this post was submitted on 11 Jun 2023
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I'd say that a fairly debated topic related to transgender people, which isn't just transphobes attacking people trying to live their own life, is the presence of transgender athletes in competitions. Some will take it as a personal attack whether you take a side or sit on the fence. I'm not looking to start that conversation here, but yeah. It's definitely possible to hold a polite conversation about this while disagreeing on parts of the question. In a healthy space.
I disagree, that isn't a "polite disagreement" and is, absolutely, "just transphobes attacking people trying to live their own life" as you put it. Every time that "Argument" happens it's openly done in biologically unfounded ways by people who simply don't understand how our bodies actually work- yet those arguments get mass upvoted by people who also don't understand how biology actually works and who believe that trans athletes get some insane, unfair advantage.
If you want to pass laws to restrict trans people from sports, then you want to pass laws to discriminate against trans people. That's not really up for debate IMO, it's a straight up fact; it's what you're doing when you advocate for laws that are not founded in science, that are specifically targeting a tiny minority for the chance that one of that tiny minority might beat cis athletes in an "unfair" way, you're advocating for bigoted laws.
Such arguments are also inevietably filled with people misgendering trans people, deliberately calling trans women "men" and hiding behind the "I'm talking about biology" argument to do so.
Replace the word "trans" with "black" and you'll find that people are making literally identical arguments to those against desegregating professional sports leagues 80 years ago. Literally word for word.
The thing I don't understand around it is that the people who are making the argument "trans people shouldn't be able to participate in sports" are usually also people who are not interested in the sport at all. As in are they upset because someone on the telly told them to, but they really don't care about the sport except in this very niche aspect which impacts a very slight minority of participants. I mean would half the US public be very interested in the deep technicalities of competitive high-school running?
Same with HRT. Why do I even have to know about it? It's a niche medical treatment for a comparatively small amount of people suffering from some very specific conditions. I can barely understand what the difference is between ibuprofen and paracetamol, and I'm sure most people are even less informed. Why is it not the sole interest of people affected by gender dysphoria (IDK if I'm even spelling or saying it right, sorry for my ignorance), and their doctors?
The thing that actually grinds my gears is that this culture war stuff takes over places and trans people have to get defensive over their existence, and a forum on fricking Bionicle gets full of trans memes. Don't get me wrong, if you're a trans person, or a Zulu, or IDK what niche minority, and you've made a Bionicle that uniquely represents you, I'm going to upvote that shit so hard since it's frickin awesome. But having the whole place be full of low effort "trans people are people" memes is about as funny or interesting as having the whole place full of "the sky is blue" memes.
People are getting outraged about what some socially disadvantaged minority is doing with their lives instead of actually contributing to society, because some idiotic grifter TV host told them to. Fucking lemmings.
I'll be the first to admit I don't know how our bodies work, but I think explaining it will be more helpful in the long run than just making the subject taboo and banning everyone who asks it.
At the beginning of the pandemic a common argument against masks was "the virus is too small to be caught in a mask" - which made sense from a layman's point of view. When people started explaining that masks did stop the water droplets the virus needs to be airborne - that argument become a lot less common.
Not everybody who has questions is "just asking questions", if you catch my drift.
I agree with that statement, context is everything.
I think that in the context of someone starting out going "it's unfair for men to compete in women's sports," the person is "just asking questions." That context poisons the well for questions.
But if someone comes in and makes a thread like "I don't understand how hormone therapy works, can someone please explain it?" that, to me, is a good faith question and 100% should not be bannable.
All good :)
Now that I have your attention though, what would be a good counter argument on why trans women should be allowed to compete in the same league as non-trans women (please excuse my lacking vocabulary)?
Like I mentioned, at first sight as a layman, the argument that trans women would have an competitive advantage makes sense to me. So I'd be grateful if you could take away my ignorance.
First for the vocabulary:
non-trans = cisgender. cis meaning "same," as in "same gender as assigned at birth."
Second, I'm not the best at doing that, but I know of a really good report which has good citations of studies and really thoroughly discusses the issue. PDF WARNING: It can be found here.
Thanks for the former, guess I should have known that, but I'll be sure to remember now. As for the second... I'm interested in the answer, but not 86 pages scientific report interested. Guess I'll just have to wait around for the "water droplet"-size answer, but thanks for your patience nonetheless :)
Okay thanks for the input
I think that after HRT the difference is not that big. Trans athletes may even be at the disadvantage since there are some cis woman that have higher than average amount of testosterone.
In the long shot I think it would be for the best to abolish gender based separation altogether and replace it with something more like weight categories.
Consider two 5'6" 65kg athletes, one man and one woman, are you saying that the man doesn't have an advantage?
