A young girl competing in her rural netball competition in Victoria has spoken to Ben Fordham on Sydney’s 2GB explaining how she felt like she had to speak up after competing against a trans player.
Isabella, who resides in country Victoria told Fordham she felt “really shocked” when she recently arrived on game day for her weekend netball match to find out “it was actually happening” in that the opposition team featured a transgender player.
“I felt a really sick way to my stomach because that afternoon I wasn’t going to be playing against a regular with the same build to me with the same colour sneakers on. You know my opponent was a 6’2″ man with huge muscular arms and great broad shoulders,” Isabella said.
The young female player added she felt very violated and really let down, fearing she would get badly hurt.
“I was really scared I was going to get hurt, not on purpose, but any action, fall or stumble and I would have easily been crushed on the ground,” she said.
“During the game I couldn’t let my thoughts get in the way of my performance. I couldn’t run away when I was aiming to shoot for goal, and their body was eight foot tall when I was aiming the ball.
“I couldn’t say a thing when their body was rubbing against mine when they tried to keep me away from the ring.”
Isabella said this “messy topic” of transgender players competing in her competition has left women feeling as though they can’t speak up about the issue, as the whole situation has made her feel uncomfortable.
“He was huge and even as they walked into the female changerooms I just had that thought like there’s little kids in there playing around, females get changed and have showers,” she said.
“It was really uncomfortable, it’s such a messy topic that like I don’t know how to feel.
“It was very scary and daunting.”
In her state, Netball Victoria’s gender diversity policy states players are allowed to compete “in accordance with their gender identity, irrespective of their legal sex classification”.
However, in AFL and soccer, non-binary players can participate in a competition of their choice up until to the age of 14.
Following Isabella’s weekend fixture, the year 12 student had a task to do in class on writing about a protest. After competing against a trans player, she decided to write about this.
After writing her protest story, she said it had changed her teacher’s perceptions on whether trans players should play in women’s netball teams, after originally thinking her teacher would be against her story.
“My teacher is amazing, she is the woman who you can go to about any problem, she’s the first to say everyone deserves equal rights and everything. So, I thought ‘oh I don’t know how she will feel about this’,” she said.
The 17-year-old said she is not discriminating against the lifestyle of transgender people; she just wants to take part in a fair game of netball which “needs to be protected for the sake of women’s sport and its future”.
