'The statement for women is you do not matter': USA Swimming official who resigned in protest of trans athlete Lia Thomas says she is 'destroying women's swimming'
A USA Swimming official who resigned in protest at trans athlete Lia Thomas has said she is 'destroying women's swimming.'
Cynthia Millen stood down last week after working for the presiding body for more than three decades saying she could 'no longer participate in a sport that allows biological men to compete against women.'
Thomas, 22, who previously competed as a man at the University of Pennsylvania for two full seasons, is now dominating the women's field and smashing records. NCAA rules mean she can participate because she takes testosterone suppressing drugs.
'It's horrible,' Millen told Fox News last night. 'The statement for women then is you do not matter, what you do is not important, and little girls are going to be thrown under the bus by all of this, he's going to be destroying women's swimming.'
Cynthia Millen (left) who stepped down last week over Lia Thomas (right) who has wiped the floor with her female opponents after previously competing for the University of Pennsylvania as a man
She explained that from a young age girls and boys do not compete against each other because males have physiological advantages which are only accentuated through puberty.
'The fact is that swimming is a sport in which bodies compete against bodies. Identities do not compete against identities,' Millen said. 'Men are different from women, men swimmers are different from women, and they will always be faster than women.'
'Boys will always have larger lung capacity, larger hearts, greater circulation, a bigger skeleton, and less fat,' she added. 'Girls go through puberty and they have a double whammy, they not only grow breasts and hips, but they have periods, and they often have a totally different sense of gravity and have to learn to swim over again.'
Millen said that 'no matter how much testosterone suppressing drugs he (Thomas) takes he will always be a biological male and have this advantage.'
Thomas recently wiped the floor at the women's swimming event at the Zippy Invitational at the University of Akron, smashing two US records.
She finished the 1,650 yard freestyle by a whole 38 seconds ahead of her nearest rival - teammate Anna Sofia Kalandaze.
At the same event, Thomas romped to victory in the 500-yard freestyle, setting a new US record with a time of 4:34:06, finishing 14 seconds ahead of Kalandaze.
And in the 200-yard freestyle she finished in 1:41:93 - seven seconds ahead of her nearest rival, giving her the fastest female US time ever for that race too.
Earlier this month, Lia Thomas won three events and set three new school records including two new Ivy League records. She is pictured setting the record at the 500 yard freestyle on December 3
Thomas (pictured in 2016 and 2017, respectively) was a star swimmer in high school
Millen said it would be a 'travesty to throw away' the hard work, talent and legacy of Olympic swimmers, such as Janet Evans and Jenny Thompson.
'All these women who worked so hard before Title IX when they didn't have the opportunities that men had. It would be such a shame, such a travesty to throw it away now. This is what will happen,' she told Fox.
Title IX is a federal civil rights law passed as part of the Education Amendments of 1972. It prohibits sex-based discrimination in any school or other education program that receives funding from the federal government.
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