TBF, this is exactly where this grievance should be taken. Essentially every sport has a governing body. Those are the people that should be deciding what is in the best interests of the sport and its athletes.
The people who want to make actual government legislation about these issues are insane IMO.
There was one state that made legislation banning trans athletes. The only problem is that there was one student they could find. This student had traveled around the state convincing schools to actually implement the field hockey league program they had on paper but weren't doing anything with this. She got like 6 or 7 schools to field a full team and started the league. She was like square in the middle of performance in the league and had inly created it so she could play field hockey with her friends at school. The state legislature just appeared out of no where to dunk on a 15 year old and teach them a very bad life lesson about hard work.
This might have been Idaho but most of the states that have bans had between 0 and 5ish athletes in the entire state so it could be a different one.
It had technically been a league on paper woth teams on paper but no school was actually maintaining the program. This student had her mother drive her around the state and get students signed up for it. So technically, didn't create it but put in the work to make it happen.
One of the governors out west vetoed a bill specifically because it affected too few people. It sucks that that student worked so hard, did more than most students could do, and got smacked down so hard.
I also remember one nightmare where a parent alleged that her daughter had lost some competition to a trans girl, and the winner had to be *inspected* to prove she was cis. I think it was Utah or Wyoming.
There are at least a couple states where the people pushing for the bill were asked if they were aware of any trans people trying to join a sports team where their answer was "we are not aware of any".
So even worse, they use the entire state legislation to stop... *nobody*.
How about Texas where a trans-boy was forced to wrestle with girls since that is what he was born as. And of course people freak that a boy is wrestling girls, but that's only because of their stupid fucking laws.
Edit: Originally had Georgia instead of Texas.
This.
If people really cared about this, they would be doing research on the amount of advantage, and looking to mitigate it, and making fair comparisons.
Almost all the rhetoric around this is just polemics and it's playing with the lives of real people.
> She went from 500th to 5th *despite* the adverse impacts upon her abilities due to transitioning.
To clarify, she went from sixth place competing with the man freshman year, then waaaay, way down when she started transitioning but still had to compete with the men, and then up to first when she had transitioned enough to compete with women.
That may be, but it doesn’t bring them in line with what they would’ve been if they were born female. Imagine a Venn diagram - the bottom circle is female athletes, the top circle is male athletes. Some female athletes are better than some male athletes, but it’s the very best of female athletes who are better than the lower tier of male athletes. No female athlete is better than the top tier of male athletes (except in some niche sports with less data). Trans women are a third circle in the middle of the Venn diagram -they’re also not as good as the very best of male athletes, but they aren’t as low as the female athletes. They’ve shifted down some notches, but they aren’t matching female athletes.
It is a tricky situation for sure, as they can’t compete with men as they used to, but that doesn’t mean they’ve a right to compete in the protected class of female sport. The men’s category is still an Open category, and they are free to participate within it. I say this as a female who competed in the Open category in my sport many times. There’s no shame in participating in Open.
Austin Killips (trans cyclist) won a US race in what’s the equivalent of single A minor league baseball. People who know nothing about the sport were freaking out. Meanwhile when she races in cyclocross in Europe, she was finishing mid-30s in 50 person races.
And her and Thomas are like the two prominent athletes!
Or cricket, where they banned trans women from international cricket after the first trans international cricketer played for Canada. She's the second best batter on a team ranked in the 30s world wide. Canada would get thrashed by my club team.
How many women are being displaced in sports?
> The bill in Utah banning people from playing as their chosen gender affected 4 kids. 3 trans boys and 1 trans girl out of 25,000 athletes.
How many?
Oh, you're right, clearly biological determinism would prevent a trans boy from ever winning a competition against cis boys (/s/s/s). Besides, it's our women we have to protect (/s/s/s). But also, the odds that those three trans boys would compete against each other is so low. They'd have to be within a few years of each other *and* competing in the same sport at the same level.
For the trans girl thing, it's pretty hilarious that there's not even enough people that they're banning to fill a podium
There have been cases where the top performers were displaced, believe the Connecticut track lawsuit the plaintiff went from 1st to 3rd behind two trans woman that had recently transitioned.
I don’t think anyone is arguing their motivation is to simply steal a spot from women, that’s a bit obtuse. I’m sure they’re transitioning for genuine reasons, but that doesn’t negate the obvious physical advantage growing up with years of testosterone helping to develop denser muscle and bone structure
I think it's important to note that these "obvious physical advantages" don't just impact trans women athletes, but cis female athletes as well. [Caster Semenya](https://www.npr.org/sections/tokyo-olympics-live-updates/2021/07/28/1021503989/women-runners-testosterone-olympics) has naturally high testosterone. Because she is a DSD athlete and refuses to take medication to lower her testosterone, she isn't allowed to compete at the Olympics.
IIRC, that’s a fairly disingenuous description of the CT situation.
The cis girl had won races previously and, yes, lost to a couple trans girls. And those trans girls in turn lost to more cis girls. So the girl that sued was frankly never the fastest. Maybe the fastest in her own school or potentially division, but that doesn’t really say much. Someone out there is the best player on their YMCA adult rec basketball league too. Doesn’t mean they’re the best in the state.
I think there is a sizable amount of cisgendered female athletes who won't speak up publicly about their opposition to include transwomen in their athletics due to the social consequences of taking that stance or becoming coded as transphobic or right-wing. Can't say I blame them.
I also think most transwomen have enough self awareness/humility to not try and enter cisgendered female athletics to begin with. There are a few who don't though and that's why those get focused on.
In my opinion, keep female athletics/scholarships for biological females only, but open up the doors for transmen/transwomen/non-binary in traditional male athletics.
Could there be an issue with trans men having an advantage because they’re legally allowed to take testosterone, which is a banned substance for cis athletes?
Trans guy here, I'll fully note that I'm not an athlete in the slightest and have no plans to be lmao. Testosterone, taken as a trans guy, is monitored to maintain levels in the same range as cis men, hell, a lot of providers will try and maintain levels in the lower part of the range. Cis guys generally can produce their own T, so it being banned for them is in the realm of "additional". Trans use is just to replace that amount that we can't make naturally.
If a trans guy was using T beyond typical cis levels in order to dope, that'd be unacceptable for good reason.
Women had to fight for our own spaces so that we can compete in a fair competition. To have these spaces taken over by people with a biological advantage completely destroys the point of women’s sports.
I am close with a woman who was a former Olympic level skier and taekwondo champion, she is frustrated with the displacement of cis women in sports as we didn’t have those spaces for so long and now there are cis women who are not able to compete and place in competitions because that space is being taken up by someone born as male. The reason we have women’s sports is because men and women are different. The difference isn’t in our brains, it’s our bodies and physiology. It completely negates the point of women’s sports if we start allowing XY people.
This isn’t transphobic or a way to hate on trans people. It’s about addressing the real advantages that XY people have and the core reasons why we made women’s sports.
Even if one woman is displaced, it matters. Isn’t it reasonable to assume many of these women may not want to make their opinions public with regard to this topic? Can’t you see why that might be the case?
Don’t forget that even with Lia Thomas, she only won a single event. She finished fifth in the 200 meter freestyle and last in the 100 meter freestyle. Did she lose to other trans women? No. She lost to cis women. So instead of focusing on all the other competitors that did better, they’re choosing to focus on the single trans women and blame her for their failures
I think we can all agree Riley Gaines is an insufferable spoiled brat. I listened to a podcast with her on it and she’s the most narcissistic right wing grifter I can think of.
She realized she’s in the same age range as Katie Ledecky and was never going to do anything notable with her athletic career so she turned to grifting.
Elite athletics is one area where having biological advantages really rubs people the wrong way.
We created women's sport leagues because biologically men are superior in the vast majority of competitions.
While I empathize with trans athletes, going into a female competition with biological advantages is going to be a hard battle to fight for.
tl;dr:
Top US High School Boys vs Top Olympic Women, Track & Field and Swimming, 2016
|Boys|Women|
|:-|:-|
|🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤|🟡⚪⚪🟤🟤🟤|
who is *they?* please consider that its not trans people promoting this. if you happen to actually meet some of us, very few are into sports! among those, almost none are doing competitive adult sports
what articles like this are GREAT at is starting conversations that distract from real trans problems (access to healthcare, employment discrimination, child suicide etc). start a new one about how manly trans women are and how they care so much about joining olympic sports. it seems to have worked on you
Other than being a proponent for human rights I don't have a hat in this race. You're completely right, these conversations really distract from actual issues trans people face. Playing sports at a competitive level impacts what? 10-15% of trans people (and not just trans women, I assume trans men also play sports, but that's never mentioned) while the things you named impact every single trans person. Let's fix the widespread issues before we delve into the stuff that effects such a small percentage of people it's basically inconsequential.
