Sport is such a weird stick to beat women and the trans community with. I don’t get it.
I don’t care for sport generally, it’s not for me, but a LOT of people love it and feel very passionately. For a lot of men it’s the only outlet they have to emote (which is a sad separate topic) so I understand that it can be something which sparks strong emotions and reactions.
I’ll stick with Star Trek and cartoons instead thanks.
Women weren’t allowed… sorry what? Weren’t ALLOWED, to compete in sports? Because?
But then they were… segregated into their own leagues.
This feels very ‘No Girls/Women Allowed’ to me. A boys club in a tree house.
Anyway, now there’s panic about trans athletes and they can’t play with anyone because?
It’s not fair to Women? The women they (men) didn’t want playing sport in the first place.
Is it simply that men fear emasculation by being ‘beaten by a girl’, under the guise of protecting women?
Ok, so I get there’s nuance here and more evidence is needed to see how much of an advantage testosterone gives etc.
But I don’t understand why some sports are segregated.
Surely somebody’s eligibility to compete should be based on their ability and whether or not they meet the criteria regardless of gender?
There may well be a divide, especially in elite athletes, but we don’t know, because that doesn’t happen in sport… does it?
Someone please tell me!
Tennis has mixed doubles. Yay, I guess?
What about darts, snooker, golf, bowling and all the other boring things people like to do, but aren’t allowed to because of a gender divide? Seems silly to me.
I think it also comes down to personal risk assessment. Is anybody asking the athletes’ their opinions?
People skydive, free climb, scuba dive, go potholing and all manner or other crazy shit that may result in death. All genders do this and no-one says a word. From a woman’s point of view, she might rather choose a boxing match with a man over climbing a mountain, because it’s safer.
Two to three boxers die a year vs hundreds of climbers.
But if it’s suggested men compete against women professionally? Gasp! Throw in trans/non-binary people and the world loses its mind.
Can you see why I don’t understand?
I do have some cognitive dissonance here that I’m willing to admit though.
I couldn’t be a boxer or anything like that. I couldn’t hit anyone, especially women. The violence makes me ill and the history of violence against women by men made legitimate by sport feels so wrong to me…
Maybe that’s some internalised misogyny?
I think that’s why people feel so strongly about this?
Conor McGregor (pukes, everywhere) won’t be allowed to put on a dress and mercilessly beat women. That just won’t happen.
Any sport fan understands there are loads of regulations, testing and boards involved in making these decisions and they wouldn’t just suddenly allow it. It’s sheer unfounded trans panic… I say that, but in actual fact, the concern in that scenario is that a cis man will pretend to be trans in order to legitimately beat a woman.
The actual danger there is yet again, a cis man!
Sport itself needs to solve this issue equitably and the general public needs to calm the fuck down in the trans witch hunt stoked by the media.
Mixed gender sport isn’t a crazy idea.
Football with a time bomb inside it is and that’s what I want to see! Throw the occasional hungry tiger on the pitch too.
Much more interesting!
But wait, there’s more…
Sooo… not only trans women, but also cis women with ‘male’ levels of testosterone won’t be allowed to compete?
This is so fucking dumb. And wrong.
Remember when all the trans rights activists said that changing laws and banning trans women in sport was going to be harmful to cis women too?
Well, there you go.
This is restricting and controlling women.
Also, if a woman has ‘male’ levels of testosterone, then that’s probably just normal for her.
Like some men have more estrogen than others.
Suddenly our hormone levels are being policed!
What if a man has higher testosterone than the other man/men he’s competing against?
There’s no mention of male levels being checked and limits applied. Are there?
Or am I missing something? Is it that the anti-trans, pearl clutching arseholes really only care about hormone levels? If you’re a cis man with high estrogen, does that make you a woman?
No, of course it doesn’t. But these idiots have such a poor grasp of science and gender that they actually have no idea what they’re talking about. They have the confidence of a mediocre white man, enough to weigh in on a topic that doesn’t affect their lives in any way what so ever.
Isn’t this absolutely ridiculous?
Sport. It’s just sport ya bunch of fucking clowns.
Just let people compete if they’re good enough.
As an aside, I might be more interested in sport if there were zero restrictions. Give them all the drugs!
You want horse legs? You got it!
How big can muscles get? Let’s find out, go nuts!
Ultimately this whole issue has been blown out of proportion in order to punish the trans community and turn the general public against them. So when their rights are restricted, people will think it’s the right/fair/correct thing to do, when in reality, it should be a non-issue and nobody should be penalised simply for existing and wanting to play a sport.
The invasiveness of genetic testing and suspicion of gender that is now a regular part of sport isn’t serving anyone, improving anything or even making things fairer, it’s destructive and a waste of time.
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