I used to believe the same until I saw the recent Women's Premier League in Cricket. They had to reduce the size of field and the weight of ball. Even with that, the fastest bowl in the tournament was 130kmph while that speed is considered a "slower ball" in men's cricket.
Now some of these female cricketers earm more than any Pakistani male cricketers. Which is fair, bigger market, bigger payout. But female cricketers don't stand a chance against the male cricketers
Ok, that's literally completely irrelevant to the topic at hand. You just flat out stated in this comment that you think that all trans women are actually just men. You're flat out wrong about that.
We have more than enough science that demostrates conclusively that a person on hormone therapy is athletically more similar to the sex they are transitioning to than the sex they were born in. You're just ignoring all of that and pretending that it doesn't exist. YOU might not like that it exists because it makes it clear that you're just being a bigot, but it does exist, and it demonstrates exactly that.
What does an athlete that's a man have to do with trans people
Here is a surprise for you: HRT actually does things to your body. I don't think this should have been that hard to find on your own, but I can't judge your circumstances.
No, my MMA teacher was female and she'd kick my arse regularly
Now you're undermining your first point, you're not comparing same heights and weight. Physics is real.
Okay.
Ellyse Perry, the fastest bowler in women's cricket is 176cm at 60kg (amazing athlete, represented Australia at both Cricket and Football world cups!). Her fastest ball was 130.1kph
Shoaib Akthar, the fastst bowler in men's cricket is 180cm at 80kg. His fastest was 161kph
Laws of cricket dictate that women should use a ball that is between 415⁄16 and 55⁄16 ounces (139.98 and 150.61 grams); which could be up to 13⁄16 ounces (23.03 grams) lighter than the ball used by the men.
Also made me think, the whole height-weight distinction will only work in purely physical sports like boxing (maybe even some american sports like baseball and nfl). It is not going to work in global sports like Cricket and Football. Think about the greatest footballers of our generation. Cristiano was 183cm (6ft) and Messi 169cm (5ft 6in).
So his mass is 33% more and the ball goes 23% faster? Momentum is mass x velocity iirc.
I only pointed out the difference between the fastest. There’s plenty of shorter, leaner bowlers in men’s cricket who bowl faster than Perry. Kemar Roach for instance is in the same height and weight category as Perry and regularly bowls 150kph
Tbf it’s expected. You know women going below 16-18% body fat is completely unhealthy while top male athletes are perfectly healthy at 6% or so
Edit: wtf mate? Momentum is not mass of propeller times velocity. By your logic a sumo wrestler would easily be the fastest cricket bowler!
Momentum is mass x velocity. Google it.
Would you rather get hit by a featherweight or heavyweight? Mass matters
I'd say the difference between men and women's cricket will reduce as women get more training and money, I don't see any reason why not
Yes dear friend, momentum is indeed mass x velocity. But we’re not talking about the speed at which the bowler runs. It’s the speed at which the bowl is propelled.
(to be clear, the lower mass of cricket ball in women’s cricket is a factor in reducing momentum. But we’re talking purely speed here)
Some women cricketers (outside Pakistan) earn more than Pakistani male cricketers already. And I must say, I’m a huge supporter. Unlike the WNBA in the US, women’s cricket is way more popular in rest of the world.
It’s a biological factor that women, generally, aren’t as physically strong as men and as a supporter of female athletes, abolishing gender boundaries is practically killing women’s sports. Here’s some more data you could’ve found out by googling: https://boysvswomen.com/#/
Thanks, done a little googling, I'm not very au fait with the subject
I found this article that reinforces most of what you say, but also makes the comment:
https://www.thecricketmonthly.com/story/1104475/how-far-can-women-s-cricket-go
There are things that don't completely change with HRT (particularly when started after puberty.) Height, bone density, lung capacity, hand/foot/limb size etc. do not vary significantly after HRT and depending on the sport can make a huge difference (eg. Hand and foot size or lung capacity in swimming even where the two swimmers are the same height.)
Then we should allow people to access gender affirming treatment earlier, no?
That could be one conclusion since it may lead to more desirable outcomes. On the other hand, we generally don't allow children to undergo other permanent procedures (eg. Nose jobs, tattoos etc.) because children change their minds. It can be argued that medical transition is necessary medical care (eg. like how we give chemo even though it may have permanent long-term effects.)
However, since dysphoria is a psychiatric diagnosis (there's nothing physical to test like a tumour) we cannot be sure in the same way that treatment is medically necessary. Therefore, I believe that the care providers should have to be extremely sure that the child is not going to detransition before making any medical moves like puberty blockers or HRT. I'm not convinced they can be sure enough or at least that they are being that rigorous (they clearly weren't here: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-62335665.)