Transgender athletes in sport

[sweetheart]

My dd plays ladies football. Recently she played against a team with a player who looked and sounded very masculine. It has been confirmed since that this player was transgender male to female.

Dh and I have had many conversations about the rights and wrongs of allowing this.

This player had a significant physical advantage.

We would both be really interested to hear peoples thoughts on this

• [Title edited by MNHQ]

penisbeakers

Thank you for your predictably illuminating post.

I've said it before, it's often not feminists who convince people to become gender critical.

Emotional blackmail and name calling doesn't work anymore penisbeakers, TRAs have overused such tactics to the point of rendering them meaningless.

EnionEile that is what I was thinking, and it is that misognistic attitude that gives transmen the brass neck to take over women's sport and feel that they can outbetter the biological women. The FTM transmen know that they would be no match against the strength and physical abilities of biological men.

Males shitting at women from a great height, once again through their drive to take over women's sport for themselves.

I train in martial arts, its a mixed club. I am a black belt and good at it but when sparring against a lower belt male who is significantly bigger & stronger than me i will never win. I may, if I'm lucky manage to hold my own if they play down their strength. But if they're 6ft 4in, 16+stone self decides to go full force on my 5ft 4in, 10stone self I will come off worse & unfortunately have come off worse many times.

Recently our very old (late 70s) chief instructor asked if we felt women had a place in martial arts & if there was equality for us within it. Yes, there is equality so far as we are able to enjoy it as much as a man does, but it will never be equal as traditionally most martial arts clubs are overwhelming male and therefore we have to train & compete against males.........even if that male decides to become a woman my disadvantage still remains.

Aside from the lung capacity, heart, stride, grip etc women who have had babies also have additional differences. No MTF will ever have these issues.

I totally agree Arrow I am glad you talked about your experiences in Martial arts, I just thought that I was extra shit, as I was not able to defend all the punches as well as throwing in some moves myself. Funny that you say that, the right team in or Dojo, comprises of just males.

Fight team, doh

It is not my job to educate your small mindedness. I do wonder if some of you realise that you can find actual scientific information via google if you just make a bit of effort, instead of the echo chamber bollocks most of you are spouting here.

penis you are the one making the laughable claim that transwomen - who have male bodies - don’t have physical advantages in spirt over women. It is
your job to try to back your made-up science up. Otherwise it’s just trolling.

Thank you for your well considered post Sam. I'm sorry life is so hard for you. I think in your particular case noone could object to you using disabled facilities (not usually something I say!) as a reasonable adjustment to allow you to fully participate in life.

An earlier poster suggested that archery could be one where men and women compete equally. Nope. Physical strength still comes into it - the draw is hard. I can come up with shooting and horseriding, that's it. Even mixed teams for other sports tend to have Male and female roles - in curling the man (usually) sends the stone down using his greater strength and the women brush the ice. (I'm not a curling expert-this is based on limited observation!). So the only thing men and women compete equally on is where there is no physical strength advantage at all - something else provides the power element.

I could be wrong but I believe archeologists can identify the sex of a child from a very young age. Not going through puberty isn't enough - there are still many physiological advantages that a male will have regardless. Yes, they won't be as great as one who has been through puberty but they will still have different pelvis, better lungs etc. Sorry but we need complete separation of sexes in sport.

And why does my autocorrect capitalise Male but not female?!

Maybe it thinks you are talking about the place Male? I think it's in the maldives

I think it is probably pure coincidence. But an appropriate one.

Im sick of all the people who come on to threads like this to call everyone bigots but can never quote any actual transphobic posts, and in this case give any evidence to back up their position. The proposition that males don't have a biological advantages over females when it comes to sport is so ridiculous its laughable. They just want us to shut up talking about it. Well, we aren't going to so you may as well fuck off then! The entire human race knows the truth, it's is impossible to change sex.

DandilionBreak
Yes, there are transwomen ballet dancers - I believe there's one at English National Ballet.

Very unfair to female dancers - who are competing against many other girls from a very young age for places in elite training. There are far fewer male ballet dancers and therefore the stats are already much more in their favour.

The 'ideal' body type for female ballet dancers is extremely slim with small breasts, hips and thighs - 'boyish' you could say.

There are other physical advantages that male bodies have - allowing them to jump higher and further for instance, as well as general strength and stamina. They also don't have to deal with periods.

Of course, unless they've trained as a 'girl' from very young they'll be up against it in terms of pointe work and female technique.

As with sport, I don't think transmen - on the other hand - would successfully manage to take the place of male ballet dancers, certainly not in traditional repertoire.

I’m sure I read that transwomen ballet dancers don’t need to do pointe work.

Sportswomen might as well pack up and go home, if this is the future of their sport.

I'd be miffed if I was a serious ballet fan expecting to see perfect coordination and one was doing different moves (not on pointe). If they can do the role entirely to the same standards as the others (and fit in with the ridiculously limiting aesthetics) then fine.

The Trans agenda hates gays
(if your son is effeminate, cut his willie off, not let him be gay)
and the trans agenda hates women
(I have strapped my willie to I cannot overpower you)
it is not "woke" its broke

Maybe sailing, in some categories, Binglebong? Basically things where skill rather than pure muscle makes the vital difference -- and something else provides the power.

I've just explained this to my husband

If you decided now you were a women and you ran in a race tonight against women who were born women is this equal?

He looked at me like I was batshit and said

No don't be fucking stupid
It's not the people it's the rules obviously if I was to be seen as the winner

It does tick me off that people like penis never consider the women who have worked so hard to compete at the top level just to be beaten by a mediocre man.

Why should women bother to compete in a sport where they can’t win or even properly participate because male feelings are deemed more important.

That is to while fucking story of the human race: men can be whatever they want to be and women are whatever they let us be.

This whole thing makes me enraged.
How unfair and disheartening to train at a sport and then be beaten (easily) by someone who was born male.
I don’t understand why people like Rachel McKinnon can’t see it - surely it is a hollow victory? She likened having to go on television with someone who thinks transwomen shouldn’t complete against women to being a black person and having to sit with someone from the klu klux klan. I mean if that isn’t going to shut down discussion, what it? And the other person then wasn’t allowed to appear.
I was talking to one of my close gay male friends about it and he surprised me because he thinks that men who identify as women - including men who are pre op - should be allowed into women’s only spaces like prisons and hospital wards. That enraged me too. I said I didn’t think vulnerable women should be put in the position of sharing these spaces with transwomen and he just shrugged his shoulders and said it was discrimination if they couldn’t. Basically to hell with the other women.

Cheekysquirrel
he surprised me because he thinks that men who identify as women - including men who are pre op - should be allowed into women’s only spaces like prisons and hospital wards.
Would he be happy sharing a changing room with KKK homophobes ?
Or does he think he has the right to be safe from people who might threaten him?

I know he’s faced prejudice so I guess that’s why he was so sympathetic.
I was really surprised though. When I said women might feel uncomfortable in those spaces with - in particularly pre op - transwomen he was very much ‘so what?’

Isn’t that the response of many men though? It doesn’t affect them so it’s not an issue.