The root problem is the money (scholarships) in sports. Families invest a ton of time and money in the hope that little Jackie and Janie can win a full ride athletic scholarship. Title IX has been...
The root problem is the money (scholarships) in sports. Families invest a ton of time and money in the hope that little Jackie and Janie can win a full ride athletic scholarship. Title IX has been pretty effective at ensuring that as many women as men get scholarships. Men choosing to play women's sports threatens that balance. Ideally, we'd remove college athletic scholarships to eliminate that incentive. Then who wants to play on what team would carry a lot less repercussions. However, there's too much money in college sports for that to ever be a viable solution. So, morals aside, how do you ensure equitable access to college athletic scholarships by gender under Title IX, while recognizing a person's gender identity?
I think it's important to assume the best of people, and I think @bobby_tables is not lumping all trans athletes in as "men pretending to be women". I think a common bogeyman that people bring up,...
I think it's important to assume the best of people, and I think @bobby_tables is not lumping all trans athletes in as "men pretending to be women". I think a common bogeyman that people bring up, though, is "men pretending to be women" in sports. People get very concerned about people who are so driven to win that they will undergo life changing surgery, and it does happen, albeit incredibly rarely. I think it is one of the primary things that people who worry about trans athletes are actually worried about, which just serves to highlight how ridiculous that position actually is.
Edit: as @EsteeBestee says, trans women are underrepresented in women's sports, and men pretending to be women are a far, far, far smaller number than that, so the common "fox news"-esque bogeyman isn't actually a particularly valid concern.
Does it? Do you have any examples you can point to, or is it more of a “feeling” that someone has to have done that?
People get very concerned about people who are so driven to win that they will undergo life changing surgery, and it does happen, albeit incredibly rarely.
Does it? Do you have any examples you can point to, or is it more of a “feeling” that someone has to have done that?
Sadly, it doesn't matter if there are actually any examples people can point to. The mere suggestion of the idea that it might happen, and the "intuitive feelings" most non-LGBTQ+ people have...
...so driven to win that they will undergo life changing surgery...
Do you have any examples you can point to...
Sadly, it doesn't matter if there are actually any examples people can point to. The mere suggestion of the idea that it might happen, and the "intuitive feelings" most non-LGBTQ+ people have about the "inherent" connection between sex assigned at birth and competitive advantages (regardless of the truth) are enough for the majority of them to take a side on this overall issue. And the political right in many countries are taking full advantage of this by muddying the waters even further by spreading misinformation on the issue in order to more effectively use it as a wedge issue. :(
It is not a feeling; there have been gender-based fiascos in sports, and I am comfortable with stating that at some point someone underwent some kind of surgery to cheat the system, likely due to...
It is not a feeling; there have been gender-based fiascos in sports, and I am comfortable with stating that at some point someone underwent some kind of surgery to cheat the system, likely due to systemic pressure from their country, and not because they were experiencing dysphoria. I have a recollection of a Nazi Germany example; I'm disinterested in looking it up, but there have been a fair number of cases that I can recall also from my own lifetime of examples where someone purposefully competed as a woman when they were not.
Asking for proof kind of misses the point that I was raising though. I think that such cases are so few and far between that a sporting body coming to any ruling because of them is shockingly stupid. Having a discussion between allies of "did this happen 5 times ever, or 0 times!?" is not useful, because it happens so infrequently that it's functionally not happening at all. And yet, it's one of the primary things that people bring up when they're concerned about trans athletes in sports.
How many trans women are getting women's sports scholarships? Dozens? Maybe less? Compared to the thousands of cis women getting sports scholarships? Is this even an issue? Additionally, men...
How many trans women are getting women's sports scholarships? Dozens? Maybe less? Compared to the thousands of cis women getting sports scholarships? Is this even an issue? Additionally, men aren't playing women's sports. Trans women are women, and men aren't playing women's sports, either).
Trans women are underrepresented in women's sports, despite what some media says. We ensure equitable access to college athletic scholarships by gender under Title IX by doing what we're doing. Some trans women might get athletic scholarships, which is perfectly fine, and cis women are largely unaffected, given how many more cis women compete at a high level in women's sports than trans women. Additionally, most sports governing bodies have rules for trans women that are based around modern scientific findings and usually require HRT for a few years, which helps to ensure fair competition.
I think part of the issue is personal experience vs. statistical significance. From a statistical standpoint, if we assume 1% of people are transgender, as in actually openly identifying as a...
I think part of the issue is personal experience vs. statistical significance.
From a statistical standpoint, if we assume 1% of people are transgender, as in actually openly identifying as a gender they weren't assigned at birth (the numbers suggest 0.5% in the adult population, but higher in youth, so let's just say 1%)... well, how many of those 1/100 people actually play sports? How many of them play competitive sports? If this whole conversation wasn't happening, how many more would feel comfortable playing competitive sports who don't already?
The end result is... probably not many. It might add up to a couple kids in a school. Then there's another question - have they undergone male puberty? Because if they're young and in high school and identifying as trans there's a possibility they haven't and if so there's no real concern re: sports.
So from a statistical standpoint... we can probably most ignore this because it's not going to be significant. But what about the individuals who are affected in the process? What about the cisgender girl who works for years towards a sports scholarship, only to be beaten out by a trans girl with a different body type from hers that leaves her preternaturally inclined to succeed in a certain sport? There are very, very few sports where a female body type is advantageous, and while a few years of HRT does make a difference, it can never close that gap.
It's also unlikely that a trans woman is going to be so good at a sport that she could beat out all cisgender competitors and say, become a world champion. I think we can all agree we don't need to worry about that level. But it's a bit of a different story when we're talking about more local competition. What if there's a trans female athlete who absolutely wipes the floor with her competitors in high school, then goes up to a higher level and loses? Some people would look at that and say "well there's no problem" while others would say to think about the girls who competed with her in her school and whether they had a level playing field.
Some trans women might get athletic scholarships, which is perfectly fine, and cis women are largely unaffected
I think this is the real crux of the argument -- cis women are largely unaffected. But what about the ones who are? Then of course you could also argue, well, what about the trans women who are affected by sports bans? Aren't they just as important? And the answer is yes, IMO, and I just don't know that there is any perfect solution to this situation or ever will be. One solution would be to have trans female and trans male athletes separated into their own categories, but obviously many of them don't want that for various reasons, and the other issue is you'd have to get further into the weeds with "did they undergo male puberty, are they on HRT, have they taken HRT for a certain amount of time" etc and you'd get into many different categories almost like para-athletes have.
And at the end of the day I don't think we can pretend there isn't an issue. We don't see this outrage over trans men in sports... why? For a very simple reason, they don't and can't win in most sports because they are at an extreme disadvantage due to their gender assigned at birth.
"What about the cisgender girl who works for years towards a sports scholarship, only to be beaten out by a trans girl with a different body type from hers that leaves her preternaturally inclined...
Exemplary
"What about the cisgender girl who works for years towards a sports scholarship, only to be beaten out by a trans girl with a different body type from hers that leaves her preternaturally inclined to succeed in a certain sport?"
This happens to cis women from cis women every single day of the year, and at an astronomically higher rate than any trans women earning women's scholarships. Katie Ledecky has absolutely dominated her entire career. Nobody stood a single chance. I doubt we had a constant media shitstorm saying it was unfair, either. But when Lia Thomas won a few events, it was a media shitstorm for half a year, despite her not even breaking a single NCAA record, as far as I remember. She was also really only good at one or two categories, I remember her being not great in a few others and being handily beaten.
I think it's disingenuous to assume trans women automatically have an advantage, or that the ones who might are inherently unfair, when cis women aren't made equal, either. IMO any bans on trans women in women's sports currently are reactionary, overkill, and unnecessary, since it has barely registered as a problem, people just think it's a problem because we don't get a news article every time a cis woman takes a scholarship over another cis woman, but we see an article every time a trans woman even plays a sport, much less wins at one.
We've had like five or fewer notable trans woman athletes recently, and while some were good at their sport, I don't remember any really being the pinnacle of that sport, either. To me, it's asinine to discriminate against trans women in sports with all these "what if's" when we aren't really seeing a problem that registers as anything more than a statistical outlier.
I do agree that there isn't a perfect solution to this, but I also think that pre-emptively banning trans women from competition and discriminating against them at this time is overkill and more based in hate and/or ignorance than actual science or spirit of competition.
I'm sorry, but this is an uninformed post. How does a cis girl losing a scholarship to a trans girl with a "different body types" differ from losing it to... Another cis girl with a different body...
