I recall a news item in which it was reported that a boys team beat the national women's side. It would seem then that Megan Rapinoe or a team member could possibly lose their place in the side to a 15 year old boy who identifies as female. That's a strange way for Ms Rapinoe to champion women's sport.
She got her money off the guys team.
Now she can go about being the lesbo kaep she's always wanted to be
Who the hell cares? The guy sounds like a complete douche bag (assuming the story is true as it sounds like something from the Onion) but who really cares? Nobody cares about this skateboarding nonsense. Obviously.
Lots of women and girls care, and we happen to make up a significant proportion of the population. Many guys care too.
Males like this particular dirt bag have been using gender identity claims to horn in on and dominate in girls and women's sports of all kinds at all levels for years now - and it's having a demoralizing impact on many of us. Women who stand up for female sports in public get a barrage of death and rape threats and tons of abusive messages from male trans activists saying STFU and "suck girl dxck" - some with photos of said body part.
A lot of the coverage of the stunning and brave blokes intruding upon female sports sound like Onion parodies. But they're not. Look at the fawning coverage given to Lia Thomas by Sports Illustrated and many TV shows, for example. NBC News even likened Thomas to Jackie Robinson - and not as a joke, either.
Just because you personally don't care doesn't mean nobody does.
Here is what I don’t understand. What the hell does this guy get out of it? He does not have the esteem of the community, does he? His esteem for himself is unlikely to inflate because he beat a girl at skateboarding, is it? I suppose he gets some recognition but is it positive recognition? The whole deal seems so odd.
To be fair, she's not wrong (entire quote): “We’re talking about people’s lives. I’m sorry, your kid’s high school volleyball team just isn’t that important. It’s not more important than any one kid’s life.”
You can debate whether her underlying assumptions are true (that inclusivity prevents deaths, which seems a reasonable position), but if you're arguing that the purity of a high school sport is more important than someone's life, I've got to disagree.
Even the comparison is debatable, inasmuch as it implies that ends justify means. Most philosophical and ethical schools of thought (e.g., Rawls) treat justice as more than simply a matter of outcomes.
I've argued elsewhere that asking which approach leads to the most psychic harm is incorrect. Suppose it's possible to determine that including the trans woman will inflict 1 unit of psychological harm on each team member, multiplied by 15 team members, for 15 total units. Suppose that excluding the trans woman inflicts 20 units of harm on her. I don't think that alone tells us what to do, though it can be a relevant consideration. We also have to ask if the means by which we inflict the harm are just. I believe that in this case, imposing less total harm is actually unjust because it requires dishonesty. Specifically, it requires people to pretend that the sporting event is fair, when it clearly is not.
I also think there's a serious problem with the way people are attempting to tally up harms in these situations. They act as though the only people harmed by inclusion are the athletes who are displaced, and they act as though excluding trans women is itself responsible for all psychic harm that these people experience. I think both are false.
First, allowing trans women to compete against biological women harms all female athletes by devaluing them. It's not just about the people who get bumped off of podiums. It sends the message that your sport isn't serious business. Rapinoe may have climbed to the highest pinnacle of professional athletics, but she seems to have forgotten how important high school sports are for the dedicated athletes who will probably never compete at such a high level again in their lives. Of course, if someone said, "who cares about the Women's World Cup; they're terrible compared to the men," she'd be outraged. But her message is essentially the same: "You're not good enough at your sport to matter."
Second, and this is something about which I'm less confident, I think people are attributing too much harm to sports exclusion. Trans teenagers are depressed and suicidal because it's REALLY FREAKING HARD to be a trans teenager. Sports might give them an arena where they can feel included (though I think it's equally possible that they'll simply be subject to more abuse because of their participation). But the fact that sports can be a lifeline doesn't mean that the inability to play on the team is what is causing the harm. Effectively, we're turning women's sports into a big "make a wish" foundation for depressed teenagers. And it might make them feel better, just like pretending to be Batman made that cancer kid feel better. But I don't know that it follows that we should be compelling people, who have their own hopes and dreams, to be unwilling participants in someone else's fantasy world.
