Thousands of non-elite women at the Great North Run got neither privacy nor fair competition

Lance Armstrong was condemned for doping. His conduct was branded shameful and he was disqualified and stripped of his titles.

Yet Emily Bridges and Veronica Ivy (or whatever he calls himself this week) got the Stunning And Brave treatment from the cycling press for competing, or trying to, in the female category.

All three are cheats, but only the cheat who disadvantaged men got DQed. The misogyny is glaring.

Grassroots cycling cannot test for doping, but that doesn't mean that clubs shrug their shoulders and say "take what you like". It's still deemed shameful and unsporting conduct that means your titles are stolen from honest competitors.

Grassroots sports can and must set the expectation that men competing in the women's category is just as shameful and unsporting as doping is.

One swallow doesn't make a spring.

I think the head exposure is a sensible choice to allow the woman to monitor her surroundings. No one can lean over the top with a camera or sneak up on her.

Iirc there are SIGNIFICANTLY more ladies portaloos than men's at these events due to the amount of time it takes us to faff around. Men have access to urinals, and many many events have ladies urinals as an alternative to queuing for a loo

Im sure the organisers would be interested to know if they can reach more people, though?

The corruption of the women's category and quality of toilet services will be of interest to many.

The reason they say gender not sex is to prioritise these cheating men - to allow them to cheat.

If these men didn't enter the womens category, the race would be by sex, or gender and sex would mean the same thing it this situation.

The gender category is the excuse because they know the men cannot be trusted, therefore its easier to change the wording then to say no to men.

I appreciate hearing from people's actual experiences at the event instead of what (and how It) has been reported.

There seems to be a disconnect with those who attended and those who didn't, particularly around perceived discrimination.

This is such a non-story. You can queue for the portaloos (which at races like these are significantly long) or you can use one of these. Same for the men who have open-air urinals. There are legitimate things to get angry about - this isn't one of them.

It is bizarre that practical issues around enforcement come into the equation at all, in the context of mass participation events, as in the context of single-sex toilets and changing.
Nothing in the Supreme Court judgement, or in GC thought, requires any shift towards proactive enforcement of sex eligibility in these contexts. All that is required is a return to the stated social expectations that were completely the norm until just a few years ago. This simply involves permitting and expecting facility/event providers to make a clear statement of eligibility based on sex. The rest is down to us.
Of course there will be violations by some individuals. That's just white noise. But there will be far fewer than there are when providers make needless and sometimes illegal statements welcoming some men into women's facilities/events. And there will be complete clarity about the lawfulness of requiring someone to leave a wrong-sex facility when they show up in one.

For the most part, enforcement is a massive red herring. That's probably why no one has been hand-wringing about the impossibility of enforcing a gender-ID-based eligibility. The people who wang on about 'genital checks' are strangely silent about the impractibility of making checks on someone's inner sense of whatever gender is.

Not that these men are expected to cheat because they are working under a different definition to everyone else, and its scary or rude to point out that they are cheats.

To be fair, if the organisers say that the race is segregated according to identity, they aren't cheating, they are just following the rules.

The problem is that women need a sex based category to compare their results, and the race has clearly been set up to enable people to compare their results.

This is really a confusing stance because they offered male urinals and female urinals which is an equal offering. There's the additional option of a portaloo which I assume can be used by anyone.

I've use the peequals at festivals before and they are brilliant and do offer enough privacy to quickly pop a squat and be on your way.

💯

If drivers licenses and passports weren't so bloody compromised, we could just use those.

The trans and queer ideology has gone out of its way to render sex identification harder and harder, it doesn't mean we have to keep going along with it.

Its not about being policed its about trust and expectations.

The expectations is that a womens race is for women, the organisers make reasonable checks and the men who enter are seen as cheats.

Not that these men are expected to cheat because they are working under a different definition to everyone else, and its scary or rude to point out that they are cheats.

Saying its not many, we cant stop them, the results arent accurate anyway is just making excuses for cheating men.

Most non-elite sport isn't set up to do drug tests and mouth swabs.

That doesn't mean we shouldn't set an expectation of fairness.

How do you think it can be policed with a run of that size where people trade their entries?

You could work out a way to stop people trading their entries.

It's not that it can't be policed, it's that the system isn't set up to do it, because it was run on trust.

Now the trust is broken.

No it is not and I did not say it was hard to police so why bother.

I said I can't see any practical way to police it so how can it be policed.

How do you think it can be policed with a run of that size where people trade their entries?

I was there, and men and women had exactly the same provision.

Which, pedantically, would not have provided equal provision because men and women have different needs.

I accept the point that it was valuable additional provision in a context where provision never meets everyone's needs.

I was there, and men and women had exactly the same provision. What on earth are people complaining about? All portaloos are nasty, but they are equally nasty for both men and women. They are fully enclosed and private. The men’s and women’s urinals are great if you like that sort of thing, but not mandatory.

I agree that people should not be singing up under gender categories, but the organisers cannot police 64000 entrants. How would it work?

Exactly.

it's this bloody disingenuous we have to have the categories so we can leverage them, but you know what, if you object, then suddenly they don't matter.

But if they don't matter, why not just scrap the male and female categories at non-elite level?

Yes, it's the expectation that it's completely and utterly wrong, there is a stigma attached to it and people objecting to it would be backed to the hilt.

TIMs running in the women's category, appears completely acceptable though.

Also peeing in the women's peequal. Women, their races, and their facilities are openly and acceptably just to be used for the validation of men. And no one turns a hair.

You absolutely did - saying it doesn't matter to any one other than the women and it's hard to police so why bother is exactly that

I actually suspect that in this day and age many mass participation runners are taking banned substances, but we are stil clear that it is cheating, even though it would be hard to prevent.

So they had portaloos, urinals, and a third option where you can squat for a wee?

I'm confused at the issue? Maybe it would be fairer to swap the urinals for more of the gender neutral squat toilets, but other than that I can't see a big issue here. Of course there will be queues for portaloos at a big event 🤷‍♀️

If they are categorising according to identity rather than sex, then they don't have a female sex category.