I'm sorry, but this is an uninformed post.
How does a cis girl losing a scholarship to a trans girl with a "different body types" differ from losing it to... Another cis girl with a different body type.
The reason you don't hear about transgender men in sports is because it's harder to lie about it. With men, the talking points can just be reduced down to "male puberty" and "bone structure", whilst for trans men they don't really have an argument so they're not brought up. This is exactly the issue: trans men exist in sports without messing anything up, but trans women are being targeted as part of a very explicitly political campaign.
This article: https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/25-transgender-athletes-you-should-know/
Found within five minutes of googling shows that there are plenty of trans men in sports (though some on that list retired after completing, a lot did compete as their new gender identity). Case in point, Laurel Hubbard in that article set records in her state when she was a man (weightlifting), but couldn't proceed in the Tokyo Olympics after transitioning.
I'm sorry if I sound aggressive, but you're caught up in something that just has no grounds in reality. Girls aren't "losing" scholarships, they're being outcompeted by other athletes. Sports at it's core is already based on a genetic lottery, should Michael Phelps not be allowed to compete because his body is different? Should a new category be made for him and people like him?
Sports events require trans athletes to be on HRT for a specific set of time before competing. No trans woman is competing still on testosterone. No-one is pretending this isn't an issue, this issue was tackled and solved a while ago, but the American right has twisted the narrative so that the average person reacts badly just hearing about trans people in sports.
But that doesn't tell the whole story. Hubbard crushed the competition in Australia several years earlier, beating the runner up by a considerable margin. Hubbard faced immense media pressure when...
Case in point, Laurel Hubbard in that article set records in her state when she was a man (weightlifting), but couldn't proceed in the Tokyo Olympics after transitioning.
But that doesn't tell the whole story. Hubbard crushed the competition in Australia several years earlier, beating the runner up by a considerable margin. Hubbard faced immense media pressure when she lifted at the Tokyo Olympics which surely made it more difficult to succeed... but also by that point was one of the oldest weightlifters to ever compete at the Olympics and specifically pointed out her age as the reason she did not do well. What if Hubbard was 10 years younger and didn't have the pressure of being the first open trans athlete at the Olympics on her head?
No trans woman is competing still on testosterone.
Nobody said they were. I certainly didn't.
the American right has twisted the narrative so that the average person reacts badly just hearing about trans people in sports
This is not just an issue in America. I'm not American and I'm not a conservative, I still think it is an issue. I have nothing against trans people but the reality here is that people have to weigh what they feel is most important - and for some recognizing trans women as women is what is most important, and the integrity of good competition in the women's category comes second.
Someone else said "Michael Phelps has an unfair advantage bc of body type, why not force him into his own category?" - well, Michael Phelps is one in a billion, he is a freak of nature, and the average trans woman is not.
I think that "someone else" is me, lol. Regardless, Hubbard "crushed" the competition in the same way Feagaiga Stowers "crushed" the competition in the 2018 Commonwealth Games (Laurel's Results;...
I think that "someone else" is me, lol.
Regardless, Hubbard "crushed" the competition in the same way Feagaiga Stowers "crushed" the competition in the 2018 Commonwealth Games (Laurel's Results; page 15). I'm not a sport aficionado, so I might be mis-reading it, but from the column labeled "total", we can see that Hubbard beat her runner up by 19 points. Stowers won by 10 points. The margin is smaller, but it's there. But then consider that in the 2022 CW games, Emily Campbell won by 18 points over the runnerup, setting a record in the process. You could try to argue that if Hubbard didn't drop out of the 2018 CW games due to her injury she would've destroyed the competition, but when you look at her performance in the 2019 Pacific games you can see that although she did win it was not nearly as far a margin as her other medals, beating the runner ups by a few kg, in line with the gap between the rest of the athletes. Same for the Roma 2020 world cup. Point being, she's not a freak of nature and not that far ahead of the rest of the curve. If she's such a monster, why isn't she demolishing the rest? As far as I can tell, not a single trans woman has ever won the gold medal in the Women's Weightlifting Championships and from skimming, it looks like none won any medals.
Exceptional people exist. Some of them are trans, the majority aren't. When Campbell destroys her competition (not to mention outperforming Hubbard by miles (151 vs 168) going by her 2017 games C&J category and beating her narrowly in the Snatch category (124 vs 123)), no-one bats an eye. Sport is about these exceptional people. Even before transitioning, Hubbard was exceptional, setting records as a man and - notably - not doing so when competing as a woman. That's odd, don't you think? According to what the media spins, someone who was a male world record-breaker competing against women should destroy them. But you can see from the results she had back then that her current performance is nowhere near the same level, especially compared to today's athletes. In fact, women have already passed Hubbard's record, with China's Li Wenwen lifting a 180 C&J in the very Olympic games that Hubbard disqualified at, so even in the absolute worst case scenario where Hubbard retained her "male strength", she'd still fall short of gold, and according to the results she did get for those lifts she attempted she'd be tying for fourth if she did win (granted this is a bit of a guess because we're missing half of her performance). Which means that among the thirteen women that attended, ONE would be trans, without even winning a medal. I can also talk about how in the 2017 games where she "destroyed" her opponent, the male frontrunner two days later beat her by 40+ points total, and if you take both Hubbard and her runner-up and compare them to the men's results you find that Hubbard would tie for sixth and her runner-up would be placed in eighth. They both get demolished by men to a roughly equal degree.
All of this to say that Hubbard is not pulling male-equivalent results and not breaking records. You have edge cases and exceptional people, but then those edge cases and exceptional people get beaten, whether trans or not.
If I understand you correctly you're arguing that there's no proof that trans women (who fulfil the mandatory time one HRT requirements) actually do have an advantage over cis women and thus...
If I understand you correctly you're arguing that there's no proof that trans women (who fulfil the mandatory time one HRT requirements) actually do have an advantage over cis women and thus should be allowed to compete in the women's leagues.
I think what the average, frenzied up sports nut wants to hear is that there is proof that they don't have an advantage, and it would take a lot of wind out of the sails of this controversy. I realize that that's a tall order, seeing as there are just so few trans athletes. But I've heard the bone structure argument so many times now, and arguing against it on reddit is practically impossible outside of dedicated LGBT+ spaces, that I don't think your line of reasoning will change much.
I agree like many decisions there are losers either way but in my opinion the trans athlete is more directly impacted. They know they are directly impacted if they are banned. An out-competed...
I think this is the real crux of the argument -- cis women are largely unaffected. But what about the ones who are? Then of course you could also argue, well, what about the trans women who are affected by sports bans? Aren't they just as important? And the answer is yes, IMO, and I just don't know that there is any perfect solution to this situation or ever will be.
I agree like many decisions there are losers either way but in my opinion the trans athlete is more directly impacted. They know they are directly impacted if they are banned. An out-competed cisgender athlete doesn't really know if they would have made it or not, it's not directly attributable. I think even on those grounds alone it should bias you to allowing trans athletes in sports.
Im definitely no sports nut but I can tell you that that line of reasoning will hold no water with people who are. They see sports not as a fun activity as many people as possible should have...
Im definitely no sports nut but I can tell you that that line of reasoning will hold no water with people who are. They see sports not as a fun activity as many people as possible should have access to, to them it is a competition first and foremost. And if you offer a restricted league for people who can't compete at the highest level (like say because they're too young, too old or were AFAB and went through the according puberty), they very much want that league to be a fair playing field. They don't see the problem with excluding trans women because the very nature of that league is exclusion based, and as long as trans women have an advantage, they should be excluded, too. Arguing about how that impacts trans women athletes just doesn't register with them, because to their mind its about fairness of competition, not fair and equal access. It would be like feeling sorry for an athlete who got caught doping.
I have the feeling trans activists and sport enthusiasts don't overlap much, and that is why this has been such a strategic wedge topic for the right: many people who are not transphobe see the point of their argument ("Well, yes, competition should be fair"), and then they see arguments from trans supporters that don't really address the issue for them. This is very harmful, because it makes it easy to dismiss trans supporters outright the next time they are confronted with trans inclusion - and there will be a next time, the right will make sure of that, they are constantly looking for another angle of attack because there are a lot of transphobes and they know that it is fertile grounds for them.
That's a good point. I'm more of a sports nerd than a sports jock, but I agree that this line of reasoning is common. I tend to look at problems at the systems level, and here you have a very...
