MAUREEN CALLAHAN: America gives a big thumbs up to the injustice of trans athletes

The recoil builds.

Women and girls begin to act publicly, to speak the unspeakable, to stop fearing the awakened crowd and to say: ENOUGH.

Enough with trans athletes stealing hard-won wins and scholarships.

Enough with biological females reduced to ornaments on stages, meant to happily stand next to biological males who won unfairly.

Enough with being forced to ever share safe spaces, be it locker rooms or dorms.

Enough with companies turning femininity into abusive pantomime, frippery, one big joke.

Enough.

Our latest injustice – and it feels like there’s almost one a day now, doesn’t it? — came Saturday, when trans athlete Athena Ryan ran in the varsity girls 1,600-meter race during a qualifier for the California state championship, placed second and then boasted a new personal best.

“I dropped about 17 seconds on my best season in the last two weeks,” said Ryan.

Ryan’s “victory” cost 18-year-old competitor Adeline Johnson, who broke her hip in two places last summer, a spot in the state final.

And while she stood next to and below Ryan on stage – somewhat derogatory – she gestured to the audience and the cameras. Good for her.

However, as the story sparked nationwide outrage on Monday, the school denied that Johnson’s gesture had anything to do with her loss to Ryan.

Johnson himself has not yet commented. But parents from The Branson School told DailyMail.com they are “too terrified” to speak out for fear their daughters will not be allowed to race.

They worry that protesting such dishonesty would be considered “bullying” under Branson’s code of conduct.

Let’s call this what it is: Gaslighting 101. Tell that to the victims she are, in fact, the oppressors.

All the more reason, then, for the image of Johnson’s thumbs down to circulate with the speed of the Black Power salute of the 1968 Olympics. For it says a lot when serious athletes, who value losing with grace as much as winning, show resentment. Fury. Outrage.

We women need the iconography of resistance because governing bodies — whether sports, medicine, school boards or C-suites — are not listening. Yet.

But they will. After all, how much longer can they ignore the growing protests, anger and frustration that are beginning to take over the fear of being labeled transphobic, bigoted or canceled?

As the wise Kris Kristofferson once wrote, “Freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose.”

“I dropped about 17 seconds on my best season in the last two weeks,” said Ryan.

Ryan’s “victory” cost 18-year-old competitor Adeline Johnson (pictured, left), who broke her hip in two places last summer, a spot in the state finals.

Women and girls realize this. We really have nothing left to lose, because so much has already been taken from us.

More iconography: the trans cyclist who stands alone on the podium after beating two biological women in a 100-mile desert gravel race.

“I have no idea why so many people dropped out for the podiums,” said Lesley Mumford, who switched in 2017 and raced in the all-female category. “But they did.”

The only thing worse than biological males competing against females is their false wonder when they wipe the floor with them: What could be wrong? What can these women be so upset about? Why are they overreacting?

The latter feeling, of course, was accompanied by age-old misogyny.

Mumford could have raced in a non-binary category but chose not to, beating the closest female competitor by 17 minutes and third place by half an hour. We call that a stolen victory.

Mumford should be ashamed. Instead, we only see pride.

Inga Thompson, the three-time US Olympic cyclist, recently called on female athletes to get on their knees.

Days later, Cynisca Cycling – which claims to be “committed to advancing women in the sport” – announced that Thompson was no longer on the board of directors and had no role within the pro team.

Something tells me Cynisca will regret that.

Also think of the brave sorority sisters at the University of Wyoming, who are suing because the national Kappa Kappa Gamma organization allowed a six-foot-tall, 220-pound trans student to join their group and did nothing while they’ living in constant fear’.

More iconography: Trans cyclist Lesley Mumford stands alone on the podium after beating two biological women in a 100-mile desert gravel race.

Also think of the brave sorority sisters at the University of Wyoming, who sued because the national Kappa Kappa Gamma organization allowed six-foot-tall trans student Artemis Langford (pictured, top left) to join their group.

They claim that the Artemis Langford, a biological male, sat in silence watching the girls for hours and even had visible erections around the frat house.

What decent person gets excited about making college girls feel unsafe?

“Our house is our home,” a sister told journalist Megyn Kelly in her podcast. ‘At the end of the day you go home to feel good and relaxed in your own skin. And you can’t do that if you know that this person has full access to your home.”

How is this considered a big question? Why isn’t feeling free from threats in your own home considered a basic human right?

How is it okay for parents not to be notified that their child identifies as transgender – as California recently ratified in April? Or that two children’s hospitals in Texas are under investigation for providing menopause-related medical care, despite a state-wide ban on such practices expected to take effect in September?

And why is it that companies like Adidas and Target have learned nothing from the Budweiser Dylan Mulvaney disaster? Or Nike’s for that matter?

Budweiser sales have dropped every week since early April, and despite leaning back to their original branding – see their latest ad complete with a Clydesdale, wheat farms and veterans raising the American flag, hand over heart, not too subtle – can the hit be lasting.

Nike lost $4 billion in the days after the breastless Mulvaney posted a video of him “training” in a women’s sports bra, as if mocking female sports.

“Literally a kick in the teeth,” said retired British Olympic swimmer Sharron Davies of the Nike-Mulvaney partnership. “Women are currently treated with total disregard, especially in the world of sports where physiology makes such a difference.”

Make no mistake: this is not just a culture war.

And why is it that companies like Adidas and Target have learned nothing from the Budweiser Dylan Mulvaney disaster? Or Nike’s for that matter? (Pictured: Adidas launched a new range of women’s swimwear this month with an apparently biologically male cut).

Women and girls realize that we have nothing left to lose, because so much has already been taken from us. (Pictured: Target’s new Pride collection features women’s swimsuits with a genital insertion area).

This is about the eradication of girls and women, of their financial and professional opportunities, of their right to compete fairly, of their physical safety.

There is no other cohort on Earth, as I’ve said before, that would ever be so dehumanized, much less expected to sit back and take it with pleasure.

Letting this go on is crying for the next generation of girls. We women fought long and hard to get all the freedom they deserved.

Now is the time to raise a fist, take a knee, add your voice to the protest.

Inga Thompson, Riley Gaines, Martina Navratilova, Sharron Davies, the sorority sisters in Wyoming, the moms, sisters, and daughters who boycott and defy — we’re all on the right side of history.

The movement is building. The snowball becomes an avalanche. Who is next from the famous and influential who is brave enough to join?