Max testosterone level for trans athletes to be halved

[EmpressOfJurisfiction]

Open access link: www.thetimes.co.uk/article/trans-athletes-face-tougher-entry-rules-in-female-events-wrrmm7vcz?shareToken=49299dde905a975d619c3b6b581b4b38

At which point, it's not fair to assume that the TW's greater risk matters more than greater risk to the female competitors.

You're right Lancelottie, but that's why I'm not making a sweeping claim to know the right level for all sports. Because there can't be one! They have to be able to be flexible, assess the risk of their own individual sport, make rules accordingly and change them if necessary.

In some sports the levels need to be lower to keep other competitors safe, in some sports they need to include consideration of other factors - and indeed many governing bodies have a panel of experts oversee the inclusion of any transathlete in the women's competition. In a reply to Jaycee above I linked a "Law in Sport" article which has links to a very good number of different rules for participation for different sports - they do really vary.

Each sport can set their own criteria based on the specifics of their sport.

And I think that's the right approach! No blanket "no transwomen", and no blanket "10nmol is fine, no other criteria". But we have to trust the individual sports to look at best scientific evidence, take advice and act in the pursuit of those aims as best they can. And as I see it this IOC change of criteria evidences that they are perfectly capable of doing that.

The issue is that like MAria Miller's parliamentary report, the transgender inclusion policies are often written with the single focus of supporting people who are transgender and by people and organisations with this focus. Inclusion is important. However, there are
or may be specific implications for women and girls. These require consideration.

These require consideration.

Oh yeah, definitely R0wan, and you're right in that the government's push for trans-inclusion comes from a government's perspective. However they pass those aims down to the individual sports who try to enact those aims with consideration for all their competitors.

It's those people I put my faith in.

There was a big push for including more women and girls quite recently too; "this girl can" for example. In my sport we have set up all sorts of sessions and outreach activities to get women and girls involved - that's my thing!

But yes, of course it requires consideration. It doesn't require a blanket ban on trans competitors though - I don't think that's what the scientific evidence requires in most cases. I don't think that's proportionate - and in fact it's often so disproportionate that to do this is considered blatant discrimination and results in law suits against the governing bodies. And I think that's right. The Equality Act allows to you proportionate means to a legitimate aim, but it doesn't allow you to go above and beyond what is necessary to achieve safe and fair competition.

I was following the Liz TRuss MP story Rat, and there is a quote from Delia Johnson in both the Daily Mail and Times:

"Last night Delia Johnston, the former head of a charity campaigning for trans sportspeople to be allowed to compete in their chosen gender, condemned Ms Truss. Ms Johnston said: ‘She is giving kudos to Mumsnet who are particularly vicious on this particular front. Truss could be investigated for backing a group that is effectively advocating violence against the transgender community. She may be a terf in disguise.’

metro.co.uk/2015/10/21/transgender-woman-on-her-desperate-struggle-with-her-new-identity-and-how-she-was-accepted-by-the-fa-but-not-her-daughter-5376352/

It is a long article and worth reading as it focuses more on the role that Delia Johnson has played in shaping inclusion policies.

To be clear, I fully support inclusion and I also believe in some situations there are conflicting rights. Just as Swim England and Girl Guides policies have been shown to have been 'improved' in order to include people who are transgender... the impact /possible exclusion of some girls and women seems to have been given little acknowledgement. In fact when mentioned, there seems a common theme that girls/women 'should be re-educated'.

There are other advantages in sports than just testosterone levels. Some are not so easy to see and others are just glaringly obvious. Sports bodies need to sort this out.

I am not singling out Delia Johnson, but highlighting that a bigger picture.

highlighting that this represents a bigger picture.

Fairenuff I don't think you can look at a transwoman's body - or any person's body to be honest - and, from a point of no scientific evidence at all, assess that what you see is the basis for significant advantage that will result in a "foregone conclusion".

You just can't.

That's not very scientific, and it shouldn't be the basis on which sports make their decisions. They can't go on the basis of how someone's body looks. That's not very rational.

But look, everyone's fallible, undoubtedly there are instances where their rules have been inappropriate. I don't necessarily mean the pictures you've linked, I just mean at some point, somewhere that will have been the case. By all means let's bring that to the attention of those sports and ask them if their rules perhaps need updating - I'm all for that!

Thanks for the link R0wan, I'm reading it now. And yes, there are issues around sport that aren't just related to the actual competition but also to the use changing rooms etc. I think Swim England for example were right to release "guidance" (not saying it was well-thought-through guidance, but that's another thread...), but certainly each facility needs to take a sensible approach that doesn't disadvantage female users.

each facility needs to take a sensible approach that doesn't disadvantage female users.

There is little evidence to suggest that this features... and as the ideology which runs alongside transgender inclusion policies is that 'trans women are women' and as the LibDem LGBT twitter comments exemplify 'trans women are female' it becomes to impossible to take this approach... however sensible.

as Delia Johnson comments in the article linked above:

It took her a while to make the move into the women’s changing rooms. ‘In my early days it was always an issue of confidence,’ she says. ‘Where I am now, when it comes to changing rooms I’m female – end of. ‘It’s like me saying to you: “As a female, what’s it like going to a male changing room?”

Fairenuff I don't think you can look at a transwoman's body - or any person's body to be honest - and, from a point of no scientific evidence at all, assess that what you see is the basis for significant advantage that will result in a