Transgender People and Sports, what should we do?

[leroy]

I know it's not yours, but this is one of the worst ideas I've ever heard.

It's basically impossible to implement, especially below elite level, as we can only estimate muscle mass and sports categories need precision.

In addition, it would mean the end of elite women's sport. Look at weightlifting records, men outlift women 20+kg heavier than them.

It also ruins many sports, who wants to see the under 50kg world cup, followed by the under 60kg world cup, followed by the under 70kg world cup?

It's the kind of idea that someone who has never played, watched or thought about sport would come up with.



Don't you think it would be a bad idea to basically end women's elite sport in most sports?

"Sorry, girls, you'll never be good enough. Just watch the men play, eh?"

Over the past decade, many women's sports have been growing in popularity and deservedly getting more recognition, why ruin this positive trend?

In some soports women tend to be better than men, in other sports women and men are equally good, ……. If this is not enough we can always invent more sports including some that where women would have an advantage over men.

 

[leroy]

Trans men are part of the diversity of men; trans women are part of the diversity of women.

If a trans athlete has a performance advantage in a particular sport, this is no different from the cis athletes who are born extra tall, or generate less lactic acid than other athletes.

In sports where genders compete separately, trans people should compete with their gender.

How would you avoid abuse?
An amateur male, can eventually decide that he is a woman and win in the Olympics, how can you know is this biological guy is actually “woman” and not just someone who is taking avantage of the system?

 

[Augustus]

How is it doing away with women's sports?

I meant get rid of seperate sexed sports. And have everyone play coed. Is that really that big of a deal?

Because in almost all sports men are significantly better than women due to their biological advantages.

As such women would disappear from high level sport.

 

[Augustus]

In some soports women tend to be better than men

Such as?

 

[leroy]

Such as?

Ok I am about to sound ignorant, but aren’t woman better in Gymnastics, dancing, and all that kind of “artistic stuff”? (This is an honest question) I don’t know

Besides in many sports physical strength is not very important archery, tenis, soccer, base ball, golf, woman should compete with men in equality in this sports, ……….

 

[Augustus]

Ok I am about to sound ignorant, but aren’t woman better in Gymnastics, dancing, and all that kind of “artistic stuff”? (This is an honest question) I don’t know

In gymnastics, men are far better at the vault which is the only discipline they do in the same manner as women.

Both do the floor exercises, but with different focus. Being stronger and more explosive men are more acrobatic though.

Men will always be better if acrobatics are being judged, if they are being judged on 'gracefulness' then I see no reason why women should be objectively better at this.

Seeing as these kind of events tend to judge both, seems men would have a big advantage.

Besides in many sports physical strength is not very important archery, tenis, soccer, base ball, golf, woman should compete with men in equality in this sports, ……….

Strength (and also speed) are very important in most of those.

Tennis, baseball, football, golf.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

How would you avoid abuse?
An amateur male, can eventually decide that he is a woman and win in the Olympics, how can you know is this biological guy is actually “woman” and not just someone who is taking avantage of the system?

Just so I'm clear on what I'm inferring from your question: you're fine with trans athletes competing with their proper gender and you think they have a place in competition, but at the highest levels of competition, you think the implementation will need to consider how to prevent abuse.

Do I understand you correctly?

 

[leroy]

Trans men are part of the diversity of men; trans women are part of the diversity of women.

If a trans athlete has a performance advantage in a particular sport, this is no different from the cis athletes who are born extra tall, or generate less lactic acid than other athletes.

In sports where genders compete separately, trans people should compete with their gender.

Well try to look at it from the point of view of a woman who lost her scholarship or some other economic support for her college, just because she lost against a trans? Seems unfair to me.

 

[Aštra’el]

This is my preference.

Just do away with men's and women's sports. It's all sport.

Ok I am about to sound ignorant, but aren’t woman better in Gymnastics, dancing, and all that kind of “artistic stuff”? (This is an honest question) I don’t know

Besides in many sports physical strength is not very important archery, tenis, soccer, base ball, golf, woman should compete with men in equality in this sports, ……….

You might be trying to be a good person… but the hard objective truth is- women are not and never will be equal at soccer, swimming, tennis, baseball, football, volleyball, gymnastics, basketball, track, powerlifting, etc.

We segregate sports based off sex, to provide an arena where females can train hard and physically excel, and experience glory and victory -individually and as a team- without males interfering with female achievements.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Well try to look at it from the point of view of a woman who lost her scholarship or some other economic support for her college, just because she lost against a trans? Seems unfair to me.

It seems unfair because you don't see trans women as women.

I really don't see your objection as different from bemoaning the "missed opportunity" that a white athlete lost out on because of the end of segregation.

 

[leroy]

In gymnastics, men are far better at the vault which is the only discipline they do in the same manner as women.

Both do the floor exercises, but with different focus. Being stronger and more explosive men are more acrobatic though.

Men will always be better if acrobatics are being judged, if they are being judged on 'gracefulness' then I see no reason why women should be objectively better at this.

