Why is Lia Thomas on the front page of a running website?

Not sure who the brothers are virtue signaling to…the most powerful people in America, culturally speaking, see gender as a personal choice.

Whether the Thomas’s of the world become more common is up to us. How acceptable will we allow it to become? How much will we encourage children to “follow their heart” and read ordinary adolescent problems as a signal that they live in the wrong body?

Because it has a profound effect on how I live, what my children are taught, and the lies that powerful people expect me to propagate about what a man or woman really are.

it has a profound effect on how you live? That's honestly just sad

Just because women's sports is boring to watch does not mean woman should not have the ability to compete fairly. Will I watch any women sports? No. Does that mean a guy should be allowed to walk around naked in the woman's locker room and compete against them? No. You are the one making this political.

How is it up to us? My children don’t have ordinary adolescent problems where they need to follow their heart and become transgender and neither do any of their classmates at their 2000 student HS. Did you have to put your foot down when your children wanted to transgender?

Trans participation in sport is obviously a hot button issue that still needs to get worked out, but I think this specific conversation has been beat to death. Lines have been drawn, we all know more-or-less where we stand on the issue, and it seems like people are generally reluctant to change their viewpoints. There's no point in shouting about your opinion or spamming the board with thread after thread on this topic (from either side of the debate, really).

Honestly reading all these trans threads is getting monotonous. Most everyone's arguments are just repetitive and lazy. What more is there to discuss here?

You didn't even mention sport once......very clearly this outrage 'to save women;s sport' is just barely concealed fear of trans people becoming 'acceptable.' Oh the horror! People making different harmless decisions about their life than me are being accepted by society rather than outcast and shunned. Oh no! Something must be done!

It's bigotry, pure and simple.

It really is funny when you realize that the greatest accomplishment between the two of them is helping pace Paula. Not that they actually deserve any credit for that either. If this site had someone who had actual relevance to the sport of running in charge of it though then I guess we wouldn't have constant posts on cross fitters, the love lives of short misogynistic posters who for some reason are always single, and other things completely irrelevant to the sport. That would be terrible wouldn't it?

hahaha........wow. The world must be such a scary place for you.

You are a much bigger threat to women's sport than trans people.

In a HS of 2000 students, there are at least a few students who are suffering from serious gender dysphoria, and possibly more. Here are a few reasons you may not know.

1. They haven't told anyone, including their family members.

2. They have told their family members, but not anyone at school.

3. They have told their close friends, their teachers or a few school staffs, but those people haven't told anyone else at school.

4. They had already transitioned before entering HS, and only their teachers and a few school staffs know about their birth sex.

good lord!....someone needs to warn Mikeh33, he's surrounded!

100% agree with this. I'm personally very glad that this site's organizers haven't caved to insanity on this subject, at least not yet.

You say "there is zero threat to women's sports as a whole," but many disagree. Males have been using gender identity claims to horn in on, and dominate in, a wide variety of girls and women's sports at all levels across the Anglophone world for years now. If you don't believe this, I suggest checking out the way roller derby has been transformed over the past decade in many places.

The Lia Thomas story has simply shone a bright spotlight on what's been happening and brought it to the attention of every Tom, Dick and Harriet and the average Joe and Joanne.

The Tokyo Olympics were the first summer Olympics in history in which males were allowed to compete under rules put in place in late 2015 that said male athletes could become eligible for female competition so long as they a)"declare" they have a "female gender identity" at least "for sporting purposes" and plan to "identify as" female for sporting purposes for a total of 4 years (not necessarily consecutive years, though); and b) they could demonstrate that for the prior 12 months, their testosterone was under 10 nmol/L. (Normal adult male and female testosterone levels are 7.7-29.4 and 0.02-1.68 nmol/L respectively.)

