Talk:Lia Thomas

Challenged edit to lead

User:Beccaynr has reverted my recent edit to the lead. The revert, which resulted in a grammatical error, can be viewed at https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Lia_Thomas&diff=prev&oldid=1181686174. The issue is whether Thomas's participation on the men's swim team at UPenn belongs in the lead. Five paragraphs in the article body mention Thomas's participation on the men's team, and there is an entire section on Thomas's statistics as a member of the men's team. I suppose it's a judgment call, but I think it belongs in the lead. What do others think? MonMothma (talk) 17:46, 24 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I also noted in my comment on your talk page that a claim made in your addition did not seem supported by the article and sources [1], in addition to MOS:LEAD and WP:DUE. She does not appear to have been notable for her college swimming career on the Penn men's swim team, so a focus on this in the lead, plus what appears to be an incorrect statement about when she came out, does not appear to be supported. Based on the available sources, she appears known for her swimming career on the women's team, both for her NCAA win and the public debate about her participation. And I think I fixed a grammatical error after my revert [2]. Beccaynr (talk) 18:08, 24 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Beccaynr, the sentence you challenged reads as follows: "After competing on the men's swim team at the University of Pennsylvania from 2017 to 2020, Thomas came out as a trans woman and competed on UPenn's women's team from 2021 to 2022". I am honestly confused about where you think the error is in that sentence.
Taking another look, perhaps there is an issue with the timetable. I suppose the sentence ought to have read, "After competing on the men's swim team at the University of Pennsylvania from 2017 to 2020, and after coming out as a trans woman, Thomas competed on UPenn's women's team from 2021 to 2022".MonMothma (talk) 19:21, 24 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
As to notability, I understand your argument. And Firefangledfeathers makes a good point below. If and when the lead is expanded, however, I believe this information should be included so that the lead reflects the article body. MonMothma (talk) 19:19, 24 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The lead should be expanded, but inserting some content about the her years on the men's team so early in the lead was too much weight on a minor aspect. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 18:14, 24 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Firefangledfeathers, you have a point. MonMothma (talk) 19:19, 24 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Addition of interviews