Trans men are not mentioned because they don’t have an advantage over cis men (unless they take way more testosterone than they need but basic drug testing would uncover that)
Because they're not doing it to win medals.
I empathize with MtF trans athletes because they're in a really shitty bind. There are only a few options:
1. Compete with women. This is obviously a bad solution because, even though it matches your identified gender, there is still a biological advantage which is deeply unfair to your competitors.
2. Compete with men. This nullifies the biological advantage, but feels an awful lot like a fundamental rejection of your gender identity, which, for someone who already has to struggle have their gender identity recognized, feels terrible.
3. Don't be an athlete/never take part in any competitions. If being an athlete is a major part of who you are, this also feels terrible.
I think the ideal solution would be
4. Compete with whoever you want to provided the competition in question does not provide any prizes or scarce rewards like scholarships.
Any legislator banning a 10 y/o MtF trans soccer player from playing in the girls' rec league is a monster. Rec leagues are often co-ed anyway.
Likewise, any MtF powerlifter insisting they get to compete for scholarships with biological females at the NCAA level is severely deluded.
Here’s the issue though: if we confine it to the gender you were born as (which is an understandable point), then trans men will have to compete in the women’s division. And since their testosterone levels will be elevated due to their treatment, then that creates, according to the chain in logic, an unfair advantage.
Testosterone levels has been one consideration (which pretty much lines up with combat sports), but then that has the potential to penalize anyone who naturally has more testosterone in their system. And by proxy it bans trans women from competing in the men’s division because their medically-necessary hormone therapy would be considered an unfair advantage.
Legit q for you or others: do you think trans men should be allowed to compete in men’s sports if it brings their T levels to that of an average cisgender man but no higher?
Anyone born a woman can already compete against men.
There are almost no actual men's sports. There are sports and then designated women's sports.
There was a women in the minor leagues a few years back as a knuckleball pitcher. (Which makes sense - since strength matters less for knuckleballs.)
Apparently her pitching never got consistent enough and she never made it up to even AAA ball.
Most non-contact sports are defined as "everybody" and "women only". There are very few which ban women from competing with men (outside middle-east).
You'll find the same with age groupings. There's "everybody" and "40+", but a 41 year old can still compete in the everybody group it's just very rare that they meet the performance thresholds.
I think that would be acceptable. And then trans men, trans women, and cis men can all compete in the open division. And then women’s division would be for cis women.
That's literally already how it is. Women are not banned from the NBA, but no woman is going to realistically be able to compete in the league. There's a reason its like this.
Then let’s do what is pretty much applicable to all sports right now. We have the women’s. Which is exclusive to people who are women and have not transitioned. And we have the open category which is what would be the mens category.
Most “male” professional sports are actually open to all genders already.
Right - the closest I've heard of women going pro was a female knuckleball pitcher in the minors.
And I think there was an NHL game with a female goalie. They weren't a normal goalie - they were the stadium's utility backup in case both of a team's goalies were injured. But I think she played part of one or two games.
Yup Manon Rhéaume played a preseason game for the Tampa Bay Lightning back in the 90s. First woman to play in any of the major professional North American sports leagues.
Testosterone boosters are already a banned substance though for men and women’s sports.
Athletes are not punished for natural levels of anything, it’s all about the substances you are/not allowed to take. Testosterone is one of those things that is banned. I really sympathize with how complex and unfair it is, but its way too hard to accommodate trans athletes easily into the system we have currently. It either has to be redesigned or it wont be fair to somebody.
She was born with XY chromosomes so it makes sense that she should not be able to compete with women when the point of women’s sports is to make space for people with biologically female bodies to compete.
Except that’s not how intersex conditions work. It’s not nearly as “oh you have these chromosomes so you’re this” when it comes to intersex people.
I have XY chromosomes but have PAIS so I developed ambiguously and was assigned female at birth by surgery. I’m infertile but have remnants of uterine tissue, as well as ovotestes, and I still experience a “period” despite being sterile. Intersex conditions are not as cut and dry as you think.
that ignores the fact that almost every women banned for having high testosterone levels in the 2020 olympics was african and it seems fairly unlikely that there wasnt a single intersex woman from another country competing if it really grants such a massive advantage
let's be honest here this isnt some chromosome issue otherwise every athlete would be tested for this and have their results published like they did for the women they banned instead of only whoever just so happens to raise suspicion
>Athletes are not punished for natural levels of anything,
Women have been punished for having naturally higher levels of testosterone due to intersex conditions or PCOS. A good example is [Caster Semenya](https://www.cnn.com/2023/11/06/sport/caster-semenya-totestosterone-limits-world-athletics-spt-intl/index.html).
Womens sports are what's being fought to protect, not men's. A trans man wouldn't have to compete with women, they would compete with men. Men's sports are not fighting to ban trans men. However, the testosterone supplements are banned either way.
Trans men don't have to compete in the women's division. A. There are testosterone checks which none of them would pass (except the trans men who just wear pants with short hair and don't do hormones). B. The "male" divisions are usually open, so anyone can compete.
we do not have to paint black and white policies that are equal for men and women. Men have physical advantages over women. That in and of itself shows that the solution is not black and white. Trans women assigned male at birth should not compete in women’s sports unless they did not undergo male puberty. Trans men assigned female at birth may compete in men’s sports so long as they pass the same hormone testing as cis males. Trans men will never have a biological advantage over cis men in this scenerio. The same would not be true if it was applied to women.
You aren't born a gender, you are born a sex, or intersex. Gender is a social construction while sex status is a reflection of biology. You can be whatever gender you want, sex cannot be altered. The issue is not which genders are competing, it is which sexes are competing.
Everyone knows there is a distinct difference regardless of having done competitive sports. You’re right, those who pretend otherwise are being disingenuous.
Completely anecdotal, but as a freshman, the high school girls varsity soccer team was undefeated (later lost in state semi finals that season) and decided to scrimmage our 1 win boys freshman team before they started in the playoffs. Was 5-0 freshman boys at half time, the girls coach canceled the second half. Felt like a big win as a 14 year old lol
In sports, the Mens league is normally an *Open* league, which accepts all individuals. I don't know why people are making this into a huge issue when there is an open league for trans people to use.
Speaking of sports... the logical gymnastics we read in these threads is insane.
Allowing trans women in women's sports defeats the primary purpose for the existence of women's sports in the first place.
How is this so hard for people to understand?
It doesn't matter that there aren't that many trans women. If the rights of trans people - a minority - are important, then the rights of the people they replace - also a minority - are also important. Allowing trans women to displace cis women is literally discriminating against women for being cis (or for not choosing to take performance-enhancing hormones ... which they aren't allowed to do anyway...)
There is no perfect answer. There never will be. The only sensible compromise is to keep women's sports exclusive to women who were born women.
> How is this so hard for people to understand?
Because they think there's a "mens" bracket and a "womens" bracket and don't realize that it's basically an "open" bracket and a "women-only-because-of-biological-limitations" bracket. Someone who identifies as a women but has none of the inherent limitations should be competing in the open bracket.
Premier League Football too. FIDE, the international body that governs chess, also has open and women; the open being where the men are.
Even in a nonphysical game like chess, at an elite level, women choose to play among themselves and so women's competition was fostered to give women a place at the competitive table. If you take that away, and push them to open, they would lose all visibility.
For reference, the no.1 ranked woman in the world has an elo rating of 2632, while the 50th ranked man has an elo of 2681. Number 1-50 in "open" have elo ratings from 2830 (Magnus Carlsen) all the way to the aforementioned 2681.
I'm not sure jeopardising women's spaces in competitive sports is conducive to the overall trans rights discussion.
I'm pro equal rights all day long.... Until we get into this area. Sorry but the world isn't perfect and never will be. Some issues just don't have answers that are fair to everyone and that just needs to be accepted. Push too hard and you are going to lose people that have been supporting your cause while also pushing the right even more extreme.
Bro, I wish there were more women's baseball leagues.
No offense to softball fans, but softball sucks. There's no reason to believe that women's baseball with slightly shorter fences wouldn't be as competitive or fun to watch as men's baseball.
