First transgender athlete June Eastwood to compete in women’s DI XC this fall, has pbs of 1:55/3:50/14:38

For those actually trying to understand this, you might find the chart below interesting. Based on what it says about fat redistribution, I could see how a three year sit-out period could end up being adopted with medical records proving estrogen/testosterone/etc are and have been in line with normal female values.

https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-B2zaJwLwkv4/V2TWjBlCTcI/AAAAAAAAKkQ/538U3tu4OwIxb_ChawOZ2D7S-F2R6pI1gCLcB/s1600/hrt%2Btimeline2.bmp

You're asking someone, assuming they don't really want to be a woman, to F-up their life for a contingent $1K?

"So it seems like the women are just fine with it." I can guarantee you at least one woman is not fine with it, and that is the woman who was cut from the team in order to make room for the man.

Again, athletes are told they must not complain or they'll be benched or removed from the team. Then there are those who've spoken out and have been threatened and harassed, ensuring silence from others who want to call out the cheater. Maybe some are OK with it but many are not. Whose opinion matters more?

Again, it doesn't matter if these males dominate or if they lose every time. They're male. That means they do not qualify for female sports. They are taking spaces and opportunities away from women. If they can't cut it in male sports, then they can lobby for trans sports or a trans division. And if winning doesn't matter because the true race is trying to beat your own PR, then these guys can race in the male races to try to beat their own PRs. Then there are team sports which are another can of worms. Have you seen the male rugby player who has joined a women's team? There's a cricket player who joined a women's team and was simultaneously still playing on his men's team. Examples like this are turning up more and more every day. It's just not right and everyone must stand up for women and for fair play. Sports is a male-dominated enterprise with mostly men in decision-making roles and other positions of power. Women need males to help protect female sports. The female athletes can't do it on their own; their hands are basically tied and their voices silenced. Everyone who thinks it is not right must speak out.

Again, there's so much more to male physical advantage than testosterone. Searching for some kind of workaround that would put males on equal footing with females is simply a distraction from he fact that males cannot become female; it's something interesting to think about and discuss, sort of like "what would you do if you won the lottery." You can create various interesting and challenging questions and scenarios to wonder about all day long, but at the end of the day males are male and females are female and a person cannot change their sex. Rather than trying to medically create a female out of a male, which is impossible, it makes much more sense to make male sports "open" or to create trans divisions.

If this is never going away, as you say, then it is time to create trans divisions.

I’m saying that there are guys on here stating there is zero falloff on performance. I’m saying that there is no doubt there would be a huge disadvantage to taking the estrogen. Nobody would take the money because deep down they know it would surely have a huge affect.

Ps: people get paid to take a lot worse but that’s besides the point.

You lost me at “cut from the team to make room.” Didn’t read a single sentence beyond that.

just a clarifying note on this, i believe june is on estrogen as well because she mentioned taking several rounds of "transition medication" on her running logs (now private), and the bozeman daily chronicle article confirms it saying "The difference between Eastwood and her teammates on the University of Montana’s cross-country team is the testosterone-suppression and estrogen pills she takes as part of her training regimen." i agree with the rest of your post.

no need to ask any clinicians at all actually, common sense says that the answer is testosterone and estrogen, nothing else is needed. the ncaa policy needs to be updated to mandate normal female levels for both testosterone and estrogen and also mandate testing / verification then it will be perfect. every time someone says "bone density" or some other such example i call it "bullshit density" because there is no evidence whatsoever, including in academic literature, that bone density makes someone a faster runner -- in fact if anything i believe higher bone density would make someone a *slower* long distance runner because of the added weight. everyone knows that testosterone is what makes people fast and it's astounding that the IAAF is so incompetent that it couldn't do the simplest thing to prove that in the semenya case.

girls and women aren't griping this. i haven't found a single D1 female runner in opposition to transgender competition (assuming they have female levels of test + estrogen) while i have seen many in support.

the fact that you include "Aron Taylor" in this list is amazing and it also shows how you've fallen for a disinformation campaign from the website you linked. Aron Taylor, a 3:42 marathoner. my afab coach is actually fat and runs faster than that.

girls and women aren't griping this. i haven't found a single D1 female runner in opposition to transgender competition (assuming they have female levels of test + estrogen) while i have seen many in support.

They must not be comfortable telling you how they really feel.

I'd guess that the majority of women do NOT support this but are afraid of speaking out. I haven't met a single D1 female runner who thinks this is fair and I come in contact with several daily.

