I am a supported of DSD and trans-women's rights in general but not in the context of competing with biologically female women.
To act like we can't define those things is asinine. If a med school was studying these individuals, they could tell you who had high female levels of testosterone (naturally) and who had male levels of testosterone (due to DSD or chromosomal reasons). We actually do have definitions that work because they are based on measurable T levels.
I am just tired of people who I consider allies of the trans/DSD community making a fight for social and civil right harder by demanding to compete against girls and women in sports. That is wrong of us and hurts our cause generally speaking because everyone is against it. For good reason, obviously.
They're playing dumb for ideological reasons.
Are you playing dumb or actually dumb? Nobody said you can’t come up with definitions, just that nobody cares about some anonymous Ruxton’s definition of who a man is. Sporting bodies care about performance determinative attributes for fairness and T levels could certainly be part of those criteria like they are with WA.
Are you playing dumb or actually dumb? Nobody said you can’t come up with definitions, just that nobody cares about some anonymous Ruxton’s definition of who a man is. Sporting bodies care about performance determinative attributes for fairness and T levels could certainly be part of those criteria like they are with WA.
This kind of argumentation makes us (on the Left) seem so dumb and out of touch with reality. Trump supporters and "normal people" shake their heads when we struggle to come up with a "definition of what a man is."
Can we do it, or not? I think I can. I also think I can admit that people with pronounced DSD conditions are not easily put in the male or female categories (but this doesn't mean that they can just "choose" to compete against women).
I think the fact that shocks non-runners the most is that a boy at my daughter's school (two years ago) who barely trained, ate junk food, goofed around like a normal boy, and somehow ran 1:52 in the 800m.
I think non-runners don't realize how easy it was for this kid compared to how hard all the women on Earth have trained, sacrificed, and worked. Yet all the women (even the doped ones) were never faster than that Big Mac eating 11th grader...
Testosterone is the king of the PEDs. To allow it (at male levels) into women's sports is to ruin women's competition (as we saw during the Caster/Niyonsaba years).
It's this - they don't. And it's a frustrating education gap/void.
My wife and her friends don't get it and why/how would they? Even when I explain to them that the fastest woman on the planet wouldn't get out of the first round in the 100m at the Texas state HS boys meet they don't, nor even want to attempt to, understand the gravity of this. I tell them that by the age of 14 I was good enough to win the Olympic womens 800m title and by 15 was a second inside the womens WR - again it's still meaningless to them.
Even when you explain that this is about women's rights and female equality they don't get that either - it's just lost in sea of emotional ideology that has nothing to do with facts or reality. But end of the day this isn't really about that is it? It's really about sounding compassionate, empathetic and reasonable.
Also one thing I might add to this - the person at the center of this issue isn't transgender right? (I'm responding here to other comments about transgender people in competitive sport) If we want to be bastions of facts and science we need to be consistent. This is a biologically intersex athlete that hasn't unethically been identifying as a female their entire life. This is very different to a Lia Thomas situation even if the physiological scenario is the same and the danger to the health and safety of this athletes competitors very really real and present due to the nature of the sport. This is also doesn't mean I believe they should be allowed to compete against XX chromosome athletes, because I don't.
This post was edited 1 minute after it was posted.
The "nuance" is that women have XX chromosomes and anyone with a Y is a biological male and shouldn't be boxing in the women's division.
It might surprise you that this is a silly made up definition in your head and far from a universally accepted one, especially among experts who know something about human sexual biology, and not by the IOC or WA. Some women have a Y and some men are XX.
I'm a biochemist. If you're human and you have a Y chromosome then you are a male. That is the scientific definition. All that crap you wrote is stuff you made up in your head.
Are you playing dumb or actually dumb? Nobody said you can’t come up with definitions, just that nobody cares about some anonymous Ruxton’s definition of who a man is. Sporting bodies care about performance determinative attributes for fairness and T levels could certainly be part of those criteria like they are with WA.
This kind of argumentation makes us (on the Left) seem so dumb and out of touch with reality. Trump supporters and "normal people" shake their heads when we struggle to come up with a "definition of what a man is."
Can we do it, or not? I think I can. I also think I can admit that people with pronounced DSD conditions are not easily put in the male or female categories (but this doesn't mean that they can just "choose" to compete against women).
Speak for yourself: I neither identify as left nor struggle to define a man. Neither does World Athletics that doesn’t allow athletes to simply “choose”. IBA has other problems going on.
It might surprise you that this is a silly made up definition in your head and far from a universally accepted one, especially among experts who know something about human sexual biology, and not by the IOC or WA. Some women have a Y and some men are XX.