Under these rules, three male athletes - weightlifter Laurel Hubbard of New Zealand, archer Stephanie Barrett of Canada and BMX cyclist Chelsea Wolfe of the USA - gained eligibility for women's competition at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics. Barrett took the lone female spot in archery that Canada was given by the IOC, quite an accomplishment for someone who only took up archery 4-5 years prior.

A fourth male athlete - CeCe Telfer of the USA - sought eligibility for female Olympic competition in Tokyo but failed because as a track & field athlete Telfer was subject to World Athletics' stricter testosterone limits on males who want to compete in women's events. WA requires male athletes to have T under 5 nmol/L - for 12 months for all events if they claim to be trans, or for at least 6 months if they have disorders of male sex development and want to compete in women's middle-distance events.

Since the Tokyo Olympics, the IOC has abandoned its previous policy, saying that each sport should make up its own rules - but that no athlete should be automatically considered to have an unfair advantage over women due to being of the male sex but "identifying as" a woman, or due to being of the male sex but having a disorder/difference of male sex development. With the rules at the highest and lowest level of sport now totally up in the air, and in many cases officials following the lead of the IOC and throwing the rule books out the window, female athletes are being thrown under the bus. Girls and women at all levels of sport are being demoralized, as are women and girls who don't compete in sports. What's more, young girls who haven't yet entered sports yet or are just starting out are wondering, Why bother?

The general message girls and women are getting from all this is, It's a man's world and in a man's world, boys and men who say they "feel like" and "identify as" girls and women must always be given precedence over actual girls and women - and if you don't like this, too bad, tough luck and suck it up, because if you object it means you're a bigot, transphobe, bad sport, transmisogynist, right-wing nutter, hater, old-fashioned Karen, pearl clutcher in a moral panic and Nazi pond scum, too.

Last week, the Australian national governing body for rugby indicated it was changing its rules to allow males who now "identify as" women to compete in women's rugby - even though World Rugby did an in-depth look at the issue and concluded that including males in women's rugby for any reason automatically makes the game unfair and extremely unsafe for female participants.

Just this week, British Cycling announced that a 21-year-old male who as Zach Bridges was a star in British and European men's cycling as a junior - and whose lifelong goal has always been to make it to the 2024 Olympics - has been granted eligibility to compete in women's cycling as Emily Bridges. Bridges will be racing against Britain's top women's cyclists this coming weekend, and against a broader swathe of elite female cyclists in the Commonwealth Games in the summer.

When racing as Zach and still a teen, Bridges had a series of injuries that caused the youngster to be axed in 2020 from Great Britain's national training program for the country's top up-and-coming cyclists. Losing his place in the program dashed Zach Bridges' dream of representing GB at the 2024 Paris Olympics in male competition. A few months after being cut, Bridges publicly announced that Bridges now "identifies as" a woman named Emily and still hoped to make it to the 2024 Olympics - in the women's division. Press reports say that Bridges started taking testosterone suppressants last year in 2021.

As recently as last month, Bridges was competing and performing well in men's cycling meets alongside and in fellowship with members of Bridges' own sex. Bridges participated with and competed against others of Bridges' sex apparently without the others mocking, bullying, ostracizing, scorning, harassing or otherwise mistreating Bridges - which is how it should be. Apparently, Bridges was able to compete against and amongst Bridges' own sex without suffering any serious or disabling injury to Bridges' mental health or insult to Bridges' gender identity, either.

Yet even as Bridges was competing in men's cycling events with no apparent problems, British Cycling officials were informing BC members that "zero tolerance" will be shown to anyone objecting to males like Bridges using gender identity claims to gain entry into women's cycling because BC requires all its members to be "welcoming" and "supportive" of other members' claimed gender identities.

dailymail.co.uk

Top women cyclists 'are too scared to speak out' over trans rival

https://www.facebook.com/DailyMail

Emily Bridges, 21, began hormone therapy last year and has now been given permission to compete in the women's National Omnium Championships in Derby on Saturday, April 2.

Open link

Maybe you're not distressed by these developments, but millions of women and men around the world are.

