i hope you donât mind me adding to this post op but iâve got a sorta personal connection to this story. for ppl who do not know this about me, ive been fencing for like five years and am trans. i also used to fence in the same circles as this woman
this womanâstephanie turner is her name, because i think people should know it so this shit can ruin her lifeâregularly fences cis men and wins because fencing is fucking co-ed
i know that is in the screenshots already, but what i can add which isnât in the screenshot is that i personally know and have fenced some of the people listed in that âcompetition historyâ screenshot, including some of the cis men which she beat. i know from fencing them myself that these guys are good, smart, capable fencers
that said, even if i didnât know them, i could tell you a lot of these guys are solid. do you see that column labeled âratingâ? being rated means theyâve placed very well or won medals at prestigious or decently sized tournamentsâE is the lowest rating (but still difficult to get) and ratings go up to A (and U means unrated). if you look, you can see she beat a few rated fencers in that screenshot, some of them male!
another thing i know about stephanie turner is that she fences at a club my friendâs brother works at. she regularly beats said brother, who is 6â4 and 200lbs. iâve never met this brother, but if heâs anything like my friend, heâs a damn good fencer with years of experience. stephanie turner is GOOD. per my friend, she probably would have won the bout she took a knee on. she really did not need to pull shit transphobic shit and i guarantee she knows it.
all this shit about fencing cis men really does not matter, to be clear. being a woman beating men doesnât make stephanie a good fencerâit doesnât even make her a notable fencer. every afab fencer who is good enough to beat other fencers beats amab fencers. the first fencer i beat as an afab person was a cis man who started the sport at the same time as me just bc we were at the same general level. because again, fencing is co-ed. i just am explaining all this to show how damn stupid dying on this hill is (and the fact she for sure knows how damn pointless and hateful it is)
because fencing is NOT a strength sport! being stronger or taller than your opponent, like how a cis man would stereotypically be vs a cis woman, isnât necessarily an advantageâstrength can absolutely fuck you up if you donât know how to manage it, and if you know how to use it, being shorter than your opponents can actually be an advantage
if anything, fencing a stamina sport, which something you can very much train no matter your gender if you put in the work. more than anything to do with strength or speed, though, fencing is a strategy sport. there is really no reason to gender segregate it. a lot of tournaments do, but plenty tournaments DONâT, and most clubs you go to for practice and drills and learning fencing will be co-ed and have you constantly fencing against âopposite sexâ fencers
(half relatedâone of the best foils on my fencing team is a trans woman who sometimes fences in the menâs brackets in tournaments and regularly beats cis men)
if stephanie turner is a good fencerâwhich she definitely isâshe knows all of this. that fencing is more about stamina, that strength and height mean nothing, that the only thing that really matters is your strategy.
stephanie turner was literally just doing this to be an asshole. the fact sheâs getting money for it is fucking disgusting. i hope she faces some damn consequences for this shit, because itâs such stupid, hateful bullshit, especially for a sport where that âbiological advantageâ shit really and truly does not matter
i do want to end this addition on a nice note tho, so i want to add: a few days after this story brokeâthis weekend, actuallyâi attended a two day tournament as a spectator. while it wasnât everywhere, i definitely saw a lot of refs and staff wearing trans pride/support pins, as well as a few people in attendance wearing trans supportive shirts and accessories. all of the people ive spoken to in the fencing world about thisâwhich is quite a lotâhave thought it both appalling and monumentally stupid, and im hoping that will lead to consequences for stephanie turner and anyone else who tries to follow in her bullshit idiot footsteps