Books
Their new book is an excellent guide for thinking about gender in sports.
I also cannot accept a system that mandates hormone therapy or medical treatment to participate in school sports.
Morally and philosophically, I simply cannot get there.
(Barnes believes that policies get murkier with higher-level sports like collegiate and Olympic competitions.)
In the introduction ofFair Play,you mention that your mom said to you You have always been nonbinary.
Hearing that from a parent must have been so validating.
What do you think other parents could learn from that kind of allyship?
It was very affirming and validating.
I remember driving with [my mom once,] and she asked me to define genderqueer for her.
She was also on a journey and had to come to that understanding herself.
But she never allowed her own curiosity or confusion to affect her ability to love me as her child.
She just didnt know what that word meant.
Its most important that you lead with love and allow them to be who they are.
I like that framing of You dont have to understand it to accept it.
In terms of actually writingFair Play, what was your day-to-day process like?
Im a morning writer.
I do not write well later in the day.
I didnt allow myself to do something until Id [hit my daily] word count.
Before even sitting down to write, I did a lot of reporting.
I worked the entire time [at my full-time job].
How do you maintain the energy?
Im very good at compartmentalizing, for better or worse.
But there are times where, even for me, compartmentalizing can be very difficult.
What I learned through the process of writing this book is that I need to be more intentional.
I need to set boundaries, and I got better at it.
I would take time for myself.
If I got overwhelmed, I would give myself a guilt-free morning to do something else.
I love playing video games, so I would playRed Dead Redemption 2or a few rounds of FIFA.
Or my wife and I would go to the beach.
Did you have a specific audience in mind who you were writing to?
I wanted the book to be useful for a variety of communities.
When I hear that folks who are trans learned something fromFair Play, thats really exciting to me.
What do you want readers to take away fromFair Play?
Nuance has been sorely lacking in this conversation.
We see that withLia Thomas,Andraya Yearwood, andMack Beggsto a certain degree.
I hope that folks remember that there are real people at play.
These people have feelings and perspectives and lives.
You ended up diving into your own opinions on the debate of transgender participation in sports.
When you set out to write this book, did you intend to do that?
I didnt anticipate that Id declaratively state my opinion.
Whats currently inspiring you?
Im inspired by the resilience of queer and trans people everywhere, every day.
The fact that we, as a community, continue tocelebrateandexperience joyis pretty amazing to me.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
This article was originally published onSep.