Update about agreement with federal government

I updated the article on UPenn's agreement with the federal government to erase all records and awards belonging to Thomas, but was unsure how to update the lead section. Technically, she is the "first openly transgender athlete to win an NCAA Division I national championship", but it appears that record will be erased by UPenn. Maybe something similar to Lance Armstrong in his lead?? Isaidnoway (talk) 22:54, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I'll preface this by saying that I'm completely ignorant on the topic of USA college sports. That said, what I interpreted on the article is Thomas is still winner of that championship. That said, I don't understand why UPenn deleting her records from their database is relevant. If anyone is to strip her of those titles it should be the NCAA, right? UPenn will apologize to the athletes Lia competed against but I don't think that should be in the lead. Tazik04 (talk) 23:19, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The way I understand it is she won the NCAA title with her 500-yard freestyle record, so if UPenn erases that record, how could she still retain the title if the record has been erased. And the UPenn president said: “We will review and update the Penn women’s swimming records set during that season to indicate who would now hold the records under current eligibility guidelines.” Isaidnoway (talk) 23:38, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Having said that, it is probably best to wait for additional sources to clarify exactly what will happen now with the NCAA title. Isaidnoway (talk) 23:42, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I mean factually speaking, she still won the titles that she did. At most we can add a parentheses that says "Stripped away" but like, she still won them. Wikipedia is under no obligation to reify the party line. Snokalok (talk) 23:27, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Agree with "stripped of" phrasing, similar to how we address the wins Lance Armstrong attained but which were later stripped away.McRandy1958 (talk) 00:44, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
If/when we mention something, we do not need to make comparisons to Lance Armstrong. -TenorTwelve (talk) 04:29, 2 July 2025 (UTC) TenorTwelve (talk) 04:29, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Penn said it would "review and update the Penn women’s swimming records set during that season to indicate who would now hold the records under current eligibility guidelines." It doesn't mention rewriting who won championships, but it means -- as CNN reports -- that Thomas's records will be moved to a footnote and replaced. Not seeing anything about championships, and this doesn't seem remotely similar to Armstrong. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 01:29, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The NCAA has yet to weigh in on what their plans are related to a February 2025 request from the department of education to restore titles, awards and records it says have been "misappropriated by biological males competing in female categories." So all we can report is what UPenn has done - Penn will restore all individual Division I swimming records and titles to female athletes who lost out to Thomas. Isaidnoway (talk) 04:30, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I replaced the bad sources with better factual ones that include the actual results of the updated records, since the CNN source wrongly implied erasing of all records aka them vanishing - what the university actually did was change the record holder based on the now new eligibility guidelines, but adding a footnote to the records that still states that Lia Thomas set those records based on then valid eligibility guidelines.
So, it is neither a full erasure, nor a full stripping of the records as the University is still crediting Thomas with the records she set in accordance with the eligibility guidelines at the time, while giving in to the blackmail demands of the administration of a new "record"-holder - almost in a malicious compliance way to receive the federal funding that was withheld. Raladic (talk) 01:19, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Isaidnoway - I removed this statement as it only appears to be reported by CNN (and given that that CNN source also had some other details not quit right) and is at odds with the NY Times which explicitly stated it was unclear if funds were released following the agreement and since neither the UPenn announcement, nor the Education Department's announcement mention the funding release either, I think we should keep it out until there is some other source that can corroborate CNN's claim that the funding was actually restored. Raladic (talk) 02:16, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'll also note (as I already did in the article edit summary) that some articles (by what we would otherwise consider reliable sources per WP:RSN) wrongly claim her NCAA titles are stripped - that is a question for the NCAA to decide, and they have not stated anything on the matter as of this time if they have any plans to do so or not.
The University merely agreed to do what is in their purview, which was to release the public statement affirming they comply with the Administrations Executive orders and update its records to appease the administration after its shift on the interpretation of Title IX, which it has now done, while also still crediting Thomas with setting the records in line with NCAA guidelines at the time.
It appears there is a circular echoing of some bad-sources re-perpetuating wrong statements outside the facts, so we should pay extra caution for adding any such in-dispute/contradictory statements unless they are clearly corroborated by facts, which in this case means we should also closely look at the WP:PRIMARY statements (Penn’s Title IX Resolution with the U.S. Department of Education Office for Civil Rights) from the actual organizations in question (aka. UPenn statement, NCAA (no position or statements made on the case), and US. Education Department, whose press release itself is full of many wiki policy violations (WP:NPOV and more) itself, some of which were reported by several of the articles floating around and are the likely reason for the wrong information, so thread carefully on that one)). So, keep extremely cautious to sift through the murky mud of misrepresentations around the case since it appears several news organizations have embellished things to create big WP:HEADLINEs on the heel of the bad press release from the Ed. Department, whose claims of what the agreement with UPenn actually entails appears to contain a lot of FUD. Raladic (talk) 03:07, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Raladic, Please self-revert your edits, we go by what reliable sources say, if you disagree with the community consensus that the Associated Press, The New York Times, Bloomberg News, ABC News, USA Today and CNN are WP:GREL, then you'll have to take that up at the RSN. Thanks. Isaidnoway (talk) 05:27, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
