Speaker 1: Clovis, California, became the epicenter of our nation's culture war
Speaker 1: over this past weekend. As a boy, ab Hernandez was
Speaker 1: allowed to compete in and dominate his various events in
Speaker 1: the California State High School Track and field competition overseen
Speaker 1: by CIF the California Interscholastic Federation, which is the governing
Speaker 1: body for California high school sports. Now, I was there
Speaker 1: for pretty much the whole weekend, everything that happened from
Speaker 1: the Thursday press conference held by Clovis City Council member
Speaker 1: and Mayor pro tem of Clovis, Diane Pierce, all the
Speaker 1: way to the end of the track meet Saturday night
Speaker 1: in the midst of you know, a super enormous heat wave,
Speaker 1: extremely hot temperatures even for Fresno.
Speaker 2: For the end of February.
Speaker 1: I think I sweat out over the course of Friday
Speaker 1: and Saturday, about four times my body weight worth of water.
Speaker 2: So I want to go through the whole thing.
Speaker 1: Now, let's start with the actual controversy itself and the
Speaker 1: legal setting. So California has had laws on the books,
Speaker 1: laws that were passed in twenty thirteen that went into
Speaker 1: effecting twenty fourteen and under Jerry Brown, that basically say,
Speaker 1: in California public high schools, sports and other accommodations like bathrooms,
Speaker 1: locker rooms, et cetera, are on the basis of gender identity,
Speaker 1: not biological sex. So if a boy thinks he's a girl,
Speaker 1: he gets to play girls basketball, girls water polo, girls swimming,
Speaker 1: girls track and field. He thereby also gets to use
Speaker 1: the girl's locker room, the girl's bathroom, the girls showers.
Speaker 1: This has been on the books in California again since
Speaker 1: twenty fourteen, so that's California law. President Trump in early
Speaker 1: February issued an executive order to protect girls' sports, and
Speaker 1: the Trump administration basically put forward the argument that Title
Speaker 1: nine itself demands that boys not play girls' sports, that
Speaker 1: the presence of male athletes is demeaning and insulting to
Speaker 1: women in their athletic competitions, and specifically that their presence
Speaker 1: within locker rooms is a threatening and endangering thing. So
Speaker 1: Title nine would demand adequate fair treatment of women within sports.
Speaker 1: Title nine demands that men not play, and the Trump
Speaker 1: administration basically said, we are going to engage in Title
Speaker 1: nine enforcement efforts against body athletic governing bodies that do
Speaker 1: that persist in letting men play women's sports. The NCAA
Speaker 1: pretty much immediately complied almost instantaneously after the Trump administration
Speaker 1: issued this executive order. The CIF, however, did not. The
Speaker 1: CIF basically said, well, no, we're going to have We're
Speaker 1: gonna we're going to follow California state law.
Speaker 2: So the CIF did not comply with the Trump executive order.
Speaker 1: Now, over the course of last week, CIF wound up
Speaker 1: changing their policies like twice in two different ways, and
Speaker 1: basically what they ended at was a policy that's not
Speaker 1: really in conformity with the Trump executive order because they
Speaker 1: are still allowing males to compete in competition alongside female competitors.
Speaker 1: They have also done nothing to address problems like accommodations, bathrooms, showers,
Speaker 1: locker rooms, which frankly like as as much as I
Speaker 1: think it is bad and unfair and tears of unfairness here,
Speaker 1: t I e r s of unfairness here. As unfair
Speaker 1: as I think it is that boys are stealing the
Speaker 1: spotlight from girls and getting awarded alongside girls.
Speaker 2: Or could be taking opportunities from girls.
Speaker 1: The most egregious harm of such policies is the violations
Speaker 1: of women's privacy that it entails men using women's bathrooms,
Speaker 1: men changing in women's locker rooms, men showering in women's
Speaker 1: locker rooms. When you're talking about high school, also, let's
Speaker 1: remember not just focusing on Pacific athletic event like this
Speaker 1: Track and Feel meet, but just in general, you're at
Speaker 1: a high school, you train, you know, you've got a
Speaker 1: team training. This same team like a basketball team. Let's
Speaker 1: say might have a fourteen year old freshman.
Speaker 2: Girl.
