In 2019 I watched the Washington Mystics, the WNBA here in the nation’s capital, clinch the league’s championship at home. At the time, the leagues’ following was – relatively modest: they played that final in CareFirst Arena, a nice-but-smallish venue in overwhelmingly Black Southeast D.C. The fans were mostly female, Black, queer, or some combination of all three. Fast forward to 2024, when Indiana Fever guard Catilin Clark was a rookie sensation and the demand for tickets between the Mystics and her team was so high, they drew a crowd large enough to play at the much bigger Capital One Arena downtown — where the NBA and NHL teams play. That sellout crowd was noticeably much more male and much whiter. Oh, this is going to be a whole thing, I thought to myself.
And reader, it was – and is – very much a thing: almost everything that happens on the court in the league involving Clark has come to be litigated as part of the culture wars. Fox News regularly dedicates airtime and digital ink to routine foul calls on and against Clark, while Republican lawmakers have submitted formal complaints to the league about the same. Their outrage rests on a notion that Clark is being targeted by other players (and maybe the refs) for being a straight, white woman in a league populated largely by people who are not. The embrace of Clark by right-wing activists has contributed to her polarizing reputation among the W’s overwhelmingly Democratic fanbase, and her stat lines and on-court demeanor have come to be freighted with all this meaning, very little of which is about basketball.
Jess Rapfogel/Getty Images
Over the last few weeks, the volume of this particular culture war discord has gotten louder: Sophie Cunningham, a bench player on Clark’s team, has been carving a name out for herself as a vocal opponent of transwomen in women’s sports. Then Enes Kanter, a former journeyman in the NBA, and Royce White, whose NBA career lasted a total of three games, made showy, cynical declarations that they would be identifying as women entering the WNBA draft, with their concern-troll talking points about the WNBA being overrun by “biological men.” (The league's collective bargaining agreement says “Only players who are women are eligible to play in the WNBA,”, with no specifications about sex assigned at birth.) This moral panic continues apace despite there being virtually no transwomen competing among the tens of thousands of athletes in American women’s sports, at the collegiate or pro level, and so much of the “evidence” by concerned parties about gender in women’s sports comes down to scrutinizing the athlete’s looks. It’s nasty work.
Meanwhile, the league has been seemingly caught flat-footed by the anti-trans grievance and partisan axe-grinding swirling around it. After one of the owners of the Seattle Storm confronted two fans for their anti-trans protests at a game where her team was playing, the league suspended the team owner, saying all fans should feel welcome at the league’s games. (Contrast this with the NBA, which has taken a much-harder line against bigoted fan speech at its games.) The league’s office says it is set to convene a task force of bigwigs on the issue of gender eligibility for the WNBA in coming weeks. And any policy that comes out of that — especially any new guidelines that try to codify gender as some fixed, testable thing — is likely to have huge implications for women’s sports beyond the W. Watch this space.
Newsletter continues after sponsor message
ON THE POD
Sandy Huffaker/Getty Images
How farm work became the exception to Trump's border crackdown: The Trump administration has been closing off nearly every pathway into the U.S. — except one. The H-2A visa is for the seasonal workers who pick the fruits and vegetables in your grocery store, and it’s the only federal visa program still growing: up 500% since 2012, even though pretty much everyone hates it. NPR’s Ximena Bustillo traces how the history of agricultural labor created this problematic program we can’t live without.
Jay-Z has F-you money. Is he saying it to the wrong people? Jay-Z says he's “a business, man.” He sold out Yankee Stadium for three nights last month, and used the stage to answer everyone calling him a sellout. The billionaire released the 30th-anniversary edition of his debut album about hustling his way to independence as a Target exclusive in the middle of a boycott many Black organizers say never ended. We dig into how this is what Jay-Z has been selling his whole career -- it’s how Black excellence and Black capitalism get fed to us as the same thing.
Enhance your listening experience and support what you love. NPR+ includes perks for over 25 of NPR's most popular podcasts, including Code Switch. So join us at plus.npr.org.
People are much more open these days about going low contact — or no contact — with their families. Maybe they broke things off over irreconcilable differences in politics or religion or even their identities. Or maybe they just needed to free themselves from a toxic relationship.
If you have made this huge decision for yourself, we want to hear from you. Your response could be part of a Code Switch episode we’re making about family estrangement. Send us an email or voice memo to codeswitch@npr.org.
Written by Gene Demby and editedby Dalia Mortada
Listen to your local NPR station.
Visit NPR.org to hear live radio from WAMU 88.5 (edit station).
What do you think of today's email? We'd love to hear your thoughts, questions and feedback:codeswitch@npr.org
Enjoying this newsletter? Forward to a friend! They cansign up here.
You received this message because you're subscribed to Code Switch emails. This email was sent by National Public Radio, Inc., 1111 North Capitol Street NE, Washington, DC 20002