Arguing about how that impacts trans women athletes just doesn't register with them, because to their mind its about fairness of competition, not fair and equal access.
That's a good point. I'm more of a sports nerd than a sports jock, but I agree that this line of reasoning is common.
I tend to look at problems at the systems level, and here you have a very small number of trans athletes and a very tiny minority of that group even making an impact along the lines of scholarship/award/etc. So in terms of minimizing bad outcomes it's pretty obvious to me. I think people can come around to this idea eventually, it will just take time. But it may well require some assurances about the top levels of sports, even if that's pretty unlikely to occur.
That's also the case for trans women, who don't and can't win in most sports because of the extreme disadvantage caused by their gender assigned at birth. I can count on my fingers the number of...
And at the end of the day I don't think we can pretend there isn't an issue. We don't see this outrage over trans men in sports... why? For a very simple reason, they don't and can't win in most sports because they are at an extreme disadvantage due to their gender assigned at birth.
That's also the case for trans women, who don't and can't win in most sports because of the extreme disadvantage caused by their gender assigned at birth. I can count on my fingers the number of trans women athletes I know, because the outrage is always over the same handful of people.
The reason for it is simpler, and has nothing to do with whether an advantage or disadvantage exists. It has to do with the obsession the general population has with transfeminine people - with effemimania and oppositional sexism - in all areas of life.
But the outrage isn't about the same few people. The news stories you see are just about them bc they are performing at high levels. I'm not talking about the highest levels, which I agree are...
But the outrage isn't about the same few people. The news stories you see are just about them bc they are performing at high levels. I'm not talking about the highest levels, which I agree are statistically insignificant, but the lower levels of competition where in some cases cis women could and are getting creamed. For example, Laurel Hubbard who someone brought up in another comment -- she went to the Olympics and did not do well. So there's no problem, right? But what about the Australian competition she won a few years earlier that qualified her for the Olympics, where she absolutely crushed the competition...? When she got to the Olympics there was a ton of press pressure on her for being the first out trans woman at the Olympics and she was also quite old... but at the Australian competition she dominated with 2nd place being pretty distant. So what about the other women she competed with there? Is that fair for them?
I think the question for me comes down to "is it paramount to recognize trans women as women in all facets of life including competitive sport, where they may have an unfair advantage because of that classification?" And in my case I don't have an answer. I'm not saying we should ban trans women from women's categories. I don't think that's ideal. The problem is there really is no ideal solution. Someone else said "what about Michael Phelps, he has a unique body type that gives him an advantage, why not ban him?" -- but Michael Phelps is one in a billion. You can't account for that. Trans women are not one in a billion, they're far more common, common enough that it is worth having these conversations because they'll only become more common over time as more people feel comfortable coming out + competing while out.
It has to do with the obsession the general population has with transfeminine people - with effemimania and oppositional sexism - in all areas of life.
I don't mean to offend but I would hesitate to use words like "effemimania" in conversation... given it is a word conjured up by a single writer and is redundant in this sentence. I had to look it up to even know what you were saying (which was... what you'd already just said). I don't think you're going to be surprised to hear that. And I say this as an effeminate man!!
Yes, it is. At least as fair as it is when they get crushed and creamed and dominated by any other woman - you can't account for one in a billion cases, after all. And no, they are not. They are,...
Is that fair for them?
Yes, it is. At least as fair as it is when they get crushed and creamed and dominated by any other woman - you can't account for one in a billion cases, after all.
Trans women are not one in a billion, they're far more common, common enough that it is worth having these conversations because they'll only become more common over time as more people feel comfortable coming out + competing while out.
And no, they are not. They are, in fact, far less common in sports than they should be. They are grossly underrepresented amongst both competitors and winners, and this even when the latter is all we hear about.
I don't mean to offend but I would hesitate to use words like "effemimania" in conversation... given it is a word conjured up by a single writer and is redundant in this sentence. I had to look it up to even know what you were saying (which was... what you'd already just said). I don't think you're going to be surprised to hear that. And I say this as an effeminate man!!
I wouldn't. I expect people who engage in this kind of conversation to either already know the subject, or to be willing to read up on prior discussion. Redundance - repeating or restating or rephrasing something that was already said, possibly in a more inflammatory manner - can also be used as a rhetorical tool to denote emphasis, which is exactly what I wanted, but I am not sure what you being an effeminate man has to do with it.
I think the root causes are money and hate and ignorance. Some people are against it for almost strictly monetary reasons, like you have said; it's in their best interests to reduce the number of...
I think the root causes are money and hate and ignorance.
Some people are against it for almost strictly monetary reasons, like you have said; it's in their best interests to reduce the number of competitors for scholarships or, more broadly, any money that is available for any competitors at any level. There's an issue right now in Disc Golf where Natalie Ryan has been barred from competing in the FPO (Female Professional Open) and there are a number of players who support her being kicked from competition.
Others are opposed because while they support "trans rights" they still see someone who, for example, transition MTF as a "man" in a "woman" sport. I think - I hope - that for the most part people who have this opinion don't hate trans people, they just don't understand. Their ignorance is clouding their judgment on the matter.
And then there are people like dub brought up below who are just bigots.
I think all of them make up a non-trivial percentage of the opposition, which is why it can be so difficult to figure out how to fight on issues like this. There isn't just one reason, so there's no one way to fight for what is right. And to be clear, I've simplified it to three main issues that people use to justify their position, but there is almost certainly more, and there are factions within those three camps... it's a very complex tapestry of issues.
That Natalie Ryan business hit me hard, because it was a case where the governing body of the sport and competitors were completely ignoring why Natalie is good at disc golf and just banned her...
That Natalie Ryan business hit me hard, because it was a case where the governing body of the sport and competitors were completely ignoring why Natalie is good at disc golf and just banned her because she's trans. Seemingly everybody that wants trans women banned from women's sports say how trans women are guaranteed to be stronger or faster or whatever than cis women (which is not the case), but in Natalie's case, in the tournament she won (which spurred the talk to ban trans women from women's competition in disc golf), she did not win on her throw distance, she won on her putting. She does not have the best distance on the women's tour, but the people calling for her ban were pretending she can throw twice as hard as cis women and that she's beating up on them. It just showed me how ignorant people are of this issue. People didn't actually care for any sort of data or scientific backing (which mostly says it's fine for trans women to compete with cis women after a certain amount of HRT), they just wanted to ban someone based on gut feeling. They ended up not protecting any cis women and instead just hurt trans women.
You have boiled that down into the exact reason I also am intensely angry at the PDGA and DGPT, and maybe I'll just add on one more thing. People do this thing where they think that individuals...
You have boiled that down into the exact reason I also am intensely angry at the PDGA and DGPT, and maybe I'll just add on one more thing.
People do this thing where they think that individuals from other groups do things because of their belonging to that group, whereas individuals from the same group as us do things because of their individual capabilities. I loathe this easy example, but "that person committed that crime because they are muslim" is a common one, but when someone is of the same group as us, we often attribute it to a more complex reason, and give some understanding.
The same thing happens with trans athletes, and in this specific instance it was so infuriating because there were hundreds if not thousands of people saying that Natalie won because she is trans, but Natalie won because she had a great day and played the best she has ever played. If Natalie was winning because she was trans, she'd be winning all the time, and she doesn't win all the time, or even all that often. She played well, she won, she deserved to win.
Yeah, I can't take any organization seriously that says they're banning trans women to ensure fair competition, and they end up banning someone that had one good weekend, while Tattar continues to...
Yeah, I can't take any organization seriously that says they're banning trans women to ensure fair competition, and they end up banning someone that had one good weekend, while Tattar continues to win basically every tournament. Obviously Tattar should not be banned for being good, but it breaks my brain that people want to ban trans women for being unfair when absolutely nobody can touch some of the cis women that are on top of the tour. It made it very clear it was about hate and not fairness and it's why I stopped caring about the PDGA.
Exactly. Tattar is so good, and she's good because she puts in the work... but I am 100% confident that there is a physiological / genetic component as well, but nobody talks or cares about that.
Exactly. Tattar is so good, and she's good because she puts in the work... but I am 100% confident that there is a physiological / genetic component as well, but nobody talks or cares about that.
So the obvious consequence of this would be FtM guys participating in women's sports while on testosterone? Suuuuuure. (Edit: Upon second thought, this aspect alone makes me want to tuck into the...
So the obvious consequence of this would be FtM guys participating in women's sports while on testosterone? Suuuuuure. (Edit: Upon second thought, this aspect alone makes me want to tuck into the methodology of the poll, because there is no way people are this stupid. This question must've been cued towards MtF rather than FtM, right?)
