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Trans Women are not Women

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sadhatter said:
That kinda makes me sad that people feel that way.

Personally I get inspired by people doing big things, doesn't matter if it's a thing I can do, it's the fact that an individual doing something awesome in their field .

Honestly if this is an opinion the majority of folks have, I think that is a huge part of the problem. Seems like a low key jealousy.
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There are different types of inspiration. One type is encouraging in that it shows great things are possible. Another type is encouraging and motivating because it suggests that you also may be able to excel. If you are only ever a spectator (to sport or any other aspect of life), their is no need for the latter. For potential participants however, it's quite impactful.
 
Archie Gemmill Goal said:
Oh, this I agree with. Visible examples and role models are important. But that is somewhat different than saying that it's only about winning. In fact you said it yourself 'excelling and competing' but I believe they can still excel and compete in a world where transwomen also participate.
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I think female athletes feel (rightly) that they have worked very hard and still only made relatively minor (in some sports at least) headway in gaining exposure and airtime. I can understand why they would feel (and respond) strongly to the possibility of losing any of that ground.

And you know what the weird thing, a lot of the faces arguing to exclude transwomen here are the same ones that will tell you if you switch topic to STEM employment (for example) than role models don't matter, that removing barriers doesn't matter and that it's just tough that women don't have the attitudes/aptitudes required to succeed.
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I won't derail this thread, but I'd be interested in participating in a separate thread on this issue, particularly with those like yourself who have more hands-on experience.

You seem to be able to be able to comprehend arguments so this is not for your benefit but I will spell it out clearly for the hard of thinking - I do not advocate for a system in which transwomen completely dominate sport, in which ciswomen don't have a chance to compete, in which no ciswomen ever can win anything.

And if the only way to achieve that was to exclude them entirely then I would reluctantly agree that its for the best. I just don't agree that we are at that point, and I have given an example of the kind of situation where it seems to be working OK.
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Fair enough. At present I feel like at the end, we are will stuck because biological sex creates an un-level playing field, but I'm willing to continue to discuss. Can you remind me of your example? I think I missed it in the thread.

I think we can all imagine scenarios where it would generate considerable difficulties, and some of us at least can imagine scenarios where it wouldn't. My question has always been whether there are ways we can manage things that would allow us to steer it to the latter. The counter arguments have generally been screaming nonsense about men in bras, Roger Federer identifying as a woman on a Tuesday, or 0.3% of a population entirely displacing 50% (through mathematical magic apparently). Of course there have also been the non-readers.
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Right. My feeling is that the difficulties would be the "rule" and the times things run smoothly would be the "exceptions", but I'm happy to continue to read and consider your opinions and ideas as well.

Well indeed. And what I have asked is to discuss biological and social realities rather than invented nonsense. And I have said at least once that I don't know what the actual magnitude of difference between a transwoman and a cis woman is in terms of biological advantage. And nobody else has been forthcoming with this. The transwoman in my example speaks about how hormone therapy significantly changes their biological advantage. And I have not seen anyone speak out to say they feel that they have an unfair advantage or that they don't want to play alongside her. I haven't heard any reports that she is making a mockery of the sport, or her league or the games she participates in.

And yet people here insist that she needs to be banned from competing. And I haven't seen anyone offer a single reason for that other than that she belongs to a group that they want to exclude.

And yes it's just 1 example, but nobody is seriously trying to argue that she is unique are they? There must be hundreds or thousands of people like her who could all participate happily in women's sports without causing any problems whatsoever.

Are there other situations where it doesn't work as well? Undoubtedly. Could things become an issue in future if the numbers skewed significantly? Quite possibly. But that is an argument to address those issues, not to throw the baby out with the bathwater.
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The problem I see, with respect to biological advantage is the distribution among the population. I'm confident you already understand this, so I won't belabour it, but there is one distribution for males, and a different distribution for females, which makes competition mostly unfeasible. The distribution for trans-women, would likely fall between the other two and be sufficiently unique so as to also make competition unfeasible. It's not the individual cases (for or against) that are problematic, it's the populations trends.
 