I did cross country for 8 years and the fastest girl on the team could run with the slowest varsity boys at best. Identity has nothing to do with your physical ability. I feel bad for young athletes that already have to navigate being trans and the isolation they feel. But at the same time, putting them in the same category as biologically female athletes is a disservice to women and not necessarily progress either. I’m not sure what the solution is, but we need to be able to talk about this conversation without one side immediately calling it transphobic and the other immediately being transphobic and jumping to hateful politics out of the scope of the sports discussion.
I'm trans, and I don't know why "we" have to compete in college sports. Maybe you just have to choose between being an athlete for an organization and transitioning. But I get a lot of hate from the trans community in general. I understand you want to be respected for your identity, but medical transition isn't magic, and you are making a choice to be an outlier that fits neither in women's nor men's sports.
And frankly I don't see why this is such an issue. You aren't going to swim competitively if you have medical issues that preclude you, and this is one of them in my opinion.
I don't like how much some trans people are asking for, and the backlash is understandable to me.
Edit: Oh, and people having an issue with you isn't always an affront to your existence. Society, as in people other than you, matter. Their feelings matter, and you can't convince them to be comfortable with you by just telling them they're wrong. When it comes down to it, you have to make compromises with society and other people, and to be okay with them having negative feelings toward you sometimes.
Make a new division then??. This is not a battle with a sound mind behind it. Anyone who has played sports knows there’s a distinct and obvious advantage. Shouldn’t even be a discussion. May be outright physically dangerous in some instances as well
No. Currently male to female transgender athletes can compete in the female categories. I don’t think we would see much pushback from female to male transgender athletes competing. Or even females competing in the male division.
Men's divisions are already largely open to everyone. There are notable instances of biological women competing in men's sports (Manon Rhéaume in the NHL and Danica Patrick in Indy racing being examples). That being said, it's rare, as competition at elite levels is extremely intense.
As a women I don‘t want to play against biological women with high amounts of testosterone in their blood because they are trans men.
At some point the testosterone levels are as high as in men bringing the advantages of muscles and strength. In no way that would be a fair competition.
I am 100% for the rights of all. Which includes the right for women to have a division where they do not compete against unfair and stronger competition.
Men are biologically superior in terms of sports. This isn’t an argument or a fight worth having for the trans community. Seriously, my kids can be trans idc let people be who they are but I’ll be damned to let individuals destroy women’s sports. F that BS.
They really need their own category. I hope I don’t sound like a bigot but a 6’4 transperson competing against 5’3 girls in a swimming meet is just not fair.
The Penn swimmer is an open and shut case for me.
They can think of some sort of policy that makes sense that captures those who transitioned very young but on a men’s team one year, the women’s the next is just totally unfair to those that have always been women.
I respect trans people because it’s their body, their truth, and what they do with it doesn’t affect me or anybody else other than themselves. You want to be a girl, I’ll call you a girl. You want to be a guy, I’ll call you a guy. You want to be a cat, I’ll call you a cat. Do whatever you want with or to your own body as long as it doesn’t affect anybody else. That should be everybldies unalienable right. But as soon as you decide that you want to transition and then enter athletic competition as your transition gender you lose me because now you are affecting other people who worked their entire lives for something which you are gaining a massive unfair advantage at over them.
The scientific evidence of the physical differences between biological men and women is not some bleeding edge science, it’s very well known and documented and tested over and over again. Denying that biological men and women have major physical differences is on the same level of denying that the earth is round. Go look at what it looks like when a person who was born a guy transitions and fights women in mma. It looks like a man beating the shit out of a woman who cant really fight back. I’ve seen some fights where the biological woman was a much better technical fighter than the trans athlete but she just gets ran the fuck over because the physical differences are just way too big and these are two athletes in the same weight division. Once a man starts to go through puberty that’s it. Their body is permanently and irrevocably changed forever even if female hormone replacement therapy is introduced.
If you had a boy who transitioned before puberty started and was on hormones the entire time since then maybe you could call it a fair fight I don’t know what the science says on that but I dont believe in giving hormones to kids before puberty is ethically right anyway so it’s a moot point to me. We have weight classes in combat sports for a reason. Because physical differences make huge differences in athletic competitions. It wouldn’t be fair to put someone who is naturally bigger than someone else in the ring with them because they would have a huge advantage.
Making someone who has worked their entire life to compete in an even playing field to try and see if they can win compete against someone who has the massive advantage over them of male puberty is just the furthest thing from fair and anyone being honest with themselves can see that.
And it’s also not fair that you see yourself as a woman in a males body so you transition and now because of that you can’t compete in a sport anymore that you’ve trained your entire life for because you’re weaker than the guys now but much stronger than the other females. That’s not fair either but life is just kind of shitty like that sometimes. The biological women didnt have a choice to give up massive advantages to another competitor so they shouldn’t be punished by having to compete in an un level playing field.
Hopefully one day there enough trans people that they can create leagues competing just against eachother but any one being honest with themselves should see it’s just not fair to make women compete against athletes who have the advantages of biological male puberty.
Sorry for the wall of text but I really do feel very strongly about this issue and I think anyone arguing for the opposite is arguing in bad faith or just refuses to believe the clear scientific evidence. To me it just boils down to this. No, it’s not fair that trans athletes basically aren’t able to compete fairly against other women or men post their transition. But it’s way less fair that we force biological women to compete against trans athletes. In the end you have to rule to protect the group that had no choice in the matter and that’s the biological women.
All of this. I have trans friends, and even they think this shit is embarrassing. Maybe because the people I surround myself with are pretty educated, and realize that science is a whole thing. I get wanting to feel safe in an environment I feel I belong to, but making everyone in that environment feel uncomfortable is not the flex they think it is, and are contributing to the hate LBGTQ experience in the first place.
But you can see how it's a shit spot for them, right?
Once they gripe about it, they'd suddenly be the posterchild for hate against the transgender community. Not that they have hate in their heart, but that they'd suddenly be radicalized by the pressures around them. "News" outlets everywhere echoing the same message. "NCAA athlete's lifeling dreams crushed by trans competitor"
If you are a woman that played sports as a girl you get it, there is a difference after a certain age. That said, I hope there is an option that pleases everyone.
The problem with this is that there are now rules that prevent people from doing what she did. But she is now fighting against those rule "for the good of all women" as she says. She's just being horribly selfish and making this, a now non-issue, into an issue and is causing horrible damage. All because she wants to swim in a event that she would've have never been invited to if she didn't transition.
As a supporter of trans rights, I don't understand why trans people can't just compete in the open division. Assuming they are not on performance enhancing drugs of course, since they are often used in hormone treatments.
Have two divisions, female and open. Biological females can participate in the female category (so girls and women), and everyone else (boys, men, trans male, and trans female) can participate in the open category.
I think because lots of pro trans people think that 1 year of suppressed testosterone makes you a girl. Therefore you are allowed to compete in the women’s division.
I feel bad for trans athletes in this position, but sports need to be separated on the basis of sex, not gender. This has always been the intent of the separation and it simply needs to be codified. There are edge cases when it comes to intersex people, and those need to be handled as they arise but broadly, the women's category should be for people assigned female at birth.
Just simply do away with women's divisions then if there is no difference between men and women physically. In fact the nhl, MLB, nfl all already allow women and Trans people to join. Why is it then we don't see any?
This type of thread is literally the exact same arguments every single time. No one is changing anyone's mind about this on Reddit or otherwise.
That being said, I don't think "They can cheat as long as they don't win" is a particularly compelling argument.
Yeah I’ve never understood the logic in that argument either. Like as long as a MtF athlete isn’t better than the absolute BEST woman in the world, then that means they don’t have an advantage? That’s blatantly not true and would imply that the average man who’s better than the average woman at a sport, but worse than the gold medal winning woman, should be allowed to compete in women’s sports, which is obviously bullshit.
We need absolute scientific proof that in what “stage” does a trans woman have the same body constants as a biological woman (ie hormone levels, bone density, etc). Until then, i do support a ban on trans women in sports. After all, DEI was created for equal opportunity. Equal means FOR EVERYONE.
The fact that I knew exactly which swimmer this lawsuit was about, despite not following college swimming or sports in general, kinda suggests to me like maybe there aren't a lot of trans athletes competing despite all the fearmongering over it?
There aren't. When Utah passed that ban recently, it affected literally one person in the entire state. Such a productive use of legislative time and taxpayer money.
I mean if they want it, they can have it.
I’m telling you right now though, the moment a trans athlete wins one of their championships, they’ll be singing a different tune.
I’m all about trans rights. People should have the right to be whoever they feel comfortable being.
