Cont: Trans women are not women (IX)

[Rolfe]

What "lobby" did the IAAF and IOC "cave in" to when they made their original provisional decision to allow Semanya to compete in the women's category?

Oh and I never talked about "prohibition" or "power to prevent". FINA could, for example, arbitrarily impose a ban on all male swimmers over 5ft 10 in height if they wanted to. Nothing would stop them from doing so, and they'd have the power and authority to enforce such a ban in all events that they controlled. But of course they'd very soon a) find themselves up in court in multiple national and transnational (eg CAS) jurisdictions regarding the fairness and proportionality of such a ban, and b) severely tarnish their reputation for competence and evidence-based administration.

QED

I'm not sure whether they would find themselves in legal trouble were they to do anything so unlikely as banning swimmers over a certain height, but this is pretty academic. I am absolutely certain they would not have faced any successful challenge had they decided from the outset not to change the eligibility criteria for women's events. It has always been agreed that not allowing males to enter female events is both fair and proportional, and that could not have been successfully challenged. (I won't say "not challenged", because we all know the trans crybabies will challenge anything in the hope someone will take them seriously.)

You really need to get your head round the reality that "transwomen" are male and always will be, and that it is entirely legal, fair, proportionate and proper to treat them as male in appropriate circumstances, at least outwith wildly mad jurisdictions such as Canada and Australia.

Since sports are played by bodies, not gender identities, the big mistake that was made by FINA and others was caving in to the ludicrous proposition that gender identity is something they should pander to, rather than maintaining the sex-based categories as they had always been. Now they're having to unbake a cake they should never have put in the oven in the first place.

 

[d4m10n]

Whichever states? What laws?

TN & TX, for example.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bathroom_bill#cite_ref-104

How is their corresponding outward appearance legally defined?

It isn't, you have to look.

 

[shuttlt]

What is "legal and fair" depends on having some kind of "man on the Clapham omnibus" idea of common sense. In the case of the IAAF, it is the assumptions of the international elite class of people who populate The International Court of Justice and similar bodies who decide what is and is not fair and legal. These are the type of people who are extremely reluctant to give a succinct definition of "woman". Are you sure the law is on your side here?

 

[LondonJohn]

I'm not sure whether they would find themselves in legal trouble were they to do anything so unlikely as banning swimmers over a certain height, but this is pretty academic. I am absolutely certain they would not have faced any successful challenge had they decided from the outset not to change the eligibility criteria for women's events. It has always been agreed that not allowing males to enter female events is both fair and proportional, and that could not have been successfully challenged. (I won't say "not challenged", because we all know the trans crybabies will challenge anything in the hope someone will take them seriously.)

You really need to get your head round the reality that "transwomen" are male and always will be, and that it is entirely legal, fair, proportionate and proper to treat them as male in appropriate circumstances, at least outwith wildly mad jurisdictions such as Canada and Australia.

Since sports are played by bodies, not gender identities, the big mistake that was made by FINA and others was caving in to the ludicrous proposition that gender identity is something they should pander to, rather than maintaining the sex-based categories as they had always been. Now they're having to unbake a cake they should never have put in the oven in the first place.

Um well....

1) It's obvious that your views on this matter are extremely different from mine;

2) It's also clear that your views on this matter are very different from those held by most progressive liberal democracies;

3) It's also clear that your views on this matter are very different from those held by all the major sports administration bodies.


I wonder: have you ever heard of "due process"? Because that's what's happened here (and it's also what is currently taking place in pretty much all sports administration bodies).


But then again, if one's overarching view of transgender identity is that it is fundamentally invalid/false/unreal..... one's view regarding the correct due process for sporting administrators in these matters is, I suppose, entirely moot.

Therefore I can at least comprehend (though I vehemently disagree) that if one's belief is that there's no such thing as a valid transwoman or transman, then it would almost go without saying that sports administrators should never - on principle - have allowed anyone born male/man to compete in elite level women's sport.