Darat said:
What utter nonsense, government is one of the ways societies decide to organise, government is just as much a part of society as a sporting organisation.
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Exactly: it's a part. It isn't the whole. It often doesn't represent the whole or even the majority. Government intervening to force sports organizations to include trans athletes in womens' competitions is an example of government not representing the whole, or even the majority.

And sports organizations, while also only part of society, are the most relevant part for making decisions about those sports. You said so yourself.
 
sadhatter said:
That kinda makes me sad that people feel that way.

Personally I get inspired by people doing big things
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Is it really inspiring if a biological male runs faster than biological females?

I don't really think that's inspiring.
 
attempt5001 said:
I think female athletes feel (rightly) that they have worked very hard and still only made relatively minor (in some sports at least) headway in gaining exposure and airtime. I can understand why they would feel (and respond) strongly to the possibility of losing any of that ground.



I won't derail this thread, but I'd be interested in participating in a separate thread on this issue, particularly with those like yourself who have more hands-on experience.



Fair enough. At present I feel like at the end, we are will stuck because biological sex creates an un-level playing field, but I'm willing to continue to discuss. Can you remind me of your example? I think I missed it in the thread.



Right. My feeling is that the difficulties would be the "rule" and the times things run smoothly would be the "exceptions", but I'm happy to continue to read and consider your opinions and ideas as well.



The problem I see, with respect to biological advantage is the distribution among the population. I'm confident you already understand this, so I won't belabour it, but there is one distribution for males, and a different distribution for females, which makes competition mostly unfeasible. The distribution for trans-women, would likely fall between the other two and be sufficiently unique so as to also make competition unfeasible. It's not the individual cases (for or against) that are problematic, it's the populations trends.
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Here again is the example i gave of a transwoman competing with other women in a non-elite but competitive environment.

https://www.pinknews.co.uk/2019/03/05/transgender-footballer-no-advantage-hormone-therapy/

Now she argues that her hormone therapy pretty much levels the playing field and i don't have any evidence that she is wrong in that.

Now she is not the biggest strongest best man in football suddenly deciding she wants to play in women's sport. But equally she isn't competing against the best women either.

i give this example because it was in the press here recently and I haven't seen anyone come out to argue it or say that they don't like playing against her or that it's unfair. and yet there are a handful of people here arguing that this needs to be stopped before it destroys women's sport entirely.

and that's why I don't like arguments from population differences, because they don't apply to individuals.
 
Ziggurat said:
Exactly: it's a part. It isn't the whole. It often doesn't represent the whole or even the majority. Government intervening to force sports organizations to include trans athletes in womens' competitions is an example of government not representing the whole, or even the majority.

And sports organizations, while also only part of society, are the most relevant part for making decisions about those sports. You said so yourself.
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I think you need to be careful here in assuming (as you seem to be) that because action is taken in favour of a minority that it is taken only on behalf of a minority.
 
Archie Gemmill Goal said:
Here again is the example i gave of a transwoman competing with other women in a non-elite but competitive environment.

https://www.pinknews.co.uk/2019/03/05/transgender-footballer-no-advantage-hormone-therapy/

Now she argues that her hormone therapy pretty much levels the playing field and i don't have any evidence that she is wrong in that.

Now she is not the biggest strongest best man in football suddenly deciding she wants to play in women's sport. But equally she isn't competing against the best women either.

i give this example because it was in the press here recently and I haven't seen anyone come out to argue it or say that they don't like playing against her or that it's unfair. and yet there are a handful of people here arguing that this needs to be stopped before it destroys women's sport entirely.

and that's why I don't like arguments from population differences, because they don't apply to individuals.
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“Yesterday my football team containing two trans women lost 5-1 twice to a team containing no trans women, so you can take your trans advantage and shove it.”

Odd logic

:boggled:
 
A woman could have the best possible genetic makeup for a certain sport and rigorously follow a perfect training routine, but still lose to an average trans-woman athlete.

If the above is true, then the idea of them competing together is as ridiculous as having adults compete with children.
 
cullennz said:
“Yesterday my football team containing two trans women lost 5-1 twice to a team containing no trans women, so you can take your trans advantage and shove it.”