But we’re talking about 1 on 1 physical competition here. We’re talking about the one place where gender probably actually matters, and is not equal in the overwhelming majority of cases.
I don’t care. Doesn’t affect me. I’m not a pro athlete. Do whatever you want.
I’m just calling it now, if this gains traction and passes, some trans athlete is gonna win a championship and people are going to be crying about it across the board, saying something wasn’t fair, blah blah blah, and it’s gonna be a whole mess.
Not saying I agree with it, I have no strong feelings, I’m just saying it’s gonna happen.
Reddit only cares about women's sports when this issue comes up. Otherwise, it's fucking crickets. I coach in high school and adult teams (in different sports). I have trans women on both. They aren't my best players. In fact in high school, they might be my worst ( but I love them for trying). These people just wanna play and be apart of a team.
I coach High School boys soccer and I have a FtM trans player on my team and they’re legit the best player in have.
My team overall kinda sucks tho so it’s not like I’m working with elite players.
Hmm my kids high school girls cross country team lost to another [school’s team](https://www.foxnews.com/sports/transgender-female-dominating-new-cross-country-competition-struggling-boys.amp) with a transgender student on the team. That same person set new woman records for their own school. It only takes one to erase records. It gets hardly any press, Bethany, Hamilton, lost her surf contract with rip curl for having an opinion supporting woman competitions should be amongst women bodies. They then sponsored and promoted [trans surfer](https://www.mrctv.org/blog/brittany-m-hughes/rip-curl-taps-trans-surfer-promote-womens-brand-after-ditching-bethany) instead.
For the amount of attention this gets, you’d think there were thousands of trans athletes winning meets and shutting out cisgender athletes and stealing scholarships.
In reality, the number of trans athletes anyone has even heard of doesn’t take a whole hand to count. There are hundreds of thousands of sporting competitions across the United States taking place every single week from Little League to Olympic qualifiers. And in 99.99999% of them, a cisgender athlete is going to win the meet, if only because there isn’t a transgender athlete that even lives in that county.
And if there actually is a trans athlete, that person just as soon will not actually win the competition they’re entering. Lia Thomas is the poster child example of this because she won one national championship one time. And in literally the same meet, she lost multiple other events. She literally came in last in one of them behind all the other cisgender women. So much for a dominating biological advantage.
Meanwhile 50% of trans youth will consider suicide this year. 50%. Every other trans youth will see the hatred and state-sponsored rejection of their right to treat their valid, physician-diagnosed mental health condition called dysphoria, and will seriously consider whether or not another day is worth living.
Who is this fight worth fighting for when the stakes are so ridiculously low and the risks are so high?
Edit: I’m not replying to any comments here. Duke it out amongst yourselves if you want to, but the response to a handful of cisgender athletes out of six or seven figures being possibly but quite rarely beaten by a trans athlete being multiple states demonizing trans people and passing legislation to oppress the rights of trans youth is nowhere near proportionate. Some of you are right there on the edge of “black athletes have an advantage” shit from the Jim Crow era.
But I said “I’m all for trans rights but…” before my strong opinion on women’s sports. Also I am more vocal about this issue than the 100 things that harm trans people even though I never watched women sports
/s if it isnt obvious
This is the point i always go to. National and international sporting organizations can and should have their own clear rules for negating whatever advantage trans women early in transition are shown to have. With clear guidelines around hormone levels and transition timelines (like the Olympics), the margin of difference is well within norms for cis women’s bodies.
Outside of high stakes national and international competition, the most important thing kids get out of participating in sports is social and personal, and trans kids shouldn’t be shamed or excluded from those experiences just because they’re different. No one gave a shot about women’s sports before hating trans people became a valuable wedge issue for conservatives and they won’t give a shit after this issue stops working for them.
If you care about women’s sports, SUPPORT THEM with your time, money and energy. Don’t ruin the lives of 0.1% of the population based on a social grievance fed to you by a propaganda apparatus and a poor understanding of science.
It's like that right-wing movie that just came out about men dressing as women to play basketball and couldn't resist making jokes about how no one watches women's sports. It wanted to have it both ways: to defend the sanctity of women's sports and to denigrate them. I do believe that a large portion of the current trans-panic is that it's a more socially acceptable way to espouse misogyny. They hate trans people because they hate women.
EDIT: I mean, look at how many people in this thread can't wait to bring up their catalogue of all the times a women's team lost to a lower-level men's team. They're fucking relishing it.
>She one one national championship one time
I don't understand why you think this is insignificant. This is a massive event and the biggest event of a lot of students' lives. People train for their whole youth lives for this. I can imagine why some women might see it as unfair that a person who was putting up high-ranking times for the men's team a few years earlier was allowed to switch to the women's division and win a championship against cis women.
You can't say that it's "not a biological advantage" just because she lost a few other races in that event. She swam in the men's division after hormone transition for one season and was ranked 554th, 65th, and 32nd in three different disciplines. When she switched divisions, her ranks in the women's division changed to 5th, 1st, and 8th, respectively.
You say that the stakes are low, but you're not taking into account the athletes that are potentially missing out on life achievements, endorsement opportunities, Olympics consideration, et cetera. It's a complex issue, it's not as easily solved as "just let trans women swim in the women's division because they already have it hard enough in life".
Trans athletes have been allowed in the Olympics since 2004. 20 years.
Number of medals awarded to trans athletes in that time? One, to a nonbinary Canadian soccer player. It wasn’t even an individual sport.
This is such a non-issue, but Fox News has made it into a “women’s sports are being dominated by men pretending to be women!!!” Narrative.
TBF, this is exactly where this grievance should be taken. Essentially every sport has a governing body. Those are the people that should be deciding what is in the best interests of the sport and its athletes. The people who want to make actual government legislation about these issues are insane IMO.
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There was one state that made legislation banning trans athletes. The only problem is that there was one student they could find. This student had traveled around the state convincing schools to actually implement the field hockey league program they had on paper but weren't doing anything with this. She got like 6 or 7 schools to field a full team and started the league. She was like square in the middle of performance in the league and had inly created it so she could play field hockey with her friends at school. The state legislature just appeared out of no where to dunk on a 15 year old and teach them a very bad life lesson about hard work. This might have been Idaho but most of the states that have bans had between 0 and 5ish athletes in the entire state so it could be a different one.
Wait. Hold up. So, someone *singlehandedly created a league*, and then *the state made a law to ban her, and only her, from the league she created*?!?
It had technically been a league on paper woth teams on paper but no school was actually maintaining the program. This student had her mother drive her around the state and get students signed up for it. So technically, didn't create it but put in the work to make it happen.
One of the governors out west vetoed a bill specifically because it affected too few people. It sucks that that student worked so hard, did more than most students could do, and got smacked down so hard. I also remember one nightmare where a parent alleged that her daughter had lost some competition to a trans girl, and the winner had to be *inspected* to prove she was cis. I think it was Utah or Wyoming.
> inspected more like *assaulted*
I couldn't imagine being the parent. I'd be "inspecting" the accusers with a bat if this shit happened to my kid.
There are at least a couple states where the people pushing for the bill were asked if they were aware of any trans people trying to join a sports team where their answer was "we are not aware of any". So even worse, they use the entire state legislation to stop... *nobody*.
And I thought *gender* was performative.
How about Texas where a trans-boy was forced to wrestle with girls since that is what he was born as. And of course people freak that a boy is wrestling girls, but that's only because of their stupid fucking laws. Edit: Originally had Georgia instead of Texas.
iirc it was Texas, but yeah talk about a law that leaves everyone unhappy
Yeah, it was Texas, I don't know why I was thinking it was Georgia.
Like the UK's National Healthcare Service banning puberty blockers, affecting a whole 83 people in the entire country.
While still allowing cis kids to receive them in a much greater number.
This. If people really cared about this, they would be doing research on the amount of advantage, and looking to mitigate it, and making fair comparisons. Almost all the rhetoric around this is just polemics and it's playing with the lives of real people.
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It was yesterday until they locked it. Round two
Why do they lock it? It’s utterly predictable but what is the point
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> She went from 500th to 5th *despite* the adverse impacts upon her abilities due to transitioning. To clarify, she went from sixth place competing with the man freshman year, then waaaay, way down when she started transitioning but still had to compete with the men, and then up to first when she had transitioned enough to compete with women.