Seeing as these kind of events tend to judge both, seems men would have a big advantage.



Strength (and, for some, speed) are very important in most of those.

Well currently according to google the best soccer players are

Lionel Messi.

· Cristiano Ronaldo.

· Neymar.

· Robert Lewandowski.

· Kylian Mbappé

· Kevin De Bruyne.

· Virgil van Dijk.

· Sadio Mané


None of them are particularly strong, so my point is that strength is not that important

Both do the floor exercises, but with different focus. Being stronger and more explosive men are more acrobatic though.

Being short and light in weight makes it easier to do stunts , so on average women should have an advantage gymnastics, ballet, artistic skating ……..

 

[leroy]

You might be trying to be a good person… but the hard objective truth is- women are not and never will be equal at soccer, swimming, tennis, baseball, football, volleyball, gymnastics, basketball, track, powerlifting, etc.

We segregate sports based off sex, to provide an arena where females can train hard and physically excel, and experience glory and victory -individually and as a team- without males interfering with female achievements.

Why would a man be better in say soccer than a woman ?it seems to me that men are better than woman simply because for every woman that is interested in soccer, there are 100 or 1,000 men that are so average it would be statistically unlikely for a woman to be in the top 10 of best soccer players.

 

[Augustus]

Well currently according to google the best soccer players are

Lionel Messi.

· Cristiano Ronaldo.

· Neymar.

· Robert Lewandowski.

· Kylian Mbappé

· Kevin De Bruyne.

· Virgil van Dijk.

· Sadio Mané


None of them are particularly strong, so my point is that strength is not that important

The women's world champion USA team got beat 5-2 by an under 15 boys' team (and a mediocre u-15 boys team at that).

Speed, power and explosiveness are very important.

USA women's team suffer 5-2 loss to FC Dallas' U-15 boys | Daily Mail Online

Being short and light in weight makes it easier to do stunts , so on average women should have an advantage gymnastics, ballet, artistic skating ……..

But these sports actually exist now, and we know that this is objectively not the case.

You are just wrong here.

 

[Guitar's Cry]

Not to sound negative, but while it's a good choice, one potential issue is what we go by to determine, as a 150 pound man is stronger than a 150 pound woman.

The divisions wouldn't just be weight. I would expect similar strength levels would compete together.

 

[Brickjectivity]

In my opinion all these solutions have advantages and disadvantages, just wondering if you have thought about this topic and what solution would you propose?

I'm going to ignore it, because common sense will prevail. There hasn't been enough time for people to fully react and to give balance to this, but they will. There will be discussion and there is already some discussion. Feminists already are pointing out that you can't very well do things this way and that you can't ignore biology. So there will be more balance in the end. All of this is happening because there was too much suppression and stigma of people with same sex feelings. There was a lot of fake spirituality, a lot of celebration of mediocrity. "Yay we are so good because we are typical straight people." On top of that you had the weird movements in universities trying to push post modernism. Hopefully things will improve for people, and society will stop hating on people for being unusual. At the same time I think society will keep its usual norms. For example where its normal to have monosex bathrooms people will continue to have them, but where its usual to have separate bathrooms they will keep having those. Sports will rule out any unfair advantages (and are doing so even now).

 

[Augustus]

The divisions wouldn't just be weight. I would expect similar strength levels would compete together.

How would that even work? It's both completely unmanageable as you can't quantify these things accurately, and seeing as most sports don't have divisions anyway, would ruin the spectacle of most sports.

10 football world cups, 10 NFLs, 10 100m finals, 10 Wimbledon finals, etc.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

I am a longstanding gay pride proponent but, try as I may, I can think of no equitable way to address the situation.

 

[Augustus]

It seems unfair because you don't see trans women as women.

I really don't see your objection as different from bemoaning the "missed opportunity" that a white athlete lost out on because of the end of segregation.

This is why I'd call them protected/open categories, this kind of inane bigoteering is so tiresome.

 

[leroy]

Just so I'm clear on what I'm inferring from your question: you're fine with trans athletes competing with their proper gender and you think they have a place in competition, but at the highest levels of competition, you think the implementation will need to consider how to prevent abuse.

Do I understand you correctly?

I don’t have a view on this topic, this is why I made the op,

It´s an honest question……… how do you prevent abuse? What prevents a biological man to simply lie, declare himself a woman, and play in sports as a woman just to get a better rank? .. literaly it seems to me that a man can declare himself a woman / play the tournament against other woman / win a medal / and declare himself a man once the tournament is over.

 

[Subduction Zone]

I don’t have a view on this topic, this is why I made the op,

It´s an honest question……… how do you prevent abuse? What prevents a biological man to simply lie, declare himself a woman, and play in sports as a woman just to get a better rank? .. literaly it seems to me that a man can declare himself a woman / play the tournament against other woman / win a medal / and declare himself a man once the tournament is over.

With the current system it is not that easy. One would have to undergo hormone therapy for at least a year to participate on a college level and for at least two years to participate on an Olympic level. Very few fakes are willing to take that sort of sacrifice.