Participation by trans gender in women's sport appears to be a recent development; that's why we have few examples to draw upon. Renee Richards was a rare exception.

Semenya is DSD46XY; in other words she is genetically male, and in that respect like a trans gender athlete. Their testosterone levels would be comparable and at a male level, unless they have taken hormone suppressants. Semenya lost several seconds when she was previously required to take hormone suppressants, and a sports physiologist, Ross Tucker, has suggested she would again lose in the region of 7 seconds if she was required to comply with the new IAAF limits. There is no suggestion that she or any trans gender athlete would have to reduce their levels further than that, but it may not make all that much difference at that point, as the IAAF views 5nml as where the testosterone advantage kicks in over women.

magggie wrote:

If this is never going away, as you say, then it is time to create trans divisions.

You may well be right, but the only way that will possibly happen is by trying to understand the transgender community. Having a seriously emotional reaction that has a vibe of fear and hatred definitely is not going to get the job done.

From what I'm seeing online the transgender population in the US is around .5-1.0%, with an increasing amount as age decreases. In high schools maybe the rate is around 1% right now? That would mean there aren't enough people to have meaningful competition at the league levels. Maybe the trans divisions would come into play at the championship level? I'm sure the issue with that, however is they would feel excluded from their gender identity. And yes I totally get the argument that nobody is guaranteed a spot when it comes to sports, but trying to have a more inclusive society seems to be where the world as a whole is headed. There was a time when we had separate sports leagues for african-americans and how ridiculous does that look now?

This is a big issue for our current society and I hope we can come up with a solution so that our descendants aren't embarrassed by our actions.

Armstronglivs wrote:

Semenya is DSD46XY; in other words she is genetically male, and in that respect like a trans gender athlete. Their testosterone levels would be comparable and at a male level, unless they have taken hormone suppressants. Semenya lost several seconds when she was previously required to take hormone suppressants, and a sports physiologist, Ross Tucker, has suggested she would again lose in the region of 7 seconds if she was required to comply with the new IAAF limits. There is no suggestion that she or any trans gender athlete would have to reduce their levels further than that, but it may not make all that much difference at that point, as the IAAF views 5nml as where the testosterone advantage kicks in over women.

This is where the IAAF is really screwing up as that is roughly 200% higher than what's considered to be the high-normal for women. That would be an exceptional outlier. It would be interesting to see what the norm is for each respective sport, as we know endurance athletes tend to have low-normal testosterone levels and weightlifter will tend to have high-normal levels. It doesn't make sense to treat every sport the same.

I might reiterate that from the example of an XY athlete like Semenya, who competes as a woman, that XX females would only likely be competitive if the XY athlete was not elite before hormone treatment. An elite male who transitions would still retain a significant margin over XX women. For example, a 1.47 male competitor might lose 5-7 seconds after transitioning, but that would put them far ahead of any XX athlete (who was not doped).

This. We don’t have much to go on right now other than opinions. We are guessing. Sadly the most vocal are the people spewing hate and ignorance. It will play itself out.

I’m 100% torn on the issue. From a social standpoint I want to see her carve a path.

Strictly taking a scientific approach I want to see the lower T and higher E levels mandated otherwise it isn’t fair. Although, I also see the argument that the body cannot be completely altered.

In around 2002, I was unwittingly on steroids. For about 6 months, I was taking Andro. It was legal. Sold over the counter at GNC. It wasn’t on the list of banned substances. It changed my body forever. I went from 165 to 215. It was outrageous. Even though I’ve not taken it in 17 years, I still feel as though it’s obviously changed my body.

So. I’m torn. But I would err on the side of compassion.

To the guy posting as if he’s a female, I disagree. I think more women are supportive than not. June will not adversely affect that many people. Not saying zero. But not many.

magggie wrote:

If this is never going away, as you say, then it is time to create trans divisions.

It will be cool watching one person in the trans division run a solo10000 on the track.

Concentric Hero - Eccentric Zero wrote:

For those actually trying to understand this, you might find the chart below interesting. Based on what it says about fat redistribution, I could see how a three year sit-out period could end up being adopted with medical records proving estrogen/testosterone/etc are and have been in line with normal female values.

https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-B2zaJwLwkv4/V2TWjBlCTcI/AAAAAAAAKkQ/538U3tu4OwIxb_ChawOZ2D7S-F2R6pI1gCLcB/s1600/hrt%2Btimeline2.bmp

I clicked on your chart to find no author or source is given. So there's no way to tell where or who it's from or how valid - or not - it might be.

