Taylor Starling and Kaitlyn Slavin – Students Athletes at Martin Luther King High School in Riverside, California – held a live press conference on X Friday hosted California Family Council Outreach Director Sophia Lorey. The two girls shared their perspectives on a recent national controversy that has besieged their community caused by a trans athlete competing for the girls’ cross -country skiing team.

“It was confusing, this has never happened to me before, as if I didn’t even think this would happen to me,” Starling said. “It was all, surprising, that there would be a guy running with the girls.”

Slavin, who is only a beginner, said that the experience of having his first year in high school involves the situation is “kind of crazy.”

“Just in high school is having to compete against men when you didn’t have to be, something that shocked me right away,” Slavin said.

Starling lost his varsity place to a trans -athlete that transferred to school for the past year, and when they were wearing shirts reading “Save Girls Sports” in protest, the school administrators claim the shirts with swastikas. The two girls and their families are now engaged in a lawsuit against Riverside Unified School District (Rusd) over these claims.

In response, hundreds of their fellow students and hundreds of other residents of the community began to carry the shirts in protest. The shirts became a local and then national symbol for the protection of female athletes against biologically male inclusion in their sports and dressing rooms.

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The subsequent controversy and media coverage of the situation has been pushing the two teenage girls, their families and the whole city in the limelight of the national debate on trans-inclusion in women’s sports, which became a hot-button-political issue in the 2024 election year.

And for Starling, Slavin and their classmates, it has come with a wave of attention that they have never experienced, both negative and positive.

“I’ve had lots of people reaching out to me and saying” Thank you so much for what you’re doing and standing up for these women, “Starling said. “For my friends, many of my friends have been shoulder -controlled because they were wearing the shirts and many of them have been cursed and called really bad names, and they sent certain things on the internet and called people terrible names to wear these shirts.”

Slavin, who says she has found stress relief in sports all her life, has only found more stress from sports because of the situation this year.

“It’s scary that it’s not something that can always be a stress-related place if we are to have all this going,” Slavin said. “It affects you mentally and emotionally … It’s so hard to have all this in progress.”

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Starling says the trans -athlete has used the girls’ toilet at the school, but they have not seen the athlete much in the dressing room due to often lack of practice.

The two girls and more parents who have spoken to Pakinomist Digital claim that the Trans the athlete was allowed to compete for varsity despite the lack of practice each week.

Starling’s father, Ryan Starling, told former Pakinomist Digital that when his daughter and other girls approached the administrators about it, they were told that “Transgders have more rights than CisGenders.” RUSD previously provided a statement to Pakinomist Digital, which insisted that its handling of the situation has been in accordance with California’s state law.

The two girls then ignited a viral trend in their community as they appeared in school in November wearing the shirts “Save Girls Sports”.

And despite being shot by school administrators for it and having to file a trial, more and more students began to emerge every week wearing the shirts as the school had to change its dressing code and start placing students in detention to wear them. This did not prevent the shirts from spreading and growing. It became a weekly ritual for hundreds of students every Wednesday to show up to carry the shirt support from the girls and their messages, and many of them created viral social media posts on it.

At the beginning of December gave up On their efforts to discipline students to wear the shirts. Sources told Pakinomist Digital that more than 400 students have been shown to wear the shirts at a time, and students at other schools in the district have begun to carry them to the class.

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Students at Martin Luther King High School in Riverside, California wear t-shirts reading “Save Girls’ Sports” to protest on a trans athlete on the cross-country team. (Courtesy of Sophia Lorey)

But Slavin, who stared their lawyer Julianne Fleischer, said the school administrators have still told the two girls that they are not allowed to wear the shirts during the press conference on Friday. However, they also said that more than 400 students at their school continued to show up to wear the shirts every Wednesday.

The situation culminated with a heated and confrontational event on December 19, when Rusd held a school board meeting to solve the problem. Before the meeting, there were competing protests between activists and parents wearing the shirts “Save Girls Sports” and LGBTQ activists.

Sources, including Ryan Starling, have told Pakinomist Digital That the LGBTQ activists at the event harassed the protesters “Save Girls Sports” and even disturbed a woman’s prayer group during a prayer circle before the meeting.

“Members of the Pro-LGBTQ groups began to heck and harass the people in line who spoke unlike their values. Some of these adult protesters even came up to the young girls who were to talk and shouted at them close to their face told “Young Women for America (Ywa) ‘s Inland Empire Chapter President Tori Hitchcock to Pakinomist Digital.

An anonymous parent told Pakinomist Digital about witnessing a child bombarded with vulgar insults of pro-trans-demonstrants after the meeting.

The transient athlete faces Kyle Harp, Left, from Riverside has Progress Pride -Flag like “Save Girls Sports” supporters Lori Lopez and her father Pete Pickering, both of Riverside, listen to the debate as they join the overflow that converters outside Riverside Unified School District Meeting Thursday Evening to discuss the rights of transnry athletes to compete in high school sports on Thursday 19 December 2024. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

“My 16-year-old son and a couple of others stood outside after talking when a group of LGBTQ community intentionally passed them and pointed to each one of them and said, ‘Fu Fu Fu,'” said the anonymous parent .

Inside the meeting, parents and opposed activists then passionate about their thoughts on the situation, with several speakers shouting in hysterical tones. The meeting continued for almost five hours and included testimonies between people who opposed trans -cluttering in girls’ sports and those who supported it.

Many of the Pro-Trans speeches were met with high-pitched cheering and waiving LGBTQ Pride flags from those present.

RUSD previously provided a statement to Pakinomist Digital, which insisted that its handling of the situation has been in accordance with California’s state law.

“While these rules were not established by RUSD, the district is obliged to comply with the law and CIF regulations. California’s state law prohibits discrimination on students based on gender, gender identity and gender expressions and specifically prohibits discrimination on the basis of gender II physical education and athletics.

Rusd also blamed his handling of the situation of officials in Washington DC and California’s state capital, Sacramento. They made this statement back in early December before President Donald Trump returned to the office.

“Save Girls Sports” supporters Skylar Crawford, left, and Jadeynn Gallardo, both of Martin Luther King High School, and Tori Hitchcock, on the right, of young women for America, pray among the flooding volume that converters outside Riverside Unified School District – Meeting Thursday night to discuss trans -bright athletes’ rights to compete in high school sports on Thursday 19 December 2024. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

“As these issues play out in our courts and the media, opposition and protests should be directed at those who are able to influence these laws and policies (including officials of Washington DC and Sacramento),” reads their statement.

Trump has promised to ban trans athletes from competing in girls and women’s sports as a federal bill entitled The Protection of Women and Girls in the Sports Act is currently progressing through Congress. It has already gone into the House of Representatives.

Until this bill is potentially signed in the law, Slavin and Starling ask their supporters to “pray” for them.