s a convenient excuse offered by those who don’t want to do much themselves, except criticise from the sidelines. There are plenty of those types — full of advice whilst sitting on their keyboards, rather than getting off their arses and out to a protest. This has to be a joint effort and we can’t expect the women playing to be the only ones who object because some never will, and the brave can’t do it on their own.
There are women in small groups working tirelessly to provide a platform so that other women in sport feel emboldened to act, to become the next Lynne Pinches, Stephanie Turner or Abigail Thompson. I’d say to those women — yes, you risk a lot, but when you look a six-foot man in the face and say “I will not play you” you will feel ten feet tall.
There are few things more empowering right now than the words “you’re a man” spoken to a man saying he’s a woman. Truth makes women into giants.
