Australia protesting Laurel Hubbard

[Springtrolls]

It was only a matter of time. Do you think that other countries will now start asking questions about the commonwealth and olympics?

www.news.com.au/sport/commonwealth-games/games-ticking-time-bomb-explodes-as-rival-nation-protests-transgender-weightlifters-presence/news-story/4b2a53fbd236bc63ef1e45d91de5acd6

I don't really understand what is wrong with the rule 'if you were born male, you compete with the males'?

Where are those 'criteria' they supposedly meet? I assume it includes hormone levels, but I don't think that can reverse the physical structure growing up as a man gives you, especially in weightlifting.

Testosterone has to be beneath certain threshold for 12 months. The level is at the lower end of the male range, but greatly exceeds the normal range for females (!).

Note that the Boston marathon has just announced pure self-identification.

The rules are wrong, but Hubbard knows that they are skewed to their advantage so competing with women is at best unsportsmanlike (or cheating in other words). Just because it's within the rules doesn't mean it's honourable or right and Hubbard knows this. Hubbard just doesn't care.

Under the new IOC rules, testosterone for transwomen competitors has to be kept under 10 nmol/L for a year. This was calculated by taking the average testosterone level of female athletes with PCOS (who have higher levels of testosterone than most women) and applying 4 standard deviations making it almost statistically impossible for a natal female to hit the upper limit.

The average range of testosterone for men 18 - 49 is 9 nmol/L to 30 nmol/L - women the same age have an average range of 0.3 - 1.7, although it's important to note that female athlete range is extends slightly higher to 2.8. The NHS will not investigate low testosterone in men unless they have less than 8 nmol/L under 49.

So even if we accepted that it was correct to only consider testosterone levels, the rules are clearly broken as the only way a woman could achieve 10 nmol/L would be with doping. As it is, it's patently absurd to claim that reducing testosterone levels to the lower end of the healthy male range would undo the benefits of going through male puberty.

In summary, I don't know whether Laurel competing is fair or not. It is a complex area, not an open and shut case. However, we should be celebrating her athletic achievements.

I don't know how anyone can write this. It absolutely is clear cut that Laurel has an advantage. You only need to look at a photograph of this individual to see the advantage they have

Article in the Times: www.thetimes.co.uk/article/laurel-hubbards-injury-delays-debate-over-transgender-athletes-2pgvf0t7v?CMP=Sprkr--Editorial--thetimes--Unspecified--TWITTER

human rights campaigners have insisted Hubbard be treated on merit and that “participation in sport and physical activity” is a human right

Is it?! I had genuinely no idea. I'm going to go and claim my place in the GB women's hockey team. I haven't played since school, and was shit at it, but it's my hoooman right, innit?

(I'm with the people who say LH isn't cheating, but the rules are batshit.)

Lauren isn’t technically cheating but is morally cheating.

“However, we should be celebrating her athletic achievements. We should also be encouraging more girl and women to take up lifting - after all muscle strength is a key element of overall fitness.”

How exactly is a middle-aged man pushing women out of their own category going to inspire women and girls to take up weightlifting?

Laurel not winning Gold due to this "injury" may have forestalled debate about the accuracy of the rules, but let's not forget Tracey Lambrechs whose place Laurel usurped.

www.nzherald.co.nz/sport/news/article.cfm?c_id=4&objectid=11947789

How exactly is a middle-aged man pushing women out of their own category going to inspire women and girls to take up weightlifting?

This!

It’s my understanding that a man transforming into a woman is now supposed to have always been a woman and it’s deadnaming and literal violence to say otherwise.

Why, then, do keep those awards and achievements they gained prior to transforming - that must be causing them such pain and anguish?
Surely they should be removed from titles since they should never have competed in the male classes in the first place? It’s literally violence to acknowledge their past achievements - isn’t it?

I understand that the testosterone levels have to be low for a year. But realistically what is to stop say LH deciding a year after winning hypothetical gold, that actually seems I’m happier living as a man? Nothing. And because he was playing within the rules he would keep the hypothetical gold.