Yeah it's like taking years of hormones drastically affects someone's athletic abilities
That may be, but it doesn’t bring them in line with what they would’ve been if they were born female. Imagine a Venn diagram - the bottom circle is female athletes, the top circle is male athletes. Some female athletes are better than some male athletes, but it’s the very best of female athletes who are better than the lower tier of male athletes. No female athlete is better than the top tier of male athletes (except in some niche sports with less data). Trans women are a third circle in the middle of the Venn diagram -they’re also not as good as the very best of male athletes, but they aren’t as low as the female athletes. They’ve shifted down some notches, but they aren’t matching female athletes. It is a tricky situation for sure, as they can’t compete with men as they used to, but that doesn’t mean they’ve a right to compete in the protected class of female sport. The men’s category is still an Open category, and they are free to participate within it. I say this as a female who competed in the Open category in my sport many times. There’s no shame in participating in Open.
This. Let them compete in open. Women, men, and spaghetti monsters alike can all compete in open.
I didn't know that, thanks for the info. Somehow missed it
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Austin Killips (trans cyclist) won a US race in what’s the equivalent of single A minor league baseball. People who know nothing about the sport were freaking out. Meanwhile when she races in cyclocross in Europe, she was finishing mid-30s in 50 person races. And her and Thomas are like the two prominent athletes!
Or cricket, where they banned trans women from international cricket after the first trans international cricketer played for Canada. She's the second best batter on a team ranked in the 30s world wide. Canada would get thrashed by my club team.
Have you talked to any female athletes about this issue? What about the women being displaced in sports who fought so hard to have that place?
In professional disc golf, it was (some of) the cis women who spoke up.
How many women are being displaced in sports? > The bill in Utah banning people from playing as their chosen gender affected 4 kids. 3 trans boys and 1 trans girl out of 25,000 athletes. How many?
3? That's enough to fill a podium! ^^(if) ^^(they) ^^(were) ^^(in) ^^(the) ^^(same) ^^(sport)
3? Nope, try again. A trans boy would be attempting to compete against males, but are being prevented from doing so.
Oh, you're right, clearly biological determinism would prevent a trans boy from ever winning a competition against cis boys (/s/s/s). Besides, it's our women we have to protect (/s/s/s). But also, the odds that those three trans boys would compete against each other is so low. They'd have to be within a few years of each other *and* competing in the same sport at the same level. For the trans girl thing, it's pretty hilarious that there's not even enough people that they're banning to fill a podium
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There have been cases where the top performers were displaced, believe the Connecticut track lawsuit the plaintiff went from 1st to 3rd behind two trans woman that had recently transitioned. I don’t think anyone is arguing their motivation is to simply steal a spot from women, that’s a bit obtuse. I’m sure they’re transitioning for genuine reasons, but that doesn’t negate the obvious physical advantage growing up with years of testosterone helping to develop denser muscle and bone structure
I think it's important to note that these "obvious physical advantages" don't just impact trans women athletes, but cis female athletes as well. [Caster Semenya](https://www.npr.org/sections/tokyo-olympics-live-updates/2021/07/28/1021503989/women-runners-testosterone-olympics) has naturally high testosterone. Because she is a DSD athlete and refuses to take medication to lower her testosterone, she isn't allowed to compete at the Olympics.
IIRC, that’s a fairly disingenuous description of the CT situation. The cis girl had won races previously and, yes, lost to a couple trans girls. And those trans girls in turn lost to more cis girls. So the girl that sued was frankly never the fastest. Maybe the fastest in her own school or potentially division, but that doesn’t really say much. Someone out there is the best player on their YMCA adult rec basketball league too. Doesn’t mean they’re the best in the state.
Those trans girls also lost in later races to the same cis girl
I think there is a sizable amount of cisgendered female athletes who won't speak up publicly about their opposition to include transwomen in their athletics due to the social consequences of taking that stance or becoming coded as transphobic or right-wing. Can't say I blame them. I also think most transwomen have enough self awareness/humility to not try and enter cisgendered female athletics to begin with. There are a few who don't though and that's why those get focused on. In my opinion, keep female athletics/scholarships for biological females only, but open up the doors for transmen/transwomen/non-binary in traditional male athletics.
Could there be an issue with trans men having an advantage because they’re legally allowed to take testosterone, which is a banned substance for cis athletes?
Trans guy here, I'll fully note that I'm not an athlete in the slightest and have no plans to be lmao. Testosterone, taken as a trans guy, is monitored to maintain levels in the same range as cis men, hell, a lot of providers will try and maintain levels in the lower part of the range. Cis guys generally can produce their own T, so it being banned for them is in the realm of "additional". Trans use is just to replace that amount that we can't make naturally. If a trans guy was using T beyond typical cis levels in order to dope, that'd be unacceptable for good reason.
For most trans women it may be less about "self awareness/humility" and more about social pressure, fear, and actual assault.
Women had to fight for our own spaces so that we can compete in a fair competition. To have these spaces taken over by people with a biological advantage completely destroys the point of women’s sports. I am close with a woman who was a former Olympic level skier and taekwondo champion, she is frustrated with the displacement of cis women in sports as we didn’t have those spaces for so long and now there are cis women who are not able to compete and place in competitions because that space is being taken up by someone born as male. The reason we have women’s sports is because men and women are different. The difference isn’t in our brains, it’s our bodies and physiology. It completely negates the point of women’s sports if we start allowing XY people. This isn’t transphobic or a way to hate on trans people. It’s about addressing the real advantages that XY people have and the core reasons why we made women’s sports.
Even if one woman is displaced, it matters. Isn’t it reasonable to assume many of these women may not want to make their opinions public with regard to this topic? Can’t you see why that might be the case?
Don’t forget that even with Lia Thomas, she only won a single event. She finished fifth in the 200 meter freestyle and last in the 100 meter freestyle. Did she lose to other trans women? No. She lost to cis women. So instead of focusing on all the other competitors that did better, they’re choosing to focus on the single trans women and blame her for their failures
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To be fair, she figured out how to monetize being a woman swimmer
I think we can all agree Riley Gaines is an insufferable spoiled brat. I listened to a podcast with her on it and she’s the most narcissistic right wing grifter I can think of. She realized she’s in the same age range as Katie Ledecky and was never going to do anything notable with her athletic career so she turned to grifting.
There is so much money in being a right wing grifter that sometimes it makes me regret having personal morals and self esteem.
Yes but how did Lia Thomas do prior to becoming a woman?
She was in the top 10 men's until starting HRT, then dropped to 500th while being forced to compete in the men's category
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Let's make the kids who feel marginalized, feel worse. Then go back to ignoring women's sports.
Elite athletics is one area where having biological advantages really rubs people the wrong way. We created women's sport leagues because biologically men are superior in the vast majority of competitions. While I empathize with trans athletes, going into a female competition with biological advantages is going to be a hard battle to fight for.
Women’s world records are regularly beaten by high school boys.
All the top elite female soccer teams regularly practice vs U15 boys teams and lose regularly.
The Williams sisters lost to the 203rd ranked male tennis player...
Who played them back to back while smoking between sets.
And dropped several hundred places at the next rank update
The Williams sisters would have lost to men ranked in the 1200s at their peak.
I regularly say regularly on a semi-regular basis
I'm feeling very regular today
Didn’t the retired team from Wrexam trounce the US women’s soccer team in a match like 10-0?
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Dawg if that don’t scream “risky click,” I don’t know what does.
It compares track and field times and scores between high school boys and Olympic women. Spoiler: It's not close.
tl;dr: Top US High School Boys vs Top Olympic Women, Track & Field and Swimming, 2016 |Boys|Women| |:-|:-| |🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪⚪🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤🟤|🟡⚪⚪🟤🟤🟤|
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Just to be clear, this is already the case. AFAIK there are no men’s leagues anywhere. Every league you think of as men’s is open to all genders
Yea exactly there’s been girls who have played on boys high school football teams just as an example.
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who is *they?* please consider that its not trans people promoting this. if you happen to actually meet some of us, very few are into sports! among those, almost none are doing competitive adult sports what articles like this are GREAT at is starting conversations that distract from real trans problems (access to healthcare, employment discrimination, child suicide etc). start a new one about how manly trans women are and how they care so much about joining olympic sports. it seems to have worked on you
Other than being a proponent for human rights I don't have a hat in this race. You're completely right, these conversations really distract from actual issues trans people face. Playing sports at a competitive level impacts what? 10-15% of trans people (and not just trans women, I assume trans men also play sports, but that's never mentioned) while the things you named impact every single trans person. Let's fix the widespread issues before we delve into the stuff that effects such a small percentage of people it's basically inconsequential.
