J.C.MacSwell

It is about transgenders (in sports of course), not just gender alone...so yes it's certainly complicated but can't be gender alone as transgender means to have changed from your gender assumed from your biological sex (or that assumed at birth) ...and your biological sex, based on your chromosomes, surely aligns with the male advantage. You can argue that some transgender females may have never had this advantage...but you can't ignore that the ones we need to consider for elite sports all did. Laurel Hubbard, for example, surely had lifts that if female at the time would have been significant World Records (I'll look it up if you don't want to...I'm more than confident that's the case if that's not obvious to you as well)

Just making it clear what my context was in that post. The less than 1% I referred to are the intersex and the transgenders therefore almost exclusively included in the 99+%. Right. One way out of this is to start adding categories. Just keep in mind that at elite level many female sports are struggling to find the level of support they would like to have... ...yet nothing prohibits anyone that can find the means to sponsor any number of events for any number of categories...and write their own rules... Link?

No. It's quite probable that the fairness won't be agreed upon, and someone or committee will be left to make a decision. In fact his seems most common at this point in time. Particularly where it's fairly clear no compromise is currently available that would be acceptable to everyone, and nothing of the sort is on the horizon. Having said that, Zapatos mentioned a weight handicap that might work for weightlifting. So if you took the World Record (or 10 best lifts) lifts for XX athletes and compared them to the World Record for XY athletes then that would be a reasonable starting point as long as none used any performance enhancing drugs, and the elite level could be assumed to be comparable. Of course any use of drugs should only be approved by physician, be considered non performance enhancing (or non masking of same) or over the counter drugs not on the list of not allowed. So take the difference, or difference as a percentage...and that's the handicap. Would most transgender athletes consider that fair? I can't speak for Caitlyn Jenner, but I think she might. I also can't speak for any transgenders females currently wanting to compete in the female elite categories, but I suspect they would consider that not fair at all, given they believe themselves female. But if you want to compare humans being the best they can be (without performance enhancing intervention), how is that not fair? ...and this is a sport that lends itself to this type of handicap. Most would be much more difficult. Say for soccer, how much bigger a net would be required to allow an XY goaltender? If the teams were all XX vs all XY the XY net requiring the complete width of the field would not be enough, you would need to increase net height as well and/or reduce number of players allowed on the field for the all XY team. Or how many goals head start would the XX team require, given they will no doubt score none without the above or similar changes of unknown severity?

No one is suggesting that everyone in each of the predominate categories are identical. Of course not. Despite men being taller than average, many women are taller than the average man. Not sure why you feel the need to point this out, given that everyone here understands that it is the top performances of each group that needs to be considered and for many sports there is such a persistent gap that World records are significantly different. The less than 1% refers to the intersex, most of whom do not transgender. Less than 1% of humanity is intersex. Most transgenders, the vast majority, have natural biologies that the science of biology can readily categorize as male or female. Most make up part of the 99+%, and the more athletic ones could dominate some female sports if not burdened by any medical interventions. When I say burdened I am referring to their potential for sports performance...it could be advantageous (or not in some cases) for their well being, depending on the competence of their medical care providers and fit of their medical treatments. These would of course be tailored to the individual and protocols would differ...making any group comparisons fairly useless for accurately assessing effect on sports performance for the purpose of any handicapping individuals for inclusion in a different group. We are talking about biological sex with regard to the significant gap in sports potentials of the top biological males vs biological females. No similar gap is known to persist in the same manner for genders. Bruce Jenner could have become Caitlyn Jenner back in 1976. This would not have changed his/her potential in the decathlon without medical intervention. Obviously this potential could readily be changed by medical intervention, positively or negatively.

FFS I've told you many times. Others have explained it as well. Stop gaslighting the thread and try explaining how you think transgender inclusion can work successfully in elite competitively fair and healthy female sports...if you can think of any practical way it can be done. So far no one has for most sports.

