Our Endorsement
WHRC–US endorses the Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act of 2021 introduced by Senator Mike Lee of Utah.
We are the US-based section of Women’s Human Rights Campaign, an international group of volunteer women dedicated to promoting the recognition of women’s sex-based rights, as delineated in our core document, the Declaration on Women’s Sex Based Rights.
In Article 1 of the Declaration, we assert that women’s rights are based on their sex, the physical and biological characteristics that distinguish males from females. Protection of the rights of women and girls should be based on the objective reality of physical sex, not the subjective concept of “gender identity”.
In Article 7 of the Declaration, we assert that women and girls have the right to equitable opportunities in sports, and that since they are objectively physically different from men and boys in ways other than reproductive capacity, certain sports activities must remain single-sex.
While this would seem a simple truism, the necessity to preserve single sex sports has been repeatedly challenged in recent years, and accommodations were made to allow gender identity to replace sex in determining eligibility in athletic competitions in many levels of sport.
This change necessitated the agencies in charge of sporting groups to examine the issue, and determine how to proceed. In October of 2020, the World Rugby Organization released its Transgender Guideline, in which it provided its reasoning that women’s rugby should be single sex. Other scientific studies have emerged to show that the physical advantages male athletes have persist years past their transition. 1, 2
WHRC-US endorses this legislation, and calls on all senators and representatives who care about the right of women and girls’ right to a fair playing field to vote for the Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act of 2021.
*Please note that the Women’s Human Rights Campaign USA (WHRC-USA) is now officially known as Women’s Declaration International USA (WDI-USA)
