Tag: Riley Gaines

Over the weekend, Simones Biles surprised many people by spontaneously calling out a right-wing transphobe named Riley Gaines. Riley was a college swimmer who competed one time against a group of swimmers, one of whom was a trans woman. That one swim competition radicalized Riley into a right-wing grifter/talking head whose sole issue is “bullying transgender people, especially trans children.” After Riley posted a photo of a kids’ team, attempting to target one trans child on the team, Simone had enough. Simone tagged Riley and said in part: “You’re truly sick, all of this campaigning because you lost a race. Straight up sore loser. You should be uplifting the trans community and perhaps finding a way to make sports inclusive OR creating a new avenue where trans feel safe in sports.” Simone also tweeted: “bully someone your own size, which would ironically be a male” at Riley directly. Well, Simone is too nice. A few days later, she posted this message:

I wanted to follow up from my last tweets. I’ve always believed competitive equity & inclusivity are both essential in sport. The current system doesn’t adequately balance these important principles, which often leads to frustration and heated exchanges, and it didn’t help for me to get personal with Riley, which I apologize for.

These are sensitive, complicated issues that I truly don’t have the answers or solutions to, but I believe it starts with empathy and respect. I was not advocating for policies that compromise fairness in women’s sports. My objection is to be singling out children for public scrutiny in ways that feel personal and harmful. Individual athletes—especially kids—should never be the focus of criticism of a flawed system they have no control over.

I believe sports organizations have a responsibility to come up with rules supporting inclusion while maintaining fair competition. We all want a future for sport that is fair, inclusive, and respectful.

Xoxo Simone

[From Simone Biles’s Twitter]

I still stand with Simone and her comments bring even more nuance to what was clearly her position all along: the start of these conversations should be empathy, respect, fairness AND inclusion. There are going to be flaws in the situation, but the answer isn’t using a public forum to bully, target and attack children. The one thing I don’t like is that she apologized to that ghastly bigot Riley Gaines. It only took one day for Riley to show her whole ass about this situation:

Gaines: I accept her apology and see this as a really big win. You have this famous public figure now issuing a groveling public apology and backtracks after tweeting pro-trans propaganda, if you will. pic.twitter.com/RVE34hiYEK

— Acyn (@Acyn) June 11, 2025

Yeah, I’m going to need Simone to come online again and say “On second thought, this bigot can kiss my ass, I meant every word I said before!” Don’t ever give these people an inch. “Groveling public apology” shut your f–king mouth.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Backgrid, Fox News screencap.