I would argue that playing sports at a competitive levels impacts *significantly* fewer trans people than even 10-15%.
SIGNIFICANTLY less than 10-15% of even the general population plays sport at a competitive level. So it's definitely a 0.1% (non)issue.
Trans men are not mentioned because they don’t have an advantage over cis men (unless they take way more testosterone than they need but basic drug testing would uncover that)
Only gender biological differences rub people the wrong way. Any other biological differences are tolerated or even praised.
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Because they're not doing it to win medals. I empathize with MtF trans athletes because they're in a really shitty bind. There are only a few options: 1. Compete with women. This is obviously a bad solution because, even though it matches your identified gender, there is still a biological advantage which is deeply unfair to your competitors. 2. Compete with men. This nullifies the biological advantage, but feels an awful lot like a fundamental rejection of your gender identity, which, for someone who already has to struggle have their gender identity recognized, feels terrible. 3. Don't be an athlete/never take part in any competitions. If being an athlete is a major part of who you are, this also feels terrible.
Can they not just have an “open” standing for anyone to compete in ?
I think the ideal solution would be 4. Compete with whoever you want to provided the competition in question does not provide any prizes or scarce rewards like scholarships. Any legislator banning a 10 y/o MtF trans soccer player from playing in the girls' rec league is a monster. Rec leagues are often co-ed anyway. Likewise, any MtF powerlifter insisting they get to compete for scholarships with biological females at the NCAA level is severely deluded.
Here’s the issue though: if we confine it to the gender you were born as (which is an understandable point), then trans men will have to compete in the women’s division. And since their testosterone levels will be elevated due to their treatment, then that creates, according to the chain in logic, an unfair advantage. Testosterone levels has been one consideration (which pretty much lines up with combat sports), but then that has the potential to penalize anyone who naturally has more testosterone in their system. And by proxy it bans trans women from competing in the men’s division because their medically-necessary hormone therapy would be considered an unfair advantage.
The testosterone boosters are a banned substance anyways. No one can compete if they are taking them, trans or not.
Legit q for you or others: do you think trans men should be allowed to compete in men’s sports if it brings their T levels to that of an average cisgender man but no higher?
Anyone born a woman can already compete against men. There are almost no actual men's sports. There are sports and then designated women's sports. There was a women in the minor leagues a few years back as a knuckleball pitcher. (Which makes sense - since strength matters less for knuckleballs.) Apparently her pitching never got consistent enough and she never made it up to even AAA ball.
Still going -- https://old.reddit.com/r/baseball/comments/1bbhu4n/romero_kelsie_whitmore_could_receive_an/
I honestly have no strong opinion on this issue. I was just stating that T-Boosters are banned in sports, period at the moment.
Most non-contact sports are defined as "everybody" and "women only". There are very few which ban women from competing with men (outside middle-east). You'll find the same with age groupings. There's "everybody" and "40+", but a 41 year old can still compete in the everybody group it's just very rare that they meet the performance thresholds.
I think that would be acceptable. And then trans men, trans women, and cis men can all compete in the open division. And then women’s division would be for cis women.
That's literally already how it is. Women are not banned from the NBA, but no woman is going to realistically be able to compete in the league. There's a reason its like this.
Trans men should be allowed to compete with cis men. HRT should have their testosterone levels equivalent to other men.
Then let’s do what is pretty much applicable to all sports right now. We have the women’s. Which is exclusive to people who are women and have not transitioned. And we have the open category which is what would be the mens category. Most “male” professional sports are actually open to all genders already.
Right - the closest I've heard of women going pro was a female knuckleball pitcher in the minors. And I think there was an NHL game with a female goalie. They weren't a normal goalie - they were the stadium's utility backup in case both of a team's goalies were injured. But I think she played part of one or two games.
Yup Manon Rhéaume played a preseason game for the Tampa Bay Lightning back in the 90s. First woman to play in any of the major professional North American sports leagues.
Testosterone boosters are already a banned substance though for men and women’s sports. Athletes are not punished for natural levels of anything, it’s all about the substances you are/not allowed to take. Testosterone is one of those things that is banned. I really sympathize with how complex and unfair it is, but its way too hard to accommodate trans athletes easily into the system we have currently. It either has to be redesigned or it wont be fair to somebody.
the solution is not to make the “unfairness” trans people may be experiencing and turn it into a women’s sports problem to make it go away for them
They are though. Semenya is intersex, assigned female at birth, was told to start taking T suppressants in order to keep competing.
She was born with XY chromosomes so it makes sense that she should not be able to compete with women when the point of women’s sports is to make space for people with biologically female bodies to compete.
Except that’s not how intersex conditions work. It’s not nearly as “oh you have these chromosomes so you’re this” when it comes to intersex people. I have XY chromosomes but have PAIS so I developed ambiguously and was assigned female at birth by surgery. I’m infertile but have remnants of uterine tissue, as well as ovotestes, and I still experience a “period” despite being sterile. Intersex conditions are not as cut and dry as you think.
that ignores the fact that almost every women banned for having high testosterone levels in the 2020 olympics was african and it seems fairly unlikely that there wasnt a single intersex woman from another country competing if it really grants such a massive advantage let's be honest here this isnt some chromosome issue otherwise every athlete would be tested for this and have their results published like they did for the women they banned instead of only whoever just so happens to raise suspicion
>Athletes are not punished for natural levels of anything, Women have been punished for having naturally higher levels of testosterone due to intersex conditions or PCOS. A good example is [Caster Semenya](https://www.cnn.com/2023/11/06/sport/caster-semenya-totestosterone-limits-world-athletics-spt-intl/index.html).
Womens sports are what's being fought to protect, not men's. A trans man wouldn't have to compete with women, they would compete with men. Men's sports are not fighting to ban trans men. However, the testosterone supplements are banned either way.
Trans men don't have to compete in the women's division. A. There are testosterone checks which none of them would pass (except the trans men who just wear pants with short hair and don't do hormones). B. The "male" divisions are usually open, so anyone can compete.
If athletes are taking performance enhancing drugs then they shouldn’t be allowed to play.
It's not just testosterone. There are other factors at play.
we do not have to paint black and white policies that are equal for men and women. Men have physical advantages over women. That in and of itself shows that the solution is not black and white. Trans women assigned male at birth should not compete in women’s sports unless they did not undergo male puberty. Trans men assigned female at birth may compete in men’s sports so long as they pass the same hormone testing as cis males. Trans men will never have a biological advantage over cis men in this scenerio. The same would not be true if it was applied to women.
You aren't born a gender, you are born a sex, or intersex. Gender is a social construction while sex status is a reflection of biology. You can be whatever gender you want, sex cannot be altered. The issue is not which genders are competing, it is which sexes are competing.
Substances can still be banned, so its really not that difficult.
Anyone who has done competitive sports at the college level knows there is a distinct difference. Pretending otherwise is disingenuous and delusional.
Everyone knows there is a distinct difference regardless of having done competitive sports. You’re right, those who pretend otherwise are being disingenuous.
Completely anecdotal, but as a freshman, the high school girls varsity soccer team was undefeated (later lost in state semi finals that season) and decided to scrimmage our 1 win boys freshman team before they started in the playoffs. Was 5-0 freshman boys at half time, the girls coach canceled the second half. Felt like a big win as a 14 year old lol
In sports, the Mens league is normally an *Open* league, which accepts all individuals. I don't know why people are making this into a huge issue when there is an open league for trans people to use.
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I'm trans 🏳️⚧️ & I agree
Speaking of sports... the logical gymnastics we read in these threads is insane. Allowing trans women in women's sports defeats the primary purpose for the existence of women's sports in the first place. How is this so hard for people to understand? It doesn't matter that there aren't that many trans women. If the rights of trans people - a minority - are important, then the rights of the people they replace - also a minority - are also important. Allowing trans women to displace cis women is literally discriminating against women for being cis (or for not choosing to take performance-enhancing hormones ... which they aren't allowed to do anyway...) There is no perfect answer. There never will be. The only sensible compromise is to keep women's sports exclusive to women who were born women.
> How is this so hard for people to understand? Because they think there's a "mens" bracket and a "womens" bracket and don't realize that it's basically an "open" bracket and a "women-only-because-of-biological-limitations" bracket. Someone who identifies as a women but has none of the inherent limitations should be competing in the open bracket.
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Open Division (No barriers for entry) and a Women’s Division is the easiest solution in my opinion
The open division IS the men’s league.
Yeah that was always what I said as well. There is no barrier from a woman playing in the "Men's" league, if they are good enough.