To be fair, she's not wrong (entire quote): “We’re talking about people’s lives. I’m sorry, your kid’s high school volleyball team just isn’t that important. It’s not more important than any one kid’s life.”
You can debate whether her underlying assumptions are true (that inclusivity prevents deaths, which seems a reasonable position), but if you're arguing that the purity of a high school sport is more important than someone's life, I've got to disagree.
Even the comparison is debatable, inasmuch as it implies that ends justify means. Most philosophical and ethical schools of thought (e.g., Rawls) treat justice as more than simply a matter of outcomes.
I've argued elsewhere that asking which approach leads to the most psychic harm is incorrect. Suppose it's possible to determine that including the trans woman will inflict 1 unit of psychological harm on each team member, multiplied by 15 team members, for 15 total units. Suppose that excluding the trans woman inflicts 20 units of harm on her. I don't think that alone tells us what to do, though it can be a relevant consideration. We also have to ask if the means by which we inflict the harm are just. I believe that in this case, imposing less total harm is actually unjust because it requires dishonesty. Specifically, it requires people to pretend that the sporting event is fair, when it clearly is not.
I also think there's a serious problem with the way people are attempting to tally up harms in these situations. They act as though the only people harmed by inclusion are the athletes who are displaced, and they act as though excluding trans women is itself responsible for all psychic harm that these people experience. I think both are false.
First, allowing trans women to compete against biological women harms all female athletes by devaluing them. It's not just about the people who get bumped off of podiums. It sends the message that your sport isn't serious business. Rapinoe may have climbed to the highest pinnacle of professional athletics, but she seems to have forgotten how important high school sports are for the dedicated athletes who will probably never compete at such a high level again in their lives. Of course, if someone said, "who cares about the Women's World Cup; they're terrible compared to the men," she'd be outraged. But her message is essentially the same: "You're not good enough at your sport to matter."
Second, and this is something about which I'm less confident, I think people are attributing too much harm to sports exclusion. Trans teenagers are depressed and suicidal because it's REALLY FREAKING HARD to be a trans teenager. Sports might give them an arena where they can feel included (though I think it's equally possible that they'll simply be subject to more abuse because of their participation). But the fact that sports can be a lifeline doesn't mean that the inability to play on the team is what is causing the harm. Effectively, we're turning women's sports into a big "make a wish" foundation for depressed teenagers. And it might make them feel better, just like pretending to be Batman made that cancer kid feel better. But I don't know that it follows that we should be compelling people, who have their own hopes and dreams, to be unwilling participants in someone else's fantasy world.
Well to your point about transgenders being excluded from sports not being the reason for their psychological distress I would say that is rather obvious. But that is what Rapinoe essentially said too EXCEPT she did imply that the exclusion made matters worse or even had some role in suicides, which I am not sure about. It is sort of like saying 100 years ago that blacks are made to feel inferior by society due to discrimination and maybe we should let them play sports. The bigger issue is the discrimination period. Sports participation is NOT going to cure society of discriminating against transgenders. However many here discriminate against transgenders and then camouflage it with some alleged concern about the sanctity of female sports while many are also contending that these female superheroes are doping. It is a mess.
It’s a long diatribe written about how their child who identifies as a they (but has testicles) was discriminated against (likely because they weren’t allowed to play on the girl’s team). But at the end, they were just fine because they were allowed to participate in the coed league. That league has always been open to everybody, because there is an expectation among the participants and parents that those are the rules. What is not okay is for an individual with testicles who has undergone puberty intact to participate in a competitive female only league.
Why are you assuming that "E" was not allowed to play on the girls' team? Nothing in the article mentions what team E quit. It could well be that E was on the boys' team and was told by the teammates and the coach "to act like a real boy."
And the co-ed team E now plays did not exist when they quit the previous team. It was created by people like E's mother for kids who did not fit into single-sex teams. (Co-ed "league" had existed.)
