parkrun defending their position

[Funtime2]

I used to be a parkrunner and do not understand how parkrun can defend their position of allowing trans identfying males into the female category.

I read that 280 published race winners in the female category are actually men identifying as women. How is this fair to women? Some women don’t care about this but some women do, just as some men take it as a race and care about the rankings and some men don’t

The other option of course is they could stop the timing, stop recording winners and records?

AIBU to genuinely not understand why parkrun claim not to be a race when they time the runners, publish times by category, rank times and runners, and have record holders by category.

They really can’t.

If they are asking for sex for data purposes with regard to sport and publishing results using the categories’Female' and ‘male' they need to make the rules that it is sex they require not Gender ID.

No policing is needed. Trans people are just as law abiding as everyone else. They will do he ight thing if parkrun ask them

Good job everyone treats it differently and is for EVERYONE no matter how they chose to run it.

Sure, they can require that and rely on people to be honest. But there still won’t be anything to actually prevent transwomen who genuinely believe they are female from continuing from registering as female, just as there’s nothing to prevent a 40-year-old registering as as a 60-year-old and being recorded as the fastest runner in their age band.

Park Runs stance on this is completely disingenuous. They can't maintain that it's not competitive or a competition uf they publish rankings and timings. So it is competitive and to maintain fairness for women, only women's times should ne published. They can still be open to trans runners by classifying the male category as "open". The reason Park Run don't do this, is because their leadership are dyed in the wool Stonewall idealogues, who want to affirm men's fetishes and don't care about women or their sport.

Digital ID with biological sex as a recorded field would be one answer.

I propose they ask this

name
age
sex at birth

(we ask for your age and sex at birth to ensure our categories are both fair and meaningful. If you would prefer not to state your sex at birth or your age, please leave the box blank and we will not include your times within a category but just alongside your name).

Everyone's welcome at parkrun

There took 30 seconds

This poster is a man so may not be able to understand your very valid points. Or something.

How do you know they're a man?.😕

They have stated such in several previous threads.

Doesn't really matter if it's competitive or of it's voluntary or if people take it seriously or not.

It's just one more example of publicly reinforcing the notion that being a woman is a feeling. Biology doesn't matter. Pandering to men's feelings.

And Lauren Jeska has nothing much to be proud of. He's a full TWO minutes behind the record holder in the make category.

Why not set up your parkrun type organisation operating under a sec realistic way, you won't be stopped?
I think this issue highlights where the law doesn't work very well because of the way people are categorised and needs to be more nuanced. Currently all trans individuals are covered by gender reassignment which causes problems. If that was split further into categories of trans men and trans women it would go a long way to address this.
Whether you agree with it or not a lot of organisations desire to be trans inclusive and skills have the right to do so, but after the sc running this is no longer possible, what we need is a pragmatic approach which allows this to occur if the organisation chooses to do so.
This would allow for organisations to set up groups that are exclusive to sex if this is their choice, but also let organisations continue to have trans inclusive organisations if they also want and then people would have the right to choose which organisations they want to join.
Both positions are valid and should be seen as acceptable.

Isn’t parkrun supposed to be a community organised fun event giving people somewhere to run - families/adults only etc

This is the 2nd anti parkrun thread in two days.

I don’t see why it matters if trans women are registered as women or not, its just for fun. Yes people like to improve their own times/get PB’s but how does anyone else time affect you

Same, and it's one of the reasons I like Park Run so much. That it's not competitive, and it's for all abilities.

Not "anti-parkrun", it's "anti-sexism".

For some people it’s just for fun
For some people it’s about bettering their own time
For some people it’s about comparing themselves to others in their category.

It’s meant to be inclusive of all these people.

How would it stop trans woman running if they had to declare their sex at birth on a form?

This is so low stakes- a name on a website with a time? If both including those who identify as women and not including them is going to upset people this much the only likely outcome would be to pull the gender separate lists altogether. Small organisations certainly couldn't police it beyond letting people declare what they are, they can't DNA test to confirm, and such a suggestion would be far too invasive for a fun run.

@Sensiblesal @IAmBeaIDrinkTea

As parkrun do post winners and times, would either of you be opposed to this form for fairness for all (including women)

name
age
sex at birth

(we ask for your age and sex at birth to ensure our categories are both fair and meaningful. If you would prefer not to state your sex at birth or your age, please leave the box blank and we will not include your times within a category but just alongside your name).

Everyone's welcome at parkrun

Are you suggesting trans people would lie?

@PurpleNightingale

But they have

parkrun Age categories = state your age.
parkrun sex categories = state how you feel.

parkrun age categories = fair competition and data collecting
parkrun sex categories = unfairness to women and inaccurate data collecting

Not consistent is it?

No one is asking for al the categories to be policed.
They are asking for them to be fair and consistent.

Some genuinely believe they are female and have always been female; some would lie; some would just like to be agents of chaos: I am reasonably certain that the record-holding runners for several segments on some of my Strava routes are either actually cyclists, or Roger Bannister has returned from the dead and regularly beats his own world record in half running around South East London. I just don’t bother myself about it.

It's not fair.

Men run faster than women. Ok, so NAMAFTW but most are. There is a female category in park run, the Supreme Court says if it's called a female category then that's what it should be. If park run was really a non competitive fun run, no one would care - but they do.

Removing publishing the category timings and placings from their website would remove the incentive for the males who want to enter the female category for the attention and rankings. In fact, Parkrun shouldn't even keep any timings at all, let the individuals buy a bloody watch and do it themselves on their wrist.

Not fair at all.
All the people shouting that it’s just for fun.
But loads of people I know look at their stats and want to know how they are doing in comparison to other of their sex and age.
It makes a mockery of any stats.
all because they can’t just ask for sex on the registration.

You are dead right OP. The people who are saying it’s just for fun are way off the mark. We run at Bushy. It’s the original site and has thousands of runners. It’s mega competitive at the top (in a good way) and winning overall is a big achievement. Sports men and women are naturally competitive people. It’s what pushes them to train and strive to be the best. Coming second to a trans would be extremely annoying.

All trans women know they are biologically male. Don’t be daft.

What happens when they go into hospital do they not declare their sex.
90% have had no surgery, do they not have eyes

Cheats and law breakers don’t mean we abolish all sane rules and laws. Common!