Media celebrates ‘female’ math prodigy, 17, by hiding that she is actually a boy

A teenage math prodigy stunned the mathematical world with an analysis, but reports praising the student seemed to be downplaying an important fact.

The teen, Hannah Cairo, reportedly solved a “40-year-old math mystery about how functions behave, called the Mizohata-Takeuchi conjecture,” according to Scientific American.

But, as author Wesley Yang noted in a thread on X, “The media celebrated a 17-year old female mathematical prodigy while actively suppressing the fact in the initial report that the girl is actually a boy.”

The media celebrated a 17-year old female mathematical prodigy while actively suppressing the fact in the initial report that the girl is actually a boy. It’s not hard to do the intersectional math and figure out why the story wasn’t framed as a triumph of “transgender…

— Wesley Yang (@wesyang) August 6, 2025

“It’s not hard to do the intersectional math and figure out why the story wasn’t framed as a triumph of ‘transgender inclusion.’ A weird confluence of different interests at play, among them the fact that 1.) a contagion of trans-identification is ripping through the male nerd population and 2.) STEM and tech are ‘solving’ their gender problems with a burgeoning new cohort of these male nerds who ‘identify’ as a women,” Yang wrote.

Amid the left’s insistence that men should be allowed to participate in women’s sports and the general confusion about what a woman actually is, Cairo’s mathematical accomplishment and the media’s framing of the story raised plenty of eyebrows.

As a child, Hannah Cairo learned math by taking online lessons from Khan Academy. By the time she was 14, she had taught herself the equivalent of an advanced undergraduate math degree. https://t.co/gTOeUIa9cZ pic.twitter.com/ur1c7RETs6

— Quanta Magazine (@QuantaMagazine) August 3, 2025

“Cairo grew up in Nassau, the Bahamas, where her parents had moved so that her dad could take a job as a software developer. She and her two brothers — one three years older, the other eight years younger — were all homeschooled. Cairo started learning math using Khan Academy’s online lessons, and she quickly advanced through its standard curriculum. By the time she was 11 years old, she’d finished calculus,” the magazine reported.

https://t.co/gZdp9qyor9
*sigh*
Still an incredible accomplishment for a high schooler, but Cairo is not a female. https://t.co/fklb1KUMcf pic.twitter.com/OXnnQCpXyC

— Margo (@is_a_woman) August 5, 2025

Yang continued to highlight the left’s self-inflicted confusion over how to relate to Cairo’s story.

1.) We want there to be an inspiring female math prodigy
2.) We have one! But he’s a boy.
3.) But trans girls are girls, right? No?
4.) No they aren’t.
5.) OK, just leave it out.

— Wesley Yang (@wesyang) August 6, 2025

“Do trans folx want to be recognized as trans or do they want to disappear into their new identification? This is an old tension within the category that was long ago resolved in the 2000’s in favor of hulking men with beards being able to use the ladies room if they say they are women,” Yang wrote in another post.

I referred to the original article but apparently there were at least three that left out the key detail of the “female” mathematical prodigy’s actual sex: https://t.co/hOqzzXxvoj

— Wesley Yang (@wesyang) August 6, 2025

Social media users also noted the problems with the narrative.

The situation is very simple: When you say “girl doing math”, everyone will be “awwww, that’s so cute”. If you say “cross-dressing boy”, everyone will think “omg, pervert”.

The “I’m just autistic and fragile” narrative didn’t stick. This is why now the norm is hiding.

— Greg (@GregNotSure) August 6, 2025

Just read the Scientific American article. They mention he’s only at the end of the biography section, below being born in the Bahamas and moving to America at age 16. Speaking of which, this is a person born to immense privilege.

— Chris (@chriswithans) August 6, 2025

It would be interesting to hear from author @KSHartnett but my suspicion is Cairo didn’t want to go on record as trans, was later willing to do so for SA, and the author decided his piece was about math anyway so why violate his subject’s request? Not that I don’t understand the…

— David Josef Volodzko (@davidvolodzko) August 7, 2025

Oh FFS.

— Me (@Naeluckmate) August 6, 2025

We’re at the point where I assume any article celebrating the intellectual, innovative achievement of a girl/woman is actually about a man.

— NoPlanRush (@GSmiley247) August 6, 2025

Senior Staff Writer
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Originally from New York, Powers graduated from New York University and eventually made her way to sunny South Florida where she has been writing for the BizPacReview team since 2015.

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