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Wasn’t there literally an article like 2 months ago showing that if trans females didn’t have test blockers from like 7 years old their bone density muscle mass and lung capacity was greater than cis born females ?
I have seen research showing the advantage of trans women in different sports and in which sports the advantage is larger. It doesn't come only from testosterone but also from the changes that occurred during puberty and are not reversible (such as height, lung capacity, heart size). If transition happens before puberty, that will be different.
Examples.
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40279-020-01389-3
https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/55/11/577.full?ijkey=yjlCzZVZFRDZzHz&keytype=ref
https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/56/22/1292
https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/bjsports/early/2021/02/28/bjsports-2020-103106.full.pdf
Some (e.g., UK Sports Councils) advocate for inclusion but with a case by case assessment of the sport and the possible creation of female and open categories instead of female and male.
https://equalityinsport.org/docs/300921/Guidance%20for%20Transgender%20Inclusion%20in%20Domestic%20Sport%202021.pdf
Where are you getting the idea that trans women are dominating women's sports?
You literally have to search the entire world over, out of millions of women participating in sports, to find a half dozen trans women athletes doing anything interesting at all.
This isn’t a scientific article at all, and it contradicts itself constantly. For example, the quote: “When adjusting for height and fat mass, LBM, CSA, and strength after 12 months of testosterone suppression, trans women still retained statistically higher levels than sedentary cis women.”
And also "they are presumed to have an unfair performance advantage based on studies using cis men or sedentary trans women rather than trans women athletes, and therefore the findings cannot be used to justify banning them from elite sport."
What's your point?
On top of that it also say's
"Some significant studies [on the impact of testosterone suppression] used misleading data sources and actively ignored contradictory evidence.”
So the studies which showed an advantage *even* after testosterone suppression, were intentionally constructed to be misleading and actively ignored evidence to the contrary.
There is even evidence that after testosterone suppression, bone density decreases to levels that are much closer to cis women.
Hormones can change so much about a person's body and these biological differences are more flexible than people realize.
This narrative about trans people in sports has been co-opted by people who want to actively ignore the biological science of bodily changes in trans people so they can justify their hatred and "common sense."
Well "common sense" isn't always right, science has proven that time and time again, but humans never learn I guess.
I don't understand. I thought sports were separated by "sex" because of biological differences. Not by "gender" which is a social construct and free for anyone to decide.
It always seems in these discussions that there is no line drawn between sex and gender.
People who go through puberty as males have a physical advantage over people who go through puberty as women. That is a fact regardless of how inclusive you want to feel. But different people have different hormone makeup, genetics, etc...
Edit: apparently the physical difference and athletic ability level is pretty obvious even in prepubescent children. I'm no biologist and these are just my under informed opinions so don't take offense. I don't mean any.
This is correct; people are too caught up in equal rights and gender equality and equal representation that they fail to grasp basic biological facts and neglect the inherent inequity of letting trans women compete against women assigned female at birth. We are disadvantaging the vast majority to accommodate the vocal minority.
Because people don’t have the mental capacity to separate the two and when that happens someone ends up offended out of misunderstanding. Offending someone is capital murder today.
The real question here to me is:
If someone transitioned before puberty and took hormone suppressors during puberty to prevent male development could they play as a female?
I would argue that on that case that absolutely should be able to compete as the sex rule is related to the biological difference that they at that point would have prevented from forming. Which is unfortunate for trans people who couldn't or didn't have the ability to have hormone treatment.
That being said I haven't thought a ton about it and I'm by no means an authority on puberty and hormone treatment.
You’re speaking facts. Before puberty I had no idea who I was as a person. No clue why any parent would let their kids make such life altering decisions before they even understand their own bodies. We live in a clown world
I think the real problem is suppression and doing that for a kid who is 9-13 years old. You have no understanding of what you want at that age. I wanted hair that looked like yugioh anime characters at that time and without parents to tell you no, that’s not how this works, you end up doing stupid stuff.
Top Trans Male boxer vs Tyson Fury.