Speaker 1: The girl's basketball team could include a fourteen year old
Speaker 1: freshman girl and a eighteen year old male who identifies
Speaker 1: as a girl, who are expected now to shower together.
Speaker 1: Let's let that sink in. Okay, and you could have
Speaker 1: you're talking about an adult male who might be a
Speaker 1: high school senior who identifies as a woman. But it's
Speaker 1: just identify as there doesn't need to be any hardware update.
Speaker 2: Let me if I can put it delicately. Okay.
Speaker 1: This might be someone who has not had any surgery,
Speaker 1: any kind of plastic surgery to make his body appear
Speaker 1: more like the body of a woman. This might not
Speaker 1: even be someone who's on hormones to try to make
Speaker 1: their appearance more like a woman. You can genuinely have
Speaker 1: a situation where an eighteen year old male is showering
Speaker 1: alongside fourteen year old females. So that was not at
Speaker 1: all addressed by the CIF policy. So CIF made their
Speaker 1: policies less egregious.
Speaker 2: How do they do that?
Speaker 1: So what CIF did over the course of last week
Speaker 1: is basically, say, a biological boy is allowed to compete
Speaker 1: in the girls event on the basis of a claim
Speaker 1: gender identity. But basically they're not going to take any
Speaker 1: spot from a girl. So no girl is going to
Speaker 1: fail to qualify for the next round if they are
Speaker 1: beat out for a spot by a transgender competitor. Okay,
Speaker 1: so if a transgender competitor makes the qualifying time or
Speaker 1: jump or whatever, instead of let's say bringing ten girls
Speaker 1: to the finalists, we're now going to bring eleven.
Speaker 2: Right. Also, no girl is going to miss out.
Speaker 1: On her final result or spot on the basis of
Speaker 1: a transgender competitor. So if the transgender person gets first place,
Speaker 1: the next ranked girl is also awarded first place, and
Speaker 1: then the next girl who is third as far as
Speaker 1: her time or distance or whatever, is awarded second place,
Speaker 1: and so on. So no girl's going to miss out
Speaker 1: on a spot because of a transgender competitor. No girl
Speaker 1: is going to miss out on a ranking because of
Speaker 1: a transgender competitor, which really kind of makes it seem like,
Speaker 1: what the heck are we doing here? This is basically
Speaker 1: just something to gratify this child's ego, or this to
Speaker 1: make this child feel good.
Speaker 2: Now, Trevor actually said it best.
Speaker 1: He had me on the show on Thursday and we
Speaker 1: talked about it, and Trevor just off the top of
Speaker 1: his head and he said, I could use this line.
Speaker 2: So I'm going to use this line.
Speaker 1: Basically said, so Aby Hernandez, this boy who's playing in
Speaker 1: the girls events, he's basically in a phantom league of
Speaker 1: his own. And that's exactly what it is. He's more
Speaker 1: or less competing in this phantom league. And you saw
Speaker 1: that during the track meet last weekend.
Speaker 2: He wins.
Speaker 1: First place in the triple jump by a massive margin.
Speaker 2: But another girl.
Speaker 1: From Albany, California is also awarded first place, even though
Speaker 1: she jumped you know, almost two feet, not as far
Speaker 1: as Hernandez did in the triple jump. The next girl,
Speaker 1: who had the third longest jump is awarded second place.
Speaker 2: And so on.
Speaker 1: Now I'm gonna take you kind of day by day
Speaker 1: over the course of the show.
Speaker 2: I'm going to take you guys kind of.
Speaker 1: Day by day throughout the week, and I'm going to
Speaker 1: start I'll start with Thursday. So Thursday was the press
Speaker 1: conference that took place at the Clovis Veterans' Memorial Building
Speaker 1: that was convened by Diane Pierce. And I just want
Speaker 1: to say this, Diane Pierce stood tall this whole week
Speaker 1: as the obvious leader locally on this issue. Now it
Speaker 1: was in Clovis, in the city of Clovis. One could
Speaker 1: argue that it sort of made sense for a City
Speaker 1: of Clovis official to be the one leading the charge,
Speaker 1: but I don't know that that's necessarily true. Anyone could
Speaker 1: have taken the lead on this. An assembly member, of state, senator,
Speaker 1: a congressman, county supervisor, and certainly a lot of local
Speaker 1: politicians participated in her efforts and were supportive. And I
Speaker 1: appreciate all the people who were there backing what Diane does.