So this is a positive story of a non-binary kid who found their place on a co-ed team where they truly belong. This team could accomodate male-to-female, or female-to-male trans kids as well as any cis kid who want to join. What's wrong with that?
27,715 "gender diverse" people were surveyed, and of which 17,151 sought some level of transition. The rest either did not seek transtion, or did not answer the question on transition.
Of 17.751, 2242 (13.1%) reported that they detrantioned.
989 of 7191 trans women (13.8%) detransitioned.
361 of 6289 trans men (5.7%) detransitioned.
1125 of 12406 people who started hormone replacement therapy detransitioned. (9.1%)
371 of 5415 people who had gender affriming surgery detransitioned. (6.9%)
82.5% of people who detransitioned cited at least one external factor. (Parental pressure, pressure for other family members, pressure from community and social stigma among the most common factors.)
15.9% cited internal factors, including 2.4% (54) who reported "uncertainty or doubt around gender" and 10.5% (235) who reported "fluctuations in identity or desire."
So out of 17,751 people who pursued some level of transition, 0.3% detransitioned because of "uncertainty or doubt around gender" and another 1.3% detranstioned because of "fluctuations in identity or desire."
So should we discourage people from transition because there are about one in 60 chances that they will regret?
Purpose: There is a paucity of data regarding transgender and gender diverse (TGD) people who “detransition,” or go back to living as their sex assigned at birth. This study examined reasons for past detransition among TGD pe...
If you're really interested enough in Shrier's book to read all those reviews, why not take the time to read the book itself? I found it to be very well-written and engaging, so I can assure you it's not at all a chore to get through. I read the whole thing in two days.
But be forewarned: Shrier's aim in the book is to look into, describe, and try to shed light on the reasons behind a worsening and worryingly widespread mental health crisis and new social contagion amongst tween and teen girls in wealthy Western countries. Though the book is of course about "trans mania" amongst youngsters, more fundamentally it's a book about troubled tween and teen girls.
Or rather, it's about a sub-population of troubled girls who are dealing with the unhappiness they feel over a host of understandably very distressing things in their lives by telling themselves - and each other - that if they pump their bodies full of exogenous testosterone, bind their breasts or get them surgically removed, deepen their voices, grow facial hair, learn to "walk and talk like a man," wear boxer shorts or men's briefs filled out with "packers" to simulate a "guy bulge," and perhaps even undergo gruesome genital surgeries, this will somehow turn them into men and will make all their problems vanish.
I personally found Shrier's book to be very compassionate and fair-mined. I don't think I could have done anywhere near as a good a job as she did - and I've done a fair amount of interviewing and writing about girls and women with self-image and self-esteem problems.
If you're interested in how "trans mania" has affected, and is affecting, girls and young women in the USA, I also highly recommend the chapters in Ariel Levy's excellent 2005 book "Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and The Rise of Raunch Culture" that detail the trend for injecting T and "becoming men" that started happening amongst lesbians in SF and NYC in the late 1990s and has burgeoned since then.
More on how the "trans trend" is affecting tween and teen girls and young women in particular can be found in the Swedish television documentary series "Trans Train" that came out a couple of years ago. It's available online with English subtitles.
For a perspective that includes what's happening to girls and young women in the West but includes girls in some non-Western countries too, there's also an excellent documentary on YT by Indian filmmaker Vaishnavi Sundar called "Dysphoric: Fleeing Womanhood Like a House on Fire."
So, I caught a little of the USWNT game against Haiti yesterday when I was grilling food for our 4th of July party, and it hit me: How prevalent do you think DSD and transgenderism are in women's soccer? The CONCACAF tournament is a pretty major tournament (Qualifier for the World Cup and Olympics), but the attendance was laughable (maybe 1,000 spectators in a stadium designed for 42,000). Which makes me think that drug testing is not likely all that extensive as there is not enough funding available. With many of these countries never reaching the world cup or Olympics, it is likely that they are never drug tested (and even then, they probably only test a handful of players). If athletes are not getting drug tested, there is no way to empirically determine if they are DSD. There have only been two or three doping positives in women's soccer ever, which is a good indication there is not a whole lot of testing taking place.
