'Second Is the New First': Meet the Athlete Who Came in Second After Trans Swimmer Lia Thomas
Transgender collegiate swimmer Lia Thomas is once again igniting the Twitterverse after blowing away his female competition at the NCAA championships this week.
Now, opponents of the gender theory that has enabled men who identify as women to compete against athletes who do not enjoy the physical advantages of that pesky little Y chromosome have decided to shift their focus to the unsung hero of the day: the woman who came in second place, i.e., the real champion, considering the only swimmer who beat her was a man.
Former Department of Education press secretary Angela Morabito called for a “round of applause for Emma Weyant, the [University of Virginia] swimmer who placed second in the [500-yard] freestyle tonight, behind Lia Thomas.
“Second is the new first,” she added.
Round of applause for Emma Weyant, the UVA swimmer who placed second in the 500y freestyle tonight, behind Lia Thomas. Second is the new first. #savewomenssports pic.twitter.com/NtHookm3qQ
— Angela Morabito (@AngelaLMorabito) March 18, 2022
After finishing the race in a career-best time on Thursday, Weyant received a hearty ovation from the crowd, which was far less enthusiastic about Thomas.
NCAA- As winners are announced crowd goes wild for 2nd place winner of the 500Y Freestyle.
Crowd goes quiet as Thomas is announced first place. pic.twitter.com/fh5sVvlVxc
— Sav (@RapidFire_Pod) March 17, 2022
It was clear both in person and on the internet that many considered Weyant the real winner.
“Here’s the name you should remember and lobby for: Emma Weyant,” pastor and author Erik Reed tweeted. “She finished second place, but would have been first place if people had the courage to speak up about the injustice of a MAN competing against women.”
Here’s the name you should remember and lobby for: Emma Weyant. She’s at UVA. She finished second place, but would have been first place if people had the courage to speak up about the injustice of a MAN competing against women.
Weyant’s time was a career best. #TheRealChamp https://t.co/wrsS7Ocf75
— Erik Reed (@ErikReed) March 18, 2022
More praise for the “real” winner:
Congrats to Virginia freshman Emma Weyant, the woman who would have won tonight’s NCAA title in the 500 meter if women’s sports were still sane. https://t.co/KYYKbIr8nt
— Clay Travis (@ClayTravis) March 18, 2022
Emma Weyant won. She’s the first female to finish. She didn’t finish in second place. She finished first in the women’s 500 Free. https://t.co/Ch0agSgpSO
— Courtney Kirchoff (@Courtneyscoffs) March 18, 2022
This is Emma Weyant from the University of Virginia.
She finished in second place to Lia Thomas in the women’s 500 Free at the NCAA national championships.
But she’s the true winner to all of us. pic.twitter.com/RbMAT3w2Dz
— American Principles ?? (@approject) March 18, 2022
One college swimmer said one of her teammates was left devastated after being pushed out of the competition by Thomas.
“It’s heartbreaking to see someone who went through puberty as a male and has the body of a male be able to absolutely blow away the competition,” the unnamed athlete told the podcast Rapid Fire. “You go into it with the mindset that you don’t have a chance.”
Virginia Tech swimmer competing in this year’s NCAA championship details how her teammate was brought to tears after her place in the finals was taken by Lia Thomas: pic.twitter.com/mow56mVp1W
— Sav (@RapidFire_Pod) March 17, 2022
Thomas can compete against women, decimate the field, land fawning media interviews and maybe even vie for the Olympic team, and the women who are being hurt by his career won’t even give their names when speaking out against it.
The progressive left is determined to force the nation’s hand when it comes to transgender ideology — you must agree that men can be women and must be treated like women if that’s what they feel like on the inside, full stop, and there’s simply no room for any other opinion.
This ignores the wide, nuanced array of concerns that naturally come along with the question of whether men should be allowed to live their lives as women and whether the confines that determine gender are really so arbitrary that we can divorce them completely from physical characteristics.
Regardless of how you feel about feminism, gender theory utterly negates it by positing that gender is a mere figment of one’s imagination. But in a world where sex is still very much a reality no matter what bizarre trends in academia and pop culture may be reigning, the fair sex is inevitably at an athletic disadvantage.
My heart goes out to Weyant and every other woman out there who has worked so hard only to be surpassed by a man who is convinced that womanhood is nothing more than feelings, a feminine name and one’s outward appearance.
She’s well deserving of the praise she’s getting on social media — but nothing will make up for her having been robbed of the opportunity to compete fairly.
You can never profess to stand for women if you are determined to dissolve the very definition of what it means to be a woman. As long as gender theory maintains its grip on establishment cultural narratives, women will continue to be the ones most injured by the erasure of sex.
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