Is this fair?

[Crunchy]

A 39 year old transgender woman just dominated a women's weight lifting event setting several records in the process.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/sport/news/art...d=11821399

Among the recommendations it states that those who transition from male to female "must demonstrate that her total testosterone level in serum has been below 10 [nanomoles per litre] for at least 12 months prior to her first competition".

Hubbard, who once competed at national level as Gavin Hubbard, transitioned in her mid-30s.

The problem is that bone, tendon and muscle growth that have been influenced over the years by training as a man with all the attendant testosterone do not simply disappear when transitioning.

[Rhondazvous]

Such standards would be hard to set since they might bring into question the extent to which the transgender individual is truly accepted as a member of the chosen gender.

Maybe they will establish a transgender weight lifting. but that may not be acceptable for the same reason.


edited after reading quotation

[brewer]

My response: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ren%C3%A9e_Richards

Edit: Add on: https://www.transathlete.com/policies, https://www.ncaa.org/sites/default/files..._Final.pdf

[Shell B]

I think it probably is quite unfair, but would it also be unfair to disclude transgender athletes from performing as their preferred gender? It's hard to make it fair for everyone, but I think it's rather certain a MTF transgender individual has distinct advantage over biological females.

[Rhondazvous]

My response: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ren%C3%A9e_Richards

Edit: Add on: https://www.transathlete.com/policies, https://www.ncaa.org/sites/default/files..._Final.pdf

Hats off to Renee.

[Minimalist]

A 39 year old transgender woman just dominated a women's weight lifting event setting several records in the process.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/sport/news/art...d=11821399

Among the recommendations it states that those who transition from male to female "must demonstrate that her total testosterone level in serum has been below 10 [nanomoles per litre] for at least 12 months prior to her first competition".

Hubbard, who once competed at national level as Gavin Hubbard, transitioned in her mid-30s.

The problem is that bone, tendon and muscle growth that have been influenced over the years by training as a man with all the attendant testosterone do not simply disappear when transitioning.

Schedule all the events in North Carolina.  She wouldn't be able to go to the bathroom.

[Crunchy]

I think that in some instances it is absolutely unfair.

Sports are not all alike and something like weight lifting and MMA do not compare to something like golf. In strength sports being born and raised and trained while a male is tantamount to a female using performance enhancing drugs her entire life.

It makes me think of Oscar Pistorius and the advantage that modern prosthetics can deliver (and they are only getting better)
 https://www.scientificamerican.com/artic...advantage/

Our natural tendency is to feel sympathy for people and I think it is overriding our ability to judge right from wrong in some cases. There are prosthetics that allow people to jump much higher and farther than any person ever could without such enhancements. It is unfair to use sympathy as an argument to allow people who have gained an advantage through human technology to compete with such a distinct advantage.

ps. Yes, it is fair to compare these two different ideas as they are both discussing an advantage created by advancements in human technology. Both prothetics and gender reassignment surgery/hormonal manipulation are the result of human ingenuity.

[John V]

Of course it isn't fair.

The only way to maintain the transgender fiction without penalizing real women in certain sports is for transgender people to voluntarily abstain from sports in which they have an advantage. But apparently that ain't gonna happen.

[Alex K]

As I've said before, it mainly just illustrates that sports competitions are inherently pointless. Gender is just one of many possible categories how to separate athletes into groups to seemingly make the competition fair. How about sorting them in categories by height, too?

[Alex K]

Of course it isn't fair.

The only way to maintain the transgender fiction without penalizing real women in certain sports is for transgender people to voluntarily abstain from sports in which they have an advantage. But apparently that ain't gonna happen.

Transgender fiction. Nice. I guess any justification is good enough an opportunity to piss on transgendered people.