If we had a clear source from the NCAA saying the NCAA is not stripping her titles, I'd agree with Raladic that we'd go with that source over essentially any contradictory source. That's a clear WP:WSAW situation.
In the absence of an NCAA source like that, I agree with you that we need to go with what the news sources say even if it's likely incorrect. Loki (talk) 07:32, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The NCAA has yet to make a statement as to what their plans are. But what we do know is what the university agreed to with the government. They have updated their website and Thomas no longer holds any records, Penn Women's Swimming All-Time School Records by Event, she now has a footnote indicating she previously held the records when the eligibility rules were different. So the sources are not wrong in reporting what the agreement is the university has with the federal government. Isaidnoway (talk) 13:58, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah and the actual NY Times article, which I’ve used as the source (not the Athletic subsidiary you listed above) is a lot more clear on the facts:
It was not immediately clear whether the agreement would prompt the Trump administration to restore $175 million in research funding that it suspended in March. At the time, a White House social media account said the decision was because of Penn’s “policies forcing women to compete with men in sports,” but an official familiar with the decision said then that the funding cuts were not directly connected to the Education Department’s inquiry. with regards to the funding. As well as In his statement on Tuesday, Dr. Jameson said that Penn acknowledged “that some student-athletes were disadvantaged” by rules that had allowed Ms. Thomas to compete. He also said the university would “review and update the Penn women’s swimming records set during that season to indicate who would now hold the records under current eligibility guidelines.” which is in line with the UPenn announcement and based on the facts that that is exactly what they did - they updated their website, but still credited Thomas with setting those records under then guidelines, it appears that at this moment, The NY Times source is the only one that did some fact checking of cross validating the Ed. Department statement against that of UPenn and stated what actually happened, not just what the Ed. Department claimed.
So for the time being, let’s stick with the source that appears to have done fact checking instead of only having used the contradicting statement from the Ed. Dept. compared to UPenn’s statement and actions. As @LokiTheLiar referenced WP:WSAW - this is a A secondary source conflicts with a primary source, where there is no way for the former to know better than the latter. case, so since we have the one good source, we can stick to that for now and ignore the other bad ones that conflict with the UPenn primary source. UPenn has explicitly only stated they are updating their records which they did, they did not say that they are stripping titles - that appears to be a fabrication of the Ed. Dept. as of this time until further clarification arises. Raladic (talk) 16:38, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'll also note that while we don't generally consider Fox news reliable per WP:RSP, in this follow-up article even Gaines who is the reason for this case herself acknowledged that "While the Ivy League, the University of Pennsylvania will have to rescind [Thomas] records from their account and their record boards, the NCAA, as I understand it, does not have to. So, we will see what the NCAA does," Gaines said. Gaines doesn't expect the NCAA will amend those records willingly. in an interview she did following the announcement. Raladic (talk) 17:01, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Isaidnoway - You should also know that The Athletic, which you mistakenly above mis-attributed to the NYTimes above (Article) is a separately run entity, which replaced the sports Dept. at the NYTimes, and is published in the NYTimes website now, but has its own newsroom and follows its own editorial guidelines and appears in this case just did what some other sources did and only stated what the Ed. Dept. claimed without fact checking it against UPenn's statement and it shows since their article conflicts with the actual article published by the New York Times.
It appears ironically that someone tried to raise this at RSN last year and it hadn't made it into the RSP list as a separate entity (and I'm not saying they are generally wrong), but this case here does underscore that care should be taken not to mis-attribute it to NYTimes, but to The Athletic and them having a different editorial board. This might actually be a good case to re-raise the situation at RSN to list The Athletic as a separate line at RSP (still likely GREL) to point out that it's a different editorial entity still. Raladic (talk) 17:33, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Raladic - No, we will not ignore the other sources. The New York Times isn't the only media outlet reporting on this. CNN reported that a White House official confirmed to CNN it had restored the $175 million in frozen funding. The Philadelphia Inquired reported that Trump’s administration has restored $175 million in federal funding to the University of Pennsylvania, a Department of Education spokesperson confirmed Wednesday. We also have confirmation from USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, and Bloomberg News. So no, we will not ignore these reliable sources.
And the agreement UPenn reached with the federal government only affects Penn's own records, not Thomas’s victories in intercollegiate competitions — which Trump’s administration is separately trying to revoke. It also lets stand her record in the 400 yard relay race, since that was achieved and shared with three other women. So any individual records, awards, titles she achieved at UPenn have been retroactively stripped from Thomas. If you don't want to self-revert your edits, I will go ahead and update the article accordingly with the multiple reliable sources we have. Thanks. Isaidnoway (talk) 05:16, 5 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
You’re free to do what you believe is right, but I will caution you not to violate WP:NPOV - Avoid stating seriously contested assertions as facts.If different reliable sources make conflicting assertions about a matter, treat these assertions as opinions rather than facts, and do not present them as direct statements.
The article as it currently stands contains only those facts that are not conflicting. If you chose to add any conflicting ones, be sure to attribute them correctly as opinion statements of the Ed. Dept. in line with the policy.
You may also be interested to know that I contacted the Associsted Press Newsroom about some of the conflicting statements and they have since revised their article to attribute all those contested assertions to be qualified by ”the Education Department said” instead of being stated as facts and pulling in the statement from UPenn instead of previously only having relied on the Ed. Dept. statements, as well as reaching out to the NCAA for clarification on the matter of titles, but not getting a comment from them.