Speaker 1: But the fact remains she was the one who was
Speaker 1: convening these press conferences and bringing the most attention to this,
Speaker 1: getting the attention of the Trump administration to focus on
Speaker 1: what was going on. She was one sort of convening this,
Speaker 1: working with Vince Fong's office to alert people at the
Speaker 1: federal level, etc. So Diane Pierce calls this press conference,
Speaker 1: and I'll say this, I think she's an extremely talented politician.
Speaker 1: I think she's a great public speaker, and I think
Speaker 1: the future is quite bright for her if she chooses
Speaker 1: to pursue some higher office.
Speaker 2: Beyond the Clovis City Council.
Speaker 1: And there are probably going to be some opportunities like
Speaker 1: that locally for her, whether it's the County Board of
Speaker 1: Supervisors or the State Senate. I know it's announced that
Speaker 1: Nathan Magzig, who is the county supervisor who represents the
Speaker 1: Clovis area, is running for the state Senate once Shannon
Speaker 1: Grove term limits out. He'll be running for Grove's seat
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty six. I think there are going to
Speaker 1: be opportunities for Peers. And clearly she was heading shoulders
Speaker 1: the leader on this whole issue. So in the press conference,
Speaker 1: Diane Pierce spoke, she read a message from State Senator
Speaker 1: Shannon Grove. David Tonguipa was there. He spoke, and he
Speaker 1: talked about some proposals he was working on for maybe
Speaker 1: open competition categories where the competition would be open to
Speaker 1: persons of either sex, in order to sort of make
Speaker 1: it clear that this is a woman's category, this is
Speaker 1: a man's category. If you want people to come in
Speaker 1: and mix regardless of Jenner in a separate category, that's fine.
Speaker 1: He was sort of taking inspiration from. I guess professional
Speaker 1: bowling does a kind of open competition in certain cases.
Speaker 2: I'm not sure.
Speaker 1: I mean, I can tell Tongu he's I can tell
Speaker 1: that talk about is trying to work within the constraints
Speaker 1: of what he can work with within the California state legislature,
Speaker 1: which is to say, very liberal constraints.
Speaker 2: I guess I'm not sure how.
Speaker 1: Sensible that's going to be, though, given that for sports
Speaker 1: like track and field, the only people who are going
Speaker 1: to be in the open boys are just so much bigger, taller, stronger, faster,
Speaker 1: and outmatch girls that the top boys out match the
Speaker 1: top girls so significantly. I mean the winning the best
Speaker 1: high jump on the girl's side was five foot seven.
Speaker 1: The best high jump on the boy's side was six
Speaker 1: foot nine. Like, what are we even talking about here?
Speaker 1: There's no, it's not necessarily very sensible for it to
Speaker 1: be a mixed category, i'd say. And throughout the Thursday
Speaker 1: press conference, the leading object of scorn as is right
Speaker 1: and just was our beloved Governor Gavin Newsom. Now Newsome,
Speaker 1: you know, he made the critical mistake of doing this podcast,
Speaker 1: which is now I think my wife noted that his
Speaker 1: podcast listenership has absolutely plummeted from the first few episodes,
Speaker 1: which is, by the way, how all these celebrity podcasts go.
Speaker 1: Every celebrity podcast does this. They announced that some celebrity
Speaker 1: has podcast, everyone makes a big start, maybe there's like
Speaker 1: one news story that breaks as a result of it.
Speaker 1: They get, you know, a bunch of people to listen
Speaker 1: for the first two episodes, and then nobody ever listens
Speaker 1: to it again. And that seems to be precisely what
Speaker 1: happened with Newsom.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: Newsom's problem was that when he started the podcast, he
Speaker 1: was like talking only with like really conservative people like
Speaker 1: Charlie Kirk and then Michael Savage and this person and
Speaker 1: that person, and it really ticked off liberals that he
Speaker 1: did that, and conservatives were like whoa, Okay, So, you know,
Speaker 1: the very first episode of Newsom's podcast, he's talking with
Speaker 1: Charlie Kirk and he says, yeah, it's deeply unfair when
Speaker 1: biological boys, when boys, you know, playing girls sports. And
Speaker 1: through the press conference, everyone's like, all right, well, Gavin Newsom,
Speaker 1: where are you, buddy? You know, if you think it's
Speaker 1: deeply unfair for boys to play girls sports.
