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What I don't understand about the trans-in-sports issue is why there is never any discussion of transgender men (ie people born female who take testosterone and transition to male). Everything I have ever read suggests that there are just as many trans men as trans women, if not more, and yet trans male athletes seem rarely mentioned. There was an interesting case in Texas that did involve a trans male wrestler [1]. Because of restrictions imposed by the state of Texas, high school athletes must compete with their birth sex. The wrestler in question takes testosterone, which naturally gives him a huge advantage over the women against he competes against, leading him to consecutive victories at the state championships. According to news coverage of the championships, he was booed after his victory, and a lawsuit was filed to try and stop him from competing at all. And yet, if you believe that anyone with two X chromosomes is a woman, these victories were the correct outcome: the championship was a competition between two women. Sure, the hormones he takes give him an advantage, but they were prescribed by a doctor for a medical condition (gender dysphoria). If a women was very tall, a result of her biology (in other words, a medical condition), no one would object when she made the basketball team. What if we generalize his case to more elite athletes? If you have a problem with a muscular, bearded, man with a military haircut demolishing cisgender women in high level competitions, then you do not agree that people with two X chromosomes should always compete, because this is what many trans men look like. A more logical position might be that anyone with elevated testosterone shouldn't compete with women, but then we have another problem, trans women often have lower testosterone than cis women [2]. So, if you object to cases like Lia Thomas's, which I totally agree seems unfair from the media coverage, then this won't work either. It seems like the solution is pretty simple: in adult athletic competitions there should be two categories, women and "open". Women is for people with two X chromosomes and testosterone in the female range, while open is for everyone else. There is one last difficulty, though. Androgens are one of the most potent athletic performance enhancers that we know of. So, if you sample elite female athletes it is almost guaranteed that many of them have higher than average testosterone. Some may even be intersex without realizing it. They would all have to compete with men, which would be awkward for them, and likely make them less competitive. But hey, if you think that a trans man with a beard demolishing high school girls in wrestling is unfair, then you ought to think that female athletes with high testosterone is also unfair, even when those athletes have had long careers winning against other women [3]. [1] https://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/feb/25/transgender-...
[2] https://www.sfaf.org/wp-content/uploads/resources/transfemin...
[3] https://www.theguardian.com/sport/blog/2019/feb/18/caster-se... |