I'm a biochemist. If you're human and you have a Y chromosome then you are a male. That is the scientific definition. All that crap you wrote is stuff you made up in your head.
Can’t really care what some anonymous on an incrl forum thinks. The world has left you behind anyway.
Instead of having men's and women's categories we should have "people with working testicles" and "people without them" categories. This would put Semenya and all the other DSD athletes in the right category.
The "nuance" is that women have XX chromosomes and anyone with a Y is a biological male and shouldn't be boxing in the women's division.
There are XY athletes who are androgen insensitive. They are not banned from female categories (and nobody is seriously trying to ban them). They do not have the advantages of a biological male. They may even be at a disadvantage vs. XX athletes because what little testosterone they have doesn't really work.
As a lefty with a grasp on science, this type of situation is so frustrating. No one on either side seems willing or able to grasp the nuance.
There have been cases where the anti-trans side (or related right-wing side) have been massively misinformed on a gender related case or argued over it in bad faith. In this case though, it was clearly the left / pro-trans side that was willfully misinformed. What Imane's critics were saying was that they did not believe "she" is a woman and particularly that she probably had an intersex condition, and they based that on the findings of the world boxing federation (I forget its exact name). Leftists / pro-trans people claimed that the rightists were being "transphobic" when they weren't even saying Imane is trans, they were saying (based on a legit report) that she is not "all woman," like Caster Semenya. The lefties also insisted that since the boxing federation was banned from organizing the Olympic tournament due to unrelated reasons, that clearly the federation is totally BS and no one should believe their finding that Imane is intersex. The bad faith on this issue was all done by the pro-trans / lefty side, probably because they've gotten too used to fighting for athletes who are clearly men with a mental disorder that tells them they are really women, as opposed to the more nuanced situation here that is based on physical oddities rather than mental delusions.
OK, I'll grant you that some facebook grandpas who type first and think never just assumed that Imane was your garden variety trans "woman" and talked some ill-informed crap on the subject based on that refusal to understand the situation. But the lefties were exercising bad faith from top to bottom.
Yes and I don't defend anyone misrepresenting the situation. That was my whole point. I also don't defend spewing hatred or not treating other people with dignity.
I think the fact that shocks non-runners the most is that a boy at my daughter's school (two years ago) who barely trained, ate junk food, goofed around like a normal boy, and somehow ran 1:52 in the 800m.
I think non-runners don't realize how easy it was for this kid compared to how hard all the women on Earth have trained, sacrificed, and worked. Yet all the women (even the doped ones) were never faster than that Big Mac eating 11th grader...
Testosterone is the king of the PEDs. To allow it (at male levels) into women's sports is to ruin women's competition (as we saw during the Caster/Niyonsaba years).
So what do you want? Ban ALL athletes with Y chromosome from women's competition? That would not only defy the science, it will probably not defensible in the court.
Ok, so how about we ban the ones with testicles? Seems kind of obvious, really. And the subject of this thread is a boxer, not a runner, so not subject to the World Athletics rules, which is the whole problem.
Instead of having men's and women's categories we should have "people with working testicles" and "people without them" categories. This would put Semenya and all the other DSD athletes in the right category.
Semenya is already in the right category. That was never the problematic issue for either party in all the litigation in her running career.
Add to this that these conditions happen more when there is inbreeding, which is also a touchy subject. DSD athletes tend to come from places with higher inbreeding. It doesn't mean they're not human beings. Hate is not the right reaction. If most people aren't enlightened enough to understand that, is it better to make somewhat disingenuous arguments in order to protect those who would become the targets of hate? Maybe. I don't know. If it protects people, it's definitely morally defensible from a utilitarian standpoint.
Instead of having men's and women's categories we should have "people with working testicles" and "people without them" categories. This would put Semenya and all the other DSD athletes in the right category.
Semenya is already in the right category. That was never the problematic issue for either party in all the litigation in her running career.
Then what was the issue? She has high testosterone because she has testicles that produce male levels of testosterone which is many times the amount that biological females get from their ovaries. That's why she has an unfair advantage.
The "nuance" is that women have XX chromosomes and anyone with a Y is a biological male and shouldn't be boxing in the women's division.
There are XY athletes who are androgen insensitive. They are not banned from female categories (and nobody is seriously trying to ban them). They do not have the advantages of a biological male. They may even be at a disadvantage vs. XX athletes because what little testosterone they have doesn't really work.
So all the Republicans who voted for HR734 are not "serious"? That bill defines "sex" by genetics and reproductive organs, meaning androgen insensitive XY people are defined as "male."
Most state laws that ban "males" from girls' sports define sex the same way. (Because the were all written by the same people.)
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