Speaker 2: This is the state.
Speaker 1: Track and field championships. We're gonna say that the bet
Speaker 1: that the high jump champion of California is a girl,
Speaker 1: that the long jump second place finisher of California is
Speaker 1: a excuse me, that the high jump girls champion is
Speaker 1: a boy, that the long jump second place girls finisher
Speaker 1: is a boy, and that the triple jump champion by
Speaker 1: almost two feet is a boy.
Speaker 2: Where are you?
Speaker 1: Where are you trying to lead the charge in the
Speaker 1: state legislature to change this? But this is the problem
Speaker 1: with Newsom. He says it's unfair, but he doesn't have
Speaker 1: the political stones, He doesn't have the political courage to
Speaker 1: actually do.
Speaker 2: Anything about it.
Speaker 1: He's not going to introduce legislation to keep boys out
Speaker 1: of girls sports, and he doesn't have clean hands on
Speaker 1: the question. It was Newsome in twenty twenty who changed
Speaker 1: California law signed into law massive changes for California prisons
Speaker 1: mandating that they house inmates on the basis of gender identity,
Speaker 1: not biological sex. Which, as much as we're talking about
Speaker 1: girl sports, and yes, I do think boys playing girl
Speaker 1: sports is unfair and unjust, housing men in women's prisons
Speaker 1: is worse. It's a much more serious violation of privacy,
Speaker 1: a much more serious risk because now you're saying that
Speaker 1: women have to be locked up.
Speaker 2: With convicted criminals, convicted criminal men.
Speaker 1: As we see in Madera County where Sally Moreno, the
Speaker 1: DA up there is prosecuting a man who got housed
Speaker 1: in the Chowchilla Women's prison who proceeded is accused of
Speaker 1: raping three of his cellmates, one of whom he got pregnant.
Speaker 1: When we return, we'll have more from my weekend at
Speaker 1: the races, My day at the races, My day at
Speaker 1: the Culture War races.
Speaker 2: That's next on the John Girardi Show.
Speaker 1: John Girardi here, we're talking about this past weekend at
Speaker 1: the California State High School track and field meet held
Speaker 1: up Buchanan High School, in which a biological well, just
Speaker 1: a boy. I'm not sure there's any other kind of
Speaker 1: boy than a biological boy. Biology is what makes you
Speaker 1: a boy.
Speaker 2: A boy.
Speaker 1: Ab Hernandez, who's a junior from la from Harupa Valley
Speaker 1: High School in southern California, a boy, won the California
Speaker 1: state championship in the triple jump, tied for first in
Speaker 1: the high jump, and got second placed in the long jump,
Speaker 1: all in the girls' division in spite of the fact
Speaker 1: that ab Hernandez is a boy. So I was there
Speaker 1: Friday and Saturday. Friday was the pliminaries and Saturday was
Speaker 1: the championship competitions for the state track and field meets,
Speaker 1: and it was actually it was my first time going
Speaker 1: to a big track and field meet like that. It
Speaker 1: was actually really interesting and pretty fun. The not so
Speaker 1: much the field events, the high jump, long jump, triple jump.
Speaker 1: Those were pretty boring, honestly, but the track events were
Speaker 1: super exciting, including the one hundred meter dash, where a
Speaker 1: boy set the new California state record in the one
Speaker 1: hundred meter dash. This kid ran a ten point h
Speaker 1: one second one hundred meter dash, which was absolutely thrilling
Speaker 1: to watch. So let me talk about Hernandez himself, who,
Speaker 1: by the way, in all of this. Let's just remember,
Speaker 1: I understand a lot of you listening don't like boys
Speaker 1: playing girls sports. I have no ill will to the kid, who,
Speaker 1: let's remember, is a kid. This is an eleventh grader.
Speaker 1: This is not an adult. So let's take that with
Speaker 1: a grain of salt. I'm not here to bash any kid.
Speaker 1: So Hernandez is a very effeminate acting boy. He's not
Speaker 1: the biggest boy, he's obviously pretty slight, but he's recognizably
Speaker 1: a boy. He's a boy who has his hair done up.
Speaker 1: His face is just caked with makeup, like almost comically
Speaker 1: so in some of the photographs from the event, my
Speaker 1: wife thought, oh my gosh, it's like it's.
