AIBU to think it was never that complicated to define a woman.

[Abisequer]

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has ruled that eligibility for the women’s category of Olympic events will now be limited to biological females, starting from the LA 2028 Games.

AIBU to think the category ‘women’ was never complicated and the obfuscation by certain governing bodies has compromised fairness in sport for women.

Examples of obfuscation include claims that genital checking would be needed or that biological men with lowered testosterone would be on an even playing field with biological women.

AIBU to think it was never complicated to define a woman and a cheek swab is all it takes.

Article

Someone on this thread just said they wouldn’t let their toddler son wear a dress up costume in case someone tried to make him trans. That’s pretty obsessive on the topic?

I think it's a very misguided outlook and I don't agree, but I wouldn't call it obsessive and even if it were, the obsession isn't with binary sex. It's with the effect of transgender ideology, which I do think has been pretty heavily pushed in recent years, to the point it's now headline news that women's Olympics are finally going back to, er, women.

But you frame this not as potentially an overreaction, or just a wrong reaction, to a hard pushed ideology, but "obsession" with an objective fact. Interesting.

I think it’s because my feelings on being trans is that it is a phenomenon that is driven by the element of society who are so dedicated to a belief that sex is binary that it bleeds into binary gender attitudes too. I completely understand that that segment of society is not everyone who believe solely in binary sex.
In my own experience, I have come across exponentially more people who are likely to pass comment negatively on a little boy with hair clips and a tutu because it’s ‘wrong’ as opposed to people who will try to coerce him into changing his pronouns.

To be fair, my own child came home from school about five years ago and declared that other students had said they must be the opposite sex because my now-teen had said that they played a particular sport and liked a particular movie.

You might call it 'obsessive', but this is a concern that some parents have already experienced.

Is it?

I have a family member who was socially transitioned (or enabled I suppose) by an activist teacher, without her parents knowledge.

She then went on to take T.

She had since detransitioned and has been left with significant health problems due to her time on T. Her mental and physical health have been seriously impacted.

She was a teenager at the time, so different to a preschooler. Also it all happened pre-Cass.

I would hope that nowadays, a teacher would not feel so empowered, but I couldn't be sure. I think people are right to be wary.

I understand why you might think it's a silly thing to be concerned about, but unfortunately my relative was in pretty deep before her parents knew what was going on and they couldn't course correct in time.

Well that really makes absolutely no sense because on pure point of objective fact, sex is binary and there's no third gamete. People are free to claim to believe otherwise, much as they are free to claim to believe water is dry, but they're simply factually wrong, and they've no right to demand the world rearrange itself around their false belief.

Binary gender attitudes are exactly what the trans brigade pushes - the idea that a woman is a man in a dress who likes baking. Terfs are the ones pointing out that it doesn't matter what he does or performs because sex isn't an action or a performance. He's a man, and the fact he's a man doing "feminine" things simply proves it's gender that's nonsense, because he's doing these things and is still a man. A woman can do none of these things and she's still a woman.

I very much disagree with the mum who wouldn't let her little boy wear a dress, but she's not the one claiming it makes him a girl. It's the TRAs who would argue that and she's trying to protect him from them.

Just looks like DARVO to me, tbh.

It is a type of DARVO where a person legitimately concerned about other people's actions based on the experience of others, is shamed for their concern.

I wonder if these poster's belief about feminist's position on the importance of sex for some issues is forever aligned with the group of people who believe that sex cannot be changed but who embrace sex stereotypes. While not necessarily understanding that sex being binary is a universal fact and not a matter for 'belief'. That is a philosophical position only to believe that people have a gender identity and not a universal fact.

That is 'reverse' part. Shaming others who believe in material reality and who don't agree on a philosophical belief.

It's also DARVO because it's taking the issue at heart - the idea of sexist attitudes - and blaming the person who isn't making that claim. This mum may be misguided (I didn't see the thread so I can't really say) but she is motivated by rejecting the idea that if her boy wears a dress, he's a girl. She knows it's not true, but she's aware that there are those who'd say he is, and she wants to protect him from them.

