How should trans individuals be included in competitive sport?

In competitive sport people should have to compete against members of their own sex. Drugs should be viewed the same whether they're being taken to enhance performance or to aid transition: female athletes should not be allowed to compete if they're taking testosterone.

No one is entitled to play competitive sport as the sex they aspire to. People have to drop out for all sorts of reasons. I agree with Vestal.

Kanye men have a different skeletal structure to women, how would you take that into account in these proposed classifications? Also lung capacity and heart size?

Why?

I think we'd need to classify by weight, height, testosterone etc. Not birth sex.

bamb

And that is a basketball team ffs.

"What annoys me though is they measure testosterone levels and will use those to make a judgement but completely ignore the skeletal advantage males have."

Nonsense

Yes, actually its really clear now I think about it- people having surgery or taking hormones to change their bodies should be banned. There, end of story.
I don't see 'transgender' as a legitimate human condition requiring treatment with surgery and /or hormones.
Gender is s social construct and therefore a load of bollocks. It isn't possible to change biological sex and I do not therefore recognise the right of 'transgender' body-changers to compete against those who come to the sports field as nature intended then.

Of course sport is based on advantage. But the fastest woman on the planet will only be able to beat very mediocre men.

Any professional man will beat a professional woman hands down. Women's sport will disappear on every level.

Yy assassin, men have larger heart and lungs, higher muscle to fat ratio, narrower pelvis. And a lifetime of training in male levels of testosterone, bar the year before entry

I think they have to have testosterone below 10units, whereas women are naturally 1-3units

The unfair advantage is beyond that of any woman though, that's the issue. MTT have an advantage because they are not the same sex as women, rather than being an exceptionally talented/hard training woman.

Indeed.

MTT should compete against men, and if they cannot compete with men, because of the hormones they took, well, sucks to be them, but I made the decision to not make an effort to train a lot, and, lo and behold, I, too, am excluded from professional sports.

Same with FTT, either they accept that the doping rules mean no testosterone for them, or they accept that they aren't allowed to compete, same as everyone else who takes substances that are classified as doping.

People must live with the consequences of their decisions. Why should trans be exempt from that, when everyone else is not?

If there are any sports in which top biological females can perform as well as top biological males, then there is no reason for having separate categories. Afaik the only ones are the equestrian events where the human element is skill rather than physical strength and/or size.

We'd probably need a third and fourth category. One for MtF and one for FtM

Those who think that doping/testosterone is the only consideration for MTT competing against women - do you discount totally the skeletal, muscular and other physiological differences between MTT and women?

The difference is 'unfair' surely mide

FloJo set the 100m Womens world record in 1988. In the last Olympics every man that ran, beat her time

The unfair advantage is beyond that of any woman though, that's the issue. MTT have an advantage because they are not the same sex as women, rather than being an exceptionally talented/hard training woman.

Under the same rules as intersex people

(these rules already exist)

I think a third category as well but am happy to let the IOC decide on their sports based in evidence.

Altho I think the "unfair advantage" argument is an odd one. Sport is based on unfair advantage, you wouldn't have a winner if no one had an advantage.

I agree with 'No'. I do not agree with women moving being outrun by men who claim to be women.

I agree with glen. I think the doping rules should be clarified so that women taking testosterone for any reason which puts them outside the normal range for women should not be able to compete in women's sports. MTTs should not compete in women's sports. If trans people want to organize their own sports events it's up to them how they make the rules.

It either needs to be a mother category

I assume that was a typo rather than a mum's only category...

I agree with vestal and Glen

It either needs to be a mother category (which they can campaign for) or accept that it's not possible

You must realise the implications when you commit to a lifetime of artificial hormones?

'What is the answer? The only one I can think of is that competitors with modified bodies are not able to compete with non-modified competitors'

That seems like the only solution to me, too. The sports bodies are going to have more cases like Pistorius where enabling technical modifications are advantageous, so they will need clarity there. Same should go for hormonal modification.

evergreen

Don't they have quite strict rules already, linked to chromosomes (so you must be XX to compete in women's events)? And I presume hormones that a male to female trans would take would be on the banned list already.

No, transwomen can compete with women and transmen can compete with men. It is all in the International Olympic Committee guidelines.

As far as I understand it if you are a man identifying as a woman and you want to compete with the women you have to have a testosterone level below a certain amount. But, I believe that maximum amount is a good deal higher than most natal born women's testosterone. Not to mention muscle mass and skeletal differences.