Transgender athletes (and related stuff)

[kwackers]

Some activities, such as motor racing or flying a jet fighter should actually favour females because having a large, heavy body could be a disadvantage. A smaller, lighter operative has a theoretical advantage. Less mass, potentially smaller space needed to accommodate them. Is it culture that keeps these male dominated, or is it a testosterone thing?

Svetlana Kapanina - FF to about 17 mins in.
She's definitely got bigger balls than me.

[youtube]aQONtYjDlMw[/youtube]

[Cugel]

Why do we separate competitions based on gender but not body-type or other genetic conditions and states? Is it fair to allow big muscley blokes to play rugby against skinny wee blokes? Of course it is. Therefore it must be fair to allow skinny wee women to play against both of them. After all, there are many skills and abilities besides brute strength.

Team sports seem to be to be one area where it wouldn't matter if there were female players. If they're good enough then why not offer them a contract? Would it matter if Man Utd fielded a female player? I don't see why it should.
If only the occasional woman made the grade then I don't think that's an issue although I'd question why if they were good enough to compete with pro-males they wouldn't want to be apex athletes in the female ranks.

OTOH, if you made individual track events mixed then from the brief research I've done you wouldn't have had a single woman in the lineup since the year dot and I'm pretty sure nobody actually wants that.

So imo, segregation for *some* sports is here to stay. I don't want to see sports where women can't compete.
I also don't want to see women's sports where the majority of participants are ex-men (and I appreciate how discriminatory that sounds).
At the moment it's not an issue and fingers crossed it'll never become one.

Thinking about it a bit more, I'd be happy with positive discrimination. Allow any male sport to be potentially open to any gender - if a particular woman can rank with the men then why not allow her to participate?
But women only versions of a sport should exclude men to prevent the mediocre athletes chancing their arm...

Many of the less obsessional "there must be winners and losers" sports do in fact have mixed gender events. The results are segregated into "first senior man", first junior woman" etc.. It little matters who was first over the finish line. .... Although there are frequently cases where it's a young woman rather than a middle-aged bloke; or an old bloke rather than a young one.

The problem with sport is the obsession with winners. Why not conduct sport along the old-fashioned lines of: "It's not whether you win or lose but how you play the game"?

When I raced a bike 90% of us knew we'd win very rarely if ever. Being a potential winner was not our motivation. Rather it was the taking part and all the joys that brought. If I got a 2nd or a 3rd I was very pleased with myself. I was always happy to finish in the bunch. A race in which I got dropped but finished nevertheless felt like an achievement.

What is sport for? One sometimes feels that the winner-loser type held in front of a horde of non-participants is merely a device for organising then milking those easily herded into a tribe of fans willing to spend loadsamoney just to "belong" to something successful. Stuff that. I'd rather be a competent participant, however lowly my placings.

Cugel

[Vorpal]

I don't see any problem with still having some teams, leagues, or sports offering the opportunity for women to compete solely against women, but then, there will always be a problem of how to define who may participate.

But at least if elite sports donb't exclude people based upon gender, we don't have a problem.

We have excluded some people simply because their bodies don't conform to expectations. They have indeterminate gender or meet all criteria for a gender, but naturally produce 'excessive' levels of testosterone, or another natural substance for which athletes are tested.

https://www.theverge.com/2015/5/22/8644 ... c-intersex

Again I believe people are being misleading or are misinformed.

Testosterone is produced in small quantities in the ovaries & adrenal glands, and in large quantities in the testes.

Those athletes who have so-called excessive levels of testosterone have testicles. Their levels of testosterone are only 'excessive' in comparison to people without testes. When considered in comparison with people without testes they are perfectly normal.

I find it quite remarkable that with all the reporting about this stuff there is no mention of the simple fact that you only get healthy male testosterone levels from possessing testes (or taking steroids). No way around that, yet it's rarely if ever spelled out.

Except that it isn't correct. Some women naturally produce higher levels of testosterone, and there is ample scientific evidence.

If you prefer something less journalistic, here is a fairly neutral summary of numerous studies... https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5570685/

[landsurfer]

Still doesn't change the fact that McKinnon is a man and a cheat.

https://twitter.com/noanodyne/status/663095095663550464

[thelawnet]

Again I believe people are being misleading or are misinformed.

Testosterone is produced in small quantities in the ovaries & adrenal glands, and in large quantities in the testes.

