Jen Sey says Valkyries fans hoped she would die after wearing an XX-XY shirt at WNBA Finals Game 1 in San Francisco.
XX-XY Athletics founder Jennifer Sey went to Chase Center with three San Francisco friends for Game 1 of the WNBA Finals. They wore shirts affirming biological sex. What started as a friendly night turned into finger-flipping, death wishes, and a security escort out of the building for their own safety.
OutKick reported Sey’s account of the night, including videos she later posted on X. Arena security told the group the shirts did not break the Fan Code of Conduct. Fans still treated the shirts as a provocation worth a death wish.
Sey lived in San Francisco for about thirty years. She thought a homecoming game with local friends would be fun. At first, it was.
“At first it was fine. We were very friendly with our seat mates,” Sey said.
That changed as the game went on. A woman across the aisle, short haircut, glasses, mask on her chin, pointed at the group, gave them the finger, and filmed them. Sey said the woman appeared to believe the shirts alone could get them thrown out.
"There was a woman across the aisle, who was pointing at us aggressively, giving us the finger. She was clearly filming us,"
Security soon arrived and told Sey’s group to come with them. As they walked up the stairs, the hostility got louder and closer.
"As we were walking up the stairs, everybody was giving us the finger, telling us that they hoped that we'd die, and that we're horrible, disgusting people,"
Sey said fans got in their faces. Near the top of the stairs, dozens waved and called “Bye!” One woman added, “Bye! I'm sorry you don't understand.” Another told them to “Go f*** yourself.” A male fan called Sey “a horrible human being.” One fan told her to “eat my a** after you s***. You're disgusting,” tried to knock her phone, flipped her off, and told her to “f*** kill yourself.”
In the security conversation, the guard sounded unsure what rule had been broken. Sey described him as confounded. The complaint, he said, was that the group was “instigating” or “antagonizing them with your shirts.”
Security affirmed the XX-XY shirts did not violate the Fan Code of Conduct. Officials asked the group not to hold the shirts up or point them toward other fans, then escorted them back to their seats. After the game, security offered, and provided, an escort out of the building because Valkyries fans had grown so hostile.
One of Sey’s friends put the absurdity plainly: “It's unbelievable. All we're doing is wearing shirts, supporting girls.”
Online posts later showed the woman who had filmed Sey’s group holding a “Trans Lives Matter” sign. She and a female companion were themselves escorted from their seats after another fan complained about their confrontation with Sey’s group. A separate female fan held an upside-down pro-trans sign reading, “We are stronger when we play together.”
The Chase Center episode fits a longer pattern. Earlier this season, a mother and daughter wearing XX-XY shirts courtside at State Farm Arena during an Atlanta Dream, Indiana Fever game were told to cover the shirts or leave. League and team officials later admitted the call was wrong.
Just the News reported that a WNBA spokesperson said, “This should not have happened.” The Atlanta Dream added that WNBA security “took actions that fell short” of a safe and inclusive environment. Sophie Cunningham had already appeared publicly with Sey and Riley Gaines in support of female-only sports.
In Seattle, two teenage girls in XX-XY shirts at a Storm, Fever game were verbally attacked by a Storm co-owner. That co-owner was eventually fined and suspended. In Chicago, Enes Kanter Freedom was escorted out after wearing a shirt defining “woman” as an adult human female and cheering Cunningham, following an aggressive approach by Natasha Cloud. Arena staff in multiple cities ordered XX-XY shirts and thank-you signs for Cunningham covered or removed while pro-trans messages stayed up.
The New York Post detailed that pattern and carried Sey’s own line on the league’s posture: the WNBA will not define the W in its own name, and will silence, eject, revise, and cover up anyone who does. Sey has also noted that roughly 73% of Americans do not want males competing in female sports.
Golden State star Gabby Williams, whose Game 1 action drew photo coverage from the night, had already staked out a different position earlier in the season after Cunningham’s comments on trans athletes.
"I would welcome a trans athlete on my team or against my team any time. I don’t think it’s a problem in the world. It’s just another way to attack trans people."
Sey’s group wore the opposite claim, XX and XY as the basis of women’s categories, and met death wishes for it inside the same franchise’s building. No injuries, arrests, or league discipline against the hostile fans appear in the available account. Security’s remedy was to move the shirt-wearers, warn them not to display the shirts too boldly, and walk them out after the final horn.
Friday night, before the Finals tipped, supporters outside an Indiana Fever game in Portland met counterprotesters. The pressure on people who say women are female has not been limited to one arena or one weekend.
Women’s sports activists showed up to watch a championship game in shirts that state a basic biological fact. They left under escort while fans told them they hoped they would die. A league that cannot protect that speech, and keeps treating it as the problem, has already picked a side.
