South Cook News

Orland Park Village trustee Jim Dodge is no fan of President Joe Biden's proposed changes to Title IX rules.

In the wake of Biden's recent announcement about amending the parameters of Title IX, a report by the Prairie State Wire found that Illinois is now one of 29 states that allow boys to compete in girls' sports on the high school level.

Earlier this month, the U.S. Supreme Court stopped short of reversing a lower court's verdict that blocked enforcement of a law passed two years ago in West Virginia that prohibited boys from participating in girls' high school sports.

Just over a year ago, University of Pennsylvania swimmer Lia Thomas won two titles in the women's NCAA swimming championships but earned the scorn and label of a "cheat" of many like University of Kentucky star Riley Gaines, who she tied in the 200-meter freestyle championships.

South Cook News contacted Dodge for his opinion on allowing boys to compete in girls' sports.

"It's completely unfair to girls. It just feels to me that people who are biologically males at birth have physical advantages at birth that makes this all terribly unfair," Dodge told South Cook News. "Democrats are so open-minded about everything that comes around that they've lost their common sense."

Dodge justified his opinion by saying that there's no way around physiological differences.

"I think as a general statement, boys tend to be bigger and stronger than biological girls because they have more muscle mass," Dodge said. "There has to be another way to make everyone feel they have a place in our society."

Dodge added that he wished the whole topic could be done "rationally and not politically."

"The issue here is who gets to compete in what sport; that should be a rational conversation where we get to follow the science," Dodge said.

Along with Illinois, the states still allowing boys to participate in girls' high school sports are Alaska, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin, according to Prairie State Wire.