How can you protect women? Everyone wants a solution.
How can you protect women? Everyone wants a solution.
You aren't giving a viable solution to the problem here. You are arguing for a sense of social statusing, but not giving a solution. This is the problem with all modern "liberals" (I put liberals in parenthesis because people like you aren't liberals you are something different), they have their angers and like to spout their hatred of the system but have zero actual ideas on how to solve the issue.
Whether you believe a trans-woman is a woman by gender or not isn't what this argument needs to be about. This decision needs to be based in hard science. We know that if a trans-female goes through male puberty they have many advantages over their cis-gendered female counter part(i.e. larger lungs, q angle is smaller which helps propulsion, greater bone density and in general muscles can differ based on amount of training put into them). This completely changes the game for competition and makes the game no longer fair.
This is why as a society we have to accept differences, to create equal opportunities for competition, but not use it to just throw out what someone needs to be considered the right version of some gender.
Same people ignoring science here are also shouting "listen to the science" with COVID.
Try Harder wrote:
You aren't giving a viable solution to the problem here. You are arguing for a sense of social statusing, but not giving a solution. This is the problem with all modern "liberals" (I put liberals in parenthesis because people like you aren't liberals you are something different), they have their angers and like to spout their hatred of the system but have zero actual ideas on how to solve the issue.
Whether you believe a trans-woman is a woman by gender or not isn't what this argument needs to be about. This decision needs to be based in hard science. We know that if a trans-female goes through male puberty they have many advantages over their cis-gendered female counter part(i.e. larger lungs, q angle is smaller which helps propulsion, greater bone density and in general muscles can differ based on amount of training put into them). This completely changes the game for competition and makes the game no longer fair.
This is why as a society we have to accept differences, to create equal opportunities for competition, but not use it to just throw out what someone needs to be considered the right version of some gender.
But science would be conflicted on how to define Caster Semenya for example (who's intersex not trans). She didn't undergo full male puberty and doesn't have testes - if they were internal they wouldn't function properly and would have been removed by now because they can become cancerous.
You're likely to cite XY chromosomes but there are genetic differences such as gonadal dysgenesis with phenotypical female characteristics and XX male syndrome. It's entirely plausible women born identical to Semenya would present as unnoticeably female or even wouldn't undergo any puberty of any kind without artificial hormones. You'll pick one of these standards as science, but then ignore other metrics, which are equally science. You just end up creating more people adversely affected than benefitting.
Please don't call me out on not being liberal, I'm advocating to include as many people in the sport as possible. I think I've put forward a reasonable argument which you can agree or disagree on but I don't think has enough air time. I agree the debate isn't really about trans people in society but so many posters present arguments which try and invalidate them - they believe they are play acting to win a gold medal. If a boy 'pretends' to be a girl that's obviously wrong, but we're not talking about that, we're talking about actual trans people - who exist whether you like it or not.
briswiss wrote:
Tatar wrote:
She makes the standard anti-trans and faux-feminist argument we've heard before.
We've explained before how fighting over how we should define women and especially reducing girls/women to their bodies is misguided.
She repeatedly says 'real girls' and says the 'boys said they were trans' implying they were pretending.
What do you want? There's no compromise the women in the video would accept so what are we to do?
Because it is absolutely insane to have boys competing against girl. It’s science as many liberals like to say when it suites their argument.
Yeah, it's insane and against science, against common sense and any sense of morality or what is right or wrong. I'm thinking God will clean up this whole mess before long- just like He did in the Old Testament. Amen, and Amen!
Tatar wrote:
Faux Feminist sez he wrote:
How is defining women and men, boys and girls by our female and male bodies misguided?
Woman = adult human female. Girl = a female child.
Man = adult human male. Boy= a male child or young man.
How is being aware of biological sex and the enormous differences it makes in the physiology and lives of male and female people and especially in competitive sports a "faux- feminist argument"?
Are all the millions of women who contributed to and bought landmark feminist works like "The Second Sex," "Our Bodies, Ourselves" and "Of Woman Born" faux feminists?
Those of us who grew up before Title IX - when girls not only had little or nothing in the way of scholastic sports and most of us didn't even get PE in school - and who went on to campaign for and build female scholastic sports in the 1970s and 1980s - are we faux feminists?
When your mum and dad brought you into being, was the matter of which one of the two would conceive, gestate and give birth to you really arbitrary and a total surprise to them? They had no idea which one might become pregnant, carry and grow you for 40 weeks and face the trials, risks and pain of childbirth? Really?
If not by our sexed bodies, how else would you define boys/men and girls/women? By preferences in hair styles? Fashion choice? Grooming methods? Interests and hobbies? Mannerisms? Identity claims?
Gee, I thought feminism centers and advocates for the human rights of, and fair treatment for, female people. Who are female solely coz of our female bodies.