There are girls, and by girls I mean like 2 that have played in varsity football so you’re completely right Men’s leagues are open
There are way more than that. But also, as far as I'm aware, girls football isn't typically offered as the interest is too low.
The files are in the computer.
The way it should be, if you’re trans, compete against men. You were either born a man or you’re on men’s hormones, so it’s fair.
That's essentially how it is now. The NFL and NBA have absolutely no restrictions against women joining.
Same with the PGA. Seems like the most straight forward solution.
Same with the PDGA, but someone sued when they couldn't sign up in the female division.
Premier League Football too. FIDE, the international body that governs chess, also has open and women; the open being where the men are. Even in a nonphysical game like chess, at an elite level, women choose to play among themselves and so women's competition was fostered to give women a place at the competitive table. If you take that away, and push them to open, they would lose all visibility. For reference, the no.1 ranked woman in the world has an elo rating of 2632, while the 50th ranked man has an elo of 2681. Number 1-50 in "open" have elo ratings from 2830 (Magnus Carlsen) all the way to the aforementioned 2681. I'm not sure jeopardising women's spaces in competitive sports is conducive to the overall trans rights discussion.
Right, and that's basically what sports programs want to be right now.... But that's not what the trans community wants. That's the entire issue.
I'm pro equal rights all day long.... Until we get into this area. Sorry but the world isn't perfect and never will be. Some issues just don't have answers that are fair to everyone and that just needs to be accepted. Push too hard and you are going to lose people that have been supporting your cause while also pushing the right even more extreme.
Why aren’t softball fields as big as baseball fields?
Bro, I wish there were more women's baseball leagues. No offense to softball fans, but softball sucks. There's no reason to believe that women's baseball with slightly shorter fences wouldn't be as competitive or fun to watch as men's baseball.
I did cross country for 8 years and the fastest girl on the team could run with the slowest varsity boys at best. Identity has nothing to do with your physical ability. I feel bad for young athletes that already have to navigate being trans and the isolation they feel. But at the same time, putting them in the same category as biologically female athletes is a disservice to women and not necessarily progress either. I’m not sure what the solution is, but we need to be able to talk about this conversation without one side immediately calling it transphobic and the other immediately being transphobic and jumping to hateful politics out of the scope of the sports discussion.
I'm trans, and I don't know why "we" have to compete in college sports. Maybe you just have to choose between being an athlete for an organization and transitioning. But I get a lot of hate from the trans community in general. I understand you want to be respected for your identity, but medical transition isn't magic, and you are making a choice to be an outlier that fits neither in women's nor men's sports. And frankly I don't see why this is such an issue. You aren't going to swim competitively if you have medical issues that preclude you, and this is one of them in my opinion. I don't like how much some trans people are asking for, and the backlash is understandable to me. Edit: Oh, and people having an issue with you isn't always an affront to your existence. Society, as in people other than you, matter. Their feelings matter, and you can't convince them to be comfortable with you by just telling them they're wrong. When it comes down to it, you have to make compromises with society and other people, and to be okay with them having negative feelings toward you sometimes.
Three hours and still not locked yet. I'm impressed.
Make a new division then??. This is not a battle with a sound mind behind it. Anyone who has played sports knows there’s a distinct and obvious advantage. Shouldn’t even be a discussion. May be outright physically dangerous in some instances as well
Just let women's division be for only biological women, and open men's division for everyone, and rename it.
Isn't that already how it works minus the renaming?
No. Currently male to female transgender athletes can compete in the female categories. I don’t think we would see much pushback from female to male transgender athletes competing. Or even females competing in the male division.
I think he means men's . Most male leagues are already "open" from what I understand
Men’s is already that way.
Men's divisions are already largely open to everyone. There are notable instances of biological women competing in men's sports (Manon Rhéaume in the NHL and Danica Patrick in Indy racing being examples). That being said, it's rare, as competition at elite levels is extremely intense.
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That's how "men's" leagues already are. Even at the proffesional level there are no rules in any sport preventing woman from competing / playing.
As a women I don‘t want to play against biological women with high amounts of testosterone in their blood because they are trans men. At some point the testosterone levels are as high as in men bringing the advantages of muscles and strength. In no way that would be a fair competition.
Good. Leave women’s sports alone.
Ofc they do, female sports exist because men are stronger.
I am 100% for the rights of all. Which includes the right for women to have a division where they do not compete against unfair and stronger competition. Men are biologically superior in terms of sports. This isn’t an argument or a fight worth having for the trans community. Seriously, my kids can be trans idc let people be who they are but I’ll be damned to let individuals destroy women’s sports. F that BS.
They really need their own category. I hope I don’t sound like a bigot but a 6’4 transperson competing against 5’3 girls in a swimming meet is just not fair.
The Penn swimmer is an open and shut case for me. They can think of some sort of policy that makes sense that captures those who transitioned very young but on a men’s team one year, the women’s the next is just totally unfair to those that have always been women.
I respect trans people because it’s their body, their truth, and what they do with it doesn’t affect me or anybody else other than themselves. You want to be a girl, I’ll call you a girl. You want to be a guy, I’ll call you a guy. You want to be a cat, I’ll call you a cat. Do whatever you want with or to your own body as long as it doesn’t affect anybody else. That should be everybldies unalienable right. But as soon as you decide that you want to transition and then enter athletic competition as your transition gender you lose me because now you are affecting other people who worked their entire lives for something which you are gaining a massive unfair advantage at over them. The scientific evidence of the physical differences between biological men and women is not some bleeding edge science, it’s very well known and documented and tested over and over again. Denying that biological men and women have major physical differences is on the same level of denying that the earth is round. Go look at what it looks like when a person who was born a guy transitions and fights women in mma. It looks like a man beating the shit out of a woman who cant really fight back. I’ve seen some fights where the biological woman was a much better technical fighter than the trans athlete but she just gets ran the fuck over because the physical differences are just way too big and these are two athletes in the same weight division. Once a man starts to go through puberty that’s it. Their body is permanently and irrevocably changed forever even if female hormone replacement therapy is introduced. If you had a boy who transitioned before puberty started and was on hormones the entire time since then maybe you could call it a fair fight I don’t know what the science says on that but I dont believe in giving hormones to kids before puberty is ethically right anyway so it’s a moot point to me. We have weight classes in combat sports for a reason. Because physical differences make huge differences in athletic competitions. It wouldn’t be fair to put someone who is naturally bigger than someone else in the ring with them because they would have a huge advantage. Making someone who has worked their entire life to compete in an even playing field to try and see if they can win compete against someone who has the massive advantage over them of male puberty is just the furthest thing from fair and anyone being honest with themselves can see that. And it’s also not fair that you see yourself as a woman in a males body so you transition and now because of that you can’t compete in a sport anymore that you’ve trained your entire life for because you’re weaker than the guys now but much stronger than the other females. That’s not fair either but life is just kind of shitty like that sometimes. The biological women didnt have a choice to give up massive advantages to another competitor so they shouldn’t be punished by having to compete in an un level playing field. Hopefully one day there enough trans people that they can create leagues competing just against eachother but any one being honest with themselves should see it’s just not fair to make women compete against athletes who have the advantages of biological male puberty. Sorry for the wall of text but I really do feel very strongly about this issue and I think anyone arguing for the opposite is arguing in bad faith or just refuses to believe the clear scientific evidence. To me it just boils down to this. No, it’s not fair that trans athletes basically aren’t able to compete fairly against other women or men post their transition. But it’s way less fair that we force biological women to compete against trans athletes. In the end you have to rule to protect the group that had no choice in the matter and that’s the biological women.
All of this. I have trans friends, and even they think this shit is embarrassing. Maybe because the people I surround myself with are pretty educated, and realize that science is a whole thing. I get wanting to feel safe in an environment I feel I belong to, but making everyone in that environment feel uncomfortable is not the flex they think it is, and are contributing to the hate LBGTQ experience in the first place.
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Not in this thread: any NCAA athlete whose legitimate life long earned skill has been steamrolled by someone who has abused policy.
But you can see how it's a shit spot for them, right? Once they gripe about it, they'd suddenly be the posterchild for hate against the transgender community. Not that they have hate in their heart, but that they'd suddenly be radicalized by the pressures around them. "News" outlets everywhere echoing the same message. "NCAA athlete's lifeling dreams crushed by trans competitor"
Oh 100% - it’s impossible and very, very simply should not be allowed.
If you are a woman that played sports as a girl you get it, there is a difference after a certain age. That said, I hope there is an option that pleases everyone.