Still....just imagine all of those national jurisdictions and international sporting bodies having fallen victim of "policy capture" at the hands of the evil, conniving, threatening trans-activists. And as part of that, imagine how so many "western" national governments stood up to murderous terrorists, yet they laid down and rolled over at the behest of those nasty (but, so far as I know, non-murderous) trans-activists. It's almost unbelievable, isn't it....?

 

[LondonJohn]

That rather depends on what you mean by "transgender identity", but from what I can gather you mean by it, then yes. Absolutely.

A male cannot become a female, a man cannot become a woman, not ever. Or vice versa. That is the nature of reality. Just as you can call a dog a cat if you like but it will always be a dog, you can call a man a woman but he will always be a man.

There is another way of regarding "transgender identity", as the performance of the perceived social role of the opposite sex, which quite obviously happens, people do it, so in that sense it's "valid". But actually, this whole concept of "valid" in this context seems vacuous to the point of incoherence. People are the way they are and behave the way they behave and whether you put a label "valid" on this is neither here nor there.

But there is no possible way in which a human being can become the opposite sex to the one they were conceived as.

Yes, I understand: you completely reject the core notion that transgender identity is valid (as opposed to, for example, being a mental health aberration or mental illness of some kind).

As I said a few days ago, I think it frames much of the debate/discussion in this thread properly if/when it can be determined:

a) which contributors hold the view that while transgender identity is valid and real, there are nevertheless fairness and safety concerns in certain well-defined areas (including transwomen in elite-level women's sport); and

b) which contributors hold the view that transgender identity is fundamentally invalid and unreal - and that therefore it follows almost axiomatically that (eg) transwomen should arbitrarily be banned from all elite women's sport.

 

[Rolfe]

Here's another one. Stunning and brave. He's 29, and he took first place away from a 13-year-old girl.

[imgw=500]https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FWIfAPuUsAAhfGQ?format=jpg&name=large[/imgw]

 

[Aber]

TN & TX, for example.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bathroom_bill#cite_ref-104

Bill =/= Law

 

[Rolfe]

Due process. Yes, that's what you do before you change the eligibility criteria to allow members of a previously excluded group to be included. You know, they come and say, but the magic gender fairy has decreed that we're really part of the included group. You look at it and you say, we need to do the research before we take any decisions on that.

You don't just say, yes absolutely Miss 6' 4" Person with a baritone voice and a beard, of course you may compete while we do the research to make sure your presence isn't massively unfair to existing competitors.

Duh.

 

[Rolfe]

Yes, I understand: you completely reject the core notion that transgender identity is valid (as opposed to, for example, being a mental health aberration or mental illness of some kind).

As I said a few days ago, I think it frames much of the debate/discussion in this thread properly if/when it can be determined:

a) which contributors hold the view that while transgender identity is valid and real, there are nevertheless fairness and safety concerns in certain well-defined areas (including transwomen in elite-level women's sport); and

b) which contributors hold the view that transgender identity is fundamentally invalid and unreal - and that therefore it follows almost axiomatically that (eg) transwomen should arbitrarily be banned from all elite women's sport.

You keep using this word "valid". I do not know what it means in this context and I am not persuaded it means anything useful. Mental illness is real. Isn't that "valid"?

If the inclusion of male competitors wasn't inherently inimical to fairness (and thus inclusion of women) in women's sport, we wouldn't have sex-segregated sport in the first place. We don't split horse or dog racing by the sex of the runners because there isn't sufficient sexual dimorphism in horses or dogs to make it necessary. There is, in human beings.

Therefore, irrespective of whether you believe in the gender fairy or not, exclusion of male competitors from women's events is not arbitrary. Hopefully this exclusion will be extended all the way down to puberty-age (at least, although boys still have a distinct advantage before puberty), because if they don't then all the efforts in recent decades to involve girls in sport at junior level are likely to go right down the toilet.