Speaker 2: Almost to the point of being clown makeup.
Speaker 1: His hair is oddly bleached, kind of a copper color,
Speaker 1: coppery blonde. But he's recognizably a boy, and the physical
Speaker 1: advantages of being a boy in these competitions or him
Speaker 1: are just obvious.
Speaker 2: He's flat chested, he's got narrow hips.
Speaker 1: He's got broad shoulders, he's got more defined musculature than
Speaker 1: most of the girls. And it's sort of that, I mean,
Speaker 1: that's why clearly he's doing so well. It's not because
Speaker 1: He's got this immaculate form in any of his events,
Speaker 1: and I'll talk about that more later. He can kind
Speaker 1: of get away with sort of mediocre form because he's
Speaker 1: got muscles on muscles on muscles that the girls just
Speaker 1: don't have.
Speaker 2: And it's not the girl's fault. They're just girls. Girls
Speaker 2: musculature is different from boys.
Speaker 1: And it allows him, as a fairly mediocre male athlete,
Speaker 1: to just completely dominate.
Speaker 2: Now, when we return.
Speaker 1: I'll talk about specific events and specifics of what I saw,
Speaker 1: including some of the craziness that happened outside the gates
Speaker 1: at the track meet. All that next on the John
Speaker 1: Girardi Show at the California State Track and Field Meet Friday,
Speaker 1: and this past Friday and Saturday, the high school track
Speaker 1: and Field meet, in which a boy, ab Hernandez was
Speaker 1: competing in the girls division for some of the events.
Speaker 1: The action happening outside was about as wild as the
Speaker 1: action happening inside the stadium.
Speaker 2: So let me kind of try and paint the scene
Speaker 2: for you.
Speaker 1: So Friday, Friday, the gates open at two at Veterans
Speaker 1: Memorial Stadium at Buchanan. It is hot. It is like
Speaker 1: one hundred plus degrees. Really stinking hot. I go into
Speaker 1: the stadium and I'm at the kind of the east
Speaker 1: end of the stadium, which is near you know, you
Speaker 1: can look right outside the fence and you see the
Speaker 1: corner of Minnie Wah Wah and Knees Avenues in Clovis,
Speaker 1: and there's sort of that corner there, and on that
Speaker 1: corner were protesters, protesters against boys in girls' sports. And
Speaker 1: at different times they were there holding signs, having cars
Speaker 1: passed by honk at them. A lot of them were
Speaker 1: were women wearing pink clothing of various kinds, holding signs
Speaker 1: that say save girls sports, no boys and girls sports,
Speaker 1: et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Different conservative social media
Speaker 1: types were out there on the corner. Now, on Friday,
Speaker 1: a pro transgender protester showed up and was out there
Speaker 1: on the corner. It was kind of after a lot
Speaker 1: of the anti transgenderism protesters had left this this pro
Speaker 1: transgenderis tester came out and now this pro transgenderism protester,
Speaker 1: according to news reports after the event, goes by the
Speaker 1: name Ethan Kroll. Now I couldn't one hundred percent tell,
Speaker 1: mostly because Kroll was really covered up. I couldn't tell
Speaker 1: if Kroll was actually a woman. I think Kroll might
Speaker 1: have been a woman, I'm not exactly sure. Just again,
Speaker 1: this person was very covered up. Kroll was outside again
Speaker 1: at the corner of Knees in Minneuowa, wearing all black,
Speaker 1: black blue jeans, a black hoodie sweatshirt with the hood
Speaker 1: pulled up. And again, let's remember it's like one hundred
Speaker 1: and three degrees, black sunglasses, a black face mask, even
Speaker 1: wearing black gloves, and holding a transgender pride flag sort of,
Speaker 1: which is I think it's like blue pink. It's five
Speaker 1: horizontal stripes on a flag, blue, pink, white, pink.
Speaker 2: Blue, because you can switch between blue and pink, which
Speaker 2: is hilarious.
Speaker 1: How the whole transgender ideology is premised on the idea
Speaker 1: that sex or gender is really just based in nothing
Speaker 1: other than very hackneyed stereotypes about the male and female sexes.
Speaker 1: Being a woman is just a matter of liking girly things.
Speaker 1: Being a man is just a matter of liking guy things.