Odd logic

:boggled:
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in what way is it odd?

Odder than 'well the male heavyweight champion would beat a woman easily if he suddenly identified as trans' ?
 
Ziggurat said:
You seem to think the motives matter. They don't, not really.
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No, you seem to be arguing that an action which helps one group only represents that group and I disagree. Nothing to do with motives.

The presence of unemployment benefits in my society don't only represent the minority of people who are unemployed but represent the majority of the society who think they are the right thing to do whether they are unemployed or not.
 
Archie Gemmill Goal said:
Here again is the example i gave of a transwoman competing with other women in a non-elite but competitive environment.

https://www.pinknews.co.uk/2019/03/05/transgender-footballer-no-advantage-hormone-therapy/

Now she argues that her hormone therapy pretty much levels the playing field and i don't have any evidence that she is wrong in that.
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I do. Skeletal structure doesn't change with hormones. The Q angle of the knee is smaller for men than for women, as an example, which makes running more efficient for men. Neuromuscular efficiency will also remain different despite hormone treatment.

For example, the standing vertical jump (SVJ) for male athletes is much larger than for female athletes. The SVJ is a very interesting measure of athletic aptitude, because unlike strength, there's actually very little you can do to improve it. Football recruiters use it precisely because it's not really trainable, and so reveals information about an athlete's intrinsic potential. It's mostly a function of how fast your nervous system can recruit muscles to fire, and how many of them the nervous system can get to fire at the same time. Getting stronger doesn't change that, and does very little to improve the SVJ. Steroids likewise don't improve the SVJ. Which is why the loss of muscle mass due to hormone therapy won't really hurt the SVJ much either. But having a higher SVJ is an advantage in almost any athletic competition. So trans women will still have that neuromuscular efficiency advantage over biological women regardless of hormone therapy.

and that's why I don't like arguments from population differences, because they don't apply to individuals.
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The entire premise of having women's sports is because of population differences. If you can't consider population differences, then there's no reason to have women's sports at all. If that's really how you feel, then be honest about the logic, and advocate doing away with women's sports entirely. But the idea that you can't tolerate being judged as a member of a population if it excludes you from a league that is entirely premised on populations, well, that's a contradiction from the start.
 
Archie Gemmill Goal said:
No, you seem to be arguing that an action which helps one group only represents that group and I disagree. Nothing to do with motives.

The presence of unemployment benefits in my society don't only represent the minority of people who are unemployed but represent the majority of the society who think they are the right thing to do whether they are unemployed or not.
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You picked a really bad example. Unemployment benefits function as a sort of insurance, which could potentially be used by more people than actually use them. Most people will never be under consideration for benefits to transgendered.

A better example would be welfare for the developmentally disabled, since most people aren't even potentially in that category. But even there, you've skipped over so many steps (like needs and justifications) that the comparison is still fairly pointless.
 
Archie Gemmill Goal said:
Is it true?
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I'm going to say yes, unless there's compelling evidence to the contrary:

"I've fought a lot of women and have never felt the strength that I felt in a fight as I did that night. I can't answer whether it's because she was born a man or not because I'm not a doctor. I can only say, I've never felt so overpowered ever in my life and I am an abnormally strong female in my own right."

Tamikka Brents on her fight with transgender fighter Fallon Fox
 
Archie Gemmill Goal said:
in what way is it odd?

Odder than 'well the male heavyweight champion would beat a woman easily if he suddenly identified as trans' ?
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Because football is a team game and the other 9 players might just be crap.

Or even their one goalie.

Presuming they are talking round ball.

It is a silly thing for them to say, and shows nothing without context.
 
Olmstead said:
I'm going to say yes, unless there's compelling evidence to the contrary:
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I think that's textbook prejudice then

"I've fought a lot of women and have never felt the strength that I felt in a fight as I did that night. I can't answer whether it's because she was born a man or not because I'm not a doctor. I can only say, I've never felt so overpowered ever in my life and I am an abnormally strong female in my own right."

Tamikka Brents on her fight with transgender fighter Fallon Fox
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Yep. And we have other examples where its just fine.
 
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