 

[LondonJohn]

Due process. Yes, that's what you do before you change the eligibility criteria to allow members of a previously excluded group to be included. You know, they come and say, but the magic gender fairy has decreed that we're really part of the included group. You look at it and you say, we need to do the research before we take any decisions on that.

You don't just say, yes absolutely Miss 6' 4" Person with a baritone voice and a beard, of course you may compete while we do the research to make sure your presence isn't massively unfair to existing competitors.

Duh.

I see. Thank you for making your position crystal clear....

 

[LondonJohn]

Here's another one. Stunning and brave. He's 29, and he took first place away from a 13-year-old girl.

[imgw=500]https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FWIfAPuUsAAhfGQ?format=jpg&name=large[/imgw]

Just to be clear here: whom are you mocking and deriding? The competitor who entered and took first place, or the relevant administration authority for this competition?

If the former, then why? If the latter, then a) why, and b) why - in your opinion - did this administration authority allow this person to compete in the women's category at this point? (Especially as you seem to believe you're near-axiomatically correct in your view that transwomen could - and should - be arbitrarily instabanned from competing against women in any sport). Is it down to this "policy capture" myth again?

 

[d4m10n]

Bill =/= Law

Right, but here's what I said:

Only a handful of conservative states have thought to create laws to reinforce these policies, and I cannot endorse the inflexible approach those states have taken, which criminalizes trans men for using the facilities which match their outward appearance.

Some red states (such as Tennessee and Texas) are trying to legally mandate that certain facilities must be separated by sex-at-birth, without considering what this will mean for people who readily pass as the opposite sex as the result of HRT. This approach runs counter to common sense, which should tell us that cisgender women don't really want to encounter people who look like Buck Angel in their locker rooms.

 

[d4m10n]

Yes, I understand: you completely reject the core notion that transgender identity is valid (as opposed to, for example, being a mental health aberration or mental illness of some kind).

We are talking about a mental condition which leads many people to cut off perfectly healthy body parts in an effort to put their minds at ease. That sounds at least as serious as, say, recurring major depression with a seasonal pattern.

 

[smartcooky]

Just to be clear here: whom are you mocking and deriding? The competitor who entered and took first place, or the relevant administration authority for this competition?

I would say both would apply equally.

This man competing in a women's competititon ought to be ashamed of himself. He is physically, physiologically and biologically male. This gives him actual advantages that he gained by going through male puberty that was unavailable to the girls and women in that competition. No amount of hormone suppression medication can undo the physical advantages of being born male - the bigger, more robust bone structure, the stronger musculature, the higher number of twitch fibres etc. Frankly, I don't know how a person who would do what this man has done can face himself in the mirror every morning. I would be like me playing in a competitive rugby game at the age to 30 against 11 and 12 year old boys... it would be personally embarrassing - I would be ashamed to even show my face. Men who "feel" they are women, competing against women in women's competition are cheating every bit as much as a person who takes performance enhancing drugs.

As for the organisation, well, they are culpable for allowing this sort of thing to happen. I applaud the FINA decision to ban transgender swimmers from the women's division of their sport, and I see that International Rugby League has followed suit. I hope that all sports organisations follow FINA's lead, and prevent people who were born male from competing in women's sports divisions.

 

[Rolfe]

Some red states (such as Tennessee and Texas) are trying to legally mandate that certain facilities must be separated by sex-at-birth, without considering what this will mean for people who readily pass as the opposite sex as the result of HRT. This approach runs counter to common sense, which should tell us that cisgender women don't really want to encounter people who look like Buck Angel in their locker rooms.

I've been over this before. What I object to is the opposite, the granting of any male who is prepared to say the magic words the legal unchallengeable right to be in women's single-sex spaces.

I do not mind any male who looks genuinely phenotypically female and behaves as a woman would behave being there. I am not hugely troubled by a male whose best efforts to pass as female aren't really good enough, but who also doesn't display any "male entitlement" behaviour. However, if people like Alex Drummond and Eddie Izzard can swan in and then call the cops on any woman who objects and have her charged with a hate crime, we cannot possibly police our spaces against predatory men. I would rather disadvantage the "not really passing well enough" cohort than have that happen.

