At least one judge has recognized the irrational fear surrounding transgender issues.

By rejecting a request to alter the current Mountain West volleyball tournament or to prevent San Jose State from including one of its players, a federal judge highlighted the insincerity of the lawsuit. This ruling sheds light on the absurdity of the sudden backlash against transgender women athletes.

“The Court finds their delay in filing this action and seeking emergency relief related to the MWC Tournament weakens their arguments,” U.S. District Judge S. Kato Crews stated in his Monday ruling.

“The movants could have sought injunctive relief much earlier if immediate court intervention was truly necessary.”

For the past three years, San Jose State’s volleyball team has had a transgender woman on its roster. While neither the athlete nor the university has publicly confirmed her status, Judge Crews noted that it hasn’t been denied either. In 2022, the Mountain West Conference established a policy governing transgender athlete participation, which included penalties for teams that refused to play against a team with a transgender player, and this policy was accepted by athletic directors across the conference.

However, the uproar did not start until this season, after a right-wing website revealed the player’s identity and she was then criticized by a teammate. It’s crucial to emphasize this point:

For two years, the San Jose State player participated on the volleyball team without incident. No injuries occurred, no locker-room assaults took place, and no influx of transgender women rushed in to dominate women’s sports. She practiced and competed, and neither her teammates nor her opponents raised any concerns. Whether this was due to a lack of knowledge about her transgender status or simply because it was seen as irrelevant doesn’t change the fact.

So, what has shifted? Apart from teammate Brooke Slusser and a few others thinking that vilifying a young woman might earn them a spot on Fox News?

Nothing has changed at all.

If the San Jose State player posed such a significant threat, and if the Mountain West’s policy regarding transgender participation was so troubling, the athletes and the educational institutions behind the lawsuit would have acted sooner.

Unless, of course, this was merely a performance. Waiting until the last possible minute seems to fuel their false indignation.

“At the earliest, Plaintiffs began to learn about one of SJSU’s teammates being identified as a trans woman from a publication in spring 2024. They were certainly aware of this teammate when member institutions began forfeiting matches against SJSU in September 2024,” Crews noted.

As expected, Slusser and three other athletes have filed an appeal. However, its chances of success appear slim, given Judge Crews’ thorough citation of legal precedents.

Individuals opposing transgender inclusion in sports often claim it violates Title IX. Yet, Crews argues the opposite, dedicating five of the 28 pages of his ruling to citing previous Supreme Court and Tenth Circuit cases affirming that discrimination against someone due to their transgender status qualifies as sex discrimination—a violation of Title IX.

“The plaintiffs’ Title IX argument in this case directly contradicts Title IX’s prohibition against discrimination of transgender individuals,” Crews expressed.

San Jose State is currently the No. 2 seed in the Mountain West Conference tournament, starting Wednesday. The Spartans received a bye in the first round and will compete against either Boise State or Utah State on Friday. These are among the schools that forfeited games earlier in the season, which will reveal just how committed these teams are to their prejudice.

Amid all the concern about transgender women athletes, it is the cisgender women who chose to forfeit that have ultimately deprived their fellow athletes of playtime opportunities and burdened their teams with losses. They, rather than the San Jose State player, are the genuine concern.