So maybe several sources that appeared based on the wording to have only relied on the Ed. Dept. statement without qualifying those statements may indeed be wrong as of right now, so I prefer to err on the side of caution and sticking to those sources and statements of facts that appear uncontested between the two parties as of right now since we have no WP:DEADLINE and do not need to rush.
But if you still feel compelled to add some of the contested details about the claimed funding release and titles, you have options outlined in WP:WSAW to attribute and explain them in the article. Raladic (talk) 07:14, 5 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
No need for the unwarranted caution. I am more than aware of our relevant policies and guidelines when adding and/or changing content to any article, especially BLPs, and using attribution where it is required, as it is not uncommon for editors to attribute statements originating from government officials, to those government officials, regardless of the administration in the White House.
It's also unclear why you keep on bringing up the NCAA when it has been stated multiple times in this discussion we do not have a statement from them. Thanks. Isaidnoway (talk) 07:50, 5 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I brought up the NCAA as you didn’t specify what you want me to revert. The two conflicting things we have between sources at the moment is whether funds were actually released and received by UPenn, and second, whether Thomas’s NCAA titles will be removed.
Also just preemptive apology that I didn’t mean to be facetious with pointing out the guidelines, I figured you’d know it, given your experience, but my brain just sometimes goes into overdrive (and personally sometimes I appreciate when someone links some policy or essay
that I haven’t fully imprinted into memory, so it’s hard to judge sometimes when I should or shouldn’t link and just generally tend to err on linking more than less) Anyways, sorry again if it came across facetiously, wasn’t intentional :)
I primarily just wanted to highlight that having seen the AP revise several statements in their article since the publishing and my contacting their newsroom, it does appear that several other sources did indeed not do their initial homework in this case, so it’s really more of a general caution that even reliable sources are not infallible sometimes, in case any other editors come across this conversation, since it could be hard to follow unless someone wants to go compare archived snapshots of what some of the sources said and then didn’t say/revised.
So if you just care about the funding release, I attributed the statement in the body, but please let me know if/what you’d like me to change, or go ahead and make the changes :) Raladic (talk) 08:10, 5 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the update. And there is no conflict between the sources on whether Thomas’s NCAA titles will be removed. All of the sources make it clear this was an agreement between the government and UPenn, not an agreement between the government and the NCAA. And besides, UPenn has no authority over the NCAA to tell them what to do with their records, and as of this comment, the NCAA still credits Lia Thomas.
And what I originally added to the article, came from the Associated Press. You can also find similar language in USA Today, and ABC News, plus multiple other sources. If you want to attribute that to the Education Department, I'm fine with that, or in the alternative, we can also just say they updated the women’s swimming records set during that season to indicate the female athletes who would now hold those records under the current eligibility guidelines. It's a primary source from UPenn, but it also aligns with what the other sources are saying as well, without using the terms "Division I" or "awards and titles", which seem to be the terms you find objectionable that came from the government. Thanks. Isaidnoway (talk) 14:15, 5 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, what you added came from the AP, but they have since revised the paragrah of the statement to be qualified with "the Education Department said." since it's contradicted by UPenn's own announcement, which only states the records update as you also just referenced - this information is already in the article in the paragraph:
Following the announcement of the agreement, the university updated the swimming records under the current eligibility guidelines and adding an italicized footnote to the bottom of their records pages: "Competing under eligibility rules in effect at the time, Lia Thomas set program records in the 100, 200 and 500 freestyle during the 2021-22 season.", which is more or less the wording without reference to any awards or titles - do you feel any more needs to be added? Feel free to just reword that sentence directly, I think we're on the same page now. Raladic (talk) 20:36, 5 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
No, they didn't revise that paragraph with "the Education Department said", because I archived the article at the time it was published. Here is the original paragraph Under the agreement, Penn agreed to restore all individual Division I swimming records and titles to female athletes who lost out to Thomas, the Education Department said. Penn also agreed to send a personalized apology letter to each of those swimmers. and here is the revised paragraph Under the agreement, Penn agreed to restore all individual Division I records and titles to female athletes who lost to Thomas and send a personalized apology letter to each of those swimmers, the Education Department said. So all they did was combine the two separate sentences into one paragraph.
And quite frankly, this whole thing should be summarized to the most important points, and use the reliable sources in the way they summarized it, like this: In March 2025, the Trump administration stripped away $175 million dollars of federal funding from UPenn over their allowing Thomas to swim as a woman, accounting for 17.5% of the university's total federal funding. In July 2025, it was reported that UPenn entered into an agreement with the Education Department to bar transgender athletes from competing on female sports teams, and according to the department, they also agreed to restore all individual Division I records and titles to female athletes who lost to Thomas, and send a personalized apology letter to each of those swimmers. Following the agreement, the government released the $175 million dollars of federal funding they withheld to UPenn according to a White House official speaking to CNN. Because in my opinion, all the details and extra verbiage you added, along with the unnecessary blockquotes, places undue emphasis on this whole thing in her BLP, which in my view, makes it seem like she bears some sort of responsibility for this investigation being launched in the first place, when she is the one person who is totally without any fault whatsoever in this debacle. If necessary, we can add a note with a ref to the statement put out by the university. Isaidnoway (talk) 04:47, 6 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Women's swim team records

