Bill to ban trans athletes from women’s sports blocked in US Senate

It's not just Republicans that smuggle in things in otherwise popular or sensible legislation - but I think in this case the entire amendment is as quoted upthread. The word "transgender" does not even appear. It's about protecting the female sports category from incursion by males.

I certainly haven't seen any argument against it raised other than the usual "genocide" or "TW are banned" hyperbolic claims.

Does this bill only address the single question of trans athletes? Republicans have a habit of wrapping anti-democracy measures in trans legislation. See the “bathroom bills” introduced in various states that were in part designed to reduce the power of (Democrat) cities and instead give control to (Republican) state government. They weren’t just about toilets. It would be foolish to vote for any legislation without doing a thorough threat analysis on it. Dems are by and large idiots when it comes to gender, but they may have other reasons not to vote for this that have nothing to do with gender ideology.

They are the epitome of “keep doing the same thing, keep getting the same outcome”.

This will get the voters flocking back to the Democrats. Idiots. They're setting up to lose in 28.

You'd think some of the Democrats voting against would either be women who have participated in competitive sport or have wives/ sisters/ daughters / female friends who have but, apparently not.

That's the same Minnesota whose governor Tim Walz declared it a sanctuary state for trans-identifying kids whose parents are unwilling to affirm their new identities.

Very much on brand for a state that wants to prove that, even in the Midwest, you can have California style insanity.

A similar bill also failed in Minnesota, unfortunately.

https://www.house.mn.gov/sessiondaily/Story/18545

One of the representatives who voted against the bill decided to up her level of rhetoric to unhinged, calling it "state-sanctioned genocide".

If you're trying to get novices interested, or doing it for fun, strictly girls only. Coaches already know this. You can involve boys in training if there is a benefit to the girls (and reciprocal benefit to boys), If not, not. That's basically what the clause is saying. If it's not to the girls' benefit, then it's unlawful.

There are so many different situations and a total ban might result in fewer girls having access to their favoured sport.

By my understanding (Murican friends will know baroque Senate procedure better) you need a filibuster proof 60 votes in the Senate to vote for cloture, which will advance the bill for a full vote. That's not 60 votes to pass the bill, it's a hurdle where 60 senators have to agree to take it to a substantive vote where a simple majority could pass it.

That means you need 7 Democrats to break ranks and say, let's put this to the vote. Obviously, and Tuberville has said this repeatedly, there aren't seven Democrats who are sensible and/or brave enough to do so.

The thing is, the Democrat caucus is holding very firm on this. Once you get past John Fetterman, I struggle to think of any mavericks in the caucus. There are three ways it's getting to 60 votes: if the GOP make significant gains in the midterms (it's a difficult map for Democrats but there aren't that many competitive seats) or if some of the senior Democrats say "Fuck it, I'm 80 and I'm not running again, I don't have to suck up to the Pritzkers any more."

Neither seems very likely right now. So it's a matter of whether Senate Democrats can read polls and see that their activist/lobbyist guys are out of touch with Democrat voters.

But my point is that sport just keeps ring fencing itself for the tough, able girls. There is no need to try very hard to get a wider range of girls interested. Just add in a few boys. I see how that is solving an immediate problem but it isn't solving the bigger problem. And it's not a good enough reason to continue to allow trans identifying males access to women's sport.

Here's a good video that sums it up.

I'm not in the US but my understanding is no but an Executive Order is always vulnerable to being overturned by a future president, whereas this would have fixed it in law. Hopefully a US poster can clarify that.

Two thirds of Democrat voters know that genderism is barking mad rubbish, but still the party think that they know best. They must want to lose again. If Trump doesn't suspend elections next time.

I'm so sick of it all now.

GB News and other right-wing outlets are still going on about 'gender transitions' in schools. A lot of people are saying they didn't vote Democrat, or even voted Republican, because of genderism. Gender ideology, being so ridiculous, so aggressively enforced, and so weakly caved into by the establishment and corporate culture, was the perfect weapon for the right and continues to be so.

I'd like to ask the genderist side to back off. We've got bigger problems now, and part of the reason this all came about is the backlash against gender ideology. By all means, we need to show tolerance and kindness towards that tiny minority of people who suffer from sexual dysphoria. But don't push an ideology where everyone has a 'gender identity' and it's that identity that counts, not biological reality. Don't mob feminist meetings, insist on males in women's sports, or teach little kids they might be in the wrong body. We've seen where that leads to.

Does this mean that Trumps EO will now be ignored?

Kara Dansky on Substack:
'we thought there was a remote possibility we might get one or two yes votes from Senate Dems, which would at least have shifted the national conversation. But nope.'

I wonder who those one or two Senate Dems are?

https://karadansky.substack.com/p/so-much-for-s9

I didn’t realise, and yes very cheeky.

Ive been an on and off subscriber to them for years, as I used to do a lot of work for an American company and spent time out there. I bagged a special offer of a subscription for $1 per month - I don’t read it as often as I did but it’s good as part a varied diet of news media. However, it’s not the institution it was when Woodward and Bernstein worked for them.

Thanks for the sharelink. Annoyingly, some news sites still ask people to create an account to read legitimately shared articles - it’s v cheeky of them.

If girls are thought to be self-excluding, then you exclude boys. In other situations, you need some flexibility because it actually is very hard to recruit girls into sports teams, especially after puberty starts. They drop out in droves. It would be a bit rough on the keen girls who do carry on and want to play in situations when you need a minimum number or an even number of participants for the training game/session to go ahead.
And just to hammer home the point - they would be participating as boys.

We can thank the Democrats for what is now going on in Ukraine. How can they not see that letting males into females competitions massively disadvantages and endangers female people? God, their thick.

The thing is, many girls will self exclude if boys of any type are included. It annoys me when some girls say they are happy to have boys in their teams, because they are simply ring fencing women's sport for girls like them, the best, most competitive, able to compete with and against boys. This leaves other girls out in the cold, not to mention girls from certain religious/cultural backgrounds. Is anyone able to object when the coach brings in a boy to make up the numbers? How easy to do that instead of recruiting and developing a few more girls!

Section 4 is also limited to training and practising, so presumably not playing competitively.

I understand your concern, MariedeGournay, but this is how I read it as well. It doesn't simply mean M2F boys - it's any boys, playing with the girls as boys. A lot more boys play sport than girls do. Sometimes you need a boy or two to make up the numbers in an 11-a-side football game - perhaps playing one half for one side and the other half for the opposing side, or one boy on each team. A spare boy drafted into the girls' rowing 8 so that all 7 girls who have turned up can get out on the water. I think they would be playing as boys, is the point.

Edited for clarity.