So, I caught a little of the USWNT game against Haiti yesterday when I was grilling food for our 4th of July party, and it hit me: How prevalent do you think DSD and transgenderism are in women's soccer? The CONCACAF tournament is a pretty major tournament (Qualifier for the World Cup and Olympics), but the attendance was laughable (maybe 1,000 spectators in a stadium designed for 42,000). Which makes me think that drug testing is not likely all that extensive as there is not enough funding available. With many of these countries never reaching the world cup or Olympics, it is likely that they are never drug tested (and even then, they probably only test a handful of players). If athletes are not getting drug tested, there is no way to empirically determine if they are DSD. There have only been two or three doping positives in women's soccer ever, which is a good indication there is not a whole lot of testing taking place.
Interesting that you brought this up just now.
Over the weekend, the standout star in women's soccer at the Tokyo Olympics, Barbra Banda, captain of the Zambian women's squad, was forced to withdraw from the Women’s Africa Cup of Nations due to "high testosterone levels" and a "manly body."
Banda shot to prominence on the world stage last year when the ace striker scored six goals at the Tokyo Olympics, becoming the first player in women's Olympic football history to score back-to-back hat-tricks.
In 2020, Banda moved from playing for EDF Logroño in Spain to being the star player for Shanghai Shengli in China. Banda finished the season as the top scorer in the the Chinese Women’s Super League by scoring 18 goals in 13 matches.
In June, Banda was reported to have signed a multi-million dollar deal to play women's soccer for European football powerhouse Real Madrid. Banda was supposed to join the prestigious Spanish team in July after the Women's Africa Cup of Nations.
GiveMeSport has reported that Banda's
"situation is similar to that of South Africa’s Caster Semenya, who is currently unable to compete across a number of distances due to the World Athletics regulations for athletes with differences of sex development" in women's track and field.
What GiveMeSport leaves out is that the WA regulations only apply to XY athletes with a small number of conditions that exclusively affect the sex development of males. These are not female athletes with disorders/differences of sex development the way they are often described in the press. Rather, they are athletes with disorders/differences of male sex development who have been permitted to compete in women's sports due to the lax rules that international sports governing bodies like IAAF and IOC put in place after deciding in the 1990s to stop requiring athletes seeking eligibility in women's elite international events to undergo mandatory testing for sex chromosomes and the male-determining SRY gene. Though these athletes have atypical external urogenital anatomy for males, all of them have functioning testes and have been through male puberty of infancy and adolescence.
Mundo Deportivo also reported that the Football Association of Zambia has received warnings about the testosterone levels of Racheal Nachula and Racheal Kundananji.
It has now emerged that Zambia's prolific striker Barbra Banda was omitted from WAFCON after she returned high testosterone levels, plus she had a 'manly body.'
This Nigerian sports news source, whose reliability I have no idea about, reports that a total of 10 athletes have been declared ineligible for the Women's Africa Cup of Nations "for 'medical reasons' relating to high testosterone levels."
It also says that Banda is now "considered a man" and "a report said Banda was no longer deemed as a woman."
14,773 total views, 1 views today By Amaechi Agbo Francisca Ordega, Super Falcons attacker have been disqualified from participating in the ongoing 2022 Women’s Africa Cup of Nations, WAFCON in Morocco, www.bestchoicesports.c...
The reason for the crackdown seems to be that WACON is an event run by the Confederation of African Football or CAF, and CAF has put in place rules about testosterone levels and sex testing for women's competition that are stricter than the rules of other relevant sports governing bodies like FIFA and the IOC.
CAF represents the national football associations of Africa, runs continental, national, and club competitions, and controls the prize money, regulations, and media rights to those competitions. Football associations of 53 African nations are currently full members; FAs of 2 other African nations are associate members. The Réunionese Football League from France is an associate member, and the only FA from outside Africa in the CAF.