Afair (feel free but not obliged to correct me), sports performance of either trans gender is statistically different from cis women, depending on the sport, right? With FtM having more muscle (often important) and MtF having heavier bones (less often important, sometimes a detriment)? Of course it is definitely not fair to them to lump both in with men. So what do we do then? Acknowledge that sports isn't fair by nature? Would make sense to me, considering it is extremely likely that performance is massively influenced by genetic factors. But how do square that up with maintaining all the facets that currently make competetive sport interesting?
Or, the null hypothesis of accepting that trans athletes are generally more akin to their chosen than born gender as far as performance goes. Sadly that comes with raised eyebrows everytime a MtF athlete achieves literally anything...
I do wonder though if there's a way to acknowledge that sports isn't fair genetically, but keep it appealing. Statistical handicap ratings based on genetically expected performance seem not exactly marketable. Fair, sure. Possibly very spicy as far as racial differences go... But interesting probably only to the more statistically minded.
(Let me know if you think it's ok to post this. Trying to be respectful of this group, while also not marking it read-only in my head.)
I mean I think they probably just don't want trans guys to compete at all. See the recent bathroom discussions. So many people were bringing up trans guys as a kind of "gotcha!" to TERFs, posting...
So the obvious consequence of this would be FtM guys participating in women's sports while on testosterone? Suuuuuure. (Edit: Upon second thought, this aspect alone makes me want to tuck into the methodology of the poll, because there is no way people are this stupid. This question must've been cued towards MtF rather than FtM, right?)
I mean I think they probably just don't want trans guys to compete at all.
See the recent bathroom discussions. So many people were bringing up trans guys as a kind of "gotcha!" to TERFs, posting pictures of men who'd been on testosterone for years and being all like "Do you want THIS in the women's bathrooms?" As if people who were arguing that trans women shouldn't be allowed in women's bathrooms would be like "Oh shit, I didn't realise this would be the outcome, whoops!"
Of course, what's actually happening is that trans men are unwanted in both spaces (as are trans women ofc), and that was always the point.
Absolutely, no doubt. A lot of transphobes don't want them to exist in any meaningful capacity, except perhaps surviving in an ahem cupboard under the stairs, just so they don't have to live with...
Absolutely, no doubt. A lot of transphobes don't want them to exist in any meaningful capacity, except perhaps surviving in an ahem cupboard under the stairs, just so they don't have to live with the guilt of killing them.
What little methodology I can gleam without digging too deep suggests that the question didn't give an option beyond "birth gender" "chosen gender" "don't really care". Which of course makes people with notions about sports performance that are divorced from reality pick whichever sounds right, without actually thinking too much. I'd hazard the guess if you put "trans people can participate in male sports" as an option, many people would in fact select that, as it's the rational choice from a transphobic perspective.
Regardless, as it is I think the methodology here is questionable. We can probably draw the conclusion that support did decline, but I don't think the actual percentages are representative, as the study demanded that confused/uninformed moderates make an uncomfortable choice. I'd expect a statement like "Trans athletes can compete in whichever gender category best describes the average performance level of their trans gender[1]" to be fairly uncontroversial among vaguely-supportive know-nothings (which I suspect is a large group). But to commit to putting MtF athletes into women's sports without knowing how that affects women is a bit of a reach. "Keeping" them in their gender group seems like the safer choice, at least at a glance, even if you support their chosen identity. Again, assuming a vaguely supportive know-nothing here. In short, this question polarizes by not giving the center a real choice in the matter.
[1] for clarity, I'm using trans gender here to refer to either MtF or FtM.
The wording of the question here seems to be: With the options being: Via the PDF download at the bottom of the page.
The wording of the question here seems to be:
Next, we have a question about policies for competitive sports that have separate teams for male and
female athletes. Do you think transgender athletes – [ROTATED: should be able to play on sports teams
that match their current gender identity (or) should only be allowed to play on sports teams that match their birth gender]?
With the options being:
Able to play on teams that match identity / Only on teams that match birth gender / No opinion
IMO the most reasonable outcome is making one or two categories: open, and a handicap league in sports where one gender is typically disfavoured (usually women, with some exceptions).
IMO the most reasonable outcome is making one or two categories: open, and a handicap league in sports where one gender is typically disfavoured (usually women, with some exceptions).
The thing is, women’s sports are essentially handicap leagues. Without them, women would not practically be able to win medals at all. I have no particular issue with trans athletes competing in...
The thing is, women’s sports are essentially handicap leagues. Without them, women would not practically be able to win medals at all.
I have no particular issue with trans athletes competing in the open categories, but it seems to me that the evidence is telling us that trans athletes (in either direction) are roughly equivalent to female athletes on PEDs.
I've seen this making the rounds on Twitter, and my reaction is come on.... This requires a lot of suspended disbelief. The history of when/why Olympic sport categories were created is...
I've seen this making the rounds on Twitter, and my reaction is come on....
football (soccer), and ultra endurance biking and foot races
This requires a lot of suspended disbelief. The history of when/why Olympic sport categories were created is interesting, and undoubtedly full of a few examples of embarrassed men like the skeet shooting and figure skating examples, but that doesn't really support your point.
I watch a fair bit of women's soccer. I enjoy watching women's soccer more than men's soccer. There are a lot of handicaps outside of sex women have to contend with -- they need real jobs alongside their soccer careers, there's no golden ticket to aspire to, there is a relative lack of funnels and role models to promote entry into the sport. I get all that. But a women's soccer category isn't preventing women from dominating soccer today, I can assure you.
There is an article on Wired which covers the gender separation in professional football. One thing I found interesting with regard to the study referenced in the article is the impact of...
There is an article on Wired which covers the gender separation in professional football. One thing I found interesting with regard to the study referenced in the article is the impact of environmental and social factors as well as the physical aspect. I'd not really considered that before. It makes me wonder how much that has a part to play, and whether the rising popularity of women's football might lead to changes in policy from some governing bodies.
Starting to get some Malice flags and other indications that this thread isn't going well - I don't have time to go through it in detail right now so am going to lock and remove it. I will...
Starting to get some Malice flags and other indications that this thread isn't going well - I don't have time to go through it in detail right now so am going to lock and remove it. I will reinstate it later if it seems salvageable.
If we truly care about fair play, we would stop using gender at all. Simply create 2 or 3 classes and base the metrics on testosterone levels. There are many born genetically female that have...
If we truly care about fair play, we would stop using gender at all. Simply create 2 or 3 classes and base the metrics on testosterone levels.
There are many born genetically female that have extreme high testosterone, and many born genetically male with very low testosterone.
This seems like an obvious solution to me, but it would require both sides of the argument to give up on gender based divisions. I have seen plenty of people dislike this idea when I suggest it, but none with a viable reason as to why it's a bad idea. Open to have my mind changed.
Current testosterone isn’t the only factor though. There are many reasons that men outperform women on average, such as bone density, the size of their upper body, heart, and red blood cell counts.
Current testosterone isn’t the only factor though. There are many reasons that men outperform women on average, such as bone density, the size of their upper body, heart, and red blood cell counts.
If you’re dividing by anything it should be by skill. In a few sports there would be no gender gap. But in most the best women in the world would be in the lowest skill bracket.
If you’re dividing by anything it should be by skill. In a few sports there would be no gender gap. But in most the best women in the world would be in the lowest skill bracket.
This article is to be focused on popular opinions. Like all civil rights issues, these evolve over time and opinions change. I'm not sure popular opinion should be driving this matter, especially...
This article is to be focused on popular opinions. Like all civil rights issues, these evolve over time and opinions change. I'm not sure popular opinion should be driving this matter, especially when there are such strong prejudices involved currently.
What I'm genuinely curious about is:
Why were/are some sports segregated between males and females in the first place?
What science was/is involved in these decisions (if any)?
How does that science (if any) apply to trans persons?
To answer your first question, you have to examine the history of each sport individually. 99% Invisible has a great episode on early Women's Basketball in Iowa: Podcast episode link
To answer your first question, you have to examine the history of each sport individually. 99% Invisible has a great episode on early Women's Basketball in Iowa: Podcast episode link
I think to keep it fair, that if women get banned for hormones issues includ trans women. If you would ban a woman with poces or chromosome differences then it makes sense to ban trans women on...
