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

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.

💯

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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

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.

One swallow doesn't make a spring.

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.