As long as there is ONE person with ovotestecular syndrome, human sex is NOT binary. It is totally inhumane to assume they did not count as human just because their number is extremely small.
If you have Y chromosome, then you are male, full stop. If you don't have a Y chromosome, then you are female, full stop. There is no grey zone, the presence or even complete lack of sexual characteristics doesn't matter, a male (XY, or even XXY) without a penis and/or balls is still a male.
There will always be freaks that are just blessed with something special. That says more about how crappy the mens marathoners were, not how amazing Paula was. Look at the African countries. The women wouldn’t have a chance. The outliers only enhance the fact that, at least for now, women can’t compete on a grand scale. The problem is they just need the time. Men have been pushing each other for centuries. The marathon wasn’t even in the Olympics for women until 19 freaking 84. Women will eventually close the gap. It may take decades, but it will happen. Until then, we have to just accept a fact of science-women as a whole, not including some extremely rare freakish outliers that are still not stronger then men but can at least compete on some level, are not on the same physical level as men. Hence the reason you can only compare them to other women. Otherwise, women's sports will not exist.
Decades of research have shown that sex is far more complex than we may think. And though sex differences in sports show advantages for men, researchers today still don’t know how much of this to attribute to biological difference versus the lack of support provided to women athletes to reach their highest potential. “Science is increasingly showing how sex is dynamic; it has multiple aspects and also shifts; for example, social experiences can actually change levels of sex-related hormones like testosterone in our bodies in a second-to-second and month-to-month way!” Sari van Anders, the research chair in social neuroendocrinology at Queen’s University, in Ontario, told me by email. She said that this complexity means it doesn’t make sense to separate sports by sex in order to protect women athletes from getting hurt. “If safety was a concern, and there was evidence to select certain bodily characteristics to base safety cut-offs on, then you would see, say, shorter men excluded from competing with taller men, or lighter women from competing with heavier women, across sports.” We do see weight-class separation in boxing, rowing, and wrestling, yet it’s far from the norm across all sports, and isn’t typically seen as a method of integrating athletes of different sexes—though it could be. Old notions of sex as a marker of physical capability are changing, and more research is making clear that sex differences aren’t really clear at all.
I don’t know but this seems like an interesting topic to me. I come from the same place as those thinking the sex differences are important in terms of results and performances, but not so sure the risk factor for injury or emotional distress is really that bad. Vivre le difference!
Women and men compete directly against each other in virtually every single open road race in the world. It's not that hard to do a statistical analysis of finish times to see if there is any significant difference in performance. Captain Obvious could probably help them with that.
Sure this has been brought up but... didn't they pass a federal law to make sure that there were explicit set aside funding for sports designated specifically for females?
Could we at least get a LINK to this alleged Atlantic article? I'd like to see the context of the whacky comments posted in the OP. The Atlantic is, imo, typically very high quality journalism whether you agree or not with the author. So, I'd like to see the whole article. For all I know this was a straw man posed in the piece.
I've added the link below the first post. Friendly reminder, when you quote an article or social media post, please try to link to it. It's like putting a footnote in a research paper.
We don’t need to have a debate about gender constructs and sociology. The bottom line is that it’s not fair due to biological advantages. There are situations where we can make fairness less important than inclusion (intramural sports, road races, and maybe high school sports), but allowing MtF athletes to compete at the Olympics or in the NCAA would be wrong in my opinion. However, nobody will fight for the middle ground because it feels like a loss for both sides.
The problem is we have conflated gender with biological advantage. If we agree that gender is fluid then we need to stop talking about men's and women's categories. We need to talk about whether of not the racer has the key differentiating physical aspect: testicles.
On ranches there are often 3 categories of related to testicles (Bull/Stallion, Steer/Gelding, Cow/Mare). There are clear physiological difference in terms of size and performance.