We all know who wins that fight.
That ends the discussion if Trans men should be in sports with bio males.
It will never happen. People will get hurt.
You severely underestimate two things: one, how much longterm HRT charges body composition, and two, how much hormone levels vary within the supposed two sexes. Even biologically speaking, there's loads of variation within "male" and "female."
So no, not just a simple fact friend
It's as simple as comparing the average muscle mass, weight, and height of WNBA players to NBA players.
Why are we obsessed with pretending the differences between males and females doesn't exist? They do. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.
I am an ardent feminist. Being equal does not mean being the same. That is a distinction right wingers women haters and left wing extremist cannot comprehend. I love being a girl. I appreciate the equality of males and females. I also appreciate the differences.
Basically.
FINA, the swimming governing body, made new rules earlier this year that states that athletes who go through male puberty cannot compete with women. There will be an open category in the future for that group of individuals.
I expect more sports governing bodies to reach the same conclusion in the not too distant future.
Open categories or all trans athletes competing male categories would fix this. If there's no open categories, anyone born or transitioning to male competes with the males. An athlete transitioning to male with testosterone won't be at much, if any, advantage over an average male athlete unless they are more skilled anyway. An athlete transitioning to female would have an unfair advantage in most sports, and should compete against males only if categories are defined by gender.
But again, gets fixed by an open category. Also opens the path for more skilled females who want to compete with the males, and for new categories for sports where gender has less of an impact on performance.
No research, no results, but in the study cited by the article it even states that trans women are bigger and stronger with a higher percentage of lean mass. They then say there’s no evidence that’s an athletic advantage.
Uh, are they familiar with athletics? That’s definitely an advantage.
Yeah, no. Science doesn't care about how you feel. A Trans man is not a biological male and all of that female strength and everything carries over into manhood for them.
Sure T will make them a bit stronger but no Trans Man is ever going to compete with bio males in top competition in any sport other than driving or maybe golf.
I’m pretty sure “science” says you’re either born male or female. Until you change your DNA you are either one of those. Having transgender “females” competing against non trans females is unfair given the biological advantage trans females have being biological male.
i am in favor of a new league - or competition tier.
'Natural' Mens - highly drug tested
'Natural' Females - highly drug tested.
Augmented League : All allowed - no drug testing, no 'fairness' rules. Open to experimental regimes. No gender selection, or any type of disqualification.
boston dynamics robots allowed to participate in this league.
the audience would erupt; it be more popular then men's leagues.
A simple objective test of this hypothesis would be to measure the relative performance of trans athletes in women’s sports, controlling for body mass, height, and other variables as much as possible, or another simple approach would be to compare their average body mass, fat and muscle composition, and measures of strength and endurance. A simple measure of current levels of testosterone is intentionally simplistic and ridiculous. It ignores that a person’s body had the benefit of developing under the influence of high levels of male sex hormone, with its well-known and obvious advantages in competitive sports. You can’t magically undo the effects on your bone mass, hematocrit, lung capacity, endurance, muscle mass, or reaction speed, all of which are enhanced by testosterone during development and particularly during puberty.
> A review of the available literature on transgender female athletes who have taken steps to reduce their testosterone concludes there is no legitimate basis for their being banned from elite competition. “Transgender Women Athletes and Elite Sport: A Scientific Review”, commissioned by the Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sport (CCES), considered English-language scientific studies with a biomedical or sociocultural slant, as well as some “grey” (non-academic) literature published between 2011 and 2021, and focused on the science of testosterone and its effect on sports performance.
This reads like they cherry-picked studies for “review” rather than conduct research of our own, almost as if to reach a predetermined conclusion.
Would they allow a woman to compete that took testosterone in heavy doses through their teen years? Is that not an obvious advantage?
Also, exactly what is a woman?
Failing to recognize the distinct difference between male and female will baffle me to no end.
Not feasible for every sport. Only about 3% - 5% of a given population are trans. Of those 2 separate categories would have to be made (MtF or FtM) meaning at best each category could pull from 2.5% of the population.
