Gun

The last time there was a retarded headline like this, the actual quote was about a hypothetical fight against American insurgents where government troops were disproportionately trans and the headline was "such and such calls for violence against trans people". It was making fun of the military's push for representation and diversity with efficacy being a far lesser concern.

Huge props to the guy who just won the NCAA womens swimming title

Props to schoolboy on holding fast on the use of "retarded."

No need to misgender her, Bammer

That was for you.

My wife and i having some interesting discussions this morning about the Lia debate. We both agreed maybe we are just not educated enough on the issue.

I don’t think there will ever be consensus on what is right. Individual rights versus group rights versus the degree one believes gender to be transmutable or malleable.

In the short term, I would go the easy route and create a third division for trans sports.

Are there enough Trans athletes to make this viable?

I’m going to sound ignorant here I’m sure. I hope this doesn’t come across the wrong way, because i just don’t have physical medicine knowledge enough to know. But this swimmer competed as an adult male in college before transitioning. Which means the body was fully developed. When she went on the hormone therapy, that doesn’t change adult muscle structure, does it? I understand the debate if it is kids in high school still developing, but not sure i understand how this isn’t an unfair physical advantage for a fully grown adult? I’m genuinely asking, not accusing, if someone with more knowledge than i have can help explain it to me I’d appreciate it.

My understanding is that being on hormone therapy will after a year or so take away the muscular advantage to a very high degree. However it cannot and does not change skeletal advantages such as bigger lungs, different hip and bone length/ratio differences between men and women. Those immutable differences may make a for a huge competitive advantage in a sport. Not every sport will experience the same competitive advantages for trans athletes.

Yeah so I think this is a legitimate issue which is often unhelpfully framed as some sort of malfeasance on the part of trans women (imagine going through something as life changing as hormone replacement for something as small potatoes as college swimming). As I understand it, Lia was a male swimmer, came out as transgender, was on hormone therapy for a year and per NCAA guidelines is now eligible to compete in women's sports. The thinking is that the year of hormone replacement therapy negates any competitive advantage in terms of muscle mass.

It's that final aspect which it seems to me legitimately debatable--is a year enough time? I believe USA Swimming (?) recently updated their guidelines to three years, but NCAA is sticking with a year for now. I'm not sure there's research to justify either decision beyond reproach but of course you also have to balance it with practical concerns.

My sense is that this is just going to be messy for a bit, because it's grafted onto larger social issues. Would more trans kids transition before/during puberty if we had a less transphobic society? Would any of this matter if college sports weren't tied to scholarship opportunities?

I asked my kid his thoughts on this, because well, the generation behind us seems to know how to handle this better than we do.

His first answer was, "I don't know. The issues seems too complex, and I'm not transgendered," which was a damn good answer that more people need to consider giving.

But he did eventually suggest that maybe, there should be a non-binary or non-cis category of competition, which of course, is financially impossible as the world stands, but he's trying.

My high school had boys wrestling team and girls volleyball team in order to make it even. All other sports (basketball, track etc.) had both.

Someone please explain to me why a girl was allowed to compete on the wrestling team but a boy was not allowed to compete on the volleyball team.

The flip side to improve 'fairness' by transitioning younger is probably a terrible idea from a health perspective, so there's not really a winning outcome for trans athletes (except for trans men, because no one cares).

This brings up a separate question, though. Is a 12 year old kid able to make that choice? My oldest will be 12 in six weeks, and she is definitely not transgendered (as far as we know), so I really don't know what it's like for others. All I know is that she does not seem old enough to make any decision yet which is this serious and life changing.

I absolutely don’t know enough because I’m not trans gendered. But unfortunately issues like this sports one are not going to be solved by just trans people as it also involves cis gendered people as well.

Joey cut my post. He did eventually try to answer. That was just his starting point.