I think to keep it fair, that if women get banned for hormones issues includ trans women. If you would ban a woman with poces or chromosome differences then it makes sense to ban trans women on the same rule. If they are not doing that then allow all women to play. Also it should not be a government law, it should be a organization policy or state law of public school related.
Coming from a Trans women that did track but before transitioning so I don't have skin in the game.
It would be difficult to ban trans women for the same hormone issues that cis women are sometimes banned for because trans women are usually at pretty low T levels, since they're actively...
It would be difficult to ban trans women for the same hormone issues that cis women are sometimes banned for because trans women are usually at pretty low T levels, since they're actively monitoring it (unlike almost all cis women). Banning cis women with naturally high T levels is absurd anyway and typically only occurs as a side-effect of trans hysteria or as an excuse to eliminate a particular high-performing woman from the playing field (who more often than not is a woman of color).
If I remember things correctly, cis women in sports also tend to have higher than average T levels. It makes me wonder if it is even fair for trans women to compete against them - after all, we...
It would be difficult to ban trans women for the same hormone issues that cis women are sometimes banned for because trans women are usually at pretty low T levels, since they're actively monitoring it (unlike almost all cis women).
If I remember things correctly, cis women in sports also tend to have higher than average T levels. It makes me wonder if it is even fair for trans women to compete against them - after all, we can clearly see that trans people are underrepresented all across the board.
It might just be the case that being cis constitutes an unfair advantage.
Yeah, my Dr said I might have to take T after surgery as my T levels was really low before I started HRT, the other thing conservatives are saying now is the amount of muscle fibers is different...
Yeah, my Dr said I might have to take T after surgery as my T levels was really low before I started HRT, the other thing conservatives are saying now is the amount of muscle fibers is different for someone that went thru puberty but I haven't found papers on that.
I agree, there are some physical variables on top of financial and home/environmental differences. That "option" is the only thing I would be "ok" with since cis women can take blockers as well....
I agree, there are some physical variables on top of financial and home/environmental differences. That "option" is the only thing I would be "ok" with since cis women can take blockers as well. That bring in a can of worms with what is the acceptable levels of T for women and as you said the discrimination that brings.
I'm with you, it's incredibly frustrating to watch the propaganda work and to see more and more people ignore science and statistics, which suggest there is basically no issue at all. Media just...
I'm with you, it's incredibly frustrating to watch the propaganda work and to see more and more people ignore science and statistics, which suggest there is basically no issue at all. Media just twists the problem to form a narrative. It's easy to think trans women are evil and beating up cis women when fox news covers Lia Thomas for a month straight or something. I wish the people buying into this would instead listen to people who are actually knowledgeable on the subject.
The thing that really gets me with all of this is how the ire gets directed at the trans athletes directly. You can make the argument for requiring medical transition for X amount of time before...
The thing that really gets me with all of this is how the ire gets directed at the trans athletes directly. You can make the argument for requiring medical transition for X amount of time before allowing one to participate in Z division, but I really don't see what the harm is for sports on a sub-competitive level as long as there's not a clear imbalance that undermines everyone else's fun, which, hey: that's what sports are supposed to be about! On a case by case basis, you deal with people who make the environment unfair or unsafe.
Trans athletes should not be harassed when they go out of their way to ensure they are following competitive sports organization guidelines. Lia Thomas abided by the NCAA rules before competing in the Women's division, and if there were a productive discussion on the matter, it should be on whether the NCAA rules need to be revised; instead, we get laws being written based on gut reactions and gender essentialist views that stem from religious beliefs. A reasonable discussion is science-based, coupled with reasonable judgement calls on what actually determines an "unfair advantage", but the line of most of these conservative lawmakers falls down to chromosomes and what gender one is assigned at birth, ignoring the myriad of factors that influence how a person develops into a unique individual over time.
All that said, unfortunately, testosterone is a performance enhancing drug for most physical activities. Luckily, we have a pretty wide body of research on its effects, which have been used to make participation recommendations and used by organizations to set guidelines. Some of those guidelines on blood testosterone levels have ended up excluding many cis black women from competitive athletics even to this day, but that's a whole other topic.
I’m not aware of statistics about trans athletes results compared to non-trans, but my theory is that videos of non-trans athletes losing against trans athletes and displaying their disappointment...
I’m not aware of statistics about trans athletes results compared to non-trans, but my theory is that videos of non-trans athletes losing against trans athletes and displaying their disappointment are really effective at forming the public perception.
The root problem is the money (scholarships) in sports. Families invest a ton of time and money in the hope that little Jackie and Janie can win a full ride athletic scholarship. Title IX has been pretty effective at ensuring that as many women as men get scholarships. Men choosing to play women's sports threatens that balance. Ideally, we'd remove college athletic scholarships to eliminate that incentive. Then who wants to play on what team would carry a lot less repercussions. However, there's too much money in college sports for that to ever be a viable solution. So, morals aside, how do you ensure equitable access to college athletic scholarships by gender under Title IX, while recognizing a person's gender identity?
I think it's important to assume the best of people, and I think @bobby_tables is not lumping all trans athletes in as "men pretending to be women". I think a common bogeyman that people bring up, though, is "men pretending to be women" in sports. People get very concerned about people who are so driven to win that they will undergo life changing surgery, and it does happen, albeit incredibly rarely. I think it is one of the primary things that people who worry about trans athletes are actually worried about, which just serves to highlight how ridiculous that position actually is.
Edit: as @EsteeBestee says, trans women are underrepresented in women's sports, and men pretending to be women are a far, far, far smaller number than that, so the common "fox news"-esque bogeyman isn't actually a particularly valid concern.
Does it? Do you have any examples you can point to, or is it more of a “feeling” that someone has to have done that?
Sadly, it doesn't matter if there are actually any examples people can point to. The mere suggestion of the idea that it might happen, and the "intuitive feelings" most non-LGBTQ+ people have about the "inherent" connection between sex assigned at birth and competitive advantages (regardless of the truth) are enough for the majority of them to take a side on this overall issue. And the political right in many countries are taking full advantage of this by muddying the waters even further by spreading misinformation on the issue in order to more effectively use it as a wedge issue. :(
It is not a feeling; there have been gender-based fiascos in sports, and I am comfortable with stating that at some point someone underwent some kind of surgery to cheat the system, likely due to systemic pressure from their country, and not because they were experiencing dysphoria. I have a recollection of a Nazi Germany example; I'm disinterested in looking it up, but there have been a fair number of cases that I can recall also from my own lifetime of examples where someone purposefully competed as a woman when they were not.
Asking for proof kind of misses the point that I was raising though. I think that such cases are so few and far between that a sporting body coming to any ruling because of them is shockingly stupid. Having a discussion between allies of "did this happen 5 times ever, or 0 times!?" is not useful, because it happens so infrequently that it's functionally not happening at all. And yet, it's one of the primary things that people bring up when they're concerned about trans athletes in sports.
How many trans women are getting women's sports scholarships? Dozens? Maybe less? Compared to the thousands of cis women getting sports scholarships? Is this even an issue? Additionally, men aren't playing women's sports. Trans women are women, and men aren't playing women's sports, either).
Trans women are underrepresented in women's sports, despite what some media says. We ensure equitable access to college athletic scholarships by gender under Title IX by doing what we're doing. Some trans women might get athletic scholarships, which is perfectly fine, and cis women are largely unaffected, given how many more cis women compete at a high level in women's sports than trans women. Additionally, most sports governing bodies have rules for trans women that are based around modern scientific findings and usually require HRT for a few years, which helps to ensure fair competition.
I think part of the issue is personal experience vs. statistical significance.
From a statistical standpoint, if we assume 1% of people are transgender, as in actually openly identifying as a gender they weren't assigned at birth (the numbers suggest 0.5% in the adult population, but higher in youth, so let's just say 1%)... well, how many of those 1/100 people actually play sports? How many of them play competitive sports? If this whole conversation wasn't happening, how many more would feel comfortable playing competitive sports who don't already?
The end result is... probably not many. It might add up to a couple kids in a school. Then there's another question - have they undergone male puberty? Because if they're young and in high school and identifying as trans there's a possibility they haven't and if so there's no real concern re: sports.
So from a statistical standpoint... we can probably most ignore this because it's not going to be significant. But what about the individuals who are affected in the process? What about the cisgender girl who works for years towards a sports scholarship, only to be beaten out by a trans girl with a different body type from hers that leaves her preternaturally inclined to succeed in a certain sport? There are very, very few sports where a female body type is advantageous, and while a few years of HRT does make a difference, it can never close that gap.