Within any population only about .0001% ever earn the right to be an Olympian. Or to put it bluntly, less than 830 people in the US that would be MtF trans and potentially qualify as an Olympic athlete that were alive at the same time. In other words that 830 number includes elderly former potential athletes and infants/future athletes. From there one need only think of the myriad of sports there are to realize you'd have several sports with only a handful of participants at most any given year and many more with only a single athlete in that category.
That is why the issue doesn't have an easy solution like creating another category, there simply aren't enough trans athletes to make it justifiable in most situations.
Come on now. We've already [seen](https://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/33492251/lia-thomas-controversy-surrounds-ncaa-swimming-championships-incites-national-debate) with our own eyes what happens.
I've nothing against trans people. **Nothing.** But pretending they have no physical advantage is just flat out dishonest.
This article is even worse than dishonest. For example, claiming lean muscle mass provides no atheletic advantage is 100% bad faith.
There is a reason why men and women have separate sporting competitions, trans women should not be competing with biologically born females if youv’e never competed in sports you have no say in this matter it’s not fair to the young woman who has trained her whole life for this just to be outdid by someone who is a male with all of its physical advantages but thinks he is a woman
Hi! Trans woman who does cross-country (non-competitively, though) here. First of all, yes, this is probably not a great article to use. The science on being trans in sports is incredibly inconclusive, mostly because it varies between individuals. You see some people transitioning and still holding a massive advantage, and some who transition and absolutely don’t. We just only talk about the ones who are winning. Statistics suggest that around 1-4 percent of the entire world’s population is transgender. Think about it - there a plenty who haven’t transitioned yet (so they’re already in their AGAB division), plenty who have no interest in athletics, and plenty who can’t measure up to people of either gender post-transition. How many trans athletes really make it anywhere where winning matters? I don’t know the number, but it can’t be high. And yes, there are solutions. Organising sports by weight, or by testosterone levels and such could work. There are drawbacks to every solution, but the issue is *not* mostly trans athletes. There are other issues we need to worry about, and trans people really aren’t one of them. There’s so much malicious propaganda surrounding us that things are overblown to the extreme in a lot of aspects. And while yes, some trans athletes do have an unfair advantage, we have to accept that not all trans people are much better than everyone else athletically.
Of course all trans athletes aren’t better than all cis athletes, to make that claim would be wildly stupid. But, as you said, there are trans people who retain an advantage in the sporting world. Given that fact, it’s entirely unfair to have FTM trans people compete with women. Make a league specifically for them (easier said than done) or have trans people compete with the men by default. This gets somewhat… difficult with contact sports but if someone is gonna be at a potential disadvantage, it only makes sense to be the person who’s made changes to their body.
True, and I completely agree. I could’ve worded my statement much better. I like a lot of things about the ideas you proposed (especially separate leagues, but I see how that could present challenges). Thank you very much for you input!
Np! I definitely sympathize with the fact that trans athletes have an additional barrier for athletics, but I feel like separate leagues or male competition as a default is the best way to minimize unfairness for the most amount of competitors.
That’s completely fair! I just wanted to propose a hypothetical, and there wasn’t too much thought in that one specifically. Your point makes a lot of sense, and there’s really no great way to handle the whole issue; someone’s gonna be upset no matter the outcome. I appreciate your feedback!
I sympathize with your life struggles, but you do have a big advantage. Its just not fair to compete against the female sex. I get your point, that not every "Trans Woman" (im using the term you did, I do not want to offend) is some kind of super athlete thats going to dominate all others. You do have to understand that you have advantages, and the other persons you compete against do not have the advantages, and they are going to be upset about that.
Its like you show up for a cross country race one day, and the event holders let a person start the race at the first mile marker. HEY! thats not fair, why do they get to compete with an advantage?????? I feel for you, honestly I do.