Those athletes who have so-called excessive levels of testosterone have testicles. Their levels of testosterone are only 'excessive' in comparison to people without testes. When considered in comparison with people without testes they are perfectly normal.

I find it quite remarkable that with all the reporting about this stuff there is no mention of the simple fact that you only get healthy male testosterone levels from possessing testes (or taking steroids). No way around that, yet it's rarely if ever spelled out.

Except that it isn't correct. Some women naturally produce higher levels of testosterone, and there is ample scientific evidence.

If you prefer something less journalistic, here is a fairly neutral summary of numerous studies... https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5570685/

Naturally from their testes. Call them women if you like, but the 'naturally high level of testosterone' is being produced by testes.

Read your own link

"Maria Patino ... was born with a Y chromosome, leading to the development of testes"

The rest of the article talks about 'hyperandrogenism' without spelling out the biological cause which can ONLY be from testes. The fact that it is natural or whatever is hardly the point.

(Some women without testes have higher than normal female testosterone levels (PCOS) due to obesity, ovarian cysts, etc., but it is far below the normal male range and is a red herring in this context)

[landsurfer]

I suspect that many of the regular posters on here will be scared to post on this issue ... which is so frightening in itself ... the fear of putting your head above the parapet ... is the end of freedom ...

[Mick F]

To cut the Gordian Knot of this "problem" ..... why not allow anyone to compete with anyone else and see who wins?

No knotty issue as far as I'm concerned.
Competition is competition. If you're the best at something, you're the best. Gender or size or build or race or age, if you are the best, you are the best.

[landsurfer]

To cut the Gordian Knot of this "problem" ..... why not allow anyone to compete with anyone else and see who wins?

No knotty issue as far as I'm concerned.
Competition is competition. If you're the best at something, you're the best. Gender or size or build or race or age, if you are the best, you are the best.

So your comfortable with Men deliberately entering Women's events to win and humiliate the female participants .... ?
McKinnon is a "Trans activist" ... yet a man.
Similar then to the "Activist" that deliberately entered a bakers in Belfast to publicise his agenda to the christians owners...
Back to my original post on this, there anyone out there apart from myself that see's the danger to Women's rights deliberately enacted by this man and his cadre ...

[Mick F]

So your comfortable with Men deliberately entering Women's events to win and humiliate the female participants .... ?

No.
Not at all.

No humiliation in the slightest.
If you can do something well, does it matter what gender you are?

[landsurfer]

No.
Not at all.

No humiliation in the slightest.
If you can do something well, does it matter what gender you are?

If you Mick, deliberately entered Women's events in order to win, that can only be about power.
McKinnon only enters Women's events to pursue his agenda ...
Would you Mick ?
How would your wife feel about you deliberately entering womans events in order to win ?

[Mick F]

I'm saying that we need an age division maybe?
What about a youth or children division?
Adult as well of course.

Sex and equality?
Sexism?

Does it matter what sex or gender or whatever you are?
Why have sexism in sport?

[Mick F]

Back to my point up thread.
Why do women wear revealing bikinis to run on athletic tracks and men wear shorts and a vest?

Why have sexism in sport?

[landsurfer]

I'm saying that we need an age division maybe?
What about a youth or children division?
Adult as well of course.

Sex and equality?
Sexism?

Does it matter what sex or gender or whatever you are?
Why have sexism in sport?

Actually agree .. in principle ... but how would that help the 40+ woman class if all the 40+ men entered it ....
Or if the 40+ woman was stripped of her title after a faster, but a long way down the list male decided he was female that day ????

This is beyond sport I'm afraid .... this is about a tiny % of society using fear to stamp their version of reality on the rest of us ... We stand up to this or lose our rights ... The threat of being Transphobic is being used to control and deny Women a platform to talk in our universities already ....

[landsurfer]

Why do women wear revealing bikinis to run on athletic tracks and men wear shorts and a vest?

Do they ? Or do they just wear whats comfortable for their different shaped bodies with different masses in different positions .....

Its a short distance to blaming girls for wearing short skirts ... and deserving what happens to them ....

[Mick F]

I doubt very much that a woman in a tight revealing outfit is better suited to running than a man in a tight revealing outfit.

If a person can run a mile in under four minutes, does it matter what gender or anything that person is?
Does it matter if the TDF winner is a woman?
Does it matter if the snooker world champion is a child?

It matters not.
If you are the best, you are the best.