And of course with all the doping that has gone on over year, this realistically could happen.

human rights campaigners have insisted Hubbard be treated on merit and that “participation in sport and physical activity” is a human right

Way back in the 80s some feminists said that 'human rights' are men's rights. They were right. Not only is this proof, but so is the claim that men have a 'human right' to use women's bodies in prostitution.

Springrolls But realistically what is to stop say LH deciding a year after winning hypothetical gold, that actually seems I’m happier living as a man?

Laurel has always lived as a man and will presumably continue to do so. He changed his name to a feminine name, grew his hair long (as many middle-age men do!), and once wore pink trainers.

He has never, to my knowledge, claimed to be transgender. He is not a transactivist, he is just a guy who wants a Commonwealth gold medal!

So, testosterone declines. Does the heart get 'smaller' and less powerful, does the lung capacity decrease, do the bones get weaker, does the centre of gravity (important weight lifting factor) change to such a degree it matches a woman's? If all these things don't matter (and it's all about testosterone) why do we have weight categories in weightlifting at all?

Answer = it isn't all about testosterone.

How Hubbard can live with herself (note my courtesy there) and sleep at night I do not know.

And WTF about a female competitor saying it's OK ? Talk about an overload of female 'everyone's needs before mine'.

I am so fed up with all this bullshit.

Terfsup do you remember the case of Lauren Jeska, a transgender fell runner who was so peeved at the prospect of having their rankings removed after competing as a woman that they attempted to murder an official.

I don't believe in divine intervention but can't help doing a little whoop and ladylike fist punch at the news that Hubbard has withdrawn from the competition. I read a very interesting article about Hubbard , can't remember the source, about how Hubbards inclusion in the team in the first place was due to some very shifty shenanigans by their very wealthy family.

I am so sorry for the NZ weightlifter whose chance of inclusion in the team and the Games was wrecked by a selfish person, money and feral ambition. Poor woman, she never stood a chance.

I am also a kiwi and we should look at the response in NZ in context of a long history of transgender support.

When I was a child there was a transexual MP who went on to have a long career in politics (and probably still does) So as I grew up, trans stuff seemed really normal.

NZers are also outliers. We have a sense of being apart from the rest of the world and perhaps a little special? We are often first adopters of cultural shifts and like to think we have a laid back approach to most things - especially towards what other people want to do with their lives.

NZ as a culture promotes tolerance.

These are all things I am proud to have as my heritage.

However, when it comes to sport we can lose our perspective. here the sense of tolerance has combined with fervent national sporting pride to become some weird misjudgement.

It's a totally different culture and while that's no excuse - the live and let live aspect has to be acknowledged. It's a win win for NZ - seen to be a tolerant country that welcomes all and also they get a gold medal... all good from their perspective.

I really don't understand how anyone can think that LH taking part in a womens competition is a positive and is goingt to inspire more women to compete. It's obvious that it will in fact discourage young girls and women from entering the sport. If LH and other transgender athletes continue to compete in their chosen gender rather than sex the only people it will encourage will be other transgender athletes which in reality we all know is other men identifying as women.

Sorry don't agree that NZ is a tolerant country, I found it more racist that the UK. The thing NZers love is winning - especially in sport.

Terfsup do you remember the case of Lauren Jeska, a transgender fell runner who was so peeved at the prospect of having their rankings removed after competing as a woman that they attempted to murder an official

I do, indeed.

Note that the Boston marathon has just announced pure self-identification.

Holy heck

time.com/5232877/boston-marathon-transgender-runners/
runningmagazine.ca/first-three-transgender-women-preparing-race-boston-marathon/

Background: Women were barred from officially entering in the Boston Marathon until 1971. The issue came to national attention in 1968 when Katherine Switzer was issued a bib number after she did not identify herself as female. Race organizers famously tried unsuccessfully to physically pull her out of the race.

Katherine Switzer is rather wonderful- here she is running the marathon again, in 2017 www.nytimes.com/2017/04/17/sports/boston-marathon-kathrine-switzer.html

This discussion reminds me of this music video :)