It's also unlikely that a trans woman is going to be so good at a sport that she could beat out all cisgender competitors and say, become a world champion. I think we can all agree we don't need to worry about that level. But it's a bit of a different story when we're talking about more local competition. What if there's a trans female athlete who absolutely wipes the floor with her competitors in high school, then goes up to a higher level and loses? Some people would look at that and say "well there's no problem" while others would say to think about the girls who competed with her in her school and whether they had a level playing field.
I think this is the real crux of the argument -- cis women are largely unaffected. But what about the ones who are? Then of course you could also argue, well, what about the trans women who are affected by sports bans? Aren't they just as important? And the answer is yes, IMO, and I just don't know that there is any perfect solution to this situation or ever will be. One solution would be to have trans female and trans male athletes separated into their own categories, but obviously many of them don't want that for various reasons, and the other issue is you'd have to get further into the weeds with "did they undergo male puberty, are they on HRT, have they taken HRT for a certain amount of time" etc and you'd get into many different categories almost like para-athletes have.
And at the end of the day I don't think we can pretend there isn't an issue. We don't see this outrage over trans men in sports... why? For a very simple reason, they don't and can't win in most sports because they are at an extreme disadvantage due to their gender assigned at birth.
"What about the cisgender girl who works for years towards a sports scholarship, only to be beaten out by a trans girl with a different body type from hers that leaves her preternaturally inclined to succeed in a certain sport?"
This happens to cis women from cis women every single day of the year, and at an astronomically higher rate than any trans women earning women's scholarships. Katie Ledecky has absolutely dominated her entire career. Nobody stood a single chance. I doubt we had a constant media shitstorm saying it was unfair, either. But when Lia Thomas won a few events, it was a media shitstorm for half a year, despite her not even breaking a single NCAA record, as far as I remember. She was also really only good at one or two categories, I remember her being not great in a few others and being handily beaten.
Sports are not fair. I'm not saying that we shouldn't have any sort of regulation on who can compete. Trans women do have to adhere to each sporting body's rules, which commonly requires a few years of HRT and testosterone levels under a certain amount, and some studies have shown this actually does bring trans women's performances in line with cis women in some cases. Here's a study for that: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/347432700_Effect_of_gender_affirming_hormones_on_athletic_performance_in_transwomen_and_transmen_Implications_for_sporting_organisations_and_legislators
I think it's disingenuous to assume trans women automatically have an advantage, or that the ones who might are inherently unfair, when cis women aren't made equal, either. IMO any bans on trans women in women's sports currently are reactionary, overkill, and unnecessary, since it has barely registered as a problem, people just think it's a problem because we don't get a news article every time a cis woman takes a scholarship over another cis woman, but we see an article every time a trans woman even plays a sport, much less wins at one.
We've had like five or fewer notable trans woman athletes recently, and while some were good at their sport, I don't remember any really being the pinnacle of that sport, either. To me, it's asinine to discriminate against trans women in sports with all these "what if's" when we aren't really seeing a problem that registers as anything more than a statistical outlier.
I do agree that there isn't a perfect solution to this, but I also think that pre-emptively banning trans women from competition and discriminating against them at this time is overkill and more based in hate and/or ignorance than actual science or spirit of competition.
I'm sorry, but this is an uninformed post.
How does a cis girl losing a scholarship to a trans girl with a "different body types" differ from losing it to... Another cis girl with a different body type.
The reason you don't hear about transgender men in sports is because it's harder to lie about it. With men, the talking points can just be reduced down to "male puberty" and "bone structure", whilst for trans men they don't really have an argument so they're not brought up. This is exactly the issue: trans men exist in sports without messing anything up, but trans women are being targeted as part of a very explicitly political campaign.
This article:
https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/25-transgender-athletes-you-should-know/
Found within five minutes of googling shows that there are plenty of trans men in sports (though some on that list retired after completing, a lot did compete as their new gender identity). Case in point, Laurel Hubbard in that article set records in her state when she was a man (weightlifting), but couldn't proceed in the Tokyo Olympics after transitioning.
I'm sorry if I sound aggressive, but you're caught up in something that just has no grounds in reality. Girls aren't "losing" scholarships, they're being outcompeted by other athletes. Sports at it's core is already based on a genetic lottery, should Michael Phelps not be allowed to compete because his body is different? Should a new category be made for him and people like him?
Sports events require trans athletes to be on HRT for a specific set of time before competing. No trans woman is competing still on testosterone. No-one is pretending this isn't an issue, this issue was tackled and solved a while ago, but the American right has twisted the narrative so that the average person reacts badly just hearing about trans people in sports.
But that doesn't tell the whole story. Hubbard crushed the competition in Australia several years earlier, beating the runner up by a considerable margin. Hubbard faced immense media pressure when she lifted at the Tokyo Olympics which surely made it more difficult to succeed... but also by that point was one of the oldest weightlifters to ever compete at the Olympics and specifically pointed out her age as the reason she did not do well. What if Hubbard was 10 years younger and didn't have the pressure of being the first open trans athlete at the Olympics on her head?
Nobody said they were. I certainly didn't.
This is not just an issue in America. I'm not American and I'm not a conservative, I still think it is an issue. I have nothing against trans people but the reality here is that people have to weigh what they feel is most important - and for some recognizing trans women as women is what is most important, and the integrity of good competition in the women's category comes second.
Someone else said "Michael Phelps has an unfair advantage bc of body type, why not force him into his own category?" - well, Michael Phelps is one in a billion, he is a freak of nature, and the average trans woman is not.
I think that "someone else" is me, lol.
Regardless, Hubbard "crushed" the competition in the same way Feagaiga Stowers "crushed" the competition in the 2018 Commonwealth Games (Laurel's Results; page 15). I'm not a sport aficionado, so I might be mis-reading it, but from the column labeled "total", we can see that Hubbard beat her runner up by 19 points. Stowers won by 10 points. The margin is smaller, but it's there. But then consider that in the 2022 CW games, Emily Campbell won by 18 points over the runnerup, setting a record in the process. You could try to argue that if Hubbard didn't drop out of the 2018 CW games due to her injury she would've destroyed the competition, but when you look at her performance in the 2019 Pacific games you can see that although she did win it was not nearly as far a margin as her other medals, beating the runner ups by a few kg, in line with the gap between the rest of the athletes. Same for the Roma 2020 world cup. Point being, she's not a freak of nature and not that far ahead of the rest of the curve. If she's such a monster, why isn't she demolishing the rest? As far as I can tell, not a single trans woman has ever won the gold medal in the Women's Weightlifting Championships and from skimming, it looks like none won any medals.
Exceptional people exist. Some of them are trans, the majority aren't. When Campbell destroys her competition (not to mention outperforming Hubbard by miles (151 vs 168) going by her 2017 games C&J category and beating her narrowly in the Snatch category (124 vs 123)), no-one bats an eye. Sport is about these exceptional people. Even before transitioning, Hubbard was exceptional, setting records as a man and - notably - not doing so when competing as a woman. That's odd, don't you think? According to what the media spins, someone who was a male world record-breaker competing against women should destroy them. But you can see from the results she had back then that her current performance is nowhere near the same level, especially compared to today's athletes. In fact, women have already passed Hubbard's record, with China's Li Wenwen lifting a 180 C&J in the very Olympic games that Hubbard disqualified at, so even in the absolute worst case scenario where Hubbard retained her "male strength", she'd still fall short of gold, and according to the results she did get for those lifts she attempted she'd be tying for fourth if she did win (granted this is a bit of a guess because we're missing half of her performance). Which means that among the thirteen women that attended, ONE would be trans, without even winning a medal. I can also talk about how in the 2017 games where she "destroyed" her opponent, the male frontrunner two days later beat her by 40+ points total, and if you take both Hubbard and her runner-up and compare them to the men's results you find that Hubbard would tie for sixth and her runner-up would be placed in eighth. They both get demolished by men to a roughly equal degree.
All of this to say that Hubbard is not pulling male-equivalent results and not breaking records. You have edge cases and exceptional people, but then those edge cases and exceptional people get beaten, whether trans or not.
If I understand you correctly you're arguing that there's no proof that trans women (who fulfil the mandatory time one HRT requirements) actually do have an advantage over cis women and thus should be allowed to compete in the women's leagues.