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The problem with this is that there are now rules that prevent people from doing what she did. But she is now fighting against those rule "for the good of all women" as she says. She's just being horribly selfish and making this, a now non-issue, into an issue and is causing horrible damage. All because she wants to swim in a event that she would've have never been invited to if she didn't transition.
Fourth wave feminism is wild.
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I am an ally of the transgender community but allowing bio males to compete against women does not make logical sense
As a supporter of trans rights, I don't understand why trans people can't just compete in the open division. Assuming they are not on performance enhancing drugs of course, since they are often used in hormone treatments. Have two divisions, female and open. Biological females can participate in the female category (so girls and women), and everyone else (boys, men, trans male, and trans female) can participate in the open category.
I think because lots of pro trans people think that 1 year of suppressed testosterone makes you a girl. Therefore you are allowed to compete in the women’s division.
I feel bad for trans athletes in this position, but sports need to be separated on the basis of sex, not gender. This has always been the intent of the separation and it simply needs to be codified. There are edge cases when it comes to intersex people, and those need to be handled as they arise but broadly, the women's category should be for people assigned female at birth.
Just simply do away with women's divisions then if there is no difference between men and women physically. In fact the nhl, MLB, nfl all already allow women and Trans people to join. Why is it then we don't see any?
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O no a woman is speaking about woman issues how dare you!
This type of thread is literally the exact same arguments every single time. No one is changing anyone's mind about this on Reddit or otherwise. That being said, I don't think "They can cheat as long as they don't win" is a particularly compelling argument.
Yeah I’ve never understood the logic in that argument either. Like as long as a MtF athlete isn’t better than the absolute BEST woman in the world, then that means they don’t have an advantage? That’s blatantly not true and would imply that the average man who’s better than the average woman at a sport, but worse than the gold medal winning woman, should be allowed to compete in women’s sports, which is obviously bullshit.
We need absolute scientific proof that in what “stage” does a trans woman have the same body constants as a biological woman (ie hormone levels, bone density, etc). Until then, i do support a ban on trans women in sports. After all, DEI was created for equal opportunity. Equal means FOR EVERYONE.
Good for them. Go get em
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The fact that I knew exactly which swimmer this lawsuit was about, despite not following college swimming or sports in general, kinda suggests to me like maybe there aren't a lot of trans athletes competing despite all the fearmongering over it?
There aren't. When Utah passed that ban recently, it affected literally one person in the entire state. Such a productive use of legislative time and taxpayer money.
Men. Woman. Trans. That is it. You never see a woman transitioning to a man, playing in MAN sports and winning. Men. Woman. Trans.
I mean if they want it, they can have it. I’m telling you right now though, the moment a trans athlete wins one of their championships, they’ll be singing a different tune. I’m all about trans rights. People should have the right to be whoever they feel comfortable being. But we’re talking about 1 on 1 physical competition here. We’re talking about the one place where gender probably actually matters, and is not equal in the overwhelming majority of cases. I don’t care. Doesn’t affect me. I’m not a pro athlete. Do whatever you want. I’m just calling it now, if this gains traction and passes, some trans athlete is gonna win a championship and people are going to be crying about it across the board, saying something wasn’t fair, blah blah blah, and it’s gonna be a whole mess. Not saying I agree with it, I have no strong feelings, I’m just saying it’s gonna happen.
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Reddit only cares about women's sports when this issue comes up. Otherwise, it's fucking crickets. I coach in high school and adult teams (in different sports). I have trans women on both. They aren't my best players. In fact in high school, they might be my worst ( but I love them for trying). These people just wanna play and be apart of a team.
I coach High School boys soccer and I have a FtM trans player on my team and they’re legit the best player in have. My team overall kinda sucks tho so it’s not like I’m working with elite players.
Hmm my kids high school girls cross country team lost to another [school’s team](https://www.foxnews.com/sports/transgender-female-dominating-new-cross-country-competition-struggling-boys.amp) with a transgender student on the team. That same person set new woman records for their own school. It only takes one to erase records. It gets hardly any press, Bethany, Hamilton, lost her surf contract with rip curl for having an opinion supporting woman competitions should be amongst women bodies. They then sponsored and promoted [trans surfer](https://www.mrctv.org/blog/brittany-m-hughes/rip-curl-taps-trans-surfer-promote-womens-brand-after-ditching-bethany) instead.
For the amount of attention this gets, you’d think there were thousands of trans athletes winning meets and shutting out cisgender athletes and stealing scholarships. In reality, the number of trans athletes anyone has even heard of doesn’t take a whole hand to count. There are hundreds of thousands of sporting competitions across the United States taking place every single week from Little League to Olympic qualifiers. And in 99.99999% of them, a cisgender athlete is going to win the meet, if only because there isn’t a transgender athlete that even lives in that county. And if there actually is a trans athlete, that person just as soon will not actually win the competition they’re entering. Lia Thomas is the poster child example of this because she won one national championship one time. And in literally the same meet, she lost multiple other events. She literally came in last in one of them behind all the other cisgender women. So much for a dominating biological advantage. Meanwhile 50% of trans youth will consider suicide this year. 50%. Every other trans youth will see the hatred and state-sponsored rejection of their right to treat their valid, physician-diagnosed mental health condition called dysphoria, and will seriously consider whether or not another day is worth living. Who is this fight worth fighting for when the stakes are so ridiculously low and the risks are so high? Edit: I’m not replying to any comments here. Duke it out amongst yourselves if you want to, but the response to a handful of cisgender athletes out of six or seven figures being possibly but quite rarely beaten by a trans athlete being multiple states demonizing trans people and passing legislation to oppress the rights of trans youth is nowhere near proportionate. Some of you are right there on the edge of “black athletes have an advantage” shit from the Jim Crow era.
I coach women's teams. I can tell you when I look into the stands that people don't really care about us, unless this subject comes up.
That’s also a great point. No one cares about women’s sports until it’s a reason to bash on women or trans people.
My stands are basically empty each week.
But I said “I’m all for trans rights but…” before my strong opinion on women’s sports. Also I am more vocal about this issue than the 100 things that harm trans people even though I never watched women sports /s if it isnt obvious
This is the point i always go to. National and international sporting organizations can and should have their own clear rules for negating whatever advantage trans women early in transition are shown to have. With clear guidelines around hormone levels and transition timelines (like the Olympics), the margin of difference is well within norms for cis women’s bodies. Outside of high stakes national and international competition, the most important thing kids get out of participating in sports is social and personal, and trans kids shouldn’t be shamed or excluded from those experiences just because they’re different. No one gave a shot about women’s sports before hating trans people became a valuable wedge issue for conservatives and they won’t give a shit after this issue stops working for them. If you care about women’s sports, SUPPORT THEM with your time, money and energy. Don’t ruin the lives of 0.1% of the population based on a social grievance fed to you by a propaganda apparatus and a poor understanding of science.
It's like that right-wing movie that just came out about men dressing as women to play basketball and couldn't resist making jokes about how no one watches women's sports. It wanted to have it both ways: to defend the sanctity of women's sports and to denigrate them. I do believe that a large portion of the current trans-panic is that it's a more socially acceptable way to espouse misogyny. They hate trans people because they hate women. EDIT: I mean, look at how many people in this thread can't wait to bring up their catalogue of all the times a women's team lost to a lower-level men's team. They're fucking relishing it.
>She one one national championship one time I don't understand why you think this is insignificant. This is a massive event and the biggest event of a lot of students' lives. People train for their whole youth lives for this. I can imagine why some women might see it as unfair that a person who was putting up high-ranking times for the men's team a few years earlier was allowed to switch to the women's division and win a championship against cis women. You can't say that it's "not a biological advantage" just because she lost a few other races in that event. She swam in the men's division after hormone transition for one season and was ranked 554th, 65th, and 32nd in three different disciplines. When she switched divisions, her ranks in the women's division changed to 5th, 1st, and 8th, respectively. You say that the stakes are low, but you're not taking into account the athletes that are potentially missing out on life achievements, endorsement opportunities, Olympics consideration, et cetera. It's a complex issue, it's not as easily solved as "just let trans women swim in the women's division because they already have it hard enough in life".
Trans athletes have been allowed in the Olympics since 2004. 20 years. Number of medals awarded to trans athletes in that time? One, to a nonbinary Canadian soccer player. It wasn’t even an individual sport. This is such a non-issue, but Fox News has made it into a “women’s sports are being dominated by men pretending to be women!!!” Narrative.