Last year, USA Boxing made the decision to allow transgender women to compete in women’s boxing categories as long as they meet certain conditions such as hormone levels and the completion of gender surgery. Longtime boxer and boxing coach Cary Williams has a problem with that.
As a longtime boxing coach, Williams is quite the expert as she understands the barriers that keep women and girls from joining the sport. And she thinks that allowing transgender women to compete will only keep more women from joining boxing.
“This is going to be a huge barrier for the young women coming up, the young girls coming up in the sport of boxing, because, first of all, boxing is a very challenging sport. Actually, ESPN did a study. It is the toughest sport out of all sports,” Williams said.
“So, you look at that, and obviously you can get hurt. It’s a little painful when you get hit, so you already know there’s a lot of girls that aren’t necessarily interested in getting into it. But once they do, they’ve overcome that part of it. Now, you’re adding this layer of, ‘Oh, now you might have to box a boy or a man.’ You put that in front of them, and they’re going to say, ‘Well, then I don’t want a box.’“
Williams also discussed how dangerous she believes it is to allow transgender women to compete in women’s boxing, calling the move “just deadly.”
[Fox News]
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