Thanks Tatar for showing me and hundreds of millions of women the error of our ways, LOL.
The patriarchy has always used biology to justify oppression that's why its misguided.
Ask your former sports teachers and they might have tried to justify your limited options on the grounds women have certain innate biological characteristics which make them more or less suited to certain things. You are what your biology says you are, and should look and act according to what we associate with feminine or masculine. Particularly for women these are oppressive, yes?
These are the same arguments used to justify trans exclusion. You should attack these ideas. Discussing 'criteria' to be a woman is the problem - you set stereotypes which inevitably will restrict. Do you think people on this thread who usually oppose feminism are feminists? No, they only claim to be in this one instance because trans people disrupt their idea of what women are.
I'm sure every sexist will be pleased to hear how fundamental motherhood is to womanhood, after all this is what they've been saying for years. You even mention childbirth being central to a woman's experience and then make a joke about dated perceptions of women having to have children!
Trans rights are women's rights. Feminists should say sex should be irrelevant in the same way anti-racists say race should be irrelevant.
______________________
Except that anti-racists do not say that race should be irrelevant. Anti-racism centers race and argues that our entire social system, including knowlege, is rooted in white supremacy. Colorblindness is a racist concept according to anti-racism.
The overlap between anti-racism and the vision of trans rights you're promoting is that both dismiss science and objectivity as tools of white supremacy and patriarchy, respectively. Both camps view all knowledge as power-laden and in need of dismantling. In this framework, only oppression and lived experienced are real, and knowlege claims made by members of oppressed groups must be legitimated.
This makes it easy for proponents of including transwomen in sports (notice how little attention transmen get, even though they are on the losing end of the sports stuff because cross-sex hormones simultanously make transmen ineligible for women's sports and are insuficient to overcome the advantages of male birth and male puberty) to ignore the tomes of data documenting male advantage in sports. Though the gender gap in sports was once substantially related to insufficient opportunities for girls and women, this is not longer the case. The gap in performance has remained stable since the 1980s.
I'm all for looking at data on cross-sex hormones and how they impact transwomen. This is important when considering whether they should be allowed to compete with elite women. However, there is a terribly misogynist idea embedded in this talk about whether hormones level the playing field--that a weak male is the same thing as a woman. You can argue that equating womanhood with motherhood is misogynist. Fine. Many women do not have children, and they're no less women. However, that does not mean that they've magically exempted themselves from the evolutionary forces that caused female bodies to prepare for pregnancy. This includes wider hips, greater body fat percentage, and regular menstrual cycles. All of these things affect nearly all female athletes. Again, females are not weak males. They are particular types of human beings whose bodies after puberty have made adaptations geared towards motherhood. These adaptations are almost always disadvantageous in sports.
Thinking feminsts are not dogmatic. They can think logically and critically about issues affecting women, including who should be included in the category woman and under what circumstances they should be included. Gender Trouble is one book, it was written by Judith Butler, not written by God and handed down from on high. Her assertion that defining the category woman is an act of oppression and exclusion is one argument made by one person. We don't have to agree. In fact, we might even point out that Judith Butler is a philosopher, not a scientist.
GD wrote:
Except that anti-racists do not say that race should be irrelevant. Anti-racism centers race and argues that our entire social system, including knowlege, is rooted in white supremacy. Colorblindness is a racist concept according to anti-racism.
The overlap between anti-racism and the vision of trans rights you're promoting is that both dismiss science and objectivity as tools of white supremacy and patriarchy, respectively. Both camps view all knowledge as power-laden and in need of dismantling. In this framework, only oppression and lived experienced are real, and knowlege claims made by members of oppressed groups must be legitimated.
This makes it easy for proponents of including transwomen in sports (notice how little attention transmen get, even though they are on the losing end of the sports stuff because cross-sex hormones simultanously make transmen ineligible for women's sports and are insuficient to overcome the advantages of male birth and male puberty) to ignore the tomes of data documenting male advantage in sports. Though the gender gap in sports was once substantially related to insufficient opportunities for girls and women, this is not longer the case. The gap in performance has remained stable since the 1980s.
I'm all for looking at data on cross-sex hormones and how they impact transwomen. This is important when considering whether they should be allowed to compete with elite women. However, there is a terribly misogynist idea embedded in this talk about whether hormones level the playing field--that a weak male is the same thing as a woman. You can argue that equating womanhood with motherhood is misogynist. Fine. Many women do not have children, and they're no less women. However, that does not mean that they've magically exempted themselves from the evolutionary forces that caused female bodies to prepare for pregnancy. This includes wider hips, greater body fat percentage, and regular menstrual cycles. All of these things affect nearly all female athletes. Again, females are not weak males. They are particular types of human beings whose bodies after puberty have made adaptations geared towards motherhood. These adaptations are almost always disadvantageous in sports.