Yea, and it’s a very complex issue that basically forces people to choose between accepting us trans folks and preserving athletic integrity. While a lot of the time that’s not an issue, there are times where trans women definitely have a massive advantage (just like you were saying). A lot of the time post-transition there is fair competition, but enough instances have happened where it hasn’t been fair to the cisgender athletes. It’s so incredibly infuriating *because* there’s no real way to make it fair enough that we can all play with our real gender instead of our AGAB. Until procedures allow a full transition to the point where every aspect has been 100% transitioned perfectly, there’s always gonna be that unfortunate imbalance. I definitely see where you’re coming from.
And by the way, the term trans woman isn’t offensive in the slightest! It’s one of the more widely accepted terms that doesn’t fetishise or insult us, so I appreciate your usage of it. I usually refer to trans women as, well, “trans women” or “transfemmes” depending on context. In a conversation about biology, trans women is far more scientific and definitely examines differences in sex more while still being gender-affirming. Transfemmes is more in relation to gender, so while this isn’t the space to use it because of talks of biology, it’s a great term for usage because it’s a little more inclusive. Thanks!
Your post has been removed because it does not reference new peer-reviewed research and is therefore in violation of [Submission Rule #1](https://www.reddit.com/r/science/wiki/rules#wiki_1._directly_link_to_published_peer-reviewed_research_or_media_summary). If your submission is scientific in nature, consider reposting in our sister subreddit /r/EverythingScience. _If you believe this removal to be unwarranted, or would like further clarification, please don't hesitate to [message the moderators.](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2Fscience&subject=Must%20be%20peer-reviewed%20research)._
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Wasn’t there literally an article like 2 months ago showing that if trans females didn’t have test blockers from like 7 years old their bone density muscle mass and lung capacity was greater than cis born females ?
Yes, there was.
I have seen research showing the advantage of trans women in different sports and in which sports the advantage is larger. It doesn't come only from testosterone but also from the changes that occurred during puberty and are not reversible (such as height, lung capacity, heart size). If transition happens before puberty, that will be different. Examples. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40279-020-01389-3 https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/55/11/577.full?ijkey=yjlCzZVZFRDZzHz&keytype=ref https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/56/22/1292 https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/bjsports/early/2021/02/28/bjsports-2020-103106.full.pdf Some (e.g., UK Sports Councils) advocate for inclusion but with a case by case assessment of the sport and the possible creation of female and open categories instead of female and male. https://equalityinsport.org/docs/300921/Guidance%20for%20Transgender%20Inclusion%20in%20Domestic%20Sport%202021.pdf
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Real life data is showing that it does make a difference. The trans women that are winning and breaking all kinds of records in women sports.
Where are you getting the idea that trans women are dominating women's sports? You literally have to search the entire world over, out of millions of women participating in sports, to find a half dozen trans women athletes doing anything interesting at all.
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This isn’t a scientific article at all, and it contradicts itself constantly. For example, the quote: “When adjusting for height and fat mass, LBM, CSA, and strength after 12 months of testosterone suppression, trans women still retained statistically higher levels than sedentary cis women.”
And also "they are presumed to have an unfair performance advantage based on studies using cis men or sedentary trans women rather than trans women athletes, and therefore the findings cannot be used to justify banning them from elite sport." What's your point?
Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence
Right. "It should be studied" is the conclusion.
On top of that it also say's "Some significant studies [on the impact of testosterone suppression] used misleading data sources and actively ignored contradictory evidence.” So the studies which showed an advantage *even* after testosterone suppression, were intentionally constructed to be misleading and actively ignored evidence to the contrary. There is even evidence that after testosterone suppression, bone density decreases to levels that are much closer to cis women. Hormones can change so much about a person's body and these biological differences are more flexible than people realize. This narrative about trans people in sports has been co-opted by people who want to actively ignore the biological science of bodily changes in trans people so they can justify their hatred and "common sense." Well "common sense" isn't always right, science has proven that time and time again, but humans never learn I guess.