You might argue that it's the wrong approach, as I think it is, but it is patently not that she is ascribing dresses to being female, that's the whole point.

And to accuse her of being "obsessed with binary sex" is a very dishonest framing. It's untrue, and it's designed to paint the very assertion of fact as irrational.

I think it’s because my feelings on being trans is that it is a phenomenon that is driven by the element of society who are so dedicated to a belief that sex is binary that it bleeds into binary gender attitudes too.

Huh? It is driven by elements of society that believes that sex is NOT binary. It is OPPOSED by people who know that sex is binary.

I completely understand that that segment of society is not everyone who believe solely in binary sex.

You just said it WAS people so dedicated to a belief in binary sex. Do you even know what you are saying here?

In my own experience, I have come across exponentially more people who are likely to pass comment negatively on a little boy with hair clips and a tutu because it’s ‘wrong’ as opposed to people who will try to coerce him into changing his pronouns.

sounds pretty right wingy to me.

"It's also DARVO because it's taking the issue at heart - the idea of sexist attitudes - and blaming the person who isn't making that claim" expresses what I was trying to say in the first part much more clearly.

This is part of what I see happening and why people are pushing back on the claim.

No, it means that they don’t want some meddlesome dimwit - might even be an education professional - trying to suggest the child is something they are not and never can be, which unfortunately does happen.

Even in that one he talks about his childhood and always having played with boys because he found girls a little bit boring and "too soft"-only too happy to be in their category though! You'd think he'd keep those kind of opinions to himself in his position wouldn't you? But then he's got entitled male written all over him. The irony!

Yes - that it was I said in the first half of the sentence that you decided not to include in your quote.

Every single person with a DSD is either one sex or the other.
Genetically - yes, but that isn't the basis on which the IOC's new rules determine female-eligibility (instead, using "performance benefit" as the relevant metric). This arrives at almost the exact same result as the genetic binary, but not quite. Again, I do think that's the right call, I just wouldn't call the analysis/classification "simple".

And re "in developed countries" - very occasionally, they can and do - and not all athletes are from developed countries anyway, and it leaves me sympathetic to someone like Shanti Soundarajan, even though I ultimately agree with the IOC's new approach.

Offensive to whom? Its still the preferred terminology according to relevant advocacy groups, many of whom have "Intersex" in their name.

I don't know why you or the PP are focused on developed countries. Are you working from a baseline that only people from developed countries can ever be worthy of sympathy?

Some disability activists name themselves crips, and some lesbians name themselves dykes; their choice of language and there's meaning and history behind the choice for themselves, but neither is a word most would choose to use casually or insensitively to name a group as a whole.

How countries handle people born with DSDs is not the IOC's concern however. It's far out of their remit.

I'm sure dealing with the implications of a DSD can be very challenging, but
that's not the focus of this ruling.

And I never said it was. I said that I supported the decision but retain some sympathy for some athletes with DSDs - particularly if being labeled as cheats.

I don't know why that's controversial.

Offensive to people with DSDs because it suggests they're not men or women and they are. We cleared this one up years ago. "You have a DSD so you're not really a woman, therefore this guy can compete as a woman because he has a male specific DSD" is not the win you think it is. It's also disrespectful and just downright wrong.

There is also a clear consensus among the community that they do not wish to be exploited by TRAs in this way by people trying to get men into women's contests. It isn't actually anything to do with them; the existence of a small number of people with a variation of sexual development doesn't have anything to do with a man who doesn't have one claiming that he's a woman.

I don't know why you or the PP are focused on developed countries. Are you working from a baseline that only people from developed countries can ever be worthy of sympathy?

