Nikki Hiltz cried after seeing Hayward Field booed Transgender sprinter at 2024 Oregon High School State Track Championships

Horning in on girls' sports competitions, showing up girls by trouncing them on the track, and taking away opportunites and sports titles from girls - that's about the worst strategy I can imagine for male "high schoolers just trying to fit in with their peers."

Nikki Hiltz is the reason why middle schools girls on the fence about competing in cross country and track end up choosing not to. Girls will always support the current thing, even to their own detriment. It's up to the non-groomer adults to stand up for what's right.

Girls decide not to go out for sports, or they drop out of sports, in middle school for a whole host of reasons.

Nikki Hiltz isn't helping with the harmful, stupid, regressive ideology she's promoting. But she's hardly "the reason why middle school girls" decide not to go out for cross country, track & field & other sports - or they give up competing in sports at that age.

The main reasons that girls decide not to take up competive sports in MS, or they drop out of sports in MS (and early HS), is that that they're overwhelmed, unnerved, self-conscious and often extremely distressed, freaked out and panicked about the host of unsettling physical and social changes that female puberty brings.

The physical changes that MS and HS girls find it's difficult to deal with which contribute to them not doing sports include obvious breast development and the awkwardness, inconvenience and sometimes pain that goes along with that ; menstruation; menstrual cramps; menstrual irregularity; PMS/PMDD; female-pattern weight gain; and the often detrimental impact that their flucuating female hormones have on their energy levels, moods, sleep patterns, motivation and general sense of well-being.

The social changes that MS and HS girls find it's difficult to deal with which contribute to them not doing sports include the unwanted sexual attention, sexual harassment and barrage of insults that girls routinely get from boys and men starting around age 11.

Also, once girls start going through puberty, they often find that their fathers, big brothers, uncles and male coaches who used to be important sources of support in sports start treating them differently in ways that girls find upsetting. Even the most well-intentioned, loving, supportive dads, big brothers and male coaches make judgmental, cutting or weirdly sexual remarks about girls' developing bodies, and "make fun" of girls and women for putting on weight and filling out in shape. When girls start obviously developing during female puberty, the men and older boys in their lives they've long been close to and relied on for support in sports often turn chilly and start keeping the girls at arms' length (which the girls tend to interepret as rejection) - or they become inappopriately friendly and "handsy" in ways that feel off and "too close for comfort."

I firmly believe Nikki would be selfless enough to see it as a win for the community and therefore worth their personal loss. Just as they may have sacrificed business deals in order to retain their ability to speak out on such topics. Sure it would be upsetting and they may even begin to wonder if that is the sole reason why they got 4th, BUT I don't think they would be willing to sacrifice what they have given to their community and let down so many of the people that look up to them

Are you ok hun?

What?

If Hiltz tears were (her/their/other's) *personal* response and feeling about the crowd booing a young trans person, that is their business. I wouldnt judge or extrapolate on that. I respect that. If --and Im not sure its made clear here--they built a political case around their response and the sob story was part of that? Boo Who and try another way!
everyone is entitled to a personal response. But the politicking stinks.

It's absolutely acceptable to BOO the rules, the state association, the school boards, and the politicians during a track meet. You may have misinterpreted peoples' intentions.

It's absolutely acceptable to BOO the rules, the state association, the school boards, and the politicians during a track meet. You may have misinterpreted peoples' intentions.

Are you f-ing serious man? "Boo the rules, school boards, politicians" - coincidentally as a child is running up the home straight of an ultimately (in the larger scheme of life) inconsequential track meet?

Here is a simple question for you and all the "Boo'ers of the rules, school boards and politicians" - what if this kid did something to themselves? What if they wrote an IG post directly referencing this as contributing to it? We sit here and we are like "oh but that didn't happen so it's irrelevant" - yeah but it could. It's happened before in this society and it will happen again. How cool are you then huh? Was it worth the big "f-you" to the system?

I find people in this country fascinating sometimes. Like zero awareness of how their words and actions might impact others, even if they are either right or right in their own minds. And even if the boos weren't for the kid (but let's cut the BS we all know they exactly where they were directed), the fact that grown adults can't step back and read the situation and think about consequences is just absurd to me.

