Trans girl winning every race at primary sports day

“It’s meant to be fun …. So if the trans kid wants to race against the girls, then let him”

Long as the trans kid is having fun, who cares about the girls?

Thank you for posting that table.

What I wonder is, how can other boys parents not see that it is unfair?

The transgirl will get a gold medal for results, that any other boy not uttering the magic words "I am a girl" will get a silver medal for.

So it's not only girls missing out but boys too!

The issue is both. There are poster's declaring that sports should not be segregated anyway . Is this a policy you support? You said: 'My dd is faster than some of the boys in her year and there’s a girl who often wins all the mixed races.'
'At my school the top 3 fastest in my class are 2 boys and one girl. It’s always close."

And it is that a school has sex segregated sports events but allows a male athlete to compete in the female events.

Would you support children of different age groups competing together and rewarding the winner of that event? Why?

It is 'just' a fun day.

It is 'just' a sports day.

There are ways to run a 'fun' sports day then that doesn't involve solely rewarding children for their athletic ability. If the aim of the day is 'fun'. Don't call it a fucking 'sports' day and give out performance based prizes.

Call it a 'fun' day and only focus on fun and on inclusion. Sending mixed messaging this way is a major part of the issue.

Are you genuinely arguing that national sporting bodies like England Athletics are wrong? They recognise different ability between the sexes at year 3 & 4 and have different threshold times for awards at those ages.

https://www.englandathletics.org/take-part/children-and-young-people/english-schools-aa-and-awards/

Why would I? I’ve put down what I’ve seen. A few posters put some good answers and some got all ratty.

I don’t have skin in the game. I don’t think after primary it should be mixed. Think the issue is a school is allowing a boy to think he’s a girl.

I don't need to even read the studies. I can't believe people here can't see the damage in this and think it's ok.

The message it sends to the male and to the females alone is significant. If this is ok,then what next for the 8 year old boy and what his parents might demand he is entitled to. Or the school themselves for that matter.

@arethereanyleftatall I do see where the majority are coming from but the thing is, people take sports day way too seriously! It's meant to be fun and these are little kids we are talking about. One year at my daughter's school on sports day there was a child with a learning disability running in one of the races and the other children had been briefed to let her win. They did so willingly and it was beautiful to watch. That's actually just kindness. I'm not saying that this child deserved to win, they didn't - but at this age taking part IS more important than winning, and kindness to child who may well be struggling with their identity trumps competitiveness IMO. I can see how it is unfair on the girls but it's just a junior school sports day. Totally different scenario in elite sports....

OP should absolutely complain if she wants to but I'm sure the school are aware of the situation and learning how to handle it. They will be taking advice on the matter and may not have dealt with this situation before.

You said "At this age I think it’s all equal still."

Maybe you mean "At this age I think it can be equal, based on my 2 observations".

Which no one denies. Of course many girls will be faster than boys. Of course there will be those girls who go on to be elite athletes who are faster than the boys throughout their whole school life.
Does this mean girls and boys should compete together? No, of course not.

This is insanity. A few years ago I would have clapped along saying Yaay Trans Rights.

Now I'm wide awake and I'd be 'that' parent. What the absolute god damm hell is this.

I don't have a good enough comprehension of law and policy to know what can the school do, what should they do. What should they do to not ever continue this nonsense whilst not hurting or humiliating said child.

I would however be asking this question at the highest level tbh.

Absolutely.

Having to prove the absolutely bloody obvious through peer reviewed studies is ridiculous.

As @TheOtherRaven said earlier, the grown ups need to take control, have the difficult conversations and put in effective boundaries.

Even if there was no peer reviewed evidence of differences between boys and girls at that age, if you are holding a single sex event it should be single sex.

Telling children that you can change sex is a lie and is abuse.

"there is an exception to the pattern. So it’s not always true."

Yes. At some levels, regions etc, there are exceptions to the pattern.

Can you explain, in relation to the studies, why you think that those exceptions should be used to argue against single sex sports for female athletes even at those younger ages?

Have you read the studies?

Ah sorry is it only one opinion you can comment with?

My single observation (well 2 as I cover a couple of sports days) means there is an exception to the pattern. So it’s not always true.

Are you seriously that dim? Seriously?

Didn’t bother to read any of the studies upthread showing that there is an advantage before posting then?