I know I can't expect intellectual honesty or understanding of sympathy from people who insist women can have knobs and that "but intersex" is a valid argument in 2026, but you guys still surprise me. Certain DSDs are more common in parts of the world with higher levels of cosanguinity, and they're less likely to be recognised or diagnosed in countries that have less developed health systems, so that's why we mention it. Still, if you haven't had a period by the time you finish puberty, you know something is up. Khelif's trainers clearly knew he was a man; they'd never have carried a woman on their shoulders like that.

Stop lying about men being women and you won't have to perform embarrassing, ridiculous and long outdated pretzels like this to try to claim moral ground. I realise you are way behind the times because you're still doing BUT INTERSEX but for those of us who have had this ridiculous conversation 500000 times since 2018, it's not impressive.

Fine, you are allowed to be sympathetic to people with DSDs. And women are allowed female only sports. Even if the price we pay is people BUT THE MEN BUT INTERSEX-ing all over the shop about it like rules in sport to ensure fairness are new. There will be actual women competing who don't get what they want either, but I wouldn't want to distract from BUT THE MEN BUT INTERSEX.

Whatever. Just leave women's sports for women. You can still rend your garments if you must.

This is a good point.

The use of intersex does also seem to coincide with the repetition of denial that there is no sex spectrum. It does seem to be one group of activists. We have had people with DSDs come onto boards and inform us that VSD or DSD is preferred and that many with the condition reject the term intersex.

By this stage in the game, anyone who still uses the term "intersex" (with the possible exception of some people with DSDs who are "reclaiming" it or whatever it is when people try to de-fang a nasty term for them) is just trying to obscure the fact that men with DSDs are men.

It's an attempt to suggest that men with a DSD aren't as clear cut an exclusion for a women's competition. But they are, because they're men. With male-specific DSDs.

Hell, even if they were some mythical third sex (what's the third gamete? A sperg? A spegg?), they still wouldn't be eligible because the competition category is women, and third sex people would not be women. And the silly earlier suggestion that we'll get some sort of deluge of adult men suddenly discovering they're men. Clearly we won't, but even if we do, so what? Just means the problem of compromised female sport was even worse than we realised and now we can correct it. That's a bad thing?

There's really no good faith reason to respond to the news that women's sport will be retained for women other than "good, that's fair". If someone wants to feel sorry for men who didn't know they were men (and they all did by the time they competed, but whatever) then by all means they can feel privately sorry for them. What more do they need?

Do you find it at all odd that no major intersex advocacy group agrees with you, and most explicitly confirm that "intersex" is generally the preferred term, and many explicitly reject DSD terminology.

Maybe you should let them know how offensive they are all being towards themselves, because they're all wrong and you are right?

While you're at it, perhaps you could at least try to internalize that I have been very clear that:

• transwomen do not, and never did, belong in women's sports;

• that I confirmed I support the IOC's decision as the right one in all matters;

• that I specifically agreed that co-opting intersex people to advance "trans rights" causes was wrong: and

• that my limited concern was how some comments in this thread seem to make the false equivalence as between transgender and intersex, when it comes to smears of "cheating" and alike.

Then, perhaps, consider telling me what your actual objection is, rather than going off on rants that completely misrepresent me.

Again, wipe the froth from your eyes and try reading what I actually wrote - where it seems our only disagreement is on preferred terminology.

It is not the preferred term, though, however much you wish it were because you want to make a case for men with DSDs in women's sport. You saying it does not make it true. This stuff is years old. It's a misleading, incorrect and outdated term. Nobody is between sexes. There are only men and women, and a very small number of them have a variation of development that is specific to their sex.

Of course advocacy groups who want to obscure this and ruin women's sports will use misleading terms to make the case. Who cares what they think? They're the reason we need clear and honest language.

Men do not belong in women's sports. Men with DSDs are still men. You can feel sorry for them if you like, nobody cares, it's nothing to do with the issue at hand which is reserving women's sports for women. If you agree that men with DSDs don't belong in women's sports, congratulations on being right. Now use the terms that are accurate, respectful and up to date. Shouldn't be a problem if you're not trying to obscure anything.