I think what the average, frenzied up sports nut wants to hear is that there is proof that they don't have an advantage, and it would take a lot of wind out of the sails of this controversy. I realize that that's a tall order, seeing as there are just so few trans athletes. But I've heard the bone structure argument so many times now, and arguing against it on reddit is practically impossible outside of dedicated LGBT+ spaces, that I don't think your line of reasoning will change much.
I agree like many decisions there are losers either way but in my opinion the trans athlete is more directly impacted. They know they are directly impacted if they are banned. An out-competed cisgender athlete doesn't really know if they would have made it or not, it's not directly attributable. I think even on those grounds alone it should bias you to allowing trans athletes in sports.
Im definitely no sports nut but I can tell you that that line of reasoning will hold no water with people who are. They see sports not as a fun activity as many people as possible should have access to, to them it is a competition first and foremost. And if you offer a restricted league for people who can't compete at the highest level (like say because they're too young, too old or were AFAB and went through the according puberty), they very much want that league to be a fair playing field. They don't see the problem with excluding trans women because the very nature of that league is exclusion based, and as long as trans women have an advantage, they should be excluded, too. Arguing about how that impacts trans women athletes just doesn't register with them, because to their mind its about fairness of competition, not fair and equal access. It would be like feeling sorry for an athlete who got caught doping.
I have the feeling trans activists and sport enthusiasts don't overlap much, and that is why this has been such a strategic wedge topic for the right: many people who are not transphobe see the point of their argument ("Well, yes, competition should be fair"), and then they see arguments from trans supporters that don't really address the issue for them. This is very harmful, because it makes it easy to dismiss trans supporters outright the next time they are confronted with trans inclusion - and there will be a next time, the right will make sure of that, they are constantly looking for another angle of attack because there are a lot of transphobes and they know that it is fertile grounds for them.
That's a good point. I'm more of a sports nerd than a sports jock, but I agree that this line of reasoning is common.
I tend to look at problems at the systems level, and here you have a very small number of trans athletes and a very tiny minority of that group even making an impact along the lines of scholarship/award/etc. So in terms of minimizing bad outcomes it's pretty obvious to me. I think people can come around to this idea eventually, it will just take time. But it may well require some assurances about the top levels of sports, even if that's pretty unlikely to occur.
That's also the case for trans women, who don't and can't win in most sports because of the extreme disadvantage caused by their gender assigned at birth. I can count on my fingers the number of trans women athletes I know, because the outrage is always over the same handful of people.
The reason for it is simpler, and has nothing to do with whether an advantage or disadvantage exists. It has to do with the obsession the general population has with transfeminine people - with effemimania and oppositional sexism - in all areas of life.
But the outrage isn't about the same few people. The news stories you see are just about them bc they are performing at high levels. I'm not talking about the highest levels, which I agree are statistically insignificant, but the lower levels of competition where in some cases cis women could and are getting creamed. For example, Laurel Hubbard who someone brought up in another comment -- she went to the Olympics and did not do well. So there's no problem, right? But what about the Australian competition she won a few years earlier that qualified her for the Olympics, where she absolutely crushed the competition...? When she got to the Olympics there was a ton of press pressure on her for being the first out trans woman at the Olympics and she was also quite old... but at the Australian competition she dominated with 2nd place being pretty distant. So what about the other women she competed with there? Is that fair for them?
I think the question for me comes down to "is it paramount to recognize trans women as women in all facets of life including competitive sport, where they may have an unfair advantage because of that classification?" And in my case I don't have an answer. I'm not saying we should ban trans women from women's categories. I don't think that's ideal. The problem is there really is no ideal solution. Someone else said "what about Michael Phelps, he has a unique body type that gives him an advantage, why not ban him?" -- but Michael Phelps is one in a billion. You can't account for that. Trans women are not one in a billion, they're far more common, common enough that it is worth having these conversations because they'll only become more common over time as more people feel comfortable coming out + competing while out.
I don't mean to offend but I would hesitate to use words like "effemimania" in conversation... given it is a word conjured up by a single writer and is redundant in this sentence. I had to look it up to even know what you were saying (which was... what you'd already just said). I don't think you're going to be surprised to hear that. And I say this as an effeminate man!!
Yes, it is. At least as fair as it is when they get crushed and creamed and dominated by any other woman - you can't account for one in a billion cases, after all.
And no, they are not. They are, in fact, far less common in sports than they should be. They are grossly underrepresented amongst both competitors and winners, and this even when the latter is all we hear about.
I wouldn't. I expect people who engage in this kind of conversation to either already know the subject, or to be willing to read up on prior discussion. Redundance - repeating or restating or rephrasing something that was already said, possibly in a more inflammatory manner - can also be used as a rhetorical tool to denote emphasis, which is exactly what I wanted, but I am not sure what you being an effeminate man has to do with it.
I think the root causes are money and hate and ignorance.
Some people are against it for almost strictly monetary reasons, like you have said; it's in their best interests to reduce the number of competitors for scholarships or, more broadly, any money that is available for any competitors at any level. There's an issue right now in Disc Golf where Natalie Ryan has been barred from competing in the FPO (Female Professional Open) and there are a number of players who support her being kicked from competition.
Others are opposed because while they support "trans rights" they still see someone who, for example, transition MTF as a "man" in a "woman" sport. I think - I hope - that for the most part people who have this opinion don't hate trans people, they just don't understand. Their ignorance is clouding their judgment on the matter.
And then there are people like dub brought up below who are just bigots.
I think all of them make up a non-trivial percentage of the opposition, which is why it can be so difficult to figure out how to fight on issues like this. There isn't just one reason, so there's no one way to fight for what is right. And to be clear, I've simplified it to three main issues that people use to justify their position, but there is almost certainly more, and there are factions within those three camps... it's a very complex tapestry of issues.
That Natalie Ryan business hit me hard, because it was a case where the governing body of the sport and competitors were completely ignoring why Natalie is good at disc golf and just banned her because she's trans. Seemingly everybody that wants trans women banned from women's sports say how trans women are guaranteed to be stronger or faster or whatever than cis women (which is not the case), but in Natalie's case, in the tournament she won (which spurred the talk to ban trans women from women's competition in disc golf), she did not win on her throw distance, she won on her putting. She does not have the best distance on the women's tour, but the people calling for her ban were pretending she can throw twice as hard as cis women and that she's beating up on them. It just showed me how ignorant people are of this issue. People didn't actually care for any sort of data or scientific backing (which mostly says it's fine for trans women to compete with cis women after a certain amount of HRT), they just wanted to ban someone based on gut feeling. They ended up not protecting any cis women and instead just hurt trans women.
You have boiled that down into the exact reason I also am intensely angry at the PDGA and DGPT, and maybe I'll just add on one more thing.
People do this thing where they think that individuals from other groups do things because of their belonging to that group, whereas individuals from the same group as us do things because of their individual capabilities. I loathe this easy example, but "that person committed that crime because they are muslim" is a common one, but when someone is of the same group as us, we often attribute it to a more complex reason, and give some understanding.
The same thing happens with trans athletes, and in this specific instance it was so infuriating because there were hundreds if not thousands of people saying that Natalie won because she is trans, but Natalie won because she had a great day and played the best she has ever played. If Natalie was winning because she was trans, she'd be winning all the time, and she doesn't win all the time, or even all that often. She played well, she won, she deserved to win.
Yeah, I can't take any organization seriously that says they're banning trans women to ensure fair competition, and they end up banning someone that had one good weekend, while Tattar continues to win basically every tournament. Obviously Tattar should not be banned for being good, but it breaks my brain that people want to ban trans women for being unfair when absolutely nobody can touch some of the cis women that are on top of the tour. It made it very clear it was about hate and not fairness and it's why I stopped caring about the PDGA.
Exactly. Tattar is so good, and she's good because she puts in the work... but I am 100% confident that there is a physiological / genetic component as well, but nobody talks or cares about that.
So the obvious consequence of this would be FtM guys participating in women's sports while on testosterone? Suuuuuure. (Edit: Upon second thought, this aspect alone makes me want to tuck into the methodology of the poll, because there is no way people are this stupid. This question must've been cued towards MtF rather than FtM, right?)
Afair (feel free but not obliged to correct me), sports performance of either trans gender is statistically different from cis women, depending on the sport, right? With FtM having more muscle (often important) and MtF having heavier bones (less often important, sometimes a detriment)? Of course it is definitely not fair to them to lump both in with men. So what do we do then? Acknowledge that sports isn't fair by nature? Would make sense to me, considering it is extremely likely that performance is massively influenced by genetic factors. But how do square that up with maintaining all the facets that currently make competetive sport interesting?
Or, the null hypothesis of accepting that trans athletes are generally more akin to their chosen than born gender as far as performance goes. Sadly that comes with raised eyebrows everytime a MtF athlete achieves literally anything...
I do wonder though if there's a way to acknowledge that sports isn't fair genetically, but keep it appealing. Statistical handicap ratings based on genetically expected performance seem not exactly marketable. Fair, sure. Possibly very spicy as far as racial differences go... But interesting probably only to the more statistically minded.
(Let me know if you think it's ok to post this. Trying to be respectful of this group, while also not marking it read-only in my head.)
I mean I think they probably just don't want trans guys to compete at all.
See the recent bathroom discussions. So many people were bringing up trans guys as a kind of "gotcha!" to TERFs, posting pictures of men who'd been on testosterone for years and being all like "Do you want THIS in the women's bathrooms?" As if people who were arguing that trans women shouldn't be allowed in women's bathrooms would be like "Oh shit, I didn't realise this would be the outcome, whoops!"
Of course, what's actually happening is that trans men are unwanted in both spaces (as are trans women ofc), and that was always the point.
Absolutely, no doubt. A lot of transphobes don't want them to exist in any meaningful capacity, except perhaps surviving in an ahem cupboard under the stairs, just so they don't have to live with the guilt of killing them.
What little methodology I can gleam without digging too deep suggests that the question didn't give an option beyond "birth gender" "chosen gender" "don't really care". Which of course makes people with notions about sports performance that are divorced from reality pick whichever sounds right, without actually thinking too much. I'd hazard the guess if you put "trans people can participate in male sports" as an option, many people would in fact select that, as it's the rational choice from a transphobic perspective.
Regardless, as it is I think the methodology here is questionable. We can probably draw the conclusion that support did decline, but I don't think the actual percentages are representative, as the study demanded that confused/uninformed moderates make an uncomfortable choice. I'd expect a statement like "Trans athletes can compete in whichever gender category best describes the average performance level of their trans gender[1]" to be fairly uncontroversial among vaguely-supportive know-nothings (which I suspect is a large group). But to commit to putting MtF athletes into women's sports without knowing how that affects women is a bit of a reach. "Keeping" them in their gender group seems like the safer choice, at least at a glance, even if you support their chosen identity. Again, assuming a vaguely supportive know-nothing here. In short, this question polarizes by not giving the center a real choice in the matter.
[1] for clarity, I'm using trans gender here to refer to either MtF or FtM.
The wording of the question here seems to be:
With the options being:
Via the PDF download at the bottom of the page.
IMO the most reasonable outcome is making one or two categories: open, and a handicap league in sports where one gender is typically disfavoured (usually women, with some exceptions).
The thing is, women’s sports are essentially handicap leagues. Without them, women would not practically be able to win medals at all.
I have no particular issue with trans athletes competing in the open categories, but it seems to me that the evidence is telling us that trans athletes (in either direction) are roughly equivalent to female athletes on PEDs.
I've seen this making the rounds on Twitter, and my reaction is come on....
This requires a lot of suspended disbelief. The history of when/why Olympic sport categories were created is interesting, and undoubtedly full of a few examples of embarrassed men like the skeet shooting and figure skating examples, but that doesn't really support your point.
I watch a fair bit of women's soccer. I enjoy watching women's soccer more than men's soccer. There are a lot of handicaps outside of sex women have to contend with -- they need real jobs alongside their soccer careers, there's no golden ticket to aspire to, there is a relative lack of funnels and role models to promote entry into the sport. I get all that. But a women's soccer category isn't preventing women from dominating soccer today, I can assure you.
There is an article on Wired which covers the gender separation in professional football. One thing I found interesting with regard to the study referenced in the article is the impact of environmental and social factors as well as the physical aspect. I'd not really considered that before. It makes me wonder how much that has a part to play, and whether the rising popularity of women's football might lead to changes in policy from some governing bodies.
Starting to get some Malice flags and other indications that this thread isn't going well - I don't have time to go through it in detail right now so am going to lock and remove it. I will reinstate it later if it seems salvageable.
If we truly care about fair play, we would stop using gender at all. Simply create 2 or 3 classes and base the metrics on testosterone levels.
There are many born genetically female that have extreme high testosterone, and many born genetically male with very low testosterone.
This seems like an obvious solution to me, but it would require both sides of the argument to give up on gender based divisions. I have seen plenty of people dislike this idea when I suggest it, but none with a viable reason as to why it's a bad idea. Open to have my mind changed.
Current testosterone isn’t the only factor though. There are many reasons that men outperform women on average, such as bone density, the size of their upper body, heart, and red blood cell counts.
If you’re dividing by anything it should be by skill. In a few sports there would be no gender gap. But in most the best women in the world would be in the lowest skill bracket.
This article is to be focused on popular opinions. Like all civil rights issues, these evolve over time and opinions change. I'm not sure popular opinion should be driving this matter, especially when there are such strong prejudices involved currently.
What I'm genuinely curious about is:
To answer your first question, you have to examine the history of each sport individually. 99% Invisible has a great episode on early Women's Basketball in Iowa: Podcast episode link
I think to keep it fair, that if women get banned for hormones issues includ trans women. If you would ban a woman with poces or chromosome differences then it makes sense to ban trans women on the same rule. If they are not doing that then allow all women to play. Also it should not be a government law, it should be a organization policy or state law of public school related.
Coming from a Trans women that did track but before transitioning so I don't have skin in the game.
It would be difficult to ban trans women for the same hormone issues that cis women are sometimes banned for because trans women are usually at pretty low T levels, since they're actively monitoring it (unlike almost all cis women). Banning cis women with naturally high T levels is absurd anyway and typically only occurs as a side-effect of trans hysteria or as an excuse to eliminate a particular high-performing woman from the playing field (who more often than not is a woman of color).
If I remember things correctly, cis women in sports also tend to have higher than average T levels. It makes me wonder if it is even fair for trans women to compete against them - after all, we can clearly see that trans people are underrepresented all across the board.
It might just be the case that being cis constitutes an unfair advantage.
Yeah, my Dr said I might have to take T after surgery as my T levels was really low before I started HRT, the other thing conservatives are saying now is the amount of muscle fibers is different for someone that went thru puberty but I haven't found papers on that.
I agree, there are some physical variables on top of financial and home/environmental differences. That "option" is the only thing I would be "ok" with since cis women can take blockers as well. That bring in a can of worms with what is the acceptable levels of T for women and as you said the discrimination that brings.
I mean overall I think the whole thing is baseless hysteria, but ig it's baseless hysteria that appeals to cis people unfortunately
I'm with you, it's incredibly frustrating to watch the propaganda work and to see more and more people ignore science and statistics, which suggest there is basically no issue at all. Media just twists the problem to form a narrative. It's easy to think trans women are evil and beating up cis women when fox news covers Lia Thomas for a month straight or something. I wish the people buying into this would instead listen to people who are actually knowledgeable on the subject.
The thing that really gets me with all of this is how the ire gets directed at the trans athletes directly. You can make the argument for requiring medical transition for X amount of time before allowing one to participate in Z division, but I really don't see what the harm is for sports on a sub-competitive level as long as there's not a clear imbalance that undermines everyone else's fun, which, hey: that's what sports are supposed to be about! On a case by case basis, you deal with people who make the environment unfair or unsafe.
Trans athletes should not be harassed when they go out of their way to ensure they are following competitive sports organization guidelines. Lia Thomas abided by the NCAA rules before competing in the Women's division, and if there were a productive discussion on the matter, it should be on whether the NCAA rules need to be revised; instead, we get laws being written based on gut reactions and gender essentialist views that stem from religious beliefs. A reasonable discussion is science-based, coupled with reasonable judgement calls on what actually determines an "unfair advantage", but the line of most of these conservative lawmakers falls down to chromosomes and what gender one is assigned at birth, ignoring the myriad of factors that influence how a person develops into a unique individual over time.
All that said, unfortunately, testosterone is a performance enhancing drug for most physical activities. Luckily, we have a pretty wide body of research on its effects, which have been used to make participation recommendations and used by organizations to set guidelines. Some of those guidelines on blood testosterone levels have ended up excluding many cis black women from competitive athletics even to this day, but that's a whole other topic.
I’m not aware of statistics about trans athletes results compared to non-trans, but my theory is that videos of non-trans athletes losing against trans athletes and displaying their disappointment are really effective at forming the public perception.