Transgender athletes (and related stuff)

[landsurfer]

It's only a matter of time before men start cycling in tight revealing outfits.
The Alpaca Jacket will have to be left in the wardrobe.

Love your approach.
But.
Cycling takes place by Male and Female events.
Not your choice, not mine, but the world governing bodies choice.

Reality, now ... reality.

While we allow men to pretend to be women to win women's events ... then Cycling, not individuals, should be ashamed of themselves /ourselves.

[Ben@Forest]

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.

Women's events exist so they have a chance of competing and winning on a more equal footing. Having universal entry to events would mean almost no women would ever have won or got onto the podium at any Olympic event ever. The only exceptions are archery and dressage. Women compete with greater parity on ultra distance events but these aren't in the Olympics.

[Cugel]

(snip)
Love your approach.
But.
Cycling takes place by Male and Female events.
Not your choice, not mine, but the world governing bodies choice.

Reality, now ... reality.

While we allow men to pretend to be women to win women's events ... then Cycling, not individuals, should be ashamed of themselves /ourselves.

Amateur men and women do race together in Blighty and often have .....

Here is a race in Lancaster last summer. Three ladies started and two finished, one in the bunch. This was a Cat 1-2-3 race, as I remember.

One local racer is transgender (man to woman) and takes part in local races. She is very fit and once a national running champion but doesn't win races or even place. Why would you want her to be denied the pleasure and opportunity of racing?

Cugel

[thelawnet]

One local racer is transgender (man to woman) and takes part in local races. She is very fit and once a national running champion but doesn't win races or even place. Why would you want her to be denied the pleasure and opportunity of racing?

Who wants to deny what? I have long hair. If I entered the women's races I'd lose. I'd also lose if I raced against 16 year olds.

That doesn't mean if the rules exclude me that I'm being denied anything.

I'm not sure particularly what the UK rules are at non-elite level, but the US rules say you can just say 'I am a woman' three times, like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz, and you are magically eligible: https://www.usacycling.org/about-us/gov ... tes-policy

This is rather silly, as the point of male vs female categories is not based on some sort of ethereal 'gender identity' or the transubstantiation of souls or whatever else, it's based on concrete performance differences - around 10% for most speed-based sports, but as much as 35% for weightlifting. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3761733/

[pwa]

The fact that some women born as female will beat some women born as male does not mean that being born as male is not an advantage. It is just not a sufficient advantage to overcome the fact you are mediocre if you meet a very good female in competition.

This is not about what you choose to be in life. It is about the things in your body you are unable to change, that were assigned to you by nature, chance or whatever you call it, at birth. Traditionally we have recognised that half our population has a disadvantage in athletic sports versus the other half due to being born female and requires separate competition for that reason. So that those born female can win. If that is threatened, it is a serious matter. Not least for the male born females who will face hostility from co-competitors and supporters who see smaller female born athletes beaten by unusually large male looking females. It could get nasty.

I wish I could see a logical and fair way through this that would not ruin sport for female born athletes, because I do recognise that those who change gender do not usually do it lightly. And I want them to feel good about themselves. I just don't see a practical way to integrate them into competitive sport.

[Mick F]

Women's events exist so they have a chance of competing and winning on a more equal footing.

I understand that of course.

My point is that a woman's event is "second class" when it comes to sports because sports are and have always been adult male orientated. That's the way they were invented.

Women are better than men in certain things and activities. Do we ban men from them or do we allow all genders to participate?

[landsurfer]

Not least for the male born females who will face hostility from co-competitors and supporters who see smaller female born athletes beaten by unusually large male looking females. It could get nasty.

As long as we work to accommodate those who have been born with physical abnormalities that make their sex indeterminate or confused then all will be fair in the end.
I honestly believe that we should stop anyone that decides to "identify" as a different sex from competing in categories they patently are not qualified for.
If a man decides to have his Penis and testes removed he is still a man.
If a man decides to identify as a woman to humiliate others and push their own quasi - political agenda in sport they should be stopped.
https://twitter.com/noanodyne/status/663095095663550464


My own painful experience of the trauma involved through a direct family members travel along this road colours my judgement on this issue i'm afraid.

[Ben@Forest]

My point is that a woman's event is "second class" when it comes to sports because sports are and have always been adult male orientated. That's the way they were invented.

