Sophie Cunningham’s anti-trans comments lead to rally before Fever game

Indiana Fever reserve guard Sophie Cunningham, who is averaging 9.3 points per game this season, ignited debate online last week when she touched on her desire to “protect women’s sports” in a feature from ESPN.

“I got a lot of negative feedback about me hating trans. And I’m like, ‘I never once said that,'” Cunningham said. “I think that I am here to extend love. But I also think with that love is truth, being honest. And I want to protect young girls in a locker room, or young girls in sport who shouldn’t have to go against biological men.”

Cunningham then doubled down on her initial stance that trans girls shouldn’t compete with other girls when asked about it by local media.

“I said what I said. I think it’s kind of common sense,” she said. “And I think I’ll always believe in that. I think it’s really important to protect children, and that’s little girls who are also involved in that category. I stand on what I said.”

Now, the ramifications of Cunningham’s comments are being felt. Ahead of the Fever’s Tuesday night game in Seattle against the Storm, a rally is being planned by the local community.

The rally’s announcement reads:

Women Are Real, Known Heretic, and Brandi Kruse are organizing a celebratory pre-game fan rally with local female athletes outside Climate Pledge Arena on Tuesday, July 28, before the Indiana Fever take on the Seattle Storm. The rally will show public support for Fever guard Sophie Cunningham, who has faced a wave of criticism since a July 22 ESPN profile in which she expressed support for female-only sports and locker rooms. Cunningham describes her position as one of honesty and care, saying her concern is for young girls who should not have to compete against males. “With love is truth,” she said, and we agree.

It’s shocking for such a strong stance to be made by the Seattle community, considering how few trans athletes there are ot begin with, something her Show Me Something podcast co-host West Wilson touched on in a TikTok video.

“Okay, transgender athletes in American sports is such a borderline nonexistent issue that right-wingers have convinced a massive portion of people in our country that it— that these people are like a threat to sports in America when mathematically that’s not the case at all.

“And by continuing to platform this,  f*cking politicians, athletes, journalists, news outlets, you’re only isolating transgender people even more by making them seem like this giant group of people is a threat to society, a threat to sports, when that’s just not proportionately the truth in any capacity. There is like 10 transgender athletes in all of the NCAA, and so I think there are unique questions that can be handled on an individual basis, but to allow this to take our attention away from like housing and healthcare and wars and all the other actual harmful sh*t in our country is dumb.”

When factoring in how vulnerable trans children are to hate online, it’s worth asking if everyone asking for their inclusion shouldn’t focus on the more pressing issues threatening our country, and on coming together rather than looking to the things that divide us.

The post Sophie Cunningham’s anti-trans comments lead to rally before Fever game appeared first on The Comeback: Today’s Top Sports Stories & Reactions.