Speaker 1: So being a girl means you like pink. Being a
Speaker 1: boy means you like blue. In spite of the fact
Speaker 1: that like twenty or thirty years ago, feminists would have
Speaker 1: screamed at you for.
Speaker 3: Saying, just because a boy likes likes feminine things does
Speaker 3: not make him less of a boy. Just because a
Speaker 3: girl is a tomboy does not make her less of
Speaker 3: a woman, like which true.
Speaker 1: Like, I don't think you ceased to be a boy
Speaker 1: just because you're, you know, a three year old and
Speaker 1: your playing with your sister's naked barbie doll or something.
Speaker 1: And I don't think a girl is a boy because
Speaker 1: you know she's falling down in mud and wants to
Speaker 1: play baseball. Like no, you're You're still a boy, and
Speaker 1: you're still a girl. And it's based on biology and physiogogy.
Speaker 2: Your body.
Speaker 1: Is a meaningful, constitutive element of who you are, of
Speaker 1: your identity. Now, this person ethan crawl, This pro transgender
Speaker 1: protester was out there dressed all in black, holding a
Speaker 1: pro a transgender pride flag attached to an aluminum pole,
Speaker 1: so holding and it was a big flag looked like
Speaker 1: a like almost like a I don't know, like a
Speaker 1: five foot long maybe five feet by three feet or so,
Speaker 1: I guess flag attached to a large aluminum pole.
Speaker 2: Looked like it was about I don't know, four or
Speaker 2: five feet long.
Speaker 1: I saw the after effects of it, but the video
Speaker 1: of the event itself got posted onto x that Kroll
Speaker 1: got into an argument with this local conservative kind of
Speaker 1: activist guy named Josh Fulfer, who's very active on various
Speaker 1: forms of social media. Fulfer's driving by, he told me,
Speaker 1: with his wife, got into kind of a shouting match
Speaker 1: with Kroll, and Kroll goes over to the side view window,
Speaker 1: to the passenger window of the car and begins to
Speaker 1: jam the butt end of this big aluminum pole that
Speaker 1: the Pride flag is attached to through the window. Fulfer
Speaker 1: then proceeds, I actually I forget if it was or
Speaker 1: his wife. I think Fulford said it was him, proceeds
Speaker 1: to pepper spray Kroll, the pro transgender protester, gets pepper
Speaker 1: spray in the face. Police apparently saw the interaction. And
Speaker 1: you know, I'm not the best lawyer in the world,
Speaker 1: but if those are the facts, and I believe they are,
Speaker 1: that's a pretty clear cutcase of Kroll engaging in assault
Speaker 1: and of Fulfer engaging in reasonable self defense.
Speaker 2: So police arrested Kroll did not arrest.
Speaker 1: Fulfer, according to him, and according to news accounts, seems
Speaker 1: like Krohle was the only person arrested.
Speaker 2: Kroll got charged with a couple of counts.
Speaker 1: And was booked into the Fresno County Jail, including with
Speaker 1: a felony count of assault with a deadly weapon not
Speaker 1: a firearm.
Speaker 2: Now, that was nuts.
Speaker 1: Okay, So that was happening while the track and field
Speaker 1: meet's going on. I'm kind of trying to watch the
Speaker 1: track and field, but now I'm like trying to cover this,
Speaker 1: and I'm talking with kids who were eyewitnesses to it.
Speaker 2: It was completely nuts.
Speaker 1: Also, the whole I should have led with this Friday
Speaker 1: was surreal because overhead the whole time, we were pretty
Speaker 1: much the entire afternoon from you know, the gates opened
Speaker 1: at two. I mean I didn't leave until I think
Speaker 1: after eight o'clock. The competition began at three. I don't
Speaker 1: think I left until after eight o'clock. For most of
Speaker 1: the afternoon, a plane was flying overhead above Veterans Memorial
Speaker 1: Stadium at Buchanan with a banner behind it that said
Speaker 1: no boys in girls sports, just constantly flying overhead.
Speaker 2: So everyone there was like, you know, engage with it. Now.
Speaker 2: The crowd, it was a pretty full crowd.
Speaker 1: The Grand stands weren't completely filled just because the sun
Speaker 1: was just mercilessly beating down on the grand stands that
Speaker 1: are on sort of the north side of the state,
Speaker 1: the north side sort of the north slash, it's kind
Speaker 1: of the northeast side of the stadium, and then there's
Speaker 1: sort of more of the southwest side of the state.
