"This nasty piece of work" - Martina Navratilova furious at a trans broadcaster being nominated for Woman of the Year award

Former World No. 1 Martina Navratilova recently expressed her outrage at transgender broadcaster India Willoughby being nominated for the 2023 Woman of the Year award.

Willoughby, Great Britain's first transgender national newsreader, made history by becoming the first trans Woman of the Year nominee, as per The London Economic. A panel of all-cis women nominated her for the coveted accolade.

In fact, the 58-year-old TV personality received a death threat from the neo-Nazi group, National Action, in May, forcing her to keep her nomination hidden until now.

Martina Navratilova vented her rage on X (formerly Twitter). She reposted a video in which India Willoughby, formerly known as Jonathan, bragged about obtaining a 'designer vagina' that she chose from a catalog, much like 'going for a haircut', and wrote:

"This nasty piece of work gets nominated for Adult Human Female of the year? Good to know."

The 18-time Grand Slam champion then shared another post in which a user compiled a collection of India Willoughby's controversial comments about anti-trans rights activists and wrote:

"Wow- quite the role model , this nasty India. Not anyone I would ever want to hang out with, to say the least."

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Martina Navratilova revealed how she was accused of being transphobic

Martina Navratilova pictured at the Internazionali BNL D'Italia 2023

As a human rights activist, Martina Navratilova has always been outspoken. Similarly, she was vocal about controversial transgender swimmer Lia Thomas dominating the women's division.

The American felt it was unfair due to concerns that transgender females possess physical advantages over biological females, a notion supported by scientific research.

She even criticized the USTA for its position on transgender athletes competing in women's tennis tournaments after transgender tennis star Alicia Rowley won the USTA Grass Court Championships and the indoor singles and doubles events at the USTA National Championships, winning the coveted 'Golden Ball'.

These protests, though, came at a cost, as evidenced by Martina Navratilova's first-person essay for Genspect. She began by saying that she chose tennis because it's a sport that is fair to both men and women. That in 2018, fairness was all she had in mind when she posted a controversial tweet.

"Fairness has always been important to me. In fact, the reason I chose tennis—besides the fact that my family played it—is that it’s a fair sport. The ball is either in, or it’s out," Martina Navratilova wrote.

"Fairness was on my mind in 2018 when I inadvertently got swept up in the trans-athletes-in-women’s-sports maelstrom with this tweet: 'Clearly that can’t be right. You can’t just proclaim yourself a female and be able to compete against women,'" she added.

The American revealed she was then viciously attacked on X, prompting her to delete the post. Since then, she has been conducting research on trans athletes, consulting with scientists and enriching her knowledge.

"I got attacked like crazy on Twitter. Wanting to be open-minded and respectful, I took the tweet down and promised to educate myself, and for the past five years, I’ve been doing that," Martina Navratilova wrote.

"I’ve been reading about testosterone. I’ve been talking with scientists. I’ve been listening to female athletes and trans athletes, young and old. And I’ve learned a lot," she added.