Already some in the press in Zambia are alleging that racism against black Africans is the reason that the Confederation of African Football has denied eligibility for the Women's African Cup of Nations to such a significant number of athletes from sub-Saharan African countries for having testosterone levels that are too high. Only this time, the ostensible racists aren't white Europeans, they're Arabs and the North Africans of Morocco. From the Zambia Telegraph:
TOO FIT TO BE A WOMAN…WHAT NONSENSE IS THAT?
The ban of copper queens captain Barbara Banda and 7 other fit African women from playing in the Africa Women’s Cup of Nations tournament is a clear case of racism and rigging meant to give the weak Arab players and hosts Morocco, a decisive headstart!
It’s reminiscent of Caster Simenya [sic], the South African athlete whom the Olympics committee tried to ban, until South Africans protested!
Meanwhile, back home, FAZ [Football Association of Zambia] has it’s [sic] tail between its legs, sheepishly agreeing with CAF’s nonsensical decision to ban Barbara Banda from playing, alleging that she’s too fit and powerful to be a woman!
What nonsense is this ‘testosterone test’ kansi, and why does it only target African women sports personalities?
BARBARA BANDA Simataa Accuses CAF of Racism after Zambia Women’s Captain Barbara is Banned from AWCON tournament…he writes; TOO FIT TO BE A WOMAN…WHAT NONSENSE IS THAT? The ban of copper queens captain Barbara Banda and 7 oth...
Shocked to see we have so many fans of women’s sports in this thread.
Some of us have firsthand knowledge of women's sports from playing, competing in, doing women's sports. Shocking, isn't it? I mean, how dare we.
You'll have to forgive Rick. He's just your average TDS troll that decided his meaning in life is to be contrarian to establishment, no matter how deranged it makes him look.
Already some in the press in Zambia are alleging that racism against black Africans is the reason that the Confederation of African Football has denied eligibility for the Women's African Cup of Nations to such a significant number of athletes from sub-Saharan African countries for having testosterone levels that are too high. Only this time, the ostensible racists aren't white Europeans, they're Arabs and the North Africans of Morocco. From the Zambia Telegraph:
TOO FIT TO BE A WOMAN…WHAT NONSENSE IS THAT?
The ban of copper queens captain Barbara Banda and 7 other fit African women from playing in the Africa Women’s Cup of Nations tournament is a clear case of racism and rigging meant to give the weak Arab players and hosts Morocco, a decisive headstart!
It’s reminiscent of Caster Simenya [sic], the South African athlete whom the Olympics committee tried to ban, until South Africans protested!
Meanwhile, back home, FAZ [Football Association of Zambia] has it’s [sic] tail between its legs, sheepishly agreeing with CAF’s nonsensical decision to ban Barbara Banda from playing, alleging that she’s too fit and powerful to be a woman!
What nonsense is this ‘testosterone test’ kansi, and why does it only target African women sports personalities?
I always thought Abby Wambach might be DSD. Is that not racist enough for you?
But Abby Wambach , who retired as a player in 2015, competed in women's soccer during the era when FIFA policy required all member football/soccer associations to verify the sex of their own players in the women's division. The previous rules, which FIFA announced in October 2019 were no longer in force, also allowed others who had legitimate reason to raise formal challenges about the sex of a player in women's competition - and required that athletes whose sex was questioned on seemingly valid grounds undergo medical investigation under the purview of FIFA's medical director(s).
So whilst Abby Wambach might indeed have a DSD, it would have to be a disorder of female sex development such as classic CAH, late-onset CAH or MRKH - not a disorder of male sex development like AIS, the disorder of male sex development that Dutee Chand has, or XY 5-ARD, the DMSD that Caster Semenya has.
The contentious issue in women's sports is not about the inclusion of athletes with female genetics and female gonads (ovaries) who have disorders or differences of female sex development. Everyone agrees female DSD athletes belong in women's and girls sports like all other female people do.