Speaker 1: The southwest side of the stadium was more in the shade.
Speaker 1: The northeast side of the stadium was just getting beaten
Speaker 1: by the sun.
Speaker 2: So a lot of people were kind of on a hill.
Speaker 1: On the north west side of the stadium, and a
Speaker 1: ton of people wound up filling the north side bleachers,
Speaker 1: and everyone there, almost every single person there was either
Speaker 1: family of a competitor or coaches of a competitor. There
Speaker 1: were maybe there was a bigger representation of Buchanan High
Speaker 1: school kids, and a lot of Buchanan kids were volunteering
Speaker 1: for the event, but pretty much everyone there was there
Speaker 1: because they were either coaching a competitor or family members
Speaker 1: of a competitor, and so as a result, this was
Speaker 1: a relatively a political crowd. No one was there for
Speaker 1: the ab Hernandez controversy other than maybe a few scattered
Speaker 1: people in the crowd, and I talked with a bunch
Speaker 1: of people, different coaches and parents about you know, hey,
Speaker 1: you know I'm here covering this for Power Talk.
Speaker 2: You know, do you have any thoughts on the ab
Speaker 2: Hernandez thing?
Speaker 1: And no one really wanted to go on Very few
Speaker 1: people anyway, wanted to go on the record.
Speaker 2: Because they were like, you know, my kids competing in this.
Speaker 1: If I give a quote or something, that's going to
Speaker 1: distract from my kid, Like, you know, that's not what
Speaker 1: I'm here for. But and I will note the crowd
Speaker 1: seemed mostly supportive of Hernandez when Hernandez's name was first
Speaker 1: announced for I think the first event Hernandez did on
Speaker 1: Friday was the high jump. There was a smattering of applause,
Speaker 1: of kind of pointed applause, and I would imagine pretty
Speaker 1: much every liberal person there wanted to oh, yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, be very vocal about this.
Speaker 1: And you have to remember this was kind of a
Speaker 1: cross section of California. This is not a cross section
Speaker 1: of America. It was a cross section of California. This
Speaker 1: was a California state wide event. So and it's track
Speaker 1: and field, which probably draws a bit more left. I'd
Speaker 1: say than other sports. I mean, this wasn't a high
Speaker 1: school football crown necessarily, although there are a lot of
Speaker 1: African American families who I don't think have the same
Speaker 1: cultural sensitivity on these things as sort of.
Speaker 2: Lily white liberal families do.
Speaker 1: But talking with people off the record quietly beside, a
Speaker 1: lot of people.
Speaker 2: Were willing to say, yeah, it's kind of ridiculous, this
Speaker 2: is unfair. I mean, obviously it's unfair.
Speaker 1: I mean, and people were like a lot of people
Speaker 1: I talked with were like very reasonable about it. I'm like,
Speaker 1: you know, I don't blame the kid, but yeah, it's
Speaker 1: obviously unfair for competition, Like that's a boy, Like he
Speaker 1: can do stuff boys can do, and it just doesn't
Speaker 1: make sense to have them competing against girls. Now, when
Speaker 1: we return, I want to talk about the championship Day
Speaker 1: on Saturday and Hernandez's results and sort of my thoughts
Speaker 1: on basically how abe Hernandez is the twenty twenties Danny
Speaker 1: Almonte for those of you who don't remember the fourteen
Speaker 1: year old who was blown fastballs by twelve year olds
Speaker 1: in the two thousand and one Little League World Series.
Speaker 1: I'll explain when I returned this is the John Gerardi Show.
Speaker 1: So what happened on Saturday at the California State High
Speaker 1: School Track and Field Championships where a boy, ab Hernandez
Speaker 1: competed against girls in the long jump, high jump, and
Speaker 1: triple jump. Well, he put on a dominant display against girls.
Speaker 1: He tied for first place in the high jump with
Speaker 1: a height of five foot seven. He got second place
Speaker 1: in the long jump, and he got first place in
Speaker 1: the triple jump, going about almost two feet about one
Speaker 1: foot nine something inches farther the closest girl competitor. And
Speaker 1: this was where it was only watching him that I
Speaker 1: really sort of began to understand and see. I mean,
Speaker 1: obviously I knew the whole time it was unfair, but
Speaker 1: I began to appreciate the unfairness in a more distinct way.