I notice that Lia Thomas' records in the 1000m and 1650m have since been broken. Should these two 'records' be removed from the table as they are no longer record? (I added the up-to-date records so it is easy to check) Slàinte mhath a chàirdean (talk) 23:17, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

No, they should say in parentheses (surpassed in 202X) Snokalok (talk) 23:42, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
No, they were still the records at the time (2021-2022 season) and set by Thomas. That fact can't change, except by time machine. Even the Women's Swimming Top Times - University of Pennsylvania Athletics still credits Thomas with those records when you go to the 2021-2022 season (in addition to the countless other RS articles that did so at the time, and the source of tracking that Penn's website relies on - Zippy Invite - 1650 Free Women).
So per @Snokalok - we can add a note that they have since been surpassed by another athlete in following seasons. Raladic (talk) 00:02, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Inappropriate editorializing

Hi @Slàinte mhath a chàirdean - you acknowledged the reversion of a MOS:EDITORIAL edit, but made two more such editorial changes shortly after the reversion of the initial one and have yet not reverted the changes.

In the first one, you changed the sentence from the preferred (MOS:SAID) almost always neutral and acceptable word "wrote" to the only sometimes/usually acceptable word "stated" as well as restructuring the sentence, which makes the sentence read as if what the Washington Post wrote is somehow contested (which is why the word "stated" is not always acceptable as it can be used in precisely such constructs as your changed sentence, which is one such cases where "stated" as used is not acceptable as it editorializes the language due to the sentence restructuring you made and can make what we're writing appear as if something is questionable/contested.