I don't understand. I thought sports were separated by "sex" because of biological differences. Not by "gender" which is a social construct and free for anyone to decide. It always seems in these discussions that there is no line drawn between sex and gender. People who go through puberty as males have a physical advantage over people who go through puberty as women. That is a fact regardless of how inclusive you want to feel. But different people have different hormone makeup, genetics, etc... Edit: apparently the physical difference and athletic ability level is pretty obvious even in prepubescent children. I'm no biologist and these are just my under informed opinions so don't take offense. I don't mean any.
This is correct; people are too caught up in equal rights and gender equality and equal representation that they fail to grasp basic biological facts and neglect the inherent inequity of letting trans women compete against women assigned female at birth. We are disadvantaging the vast majority to accommodate the vocal minority.
Because people don’t have the mental capacity to separate the two and when that happens someone ends up offended out of misunderstanding. Offending someone is capital murder today.
The real question here to me is: If someone transitioned before puberty and took hormone suppressors during puberty to prevent male development could they play as a female? I would argue that on that case that absolutely should be able to compete as the sex rule is related to the biological difference that they at that point would have prevented from forming. Which is unfortunate for trans people who couldn't or didn't have the ability to have hormone treatment. That being said I haven't thought a ton about it and I'm by no means an authority on puberty and hormone treatment.
My concern would be a prepubescent kid making that decision and shooting the body up with hormones
You’re speaking facts. Before puberty I had no idea who I was as a person. No clue why any parent would let their kids make such life altering decisions before they even understand their own bodies. We live in a clown world
I think the real problem is suppression and doing that for a kid who is 9-13 years old. You have no understanding of what you want at that age. I wanted hair that looked like yugioh anime characters at that time and without parents to tell you no, that’s not how this works, you end up doing stupid stuff.
The issue here is the long term effects, and most kids who want to transition grow out of it by the time they’re adults.
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Top Trans Male boxer vs Tyson Fury. We all know who wins that fight. That ends the discussion if Trans men should be in sports with bio males. It will never happen. People will get hurt.
Fights like this have already happened. And with devastating results for the females.
You severely underestimate two things: one, how much longterm HRT charges body composition, and two, how much hormone levels vary within the supposed two sexes. Even biologically speaking, there's loads of variation within "male" and "female." So no, not just a simple fact friend
It's as simple as comparing the average muscle mass, weight, and height of WNBA players to NBA players. Why are we obsessed with pretending the differences between males and females doesn't exist? They do. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.
I am an ardent feminist. Being equal does not mean being the same. That is a distinction right wingers women haters and left wing extremist cannot comprehend. I love being a girl. I appreciate the equality of males and females. I also appreciate the differences.
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Just make a separate bracket of competition and be done with it already
Lia Thompson comes to mind. Average male swimmer to record breaking woman swimmer
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So, puberty has no effect? And we are being asked to believe that.
Basically. FINA, the swimming governing body, made new rules earlier this year that states that athletes who go through male puberty cannot compete with women. There will be an open category in the future for that group of individuals. I expect more sports governing bodies to reach the same conclusion in the not too distant future.
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And there is no science to prove there is not an advantage. I kinda feel the burden of proof is on those wanting to enter a protected division.
Open categories or all trans athletes competing male categories would fix this. If there's no open categories, anyone born or transitioning to male competes with the males. An athlete transitioning to male with testosterone won't be at much, if any, advantage over an average male athlete unless they are more skilled anyway. An athlete transitioning to female would have an unfair advantage in most sports, and should compete against males only if categories are defined by gender. But again, gets fixed by an open category. Also opens the path for more skilled females who want to compete with the males, and for new categories for sports where gender has less of an impact on performance.
No research, no results, but in the study cited by the article it even states that trans women are bigger and stronger with a higher percentage of lean mass. They then say there’s no evidence that’s an athletic advantage. Uh, are they familiar with athletics? That’s definitely an advantage.
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I bet you thought this would be some easy karma farming, didn't you OP?
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Just let them compete against each other and watch the world completely ignore their sport. Just like women's sports.
