Waiting for the NFL to allow female players.

Also, the sight of a grown man beating the hell out of a woman is bound to sell tickets.

Give her a fiver and send her on her way though, I mean she singed up for it.

(only half ironic here)

The entire ethos of sports divisions and categorizations which used 'Sex' and 'Age' as classifications was never in fact about 'gender' or 'age'.

Those terms were best attempts proxies to, in fact, try to establish 'level playing fields were no one could bring a real and discernable advantage to the sport others would not have'.

We came to accept that if a woman had the skill and was able to play in the NFL or NBA, etc she could. Gender was not going to be what stopped her.

Conversely if a man wanted to play in the WNBA that would be prohibited as they would be bringing a discernable advantage the other participants would not have, thus 'unfair'.

A younger child could move up and compete up in sports but an older child could not move down and compete down in age based on the same 'fairness premise'.

So 'sex' and 'age' were never immutable, they were just clumsy words to bookmark the concept.

So now society changes (and that is ok) and we separate the 'gender' from the 'biological sex' which those who contemplated the rules of sport did not consider at the time.

So which of these two areas should now govern sport?

Those who claim 'gender' must be the governing principle are calling for a betrayal of the original premise. There is no denying bringing male biology to female sport is an advantage that others in that class do not have.

However using 'biological sex' as the governing principle, absolutely protects that original premise. A person with XY chromosome can compete with others who have the XY chromosome regardless of where they fall on the gender fluid scale on that day, week, month. No one discriminates against that person and says 'your gender is now X thus you cannot compete'. NO, you can always compete and we do not have to evaluate your gender. And you always compete in a pool of people with the same XY and thus no one gains advantage.

It is as close to a balanced and fair playing field as is possible.

The argument against is one actually arguing for that person to compete with an advantage and makes no sense if you understand the original ethos of sport.

David, I think simply putting a monetary value on this misses the point.

Women's sport was not always a thing. It arose in large part so women could also have a place to pursue excellence. To demonstrate that they too could excel and compete at the highest levels within their pool and that the same concepts of hard work, dedication, etc could be exemplarily and motivating.

If we create an economy where biologically female women simply cannot compete and they have no place to compete where they can be the winners I believe the implications for that on successive generations of young girls will be significant in areas well beyond sport.

Are women currently not allowed to play in the NFL?

Quite so.

This is a good post. But for all the merit of the position it's still laughable that any of this transgender sports 'controversy' started because conservatives are legitimately concerned about the sanctity of women's sports. This is about finding legal ways to discriminate against a group that the right finds 'icky' and not much more.

Men's leagues are basically Open Leagues meaning anyone who can make the team can play regardless of gender or biological sex.

That is because we cannot discern an advantage any group outside 'men' could bring to the field to gain unfair advantage. The thought being if a woman can outcompete a man it is certainly do to skill and not any inherent advantage.


So yes if a woman could out compete a man and earn a spot she would get the spot.

The most likely area you might see a breakthrough is in the areas of kicker. Or more specifically a 'speciality kicker'. You might have a secondary kicker who might not have the same distance capabilities but who is extremely accurate at short distances. More so than male peers.

I suppose they are 'allowed'.

I guess I mean to say, waiting for the law suit to force the issue.

It used to happen at the HS level but I'm not sure it ever ended well.

Kickers need to tackle occasionally. But .... they kind of don't. lol

The problem would be taking a full on block from an opposing starting special teams player.

And you rightly identify why this, which should not be a hard issue to deal with (just define it by biological sex) is so difficult.

that is that any 'solutions' proposed to fix this growing issue are seen under the suspicion of 'you must be a far right hater' and then you have reflexive action to resist them at all cost for that reason.

And no doubt the 'far right haters' will jump on anything they perceive as 'against' transgender and amplify it using the worst terms and logic and pettiness.

In this very thread you can see elements of both of that. And both are equally destructive to getting a solution. Truly a case where the extremes can and likely will dominate the discussion enflaming nad not helping things and moderates will step aside and keep quite afraid to be mis-labeled 'hateful' and that is sad.

Sure as do very small but extremely skilled male kicker's through out history.

I am not saying the gulf is the same but rather that if the skill is perceived to be high enough that it offsets the weaknesses then the player will be selected. It is a very tough break though where competition is so high that you can often find someone with near competitive skills without the weakness but it is theoretically possible.

It was similar for the goalie position in hockey where the very small but skilled goalies used to be able to compete with the much bigger and also skilled goalies.

All things considered, if the skill gap is close the bigger goalie gets the job every time. However when the skill gap is wide enough then what they give up in one area can be compensated for in another.

not disagreeing but vast majority still have original parts and plan on keeping them fyi

Which surgery are you referring to? Maybe learn some basic biology before posting in this thread?

I suppose that's something that can't be debated. The question is, can a female ever be so good that she'd be given a spot on a limited roster knowing that she's exponentially more likely to be injured and have a shorter career than the next best male.

The problem with transgenders is of course the opposite. Men are forcing themselves into competitions that are populated by women. They aren't identifying as men but their T-count is in the male range. So, a rose by any other name....

Kramer was fighting the kids in karate class because there was no age, weight limits.

I didn't do that. I was simply saying that the other factors, important as they might be, are not strong enough to overcome the arguments for preventing transgender people from competing against girls, at least if the sport is non physical and the losses to transgender people occur infrequently. The only possibly winning argument they have in such cases would be the monetary one.

My title was wrong because I was only thinking about track athletes and the fully surgically altered.

