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Transgender Athletes

It’s odd to me that the assumption is if you think biological males should compete against biological males it is because you don’t know trans people. Ad hominem to the core.

If you believe transgender women are men who believe they are women and are just making a lifestyle choice then you probably don’t know transgender people.
 
lol this isn't really a process of logical argumentation, so invoking the ad hominem is a bit specious

bigger problem with what you wrote is that apparently XX don't go through puberty???
 
If you believe transgender women are men who believe they are women and are just making a lifestyle choice then you probably don’t know transgender people.

Cool brah. Enjoy your strawman. It’s basically the only thing you do.
 
Dude starts with “transgenders shouldn’t play competitive sports” which is really fucking broad and vague (not to mention hateful). When Ph asks him to be more specific and think deeper about what part of it he disagrees with his response is... “transgenders shouldn’t play competitive sports, because my daughter was awesome at sports”. Then asking questions that he could’ve easily researched on his own in order to answer Ph’s question better. And all this right after Fox News has been beating the “men with wigs are going to beat your daughters in sports” drum for the better part of a week.

Excuse me if I’m not holding his fucking hand on this one.

Wow, you are indeed one angry, cynical SOB. And again with the all Seniors get their perspectives from Fox News. Sad.
Our local paper had an article on a case which got me thinking. But believe what you want, it matters little to me.
Thanks to everyone else who brought their perspective and opinions on this topic. I learned something from most of you. The policy that Virginia and some other States have enacted seems to be a sound approach and one I can support so yes even an old dog......well you know the rest.
 
I think BBD needs to take some time off from the boards. Lol
 
To your actual point. While not enough research exists to speak definitively, there is evidence that within a year of hormone therapy, most of the competitive advantage is mitigated.

Further, we celebrate biological advantages in others: Shaq had a career because he was 7'1" and 325 lbs. (and being a trans woman is more common than being over 7 feet tall). Michael Phelps has dominated swimming partially because of the biological advantage of a body that has looser ligaments and produces less lactic acid.

The heart of the discussion is the denial of the existence of trans people. It's not that people have an issue that a trans woman might compete, it's that in their mind, trans women aren't women and it's really a man competing with women. The same argument is true with the bathroom bills.

like bym said, I'm fine with a competitive advantage if it means moving toward the recognition of full personhood for trans folks.

As usual, Thunderbolt manages a post with both the facts and the empathy. A couple of important points to reiterate (that I happen to agree with):

1) Being born XY could possibly give an athlete a competitive advantage over someone born XX. Usually that advantage is derived in some way from higher than average hormone levels.

2) as a society, we value, even worship, athletes who have been born with significant physical attributes, often size and strength, which are usually associated with birth sex. Intelligence is obviously not associated with sex or gender, but in many sports the physical stuff is essential and the mental only desirable.

3) implicit in thunderbolt's "competitive advantage is mitigated [through hormone therapy]" is the assumption that there is clear competitive advantage to hormone levels associated with XY people and that many advantages can be eliminated with science. If we care about "fair" competition (which many people have pointed out is a fantasy in itself) this is an issue worth talking about and one not inherently political.

4) this issue is rare and there are going to be few, if any, trans athletes wanting to compete at an elite level. There will certainly be more like Cece Telfer, but the case of Caster Semenya shows us that the issue is much more complex than "men" and "women".

5) many of these arguments begin with a shaky premise: to deny that there are essential (and often measurable) differences between "men" and "women" (or trans women and other kinds of women, for example) conflicts with the basic and generally accepted idea that men and women should compete separately. Junebug made this point with his varsity/jv argument.

But I also don't think it's a problem (in almost any case) to actively and thoughtfully recognize difference. The problem, in my opinion, is when people start wielding human beings as political tools. Trans people just want to live their lives.
 
Again, I don't deny the existence of trans people. They exist. I think it is real. But a biological male who believes themself to be a woman, is a biological male, even if they express their gender as female. I'll call that person whatever they want to be called--he, she, it, whatever--and I won't fire them, evict them, or exclude them from a place of public accommodation based on their trans status--because I don't really care how my employees, tenants, or customers want to live their life or express their gender/sexuality--but it doesn't change the fact they are a biological male.

And, more pertinent to the topic, when a biological male hits puberty, that person's body undergoes changes that make that person bigger, faster, and stronger than the person would otherwise be. Thus, that person should compete athletically against other biological males, whose bodies have undergone the same changes. No one is saying that biological males can't compete. They just have to compete against other biological males--whose bodies have undergone the same changes--so there isn't an unfair advantage. Otherwise, why do we even bother with women's sports? If sex is a continuum, we should just have jv and varsity and be done with it.

It is mind-blowing to me that this view is controversial, but I think that says more about the makeup of the regular posters on this board than it does about the merits of the idea.

It’s odd to me that the assumption is if you think biological males should compete against biological males it is because you don’t know trans people. Ad hominem to the core.

This dumbass is posting as if puberty blockers and hormone therapy simply don’t exist. His party is actively preventing trans kids from using them.
 
her opponents look pretty upset about it

I wish there was a way they could know you were here defending them -- they'd undoubtedly be thankful

You should consider the possibility you are misreading female body language.
 
This is such an ideal "controversy" for conservatives. They can pretend to care about women's rights while reaffirming traditional gender roles and stereotypes about the "weaker" sex.
 
This is such an ideal "controversy" for conservatives. They can pretend to care about women's rights while reaffirming traditional gender roles and stereotypes about the "weaker" sex.

I’ll bet if you ask someone like BKF it’ll be the same arguments from the bathroom bill that he doesn’t want some pervert with a penis changing in the locker room next to his granddaughter
 
This dumbass is posting as if puberty blockers and hormone therapy simply don’t exist. His party is actively preventing trans kids from using them.



This dumbass is posting as if those things are being required.
 
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