Exactly. The science of biology isn't quite as useless and some have implied here. Biologists reading the thread might want to take heart and drag their degrees back out of the waste basket. Creationists reading it and rubbing their hands with glee while reading some of the arguments for transgender inclusion should not get as emboldened as the arguments might suggest. The science of biology is sufficient to divide 99+% of humanity into biologically male or female and the existence of the less than 1% remaining does not change that. ...nor does any "spectrum", of secondary sex characteristics that includes the 99+%.

Maybe you need to slap your head and try reading that again...

Regardless of what may be motivating it, with regard to transgenders they certainly have: https://www.skysports.com/more-sports/athletics/news/29175/12840994/world-athletics-excludes-transgender-women-from-womens-competition-lord-coe-confirms

...But only because they won't be making the rules for elite sports based on inclusion over competitive fairness and there is a strong trend toward more fully protecting athlete health also. Since this thread started International sports bodies have certainly moved in the direction of my position. It's a shame their position on the intersex has been swept toward less inclusion and/or less health protection but it will be interesting to see what happens as Semenya's case is further resolved.

Why the negative? Don't shoot the messenger. Do you really believe this won't happen at all if (hopefully as) transgenders are better accepted over time? If so Russian and French figure skating judges have some "beautiful" "waterfront" land they would like to sell you... Note that Mistermack is not claiming true transgenders will do this. Paraphrasing INow "Easy to cheap shots, hard to do the real work" (and no I'm not suggesting INow gave the negative) Of course if this was allowed to happen (it won't be) without sound rule changes the money in female sports would sadly shrink. Shouts of "equal pay" would be drowned out by "where's the gate receipts". But it won't happen because the hard work on the rules (and probably at least as much the financial considerations...greed for some) will prevent it or nip it in the bud. Hint to Democrats: voters will accept the greed over the threat of the collapse of elite female sports. Am I overstating the concern? Yes, but only because the extremes won't get to make the rules... cue Dim to reply with that youtube again... (probably a few pages early for Vat to again add his astute observation on this thread)

Or simply female camaraderie. One of the regrettable things about exclusion I think would be missing out on that. I don't think it's anything close to enough to tip the scales for trans inclusion at elite levels, but at recreational level I think it does.

...unless there is some inherent link to potential sports performance. Swansont has suggested there may be. In that case it may be on topic, though obviously nothing sports organizations need consider at this time.

None of this required answers for any sports inclusions or exclusions. For lesbian or gay pride sports or events I think you are just accepted, but that is more recreational level. You both asked, yet I have no idea why. Lesbian athletes are over represented in many sports, and gay men underrepresented. If biology finds an inherent reason why, perhaps a new division or two could be created but I don't see the need for it. I don't see a significant performance gap due to sexual orientation at top levels that compares to the well known XY and XX gaps. This is not something the IOC, say, should be addressing at this time. Clearly a very significant performance gap remains for XY and XX elite level athletes, regardless of their declared gender, medical interventions notwithstanding. If there is something inherent motivating gender declaration, it clearly doesn't show as being significant compared to XX vs XY. I happened to be in the 99+ % of humans where basic level biology made it obvious. One of the many that don't need to point at the fraction of 1% to question any personal exclusion from elite female sports. It was problematic for the less than 1% known as intersex, though only for females with regard to inclusion in elite sports. If you want to include non intersex XY athletes in elite female sports based on possible inherent biological disadvantage, science has a lot of work to do before it becomes useful in doing so.

What would be the scientific test for that? How should the rules be enforced, if not simply accepting an individual's claim? What was Bruce Jenner's gender identity back in 1976? Unknown? It seems most of the definitions I google are trying more to justify rather than describe the working use of the term. With the definition you choose (seem motivated) to use, no one can prove their gender identity.