I realise this is not easy, because any transwoman (or indeed transman) who uses the opposite-sex facilities because they really do fit in there is in danger of being maliciously harrassed if this is made flat illegal. I still think that's a lesser evil than allowing any man at all to do virtually as he likes in women's intimate spaces though.

 

[Rolfe]

Just to be clear here: whom are you mocking and deriding? The competitor who entered and took first place, or the relevant administration authority for this competition?

If the former, then why? If the latter, then a) why, and b) why - in your opinion - did this administration authority allow this person to compete in the women's category at this point? (Especially as you seem to believe you're near-axiomatically correct in your view that transwomen could - and should - be arbitrarily instabanned from competing against women in any sport). Is it down to this "policy capture" myth again?

I think we've been over this quite often enough to be perfectly clear.

Human sex is determined at conception and is immutable. Sport is performed by bodies and is therefore segregated by sex, not by what anyone thinks the gender fairy is saying in his head. If a sporting body is so far gone in lunatic capitulation to the Stonewall agenda that they are letting males compete in female events, any male who takes advantage of that to take prizes and awards from women and girls deserves all the mockery (and indeed opprobrium) he gets.

I am completely at a loss as to why you repeatedly refer to the exclusion of males from eligibility to compete in female events as "arbitrary". It's one of the least arbitrary things on the planet.

 

[Aber]

3) It's also clear that your views on this matter are very different from those held by all the major sports administration bodies.
:

Go back and read the UK Sports Councils reports.

They have done the research, while the IOC and others had not.

 

[lionking]

It’s not really sport, but strength and endurance are necessary. I’m watching Australian Ninja Warrior just for low stress entertainment. Men and women compete against each other, and women can and do beat some men’s times. But not one has reached the final, and never will.

Leave it as it is. It’s not a real sport, but an illustration of what happens when men compete against women in open strength and endurance sports.

 

[Ziggurat]

Yes, I understand: you completely reject the core notion that transgender identity is valid (as opposed to, for example, being a mental health aberration or mental illness of some kind).

"Valid" is meaningless in this context. Don't use the term if you cannot provide a real definition for it.

But yes, body dysphorias of all kinds are a sort of mental illness. That should be obvious. They cause distress if left untreated. So is depression. The fact that something is a mental illness doesn't mean the person with that illness is crazy, it doesn't mean they should be treated badly, it doesn't mean they should be deprived of rights (and I mean actual rights, not just preferences), but it's still not normal, and it's a condition to be avoided if possible, because it causes distress.

b) which contributors hold the view that transgender identity is fundamentally invalid and unreal - and that therefore it follows almost axiomatically that (eg) transwomen should arbitrarily be banned from all elite women's sport.

This is really the worst sort of straw man. Nobody here is saying transgenderism isn't real. Depression is real. Schizophrenia is real. Psychosis is real. Anorexia is real. Lots of mental illnesses are completely real. But the reality of it isn't relevant. Transwomen should mostly be banned from women's sports because they're still male, and segregation in sports is based on sex, not gender. Sex is real too. It is an immutable characteristic in humans. And sex segregation isn't arbitrary. What's arbitrary is saying that THIS male gets to compete against females because they said so.

 

[Rolfe]

When I see this litany of "I can't believe you're so bigoted/unenlightened/hateful as not to recognise that transwomen are really and truly women, no different in any way from any 'other' woman", sometimes I think, good grief, these people genuinely believe that men can physically turn into women.

Then I remember what wise women have pointed out to me. The people who say this are behaving with undisguised contempt and scorn to women themselves, while centering the wishes and desires of transwomen (i.e. men). "If they really thought these men were women, they'd talk over them and ignore their wishes and their comfort, and scold them to Be Kind. They know perfectly well which of us are women, and you can tell by how they treat us."