So, if we are thinking about adding a new category (as the BA is with non-binary) we don't add non-binary, Instead the race categories become "with testicles", "post testicles", and "no testicles". If you have testicles you have to race in the "with testicles" group. You can identify as male, you can identify as female, you can identify as unicorn but if you have testicles you have to race in that group.
If you have made the choice to remove your testicles/or they have both been removed - for whatever reason, you now race with the post testicles group. In addition, if you want to compete with those with testicles that is allowed. But you can't compete with no testicles unless your testicles were removed before puberty, or you have undergone significant hormone replacement therapy.
Those that have never had testicles only race against each other, but - again - can race against either of the testicle groups if they so choose.
Within each group you can identify as male as female but awards and placement are solely determined by having testes. This by the way also solves the Caster Semenya issue as she is purported to have internal testes and so should race in the "with testicles" group.
This article isn't nearly as bad as you think. The main point seems to be that some girl had to go through extra exams and testing to be allowed on the football team ("for her safety"), but scrawny little boys could just show up. It doesn't seem to me like there is any good reason for that. Let anyone on the team who wants to play; it should be up the coaches to make sure no one gets killed.
Another section talks about a boy who wanted to play field hockey, and wasn't necessarily great compared to the girls, but still wasn't allowed to play. That one's a little tougher, because if there is no boy's field hockey, it seems like he should be allowed to play with the girls, but then you have to have a rule for how bad an athlete you have to be to qualify, which is kind of weird.
If these morons actually got what they think they want, i.e. the end of male and designations in every aspect of life, they’d be the first demand male and female categories for every aspect of life.
I'm not surprised some people think this... I am surprised that enough of our elites now believe it or play along that it gets printed in the Atlantic.
If we can't even win this debate, imagine the things it will be much easier for them to lie about.
Of course they don't believe it. The editor in chief of The Atlantic is Jeffrey Goldberg, who is not a M.A.G.A. conservative, but definitively right-leaning (cut his teeth as one of W. Bush's head cheerleaders in the early 00s). This is culture war click-bait. He's probably getting a big kick out of it.
Although Mandelzis’s exact experience may seem rare, it exemplifies the way many people still view sports as a perfectly reasonable venue in which to enforce exclusion on the basis of sex.
This is delusional and dangerous thinking beyond belief!
I'm not surprised some people think this... I am surprised that enough of our elites now believe it or play along that it gets printed in the Atlantic.
If we can't even win this debate, imagine the things it will be much easier for them to lie about.
Of course they don't believe it. The editor in chief of The Atlantic is Jeffrey Goldberg, who is not a M.A.G.A. conservative, but definitively right-leaning (cut his teeth as one of W. Bush's head cheerleaders in the early 00s). This is culture war click-bait. He's probably getting a big kick out of it.
The Atlantic has long been the last stop for woke hacks on their bus-ride to Palookaville, going back long before "woke" was a thing. Post 9/11, they published an article that offered up a blueprint for future Islamic terrorist attacks in the US, implying that we deserved it because, you know, America. I wouldn't wipe my hiney with The Atlantic.
Claiming that people with DSDs aren't male or female stigmatizes and others them. Calling them the misleading term "intersex" just spreads more confusion about their widely misunderstood medical conditions too.
I would rather listen to people with DSD what they think about this issue.
I hope you recognize that you're rejecting the principle of scientific objectivity. You're saying that people's perceptions of reality should carry greater weight than data based on observations of the material world.
1) We should think of sports as open and then women's only. IF a woman wants to play football and ride the bench and/or get destroyed, all the more power to her.
2) For participatory sports, I'm fine with it being co-ed.
3) As I was reading the article, I kept thinking to myself, "I wonder what the author's qualifications are." Of course it concludes with "she is a writer living in Seattle." But looking at her bio she's writing a book on women and running. I can't wait. Does she realize there would be zero female Olympic track medallists if her dream becomes reality?
4) I think I need to make a t-shirt with Seb Coe's quote about second-rate sociologists on it. How many did she quote? How about quoting an actual legit scientist?