I think you misunderstand what gender currently means. It means how an individual chooses to identify. There is no other test. You can argue whether anyone has a choice or free will, or not, but that can't be proven. We have decided to accept an individuals choice, as we understand choice. So you can take two identical twins, with essentially the same genes and hormone numbers and one can identify female and the other male and that is accepted as their respective genders. If you believe you can go further than that and find a physical something that might motivate the choice, that doesn't change the above and with respect to sports you still need to connect it to athletic potential for it to be meaningful to those that must make and put in practise rules for elite competition. Elite female sports has developed because of a clear and significant gap in the top performances of XY and XX athletes...not because of any clear or significant gap in choice of gender, or motivation for that choice. Bruce Jenner was at one time considered by many the best XY athlete in the World and clearly enjoyed XY advantage, however difficult to say exactly why. Caitlyn Jenner is now perhaps the best known transgender on the planet. Whether there was something innate driving her decision, or not, it seems unlikely to have given her as Bruce Jenner any substantial disadvantage...though who knows...it's pretty much impossible to ascertain just as it is even more impossible to prejudge athletic potential sufficiently for the purpose of elite sports any time soon. For what it's worth, I tend to agree with much of Caitlyn Jenner's position on this topic.

You are suggesting there is something inherent driving the gender identification motivation? Do you have a reason to believe there is a connection between that and sports potential?

Right. The risk players know their choice of colour will have no effect on the game. No need to complain about a current lack of evidence.

There is no known difference in athletic potential, or reason to believe there is, caused by any XY athlete's choice to change gender.

Right. Those are the types of solutions that could be used where possible, at least for the intersex, without requiring them to take unwanted treatments if they wish to compete. I wonder if Laurel Hubbard would have preferred that, in whole or in part, rather than being forced to conform (forced if she wished to compete as a female) to an arbitrary testosterone target. ...and if her only threat was to also get a medal without displacing anyone...how much more welcome might she have felt.

As I have mentioned many times in this thread, right from the early on in it, you need to be able to anticipate the results of any rules you might make. I don't know how many times I have pointed this out to Swansont when he keeps asking "where are they?" while citing current low numbers and ignoring obvious evidence that XY athletes have known advantages. As they move away from testosterone targets, as they should, the numbers will surely go up... as society becomes more accepting of transgenders, as it should, the numbers surely will go up... ...unless of course there are other rules in place to prevent it.

You said my concerns were not justified citing the current ratio as 2200 to 1, did you not?

...with questionable testosterone targets in place to maintain that? With unfair social stigmas toward transgenders to maintain that? Explain exactly how either is a healthy goal if you believe 2200 to 1 should be maintainable.

Am I? How many of those (bolded) are competing without serious restrictions? (I'm fairly certain the answer is none, even if they've gone through HRT in the past, any requirement to which is a serious restriction in itself) Much of the debate is about whether the restrictions are enough (or overly onerous) to make for fair competition. There should be no debate as to whether the current restrictions are healthy. Many on the many sides of the debate don't believe they are healthy, and certainly none of the methods used to reduce testosterone to target levels are considered to be without risk. Many here would seem to be satisfied if testosterone targets were continued to be used and adjusted over time. Attempt to find some compromise between inclusion and athlete health. When transgender athletes succeed, or fail, what exactly will have been tested?

Right. But at this point in the science of biology I believe that for the human species, 99+% of us can be clearly divided into biologically male or biologically female regardless of more overlap in secondary sex characteristics, and that division is so significant with regard to physical sports that there are demonstrable differences between the top performances of the two groups, in the range of 6-12% in many events. With gender, as we now define the term gender, no such clear division for top performers exists, notwithstanding medical science's ability to intervene. Essentially this means that unless XX athletes are given their own space, they cannot be competitive at elite level without very serious restrictions put on any inclusion of XY athletes.

No. This is a fair point. However, there is nothing to stop transgenders, or anyone else, competing against top level females. If the data is the goal it can be gained from experiments outside of and with no risk to standard top level competition.