On Aug 25, Ross Tucker @ Science of Sport said on Twitter:

The reason the authorities honed in on T is because they thought it offered a way to “resolve” the performance advantage issue (between men and women). It was attractive because if a root cause of the biological differences was T, and you could lower it, you could eliminate those differences and this would allow a compromise in terms of that performance gap. Of course, there was scant evidence & now there’s evidence refuting it

Tucker's tweet was following up on comments he made on Aug 24 that I cited earlier in this thread:

An ongoing study looking at MTF and FTM who are lowering T as per the refs and they’re measuring strength, lean mass and obtaining biopsies to study how muscle changes. On the MTF, they’ve found that lean mass drops 4-5%, muscle strength doesn’t drop, and so they retain the advantages in that area. Not seen biopsy results yet. Study is ongoing, but results were presented at some conferences recently, including one on sports law. One of them has been in touch, says that they are near completion and will publish soon The thing that is still missing, unfortunately, is data on performance. They measure muscle strength on a dynamometer, would’ve been awesome to get functional strength, like throwing, running, jump height etc. maybe future studies.

Also, on August 23, Tucker tweeted:

the biological principles for separation into men’s and women’s categories in sport are so strong that to overturn it requires exceptional evidence

(Tucker also clarified that the research he's referring is from the Karolinska Institute in Sweden, an abstract of which I posted upthread.)

About your other criticism - that I brought up athletes from other sports when I should've stuck to distance-runners only - fair enough.

But in my defense, others in this thread have brought up athletes from different events and sports here as well. And the post I was responding to made sweeping statements about female sports in general.

so you're saying that zero women are not fine with it, because the woman you mentioned does not exist. if she did exist, i would be interested in hearing from her. it's unfortunate that the 21st best runner can't be on a 20-man roster team, but that's just how the world works.

funny, because i've noticed the opposite to be true. name one athlete that has spoken out and been threatened and harassed for saying june eastwood shouldn't compete. just to be fair, here, i'll show you one person that has been harassed, including being doxxed from her facebook, for *supporting* cece telfer (scroll to the bottom where Chloe Vieira's tweet is):

can you please point me to any article which doxxes and harasses someone who opposes trans competition out in the open like this? because i only seem to see them coming from one side of the argument and it's not the side you claim it to be.

"athletes are told they must not complain or they'll be benched or removed from the team" that is a total falsehood without any evidence to support it. despite what some political hacks might say nowadays, free speech is vitally important and decent human beings recognize that, even if your opinion isn't well-informed.

yes there is, there's estrogen. those two chemicals are the only thing that matters in the context of distance running, and both can be changed and checked with medication. all the other factors that you didn't mention don't have any meaningful effect on distance running, or if anything i think they make bio women faster than bio men (like for bone density). it's the testosterone and estrogen that make the only athletic difference with distance running, it's very simple.

Kevin Hadsell wrote:

I’m saying that there are guys on here stating there is zero falloff on performance. I’m saying that there is no doubt there would be a huge disadvantage to taking the estrogen. Nobody would take the money because deep down they know it would surely have a huge affect.

Ps: people get paid to take a lot worse but that’s besides the point.

Worse than something gives you permanent breasts and possible sterility?

DMX wrote:

They must not be comfortable telling you how they really feel.

I'd guess that the majority of women do NOT support this but are afraid of speaking out. I haven't met a single D1 female runner who thinks this is fair and I come in contact with several daily.

if you've met so many D1 female runners who don't think transgender people with verified normal T + estrogen levels shouldn't compete in women's XC, please name ONE of them. clearly if they think they cause is so important to "save women's sport" as the trans exclusionists have made it out to be, they would want to advocate under their own name, right? the Overton window is so far to the right on this issue that they would be lauded for their opinion anyways, while anyone with a trans inclusionist opinion is harassed and doxxed.

SDSU Aztec wrote:

Kevin Hadsell wrote:

I’m saying that there are guys on here stating there is zero falloff on performance. I’m saying that there is no doubt there would be a huge disadvantage to taking the estrogen. Nobody would take the money because deep down they know it would surely have a huge affect.

Ps: people get paid to take a lot worse but that’s besides the point.

Worse than something gives you permanent breasts and possible sterility?

some people like to take estrogen. it wouldn't be worth it for a random joe but it might be for someone who was going to do it anyways. anyways, while any data would be helpful because our sample size is so small, luckily the trans inclusionist argument isn't wholly dependent upon this bet.