I'm glad LRC is letting users speak on this issue - and in ways that point out that many of the changes in sports policy, law and life being demanded in the name of "trans rights" today conflict with and threaten the hard-won rights of girls and women to fairness and safety in sport - and to safety, privacy, dignity off the playing field, particularly in places where we are undressed and most vulnerable to sexual predation, harassment and assault and battery by males who are stronger, faster and usually much bigger than we are.

On most social media, the voices of people who object to the obvious unfairness and blatant male supremacy that's being pushed in the name of "trans rights" today are routinely shut down - especially when those objecting are female like me.

I'm guessing it's the same reason you thought it was important enough to pose this question on a "running" forum.

Late today UK time, and about an hour after I made my previous post on this thread, British Cycling issued a statement saying that Emily Bridges will not be competing in the women's elite cycling event this coming weekend as originally planned and announced. From the BBC:

...British Cycling said in a statement on Wednesday: "We have now been informed by the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) that under their current guidelines Emily is not eligible to participate in this event."

Shortly before British Cycling's announcement, UCI president David Lappartient told BBC Sport he was "worried" the inclusion of [male] transgender athletes [in women's events] could affect the fairness of competition in cycling.

In an interview earlier on Wednesday, Lappartient said the rules regarding permitted testosterone levels in [male] transgender athletes [competing in female events] is "probably not enough".

Lappartient told BBC Sport many female cyclists had registered their concern with the UCI over fairness of competition and "do not accept" the current controls.

bbc.com

Transgender cyclist will not take part in event

Transgender cyclist Emily Bridges will not compete at Saturday's National Omnium Championships in her first women's event after a ruling by cycling's world governing body.

Open link

From Sean Ingle at The Guardian:

The trans woman cyclist Emily Bridges has been blocked from participating in the British National Omnium Championship on Saturday after cycling’s governing body, the UCI, ruled she was ineligible.

Bridges - who set a national junior men’s record over 25 miles in 2018 - had been due to compete against several British Olympians, including Dame Laura Kenny, in her first race in the women’s category. However the UCI ruled that the 21-year-old, who began hormone therapy last year to reduce her testosterone levels, was currently not compliant with its regulations as she is still registered as a male cyclist - and therefore cannot compete as a woman until her male UCI ID expires.

The UCI’s decision came amid a growing backlash from within the sport, with the Guardian understanding that a number of female riders were talking about boycotting the event in Derby because they felt that Bridges, who was on the Great Britain Academy programme as a male rider until being dropped in 2020, had an unfair advantage.

theguardian.com

Trans cyclist Emily Bridges blocked from racing at British meeting after UCI ruling

https://www.theguardian.com/profile/seaningle

The trans woman cyclist Emily Bridges has been blocked from participating in the British National Omnium Championship on Saturday after cycling’s governing body, the UCI, ruled she was ineligible

Open link

I learned quite an interesting fact today. Trans-women (men) can still be eligible to compete as a woman, but still have up to 2 x the normal amount of testosterone in women. But if women take any hormone treatments to boost testosterone, they must compete on the men's team.

Considering the natural biological advantages that men have aside from testosterone, I find these rulings to be completely insane and unfair. This will hurt women's sports. This is neo-patriarchy and these women should really take a stand. Unfortunately that's not what women do best, and they have their futures and careers on the line.

I support transwomen competing in sports as women. There need to be safe and clearly defined guidelines, but excluding an entire class of people from sports is unnecessary. There are always going to be competitive disadvantages regardless of gender. In college gymnastics the entire medal winning team minus Simone Biles are competing and dominating most of the other women. Katie Ledecky and Missy Franklin among others went on and dominated NCAA swimming after winning gold medals. Many one and done basketball players were men among boys. Cole Hocker was worlds better than everyone else in the NCAA last year but nothing compared to Henry Rono and the early Kenyan runners in the NCAA. Just establish inclusive rules of competition and stop discriminating against people who you don’t understand or are different than you.