The contentious issue in women's sport is solely about the inclusion of athletes with male genetics and male gonads (testes) who have disorders or differences of male sex development due to medical conditions that either a) only occur in males (like AIS does), or b) occur in both sexes but only affect the sex development of males (like Semenya's enzyme deficiency 5-ARD does).
Moreover, the contentious issue about "DSD athletes" in women's sports is really only about XY athletes with of a small number of specifically male disorders of sex development which cause the affected athletes to be able to physically respond to, and use, the huge amount of testosterone their testes pump out in the ways that males typically do.
In other words, the "DSD athletes" who are a bone of contention in women's sports are solely those who have testes that pump out male levels of testosterone AND who have working male androgen receptors which caused them to go through, and benefit from, the male mini puberty of infancy and the longer male puberty of adolescence. During these crucial stages of development, these athletes all acquired the male-typical physical features - such as larger and more powerful heart and lungs, denser bones, male muscle tissue and metabolism, male ability to build and retain muscle much more easily, male hemoglobin levels, male pelvis shape, etc - that collectively give males such enormous advantages over females in most sports.
Barbra Banda and the 9 other athletes that the CAF has declared ineligible for the African Women's Cup of Nations this month all appear to have begun playing elite international women's soccer in the few years since FIFA abandoned the sex-testing rules that were in place during the time when Abby Wambach played elite women's soccer.
My wife's cousin is the department head at a major university in the United States. Easily ranked in the top 10 - perhaps a small notch below a Johns Hopkins. Of course he has peer review work - lots of it - medicine requires it, lots of it. And he is the department chairman. I am hesitant to state his name because his position on this generates a lot of flak. It is also not the main focus of his research. And while he supports transgender people, and supports transition in the right circumstances, his lifelong peer reviewed endocrinology work reflects that there are consequences to medical intervention. Even if you don't agree with him - and frankly you don't seem all that tolerant of divergent views - i can't see how his focus on the externalities that obtain with medical intervention with young people is a negative. We want people to be healthy and happy, and to the extent that some opt for medical intervention when there are underlying mental issues that have not been addressed, well, I think that is a valid point to be made. Your who cares statement reflects a certain amount of arrogance. I have educational credentials few have (including likely you). I could easily say who cares what you say. But it doesn't advance any understanding. What do you think of Abigail Shrier's book? I suspect it might invoke an emotional response from you. A logical one would be desirable, however.
Researches cited in the two reviews below contradict the findings of your wife's cousin's research.
So can you kindly inform me why I should take your words over those researches?
Gender-affirming care remains the evidence-based standard of care for gender dysphoria in transgender adolescents, despite claims by some laws and lawmakers that it is “experimental”.
A lot of the "facts" about providing healthcare to transgender youth turn out to be not actually facts. We present here a summary of the evidence relating to transition-related health care for transge
Trans youth who have had medical treatment have significantly better mental health outcomes than those who do not
While RCTs are not feasible, comparisons of youth receiving treatment and those who haven’t have been done using convenience samples. A 2018 study of young transgender men who underwent chest reconstruction found their mental health was significantly better than the control cohort who were denied the surgery. A 2019 study of 47 trans youth before and after receiving hormone therapy found that the hormone therapy improved their mental wellbeing. It also found that those who had received puberty blockers for some time prior to hormone therapy ultimately reported even lower suicidality than those who had not previously received puberty blockers. In the largest study of this to date, researchers compared 272 transgender adolescents referred to the gender clinic who had not yet received pubertal suppression with 178 transgender adolescents who had received pubertal suppression. They found those who received pubertal suppression had better mental health outcomes than those who did not receive pubertal suppression. A study released in December 2021 compared two groups of transgender youth: those who wanted Gender Affirming Hormone Therapy (GAHT) but did not receive it, and those who wanted and received it. The study found that those who received GAHT had lower odds of recent depression and of a past-year suicide attempt.