Speaker 1: Explain why I want to talk specifically about the high jump.
Speaker 1: Up to that point, high jump had been Hernandez's worst
Speaker 1: event of the three events that he participates in. High
Speaker 1: long jump, triple jump, triple jumps is best event in
Speaker 1: the high jump. And I ran this by people who
Speaker 1: know more about track and field than I did, but
Speaker 1: even I noticed it. The girl competitors were in the
Speaker 1: in the Basically, you take a bit of a running start.
Speaker 1: You go in kind of almost like a semi circle
Speaker 1: up until you get to the front of the cushion
Speaker 1: in front of which is the bar that's hanging horizontally.
Speaker 1: You pump your arms, you gather yourself, you bend your knees,
Speaker 1: and then you spring. And your arms have a lot
Speaker 1: to do with your jump. How you pump and gat
Speaker 1: how pump your arms, gather your arms crouched to to
Speaker 1: spring as high as you can. Your arms have a
Speaker 1: lot to do with your success in the high jump.
Speaker 1: And I could see with the girls they were using
Speaker 1: your arms the way you would imagine they were hands
Speaker 1: and fists.
Speaker 2: Pumping. I mean, it made sense.
Speaker 1: Hernandez was doing it kind of differently from all the
Speaker 1: girls in the all the other girls in the competition,
Speaker 1: all of the girls, not other girls. He's almost like
Speaker 1: it's almost like prancing, and his with his hand palms
Speaker 1: sort of flat, not like pumping, like doing it in
Speaker 1: a more almost feminine. He's running in an almost more
Speaker 1: comically effeminate way than the girls who are running to
Speaker 1: gather up themselves for this jump. Because they're girls, they
Speaker 1: don't care if they look feminine, and I almost wonder
Speaker 1: if he's like doing this affected thing because he's trying so.
Speaker 2: Hard to give off the appearance of being a girl.
Speaker 1: And maybe I'm over analyzing this, but his form was
Speaker 1: definitely different from the girls. And yet he gets a
Speaker 1: jump of five feet seven inches to equal the best
Speaker 1: girl in spite of the fact that his form is bad.
Speaker 1: Why well, he can make up for the inadequacies of
Speaker 1: his form because he's a boy, because he's got bigger,
Speaker 1: stronger muscles. And this it led me to think of
Speaker 1: Danny Almonte. When I was a kid. Two thousand and one,
Speaker 1: there's this big scandal at the Little League World Series.
Speaker 1: Little League World Series is for twelve years old and under,
Speaker 1: and a team from the Bronx was dominating with this
Speaker 1: picture that everyone's like, this kid's a phenom, this kid's
Speaker 1: gonna be.
Speaker 2: An amazing picture. Maybe he'll go pro. Danny al Monty,
Speaker 2: this Dominican kid from New York. Wow, he's just he's
Speaker 2: dominating the Little League World Series.
Speaker 1: And then a couple of years later it turns out, oh,
Speaker 1: Danny al Monty is actually fourteen years old. His Dominican
Speaker 1: birth certificate was fudge was dicey. He was actually fourteen,
Speaker 1: and what did that do well? It immediately showed that
Speaker 1: Daniel Monty was not a very impressive athlete. Yeah, plenty
Speaker 1: of fourteen year olds can blow fastballs. By twelve year olds,
Speaker 1: it's not an indication of being anything special. And that's
Speaker 1: what Aby Hernandez is. He is the Danny al Monty
Speaker 1: of the twenty twenties. He's not actually a very good
Speaker 1: high jumper. If you compare him against boys, there were
Speaker 1: at least in the southern section of CIF, which is
Speaker 1: most of the Los Angeles area excluding the city of
Speaker 1: Los Angeles, in D three high schools, there were at
Speaker 1: least twenty boys who jumped higher than Hernandez has ever jumped.
Speaker 1: He's just kind of a mediocre athlete. And yet at
Speaker 1: the metal ceremony, here he is with the two other
Speaker 1: girls he tied for first place with standing in front
Speaker 1: of them. The symbolism was hard to miss. That'll do it,
Speaker 1: John Dirolady show, see you next time on Power Talk.