San Jose Coach Suspended for Filing Discrimination Complaint Against Transgender Player

Melissa Batie-Smoose, women’s volleyball associate head coach at San José State University, was suspended over the weekend after she filed a Title IX complaint asking the Mountain West Conference and the NCAA to investigate the school for discriminating against female athletes in favor of a “transgender” player, Blaire Fleming.

The male-bodied athlete has been the source of contention both for the Spartans and other schools.

Women’s volleyball teams at five universities have now chosen to forfeit six times rather than play San José State, Outkick reported. The latest, Boise State, has now forfeited twice, as women on the team refused to face a male player.

Women volleyballers at the University of Nevada even held a press conference during the time their game would have been played, stating their opposition to men in women’s sports.

A report from Quillette’s Jonathan Kay, “College Volleyball’s Spartan Meltdown,” explains the two key issues from the Title X complaint. Batie-Smoose asked the conference and the NCAA to look into:

1. The overt favouritism [sic] that she believes her school has shown to Fleming, at the expense of Fleming’s 18 female teammates; and
2. The unsettling measures that SJSU officials have allegedly taken in order to suppress expressions of concern from these affected women.

Kay also details some of Batie-Smoose’s allegations in her 33-page sworn declaration:

  • Neither Batie-Smoose nor incoming athletes were informed there would be a transgender player on the team because “SJSU has a policy of withholding such information from all newly recruited staff and athletes.” Fleming, a senior in his third season with the Spartans, only came out to the team as transgender in April 2024.
  • Fleming had “raw physical power” beyond most female athletes; what “stood out was spiking the [ball] and blocking on the front row, due to Fleming’s leaping ability and hitting power.”
  • Assistant Director of Student Wellness Laura Alexander told head coach Todd Kress, “Anyone opposed to Fleming’s inclusion on the women’s team should leave SJSU and seek ‘therapy.’”
  • While female athletes were “required to pretend that Fleming’s biologically male status is athletically inconsequential,” they were also “scared to even mention the fact that Fleming is transgender.”
  • Fleming’s “presence on the court” was not only “unfair to other athletes, but possibly dangerous as well.”
  • “Even defenders on Fleming’s own team, concerned for their safety, now sometimes turn away during practice matches when Fleming is winding up for a kill – a fear response … virtually unheard of in women’s volleyball.”

“The social atmosphere on the team has degenerated rapidly during the 2024 season, and now may be described as toxic, joyless, and dysfunctional,” Kay reports.

SJSU’s co-captain Brooke Slusser has been outspoken about the danger to female athletes and the unfairness of a male taking a woman’s spot on the team.

Alarmingly, the complaint details that Fleming may have conspired with an opposing team’s player, Colorado State University’s right-side-hitter Malaya Jones, to target Slusser on the court. Kay reports:

During that match, Batie-Smoose claims in her Title IX Complaint, Fleming’s play style was bizarre. Fleming defied her coaches’ instructions by allowing Jones an unhindered diagonal hitting lane that exposed Slusser to kills.
Batie-Smoose also reports that she repeatedly saw Fleming laughing together with Jones after the latter targeted Slusser in this manner. Fleming’s behaviour was reportedly so strange that even Kress expressed concern, and took Fleming aside for a one-on-one talk.

“At one point, Blaire sent an over pass, perfectly setting up Malaya to kill the ball again in the direction of Brooke Slusser, after [which] Jones blew a kiss toward Fleming and mouthed ‘thank you,’” Batie-Smoose told the reporter.

In September 2024, “Slusser joined more than a dozen female athletes in suing the NCAA for Title IX violations,” reported Outkick:

The class-action lawsuit, originally filed in March and funded by the Independent Council on Women’s Sports (ICONS), states that the NCAA has knowingly violated Title IX by allowing transgender athletes to compete against women and to use women’s locker rooms in collegiate sports.

The Daily Citizen applauds women like Melissa Batie-Smoose and Brooke Slusser who are willing to battle for women’s sports. Women deserve safe spaces where they can grow and develop as competitors – without men intruding.

Related articles and resources:

Four Women’s Volleyball Teams Forfeit – Won’t Play Team with a Man

#SaveGirlsSports – New Campaign Launched by Family Policy Alliance

Canadian Powerlifter Faces Two-Year Ban for Protesting Males in Her Sport

Girls Don’t Chest Bump: Transgender Athletes Subverting Title IX

Middle School Girls Who Protested ‘Trans’ Athlete Are Banned From Future Competition

Moms for Liberty Sues Library for Censoring Forum to Protect Women’s Sports

Riley Gaines and 15 Other Female Athletes Sue NCAA Over ‘Transgender Policy’

Third Court Halts DOE’s Title IX Rewrite, Girls’ Sports & Spaces PreservedShoving Girls Off the Podium: More Male Athletes Participating in Girls Sports

Image credit: San Jose Spartans

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