Are you disputing the fact that testosterone exposure in utero has profound effects on the resulting phenotype or are you only disputing whether the exposure to testosterone influences the neuromuscular system? 'Cause differences in the development of the brain and genitalia (the latter of which is muscular to some extent, obviously) are well established as it relates to high/low levels of testosterone. They're responsible for a lot of the differences in pre pubescent boys and girls. So somehow these differences are muscular and neurological, but not neuromuscular? how does that work?
No, but thanks for arguing my case better than I have
They maintain an advantage that many CIS men have over other CIS men - which means the problem is not the advantage itself existing because it's selectively applied as problematic.
A swimmer barely ranked before transitioning now demolishes the best of the best in the womens sport but you think it is being "selectively" applied. Ok chief.
how many olympic medals have trans women won?
Right…
They’d won 0 women’s national titles until this year. Solid argument.
We’ll for what it’s worth a former Olympian and now human rights lawyer is offering their services should (when) this is challenged legally, as the belief is that the “evidence” released is entirely selective and not representative.
Tweet
— Twitter API (@user) date
Cool. I look forward to seeing how that case goes.
She did not demolish the best of the best. It was a very good performance, granting her a narrow win in one of the weakest fields in a long time. No need to make things up.
Great way to not attempt to address what I actually wrote, ok chief. You also completely misunderstood what I meant by selectively applied. Not to mention you're wrong about the swimming example.
The innate advantage men have over women is not something arbitrary and its why you have men competing against men and women against women.
No, I wasn't disputing things you hadn't said yet, I was disputing what you said in the post I was quoting, which was:
In practical terms, it's a novel situation. The old Olympic rules - surgical transformation + legal recognition + testosterone reduction monitoring over several years - combined with the typical transition pattern (most people starting transition at 20+) made it more or less impossible for someone in their athletic prime to qualify.
Got it, and I'll take your word for it. I don't care enough about fingers nor was it the basis of my argument, which was critiqueing the notion that the differences between the sexes from a performance perspective can (near) exclusively be attributed to puberty and the associated hormonal changes.
This isn’t exactly true to be fair. Caster Semenya has been treated like shit by every sports governing body for no good reason for a good 15 years or so.
You’re right, Thomas just beat Olympic silver medalists, not gold.
how exactly is it for greater participation when those trying to compete (trans women) are excluded from it?
The Olympics committee were trying to reduce barriers to participation. Initially that meant they removed some of their old rules - including legal and surgical definitions of transition and they reduced the period of consistently low testosterone required before a transwoman became eligible to compete. A couple of years after that policy change they removed the recommendations entirely and asked sports to make up their own rules.
Because people believed she was a man, and forced her to go through sex testing. It had nothing to do with hormones, her literal gender was questioned by the public and the IAAF who made her prove that she was female. This competitive advantage which exists at all CIS levels and nobody has ever cared about before, only rears its head if people think a man is competing against a woman. If it's a man against a man? feck yeah, have at it with hormonal advantages, dude has 6x the testosterone levels of his competitor but the total levels don't indicate steroid use? No-one gives a shit, 'round 1 - fight'.
while it might seem progressive on paper when compared to the old rules, they are clearly still not inclusive of the majority of trans women.
She won by more than 1.5 seconds which is a large margin in elite swimming. NCAA Championships are firmly in the realm of elite sport so are very pertinent to the discussion. But agreed that if she had beaten Katie Ledecky's time it would be more impressive, if that is the right word.
Women's sport was created so that they could participate in as fair an arena as possible. Including trans women in CIS female sport undermines this as going through puberty as a male undoubtable gives most trans women an advantage in most sports. At all levels below elite inclusion should drive things but I can't see how you can be fair to both trans women and CIS women if you allow trans women to compete at the elite level. I wish there was.
I talked about Caster because someone quoted me first on that, but women's sport was created so they didn't have to face fully fledged men so it's a bit dishonest to figure trans women into that because they no longer have the strength that first required that distinction. Some people cannot make this distinction, so the debates end up pointless for the most part.
Just on this point I think the important difference is that we are talking about an advantage that having male and female sports is meant to eliminate. If you go to the logical extension of "people are people" you end up with a single open category that men win all the time.
Is that even a thing? Most of us will have levels between 300 and 1000 nangrams per decilitre of blood. It varies all the time for a variety of reasons but within that range there is only a small variation in things like muscle mass. In your example I am assuming you are saying that the hyper- testosterone person will be bigger/more muscly than you? In this case weight divisions are in place to protect from precisely this level of dangerous inequality. Not to mention current testosterone levels aren't, IMO, the biggest issue but rather having gone through puberty as a male.
Yes, but it wasn't just not Ledecky's time. I remember looking at the last 10 or so years, and I can't remember if this year was the only year she would've won or if she would have gotten another narrow victory as well. The runner up, who would have won if Thomas didn't race, was not close to normal winning times.
Agreed but you only need to finish 1st and a CIS woman missed out on an NCAA championship to a trans woman.
That's not a problem though, unless the trans woman has aced the world record by a mile, if she's not even beating the bets times out there why is it an issue?
most likely ultra long endurance e.g. power walking and swimming the English channel
That thought exercise makes perfect sense. If you remove the wall between mens and womens sports and just have a combined event. You are ignoring the crux of the problem and jumping to solution on an empty premise.
fact is trans women are not dominating any sport on the planet. when a trans woman wins something everyone cries foul, but when they lose it's barely mentioned - confirmation bias 101.
his point is that these advantages exist naturally already within male and female sports. you can never eliminate every advantage, not in any sport. no one cares except when trans people are involved.
This is excellent context, I did not know, thank you. It makes a huge difference and removes the "dominating the sport" argument almost entirely
I completely agree with this and have seen first hand how decisions at the top of a sport affect trans people and their treatment everywhere. A FtM trans person I know very well has been questioned about their opinion on this over and over again by people who believe "common sense has won out " he is 12 years old, though the questioners are adults in the main, all seemingly trying to score a point or two. People are weirdly aggresive about it even when they think they are trying to make a relevant point.
I think the point @Wibble was making is that people generally race to win, not to break records.
I absolutely get and understand the issue and why it is not easy to be fair, but an outright ban does feel a bit reactionary and does do a huge amount of damage as I have written about above.
how many genders are there?
this 'solution' keeps coming up. so what category is this then, a third category just for trans people? how many trans athletes do you think there are?