Women are better than men in certain things and activities. Do we ban men from them or do we allow all genders to participate?

Sports were generally set up and played by men, but l don't see that is what gives any intrinsic advantage. What gives the advantage is strength or stamina or height or weight.

And for the second part in which activities do women excel that could be a sport? Women may or may not be better at multi-tasking (such an old trope that it's taken as a given) but that is not a sport people will watch. Unless you count pentathlon and heptathlon?

[Cyril Haearn]

Wimbledon pays ladies and laddies the same prize money
But laddies make more from sponsorship, Minus One

What has €lit€ $port got to do with the price of fish?

[[XAP]Bob]

Not least for the male born females who will face hostility from co-competitors and supporters who see smaller female born athletes beaten by unusually large male looking females.

We already do have a situation where most speed/strength events are won by ‘non feminine’ physique, but actually we have that in men’s sport as well. Physique is one thing that is an advantage in competitive sports - different physiques for different sports, but it’s not as if John Regis was a ‘normally proportioned’ guy.

There is a difference between the female with naturally high levels of testosterone and the male who has had reassignment surgery. I believe the difference is more than a number measured over six months as well...

[Ben@Forest]

Wimbledon pays ladies and laddies the same prize money
But laddies make more from sponsorship, Minus One

What has €lit€ $port got to do with the price of fish?

It's a free market economy. Many people grumble that (some) football players earn too much but they get paid that much because people will pay for the TV subscription or the £70 replica shirt. People want to identify with success.

I live in the NE but l see more young boys wearing a Chelsea or Man U shirt than Newcastle or Sunderland, let alone Darlington or Hartlepool. And if women's football became as popular and well paid as their male counterparts would they mind or be any more charitable or altruistic? No.

I'm not saying l like it, but live with the facts.

[Vorpal]

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)

Did you actually read the article? Many of the women discussed as having hyperandrogenism were born biological women. Dutee Chand won a law suit and the right to compete in olympics on that basis.

If you want it made more clear, although the average testosterone produced by men and women is very different, as is the range, there is considerable overlap in the distribution for a population, if it is large.

https://academic.oup.com/jes/article/1/1/14/2890811

[Cugel]

My point is that a woman's event is "second class" when it comes to sports because sports are and have always been adult male orientated. That's the way they were invented.

Women are better than men in certain things and activities. Do we ban men from them or do we allow all genders to participate?

Sports were generally set up and played by men, but l don't see that is what gives any intrinsic advantage. What gives the advantage is strength or stamina or height or weight.

And for the second part in which activities do women excel that could be a sport? Women may or may not be better at multi-tasking (such an old trope that it's taken as a given) but that is not a sport people will watch. Unless you count pentathlon and heptathlon?

I'll just repeat the obvious that if every and anyone is allowed to compete in any sort of sporting event, the best at the sport will gradually emerge through the hierarchy of eliminating events, until one is left with top-level competitions in which only the elite can take part.

If the elite happens to contain men, women, young, old and people of many other classifications such as tall, short, thin, bulky, red-haired, white-haired etcetera, what does that matter?

Perhaps some sports will, even with full opportunity for all types of competitors, see mostly men or women win high places; mostly young or old see high places; mostly people with long eyelashes or short win high places. This will be due to genuine differences rather than those imagined by avid stereotypists. Perhaps these predominances will change over time as cultural mechanisms stop suppressing one class or another; or canalising them into mindsets in which they believe "I cannot be best because I am a tall woman with short eyelashes"?

The "transgender woman in a woman's event" issue is really a cultural issue; an issue of stereotyping; an issue of hoary old traditions past their sell-by date by some decades. Personally I've always liked the notion of The Open Society. This means: no closures for non-reasons once dreamt up by an uptight Victorian or even a C17th Puritan.

Cugel

[Vorpal]

The "transgender woman in a woman's event" issue is really a cultural issue; an issue of stereotyping; an issue of hoary old traditions past their sell-by date by some decades. Personally I've always liked the notion of The Open Society. This means: no closures for non-reasons once dreamt up by an uptight Victorian or even a C17th Puritan.

We also need to dispense with some of our ides about masculine and feminine and just let people be people.

[landsurfer]

We also need to dispense with some of our ides about masculine and feminine and just let people be people.

You mean ignore instead of dispense. I'm a man, born that way. You have no right to call me "People" !