Thinking feminsts are not dogmatic. They can think logically and critically about issues affecting women, including who should be included in the category woman and under what circumstances they should be included. Gender Trouble is one book, it was written by Judith Butler, not written by God and handed down from on high. Her assertion that defining the category woman is an act of oppression and exclusion is one argument made by one person. We don't have to agree. In fact, we might even point out that Judith Butler is a philosopher, not a scientist.
You've read a lot into my final comment. It's purpose was to say as an anti-racist or as someone who opposes racism we don't acknowledge the biological concepts of race as they are presented. We of course acknowledge it as a social phenomenon and wish to center those at the sharp end of racism. Colorblindness in the sense of totally ignoring the social effect of race is obviously racist. It's very easy to hide prejudice under the veil if saying racism doesn't or can't exist.
I've re-read your second paragraph several times and I think I understand what you're trying to say but have no idea why you've come to that conclusion. Of course lived experience is important when discussing social constructs like race or gender. To be honest I agree with much of the rest of your post in particular discussion of women being akin to weak men. I've not mentioned hormones in the context of trying to level the playing field. To my mind insisting elite women have to maintain certain levels of testosterone is deeply flawed, sexist and likely a breach of their human rights.
Trans men are rarely discussed too. I would suggest this is because women are viewed as lesser and men wishing to live as women are greeted by society with hostility. When I was at school the only thing worse than being a girl was a boy acting like one. Trans rights are women's rights because we are centering the people who experience the sharp end of sexism - this is experienced by trans women and this fact demonstrates sexism is based on constructed views of what men and women should be and not limited to discrimination of female bodies.
Precious Roy wrote:
There are just a handful of trans athletes out there. They are no threat to women's athletics. We can find space for trans and nonbinary athletes in women's sports. We can have competition that protect biologically female athletes that also includes trans and nonbinary athletes. It takes some work and some compromises from both sides. But it can be done.
That is the worst idea ever. Why do 100% of biological women have to give up their chance to win in sports just to please the .01% of men that decide to chop off their genitals?
Tatar wrote:
Trans men are rarely discussed too. I would suggest this is because women are viewed as lesser and men wishing to live as women are greeted by society with hostility. When I was at school the only thing worse than being a girl was a boy acting like one. Trans rights are women's rights because we are centering the people who experience the sharp end of sexism - this is experienced by trans women and this fact demonstrates sexism is based on constructed views of what men and women should be and not limited to discrimination of female bodies.
Actually no. They are rarely discussed here because they have a massive athletic disadvantage in sports. You won’t find any elite trans men.
Which just underscores the problem of pretending the women’s category is about gender. The women’s category only exists because of the athletic disadvantages of being born a woman. Otherwise, there is no reason to have a separate category. Women and men would just compete in the same category.
ernest 1978 wrote:
Precious Roy wrote:
There are just a handful of trans athletes out there. They are no threat to women's athletics. We can find space for trans and nonbinary athletes in women's sports. We can have competition that protect biologically female athletes that also includes trans and nonbinary athletes. It takes some work and some compromises from both sides. But it can be done.
That is the worst idea ever. Why do 100% of biological women have to give up their chance to win in sports just to please the .01% of men that decide to chop off their genitals?
That .01 percent would be a total of 45 girls ruining the sport for 450,000 female T&F athletes. And they aren't required to chop off their genitals.
The 2 Connecticut transgender sprinters have graduated and it's likely we won't see another competitive HS transgender athlete for another 10 years or so.
What is a "woman"?
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Isn't it weird that it's always cis white males protecting 'women's rights' from the evil transgenders? Almost like they're just bigotted transphobes.
As a straight male I find it refreshing that we now have the OPTION to engage with women who, objectively, appear feminine but also have the rational mindset and financial skills of a male. It's a win-win.
Let's not forget about sex. Sex with a bio woman? That's weak. It's easy. Anyone can do that. Sex with a trans woman? Now that's a level playing field. It's a competition and let's face it, LRC is all about competition.
Thank you.
Agree with her completely.
Just put transgender people in the paraolympics or give them a third category in the olympics.
ryan evans wrote:
Isn't it weird that it's always cis white males protecting 'women's rights' from the evil transgenders? Almost like they're just bigotted transphobes.
As a straight male I find it refreshing that we now have the OPTION to engage with women who, objectively, appear feminine but also have the rational mindset and financial skills of a male. It's a win-win.
Let's not forget about sex. Sex with a bio woman? That's weak. It's easy. Anyone can do that. Sex with a trans woman? Now that's a level playing field. It's a competition and let's face it, LRC is all about competition.
Thank you.
Oh look another woke poster using “cis white male” as a derogatory label.
Let’s make the world more inclusive by labeling and degrading the groups we don’t like based on characteristics they were born with. In this case cis white and male. It is like trying to be anti racist by being more racist.