Megan Rapinoe has some news for the girls still competing in women's sports.
"Sports is not fair in any sort of way ever," she said on W. Kamau Bell's podcast. "Right?"
She would know. Rapinoe spent years leading the U.S. women's national team's fight against U.S. Soccer, demanding equal pay because women were being treated unfairly. That fight ended in a $24 million settlement in 2022. She went on TV, testified before Congress and became the face of fairness for women athletes.
Now she's retired, and fairness doesn't matter so much anymore.
Bell asked why she isn't worried about biological men in women's sports. "That's the big fear," he said, "it's like, suddenly it's LeBron James with a wig on."
"Yeah, and that example isn't happening," Rapinoe said. "And I don't think it's ever going to happen."
Riley Gaines tied Lia Thomas, a male swimmer, at the 2022 NCAA championships, and then had to change in a locker room with him. A volunteer project called SheWon has counted more than 3,400 podium spots lost to male athletes across 46 sports. It's happening. Rapinoe just doesn't have to compete against it.
She wasn't finished. "God forbid somebody be good at sports and have some sort of advantage," she said.
Bell clapped along. "It's not meant to be fair." Then he brought up Victor Wembanyama, the 7-foot-4 star of the San Antonio Spurs. "Is that fair?"
"What does that mean, even?" Rapinoe answered.
Here's what it means. Wembanyama is a man playing against men. Every guy guarding him went through male puberty too. That's the whole reason women's sports exist as their own category, so women aren't competing against male bodies. It's the reason Rapinoe got to win two World Cups, an Olympic gold medal and a Ballon d'Or in the first place. If biology didn't matter, there'd be no women's national team for her to star on, and no women's team to demand equal pay for.
She rounded it out with this: "I'm okay if God forbid a trans person play sports and they're halfway decent at it." Fairness for girls, she added, "isn't the most important thing in the world."
That's an easy thing to say from retirement.
Rapinoe played her last game in 2023. Her medals are in the case. Her records are safe. Her endorsement money is in the bank. Every bit of it came from competing in a protected women's category, the one she's now telling today's girls they don't need.
The girls in high school locker rooms and on college swim teams don't get podcasts. They're the ones losing spots on the team, scholarships and places on the podium, and the woman who once marched for fairness for female athletes is telling them it doesn't matter.
Megan Rapinoe fought for fair pay for women when it was her paycheck on the line. Now that it's someone else's medal, she says sports isn't fair anyway.