I think I did that because I was anxious to show an example of a category of problem solving that is often missed even though it is indeed pretty simple and obvious. Namely when a strategy to improve the world is rejected because of a small number of people will be hurt. Some say that is enough to stop it. Others say (and sometimes demonstrate with numbers) it is a price worth paying (as long it is not them paying it). But for some reason they both often miss the simple and obvious solution to compensate those hurt to a degree that makes them fully whole and on board with the strategy.

The general idea with examples might be worthy of a thread.

Please take your ignorance elsewhere.

This was the original guidelines I was referring to.


IOC rules transgender athletes can take part in Olympics without surgery

Transgender athletes should be allowed to compete in the Olympics and other international events without undergoing sex reassignment surgery, according to new guidelines adopted by the IOC.

So I've become a fan of table tennis over the last few years. On both the men's and women's side, the sport is dominated by China-- I follow team Japan and the #2 woman the world is Mima Ito who I see is now listed at 5'0'' but I've seen before at 4'11''. And I think it's really cool how someone of that stature can dominate in a sport where size isn't hugely important-- but it isn't nothing either and generally does confer an advantage.
The difference between the men's and women's games comes down to power. Men are forced to stand further back from the table in order to handle incoming shots whereas women can generally afford to stand closer-- which is advantageous. This isn't to say that women aren't sometimes forced off the table-- because they can still hit the ball with incredible pace as well, but generally they play closer.
And Ito, being 5'0", is literally forced to stay on top of the table. Her height is actually her strength because her natural bat-height is already very close to the ideal contact point, and she is also extremely quick. And from watching her and from watching the game in general-- it seems clear that there is no difference in reaction time between males and females. And so if there was ever a sport to "fully integrate"-- table tennis could be considered.
But only pure ideologues or reactionaries would ever consider full integration across all sports. When it comes from the reactionaries it's the "burn it all down impulse". And it would obviously never happen anyways. Women's sports generate billions of dollars of year. Plus there is whole issue of women.
But even in a sport like table tennis, where no bones are going to be broken-- integration would still be a disaster for women. The top men are both extremely powerful AND extremely fast. And so as I much as I want to say that issues of transgender people in sports need to be handled on a sport-by-sport (or even a case-by-case) basis, it's a hard argument to make when in so few sports being male doesn't confer advantage. Rambly post. Thoughts?

Maybe one day there will be more categories for competitions beyond just women and men, kind of like how boxing has so many different weight classes to ensure each fight is 'fair' based on the physical attributes of the athletes and thus focused on the skill of boxing.

But I think at present this is just a tempest in a teapot. There are maybe a handful of transgender athletes at this time, and as a general rule trans people have such horrible lives anyways, why not let the odd one with the dedication to be competitive at various sports have a little success?

What next, a ban on gay guys in ballet so as to give more opportunity to straight dancers? GMAFB.

I don't believe this to be true.

At the college level at least (perhaps NCAA), there is a one year period of hormones that has to have happened. So a guy would have to have been on estrogen for at least 1 year to compete as a girl.

And I don't get why there doesn't have to be a physical transformation as well (i.e., an operation). I would make that a requirement at least for men who are saying they are women.

If in high school the only requirement to compete as a girl is to say you are a girl, then I would have objections to that as a girl competing essentially against a boy.

I would have a hard time believing that in professional women's sports a guy can compete simply by saying he is a woman. I would imagine there would be hormone tests and possibly even a physical exam if it seemed obvious the person was lying.

edit: I just saw the IOC post. That surprises me. But at least men are required to undergo hormone therapy for at least a year before they can compete as women...

I'm sure that women are already allowed into the mainstream professional team sports, but no woman has ever earned a spot on a primary roster.

Plenty of women have entered individual sport open contests like golf and marathons.

Several women have tried and failed to land spots on NBA rosters. One even played on the official summer league team for the Lakers.

A woman was a goalie in an exhibition game in the NHL.

A woman kicked a field goal for a Division 1 college football team. (It was blocked, unfortunately)

A woman drove in the Indy 500 in the 70s.

"Men's" sports don't need to discriminate against women explicitly. Biology keeps them out for purely performance related reasons. Men need to be actively kept out of Women's leagues for the same reason. Can't fight biology.


This probably won't end well.

Boxing weight classes serve an economic function. Boxing matches can be extremely short, and when people go to or pay to see fights, they don't want to spend a bunch of money to see someone get knocked out in 30 seconds.
I'm not saying that it also isn't fair or that people will not pay to see people of any size/sex fighting. But most sports don't translate to weight classes the way boxing does either.

I mean sure you're right. But someone made this OP so here we are.

Did you see my post upthread about what are becoming the governing rules for Highschool and below?

I don't think it matters what the rules are post high school if over time biological women are largely competed out of their sport by transwomen who can merely declare 'in good faith' without ever intending to take hormones or do surgery.

The sports will be inexorably be changed by that point as will the participant pool heading into College and professional sports.

We rank sports along some sort of continuum in terms 'power'.
So on the least or no power end you have: darts, billiards, curling, race car driving, ultra long distance endurance running, bowling

Then you have your net sports: table tennis, badminton, tennis, volleyball

Then you have lower contact sports like baseball/softball and soccer that still require high physical strength and speed

Then you have contact sports like football, rugby, hockey, mma/boxing.

Yes, because it's the right's made up issue of the time. See also: immigration or deficit spending, or for a better example the 'war on Christmas'.

Hard to talk sense to nonsense.

It is far better to create clear and fair guidelines before it becomes a big problem rather than waiting until it is such an issue with dew biological women able to compete that you then have to pull the trans out of their winning position.

You can clearly see the fight you will get if you allow them years or decades of advantage and then take it away.

Switching to a biological sex definition pretty much fixes things instantly. Everyone gets a fair and level playing field.