And I am sitting here as someone who also thinks it's absurd that this situation is allowed to happen. I think it's complete BS and no way is this fair or right. I'm also not going to sit in a stand with my flock of sheep and "boo" and make it even more difficult for the kid. And I say this because how many of these tough-guy "up-in-the-stands" warriors would actually go and do that to the kids face? Yeah exactly, none of those weasels would.

What is a woman?

Mature.

Someone who won’t talk to you.

There has never been a world class trans woman racer so your comment is crazy. From 2004 to 2022 trans people were authorized to race in any international or national event and in those 18 years not one trans person was good enough team so not one in those 18 years made it to an Olympic , world championship, diamond league or any other event. In fact there has never ever been one world class trans distance runner documented anywhere on earth. So your comment and all those giving a thumbs up don't know what they are talking about and those comments are out of ignorance not facts. In terms of DSD women, I didn't hear alot of these women complaining about Francine Niyonsaba. Maybe they were complaining, but I have not read that!

An adult shedding tears over a child I have never seen as a bad thing!

There has never been a world class trans woman racer so your comment is crazy. From 2004 to 2022 trans people were authorized to race in any international or national event and in those 18 years not one trans person was good enough team so not one in those 18 years made it to an Olympic , world championship, diamond league or any other event. In fact there has never ever been one world class trans distance runner documented anywhere on earth. So your comment and all those giving a thumbs up don't know what they are talking about and those comments are out of ignorance not facts. In terms of DSD women, I didn't hear alot of these women complaining about Francine Niyonsaba. Maybe they were complaining, but I have not read that!

An adult shedding tears over a child I have never seen as a bad thing!

f him

Not a kid. old enough to choose gender, than old enough to take the heat. Children would have no business picking something as serious as gender.....

But is that really what happened here?

This thread started because Nikki Hiltz said in a podcast that during a regular session with a psychotherapist, Hiltz “broke down in tears and sobbed" whilst discussing the booing some spectators at Hayward Field engaged in the previous week when a male teenager - who ostensibly claims to have a trans gender identity like Hiltz does - won an Oregon HS state track title in the girls' 200 and came in 2nd in the girls’ 400. The crowd booed when the male athlete crossed the finish line well ahead of the female competitors on the track in heats and the finals - and also when the teenage male winner walked past a bunch of female athletes he trounced on the track as he took top place on the podium to be crowned the 2024 girls’ state champion in the 200.

Here’s a transcript of what Hiltz said in the podcast:

“The week before was the Oregon (HS) state meet. There was a trans girl named Aayden [Gallagher] competing [in the girls division], and she won the 200, was second in 400… I saw a video of Hayward Field booing this trans person.

"That was really really hard to see because I very much associate Hayward Field as a very safe space, a very sacred space. And like I had THE best moment of my entire life there. And like I’m so proud of how far the sport has come to make space for me. And like I was feeling guilt coz I’m a very digestible trans person, you know. And I feel, it just broke my heart.

“I just never thought I would see Hayward in that light. Like I never thought people in this sport were capable of that. And like it was just really hard, I just kind of thought I’m kind of scared to go out there now. I know there are people who love and support me, but I now have a tainted view of the stadium, and I don’t love that.

“Obviously I didn’t want to make it about me, but I just hate that there’s transphobia. Like it was a literal child just competing and it was just like really completely so inappropriate… So like I obviously cried… I think I had been painting things with rose colored glasses.

“It really hit me deep down [where] it’s like your self-belief, deep down where’s there’s anxiety and fears. It’s just like hitting on my big fears. I really hope that in this sport I can be respected, but there’s this big fear that I won’t be - that I’ll be rejected.“

Is this really the story of a "an adult shedding tears over a child" like you say? And doing so out of compassion, kindness and the goodness of her heart? Or is it a case of a rather self-absorbed adult using an incident involving a teenager who's a total stranger to her as an excuse to turn the spotlight on herself and her own "identity," feel sorry for herself, portray herself as a much put-upon victim, kvetch that she now feels "unsafe" in Hayward Field and ill at ease in the sport of athletics, and shed tears of self-pity?