Then in the second change you changed a sentence from "sixteen anonymous members of the University of Pennsylvania women's swimming team sent a letter to the university and Ivy League officials" by prepending "Nancy Hogshead-Makar, on behalf of" - this changes the sentence to read as if the person penned/wrote the letter, which appears factually incorrect based on the reporting of one of the two inline sources for that sentence, which clarified with her that she merely sent/posted the letter - "She said in a telephone interview that she sent the letter on the swimmers’ behalf so they could avoid retaliation; in the letter, the swimmers claim they were told “we would be removed from the team or that we would never get a job offer” if they spoke out against Thomas’s inclusion in women’s competition." - so you have twisted our summary by adding a detail that isn't particularly pertinent here (most readers generally don't care who puts a postage stamp on a letter or who throws it in a mailbox) and it was therefore omitted in line with WP:TERSE as superfluous. Since you left out the detail that she merely sent/posted the letter (which isn't relevant/due, since it's of little encyclopedic value since we don't write in WP:NEWSSTYLE. If it wasn't for the fact that she's a celebrity, but instead say the athletes just asked a random person off the street to send the letter instead, the news wouldn't even have mentioned it), you editorialized it and readers are misled to believe that Hogshead-Makar wrote the letter, when she merely put it in a mailbox on it as the letter was written by the teammates, as is clear from other [16 Penn swimmers issue letter in support of new transgender athlete rules sources that appropriately stated that the swimmers issued the letter and contains the actual content of the letter, which shows it was penned by the anonymous athletes.

I recommend you self-revert these changes and take a few moments to familiarize yourself with our WP:MOS if you wish to make very tight wording changes and take a step back for now from making any further such editorial changes without great care to ensure that they do not change the meaning of our WP:SUMMARY of sources. Raladic (talk) 04:18, 19 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

My apologies that I have just discovered this comment now - I read the comments we exchanged privately but was unaware of your detailed comments here.
However, I am confused since the CNN source states,
"A letter written on behalf of 16 members of the University of Pennsylvania’s swim team was sent to the university and the Ivy League on Thursday asking that they not pursue legal action to challenge the NCAA’s new transgender athlete participation policies.
The letter was written by Nancy Hogshead-Makar, CEO of Champion Women and an Olympic champion in swimming, on behalf of 16 members of swim team."
I did not believe that the above is contracted by "that she sent the letter" as is mentioned in the other source. That was why I didn't delete my addition of the information and why i still believe it is worthy of inclusion. Regards Slàinte mhath a chàirdean (talk) 22:42, 20 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
CNN didn’t check with her and just made a mistake misstating she wrote it, it happens. That’s why we cross reference sources and if one source gets a minor detail wrong, we usually just quietly ignore it. The Washington Post however, did fact-check explicitly with Hogshead-Makar as quoted above, as well as the contents of the letter that are clearly written by the athletes from their voice. The NBC source also supports this notion and you’ll find that all 3 sources say the letter was from the 16 athletes in their headlines. So the involvement from Hogsheads-Makar is immaterial to the case, as someone trying to catch some free publicity as commonly seen by people that have dropped out of the public spotlight and Wikipedia isn’t in the celebrity spotlight business, and we’d then also have to add another sentence that the only reason for her sending it was the claim by the athletes that they were told they’d be removed from the team if they spoke out against her inclusion, and that is just more words that are not quite due for a summary of the high-level information on this BLP article (it may be due if this was an article that only focuses on the case itself). What is relevant in summary is, that the letter from the 16 athletes was actually in response to the preceding letter sent by another group of athletes two days prior that explicitly voiced their support (The letter from 16 of Thomas’ teammates followed another letter released Tuesday in which several other teammates said they supported Thomas’ inclusion. as reported by NBC), but our article currently has the order wrong, so I’ll go correct that. You’ll notice we also don’t mention who sent the letter of support from her teammates that preceded this one as again, it would be immaterial since it’s a letter by the teammates, which is the material information.
The only one where there’s a mention of a person, is the later open letter that was publicly organized by the person/organization that wrote the open letter and which was then co-signed by 300 athletes thereafter since in that one we have two material facts, the organizer/author, and the signees. Raladic (talk) 00:14, 21 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Raladic (talk), Regards Slàinte mhath a chàirdean (talk) 22:12, 30 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
allikas: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Lia_Thomas