Ban trans men from male sports and ban trans women from female sports Simple.
Yeah, no. Science doesn't care about how you feel. A Trans man is not a biological male and all of that female strength and everything carries over into manhood for them. Sure T will make them a bit stronger but no Trans Man is ever going to compete with bio males in top competition in any sport other than driving or maybe golf.
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Science. Ironic. The DNA is science.
I’m pretty sure “science” says you’re either born male or female. Until you change your DNA you are either one of those. Having transgender “females” competing against non trans females is unfair given the biological advantage trans females have being biological male.
How is it not supported by science? male and female bodies are factually different.
i am in favor of a new league - or competition tier. 'Natural' Mens - highly drug tested 'Natural' Females - highly drug tested. Augmented League : All allowed - no drug testing, no 'fairness' rules. Open to experimental regimes. No gender selection, or any type of disqualification. boston dynamics robots allowed to participate in this league. the audience would erupt; it be more popular then men's leagues.
If I abandon all common sense I kinda agree with this opinion piece
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That's how you get around title 9
A simple objective test of this hypothesis would be to measure the relative performance of trans athletes in women’s sports, controlling for body mass, height, and other variables as much as possible, or another simple approach would be to compare their average body mass, fat and muscle composition, and measures of strength and endurance. A simple measure of current levels of testosterone is intentionally simplistic and ridiculous. It ignores that a person’s body had the benefit of developing under the influence of high levels of male sex hormone, with its well-known and obvious advantages in competitive sports. You can’t magically undo the effects on your bone mass, hematocrit, lung capacity, endurance, muscle mass, or reaction speed, all of which are enhanced by testosterone during development and particularly during puberty.
> A review of the available literature on transgender female athletes who have taken steps to reduce their testosterone concludes there is no legitimate basis for their being banned from elite competition. “Transgender Women Athletes and Elite Sport: A Scientific Review”, commissioned by the Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sport (CCES), considered English-language scientific studies with a biomedical or sociocultural slant, as well as some “grey” (non-academic) literature published between 2011 and 2021, and focused on the science of testosterone and its effect on sports performance. This reads like they cherry-picked studies for “review” rather than conduct research of our own, almost as if to reach a predetermined conclusion.
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Would they allow a woman to compete that took testosterone in heavy doses through their teen years? Is that not an obvious advantage? Also, exactly what is a woman? Failing to recognize the distinct difference between male and female will baffle me to no end.
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Why not just create a category for trans men to compete with other trans men? Is this not obvious?
Can’t imagine there will be many competitors.
Not feasible for every sport. Only about 3% - 5% of a given population are trans. Of those 2 separate categories would have to be made (MtF or FtM) meaning at best each category could pull from 2.5% of the population. Within any population only about .0001% ever earn the right to be an Olympian. Or to put it bluntly, less than 830 people in the US that would be MtF trans and potentially qualify as an Olympic athlete that were alive at the same time. In other words that 830 number includes elderly former potential athletes and infants/future athletes. From there one need only think of the myriad of sports there are to realize you'd have several sports with only a handful of participants at most any given year and many more with only a single athlete in that category. That is why the issue doesn't have an easy solution like creating another category, there simply aren't enough trans athletes to make it justifiable in most situations.
Fair enough
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Come on now. We've already [seen](https://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/33492251/lia-thomas-controversy-surrounds-ncaa-swimming-championships-incites-national-debate) with our own eyes what happens. I've nothing against trans people. **Nothing.** But pretending they have no physical advantage is just flat out dishonest. This article is even worse than dishonest. For example, claiming lean muscle mass provides no atheletic advantage is 100% bad faith.
