Cis lady here. This is a good, thought provoking essay. I think gender in sports is very messy, and there is no exact way to divide groups fairly; one point the author makes that rings very true...
Cis lady here. This is a good, thought provoking essay. I think gender in sports is very messy, and there is no exact way to divide groups fairly; one point the author makes that rings very true to me is that if people are barred from participating in sports based on genetic tests, that sports will not be the end of that segregation. Once laws have been passed for the "protection" of a group of people, based on the villainization and dehumanization of another, I think it creates momentum to continue to segregate the villainized group in new ways. Where is it supposed to stop, particularly in places where a majority believes that those people are inhuman? I realize it's already happening, but it's also very scary. Is it not our moral obligation to fight the systematic marginalization of people, especially vulnerable ones?
I find a lot of the discourse (by cis people) about trans people difficult; I think some cis people use trans people as a shorthand to identify what they hate about modern wokeness, and I think I agree with the author that few, if any, people truly believe that trans people alone are costing politicians elections. But I do think it may also be more complex, that trans people for whatever reason are triggering for a certain kind of social ideology, much in the way that race does. What can be done about that? Is this a case where people who are trans becoming part of typical public consciousness and culture will gradually erode those bigoted feelings from most people, much like lesbian and gay people have over recent decades? Or is this a situation where the erosion of trans rights will continue undeterred for a particular political ideology, much as it has for many racialized people? How can that be stopped? How can the empathy of bigoted people be reached?
Cis lady here. This is a good, thought provoking essay. I think gender in sports is very messy, and there is no exact way to divide groups fairly; one point the author makes that rings very true to me is that if people are barred from participating in sports based on genetic tests, that sports will not be the end of that segregation. Once laws have been passed for the "protection" of a group of people, based on the villainization and dehumanization of another, I think it creates momentum to continue to segregate the villainized group in new ways. Where is it supposed to stop, particularly in places where a majority believes that those people are inhuman? I realize it's already happening, but it's also very scary. Is it not our moral obligation to fight the systematic marginalization of people, especially vulnerable ones?
I find a lot of the discourse (by cis people) about trans people difficult; I think some cis people use trans people as a shorthand to identify what they hate about modern wokeness, and I think I agree with the author that few, if any, people truly believe that trans people alone are costing politicians elections. But I do think it may also be more complex, that trans people for whatever reason are triggering for a certain kind of social ideology, much in the way that race does. What can be done about that? Is this a case where people who are trans becoming part of typical public consciousness and culture will gradually erode those bigoted feelings from most people, much like lesbian and gay people have over recent decades? Or is this a situation where the erosion of trans rights will continue undeterred for a particular political ideology, much as it has for many racialized people? How can that be stopped? How can the empathy of bigoted people be reached?
Thanks for sharing.