So what? Do you recognise that your DD was a fast runner?
Do you recognise that overall there are difference between males and females? Or just because your DD beat most people (as I'm sure most of our top athletes did at primary school), you think boys and girls should run together?

Well done to your DD. It breaks my heart that outstanding achievements like hers are being used by the bloody naive (I'm being generous) and utterly cynical (again, generous) to actually argue AGAINST her right to single-sex sport.

Talk about a Catch 22. It's unbelievable, really.

Heads you win, tails you lose, right?

Jfc this is a TERRIBLE post. Everybody doing whatever they like at all times and sod everyone else makes for a horribly selfish community. Amd this particular ‘do what you like’ is entirely in favour of males and harmful to females. We have enough misogyny in the world without getting the messages to 8 yr olds that boys can do whatever they want and girls must accommodate that.

My 15 yr old DD recently lapped a lot of boys at a school cross country event. Because the boys were unwilling participants and weren't trying, are unfit, don't usually run etc. My DD is a club and county athlete, was trying hard and is very fit.

None of this story says anything about the need for single sex categories in sport nor the inherent differences between the sexes in terms of potential personal bests in cross country.

Anecdotes aren't data.

@Helleofabore has articulated it well.

It really doesn't matter if one amazing girl is amazing. We have long term studies showing the difference in athletic ability between males and females... they are called the World Records.

And while puberty plays a big part in male strength and speed.. it is not the only factor.

In fact, physiology itself is not the only factor. Social conditioning including role models, unconscious bias in behaviour towards children, clothing .. and many many more.

Broadly our society has segregated boys and girls for competitive sport for a number of reasons... there is an argument that the very best performing females do better in a mixed or male dominated environment but there is also plenty of evidence that a significant majority of women benefit from female only spaces ... this was the focus of the efforts of many organisations who had aims to increase the participation of females in sport... until carving out spaces for females only, became challenging, people challenged the gendered language, the basis for the segregation and the definition of words.. so people slunk away, feeling unsupported and afriad of conflict. We need to reclaim this.

We know why we segregate boys and girls... it's not all about who is fastest (but that is a big part of it..) ... some of the reasons may not feel ideal or great to express out loud... but we know why there are fewer girls kicking footballs in the playground.. thank goodness that is changing.. the answer is not to put everyone together and say get on with it.. it is to put the girls in their own space, change their shoes and their skirts, show them how much fun football is, how good it feels in their bodies to move them, to use them, to feel powerful .. and then show the boys.. but even when there are AMAZING STRONG AND FEARLESS girls and women in the boys teams.. they have to be better, stronger and put up with a lot of negativity just to be allowed to show up.. it breaks many women. We deserve the right to do all of that, but be mediocre, be supported and enjoy ourselves.

If we lined up every year group and asked them to run across the playground... the bell curve of finishing times for girls and boys would have a very different mean... but across the country, the profile of that gragh would be similar...

I am boring myself now... but yeah.. not all peer reviewed studies reflect real world situations.

"My daughter came in second in a gymnastic competition. 50 or so little girls. One boy. Guess who came first?"

Well, if it was the boy, according to some people's opinion on this, the girls should just try harder. There is very little or no difference between the sexes therefore girls should just try harder.

Or... in another competition, the girls all beat the boy, so therefore girls don't need their own sports categories.

Or ... they are x years old, it is suppposed to be fun, girls should just suck it up if they lost. They participated and that is the main thing. Hey.... why are girls not participating in sports in the UK? It is a fucking mystery.

"I'm not sure there is much difference in boys/girls at age 8, it's when they get older"

Please read the studies that are on this thread. Maybe you will then be able to say that you are sure that yes, there is enough difference between boys and girls that girls should have their own recognition of being the winner of their race.

Your daughter is exceptional! But imagine if there was a boy the same age group who also did the amount of exercise and training (formal or informal) and kept beating her.

Would you have said to her 'it is ok DD, you are just not as good as him. He beat you fairly'? What do you think your daughter would think if you kept telling her that?

That your daughter is doing well is great, but do you think dismissing the science and declaring that there is no need to change is working well for girls in sport in general?

Just because your primary school 'always ran it mixed', with the evidence, do you this that is still right, or that maybe this is contributing to girls dropping out of sport from an early age?

Was it meant to be for girls or mixed?

No way should this be allowed. The kid is 8! And the school and HIS parents are indulging this ridiculous 'trans' nonsense.