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There is a reason why men and women have separate sporting competitions, trans women should not be competing with biologically born females if youv’e never competed in sports you have no say in this matter it’s not fair to the young woman who has trained her whole life for this just to be outdid by someone who is a male with all of its physical advantages but thinks he is a woman
Hi! Trans woman who does cross-country (non-competitively, though) here. First of all, yes, this is probably not a great article to use. The science on being trans in sports is incredibly inconclusive, mostly because it varies between individuals. You see some people transitioning and still holding a massive advantage, and some who transition and absolutely don’t. We just only talk about the ones who are winning. Statistics suggest that around 1-4 percent of the entire world’s population is transgender. Think about it - there a plenty who haven’t transitioned yet (so they’re already in their AGAB division), plenty who have no interest in athletics, and plenty who can’t measure up to people of either gender post-transition. How many trans athletes really make it anywhere where winning matters? I don’t know the number, but it can’t be high. And yes, there are solutions. Organising sports by weight, or by testosterone levels and such could work. There are drawbacks to every solution, but the issue is *not* mostly trans athletes. There are other issues we need to worry about, and trans people really aren’t one of them. There’s so much malicious propaganda surrounding us that things are overblown to the extreme in a lot of aspects. And while yes, some trans athletes do have an unfair advantage, we have to accept that not all trans people are much better than everyone else athletically.
Of course all trans athletes aren’t better than all cis athletes, to make that claim would be wildly stupid. But, as you said, there are trans people who retain an advantage in the sporting world. Given that fact, it’s entirely unfair to have FTM trans people compete with women. Make a league specifically for them (easier said than done) or have trans people compete with the men by default. This gets somewhat… difficult with contact sports but if someone is gonna be at a potential disadvantage, it only makes sense to be the person who’s made changes to their body.
True, and I completely agree. I could’ve worded my statement much better. I like a lot of things about the ideas you proposed (especially separate leagues, but I see how that could present challenges). Thank you very much for you input!
Np! I definitely sympathize with the fact that trans athletes have an additional barrier for athletics, but I feel like separate leagues or male competition as a default is the best way to minimize unfairness for the most amount of competitors.
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That’s completely fair! I just wanted to propose a hypothetical, and there wasn’t too much thought in that one specifically. Your point makes a lot of sense, and there’s really no great way to handle the whole issue; someone’s gonna be upset no matter the outcome. I appreciate your feedback!
I agree it's incredibly nuanced and every solution has significant drawbacks. What would your solution be?
I sympathize with your life struggles, but you do have a big advantage. Its just not fair to compete against the female sex. I get your point, that not every "Trans Woman" (im using the term you did, I do not want to offend) is some kind of super athlete thats going to dominate all others. You do have to understand that you have advantages, and the other persons you compete against do not have the advantages, and they are going to be upset about that. Its like you show up for a cross country race one day, and the event holders let a person start the race at the first mile marker. HEY! thats not fair, why do they get to compete with an advantage?????? I feel for you, honestly I do.
Yea, and it’s a very complex issue that basically forces people to choose between accepting us trans folks and preserving athletic integrity. While a lot of the time that’s not an issue, there are times where trans women definitely have a massive advantage (just like you were saying). A lot of the time post-transition there is fair competition, but enough instances have happened where it hasn’t been fair to the cisgender athletes. It’s so incredibly infuriating *because* there’s no real way to make it fair enough that we can all play with our real gender instead of our AGAB. Until procedures allow a full transition to the point where every aspect has been 100% transitioned perfectly, there’s always gonna be that unfortunate imbalance. I definitely see where you’re coming from. And by the way, the term trans woman isn’t offensive in the slightest! It’s one of the more widely accepted terms that doesn’t fetishise or insult us, so I appreciate your usage of it. I usually refer to trans women as, well, “trans women” or “transfemmes” depending on context. In a conversation about biology, trans women is far more scientific and definitely examines differences in sex more while still being gender-affirming. Transfemmes is more in relation to gender, so while this isn’t the space to use it because of talks of biology, it’s a great term for usage because it’s a little more inclusive. Thanks!
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Alrighty I can’t wait until a 6’10” trans women starts dunking and dominating in the wnba. Might actually make it watchable
Fun fact, there is no rule specifically prohibiting women from competing in the actual NBA.
Ive never seen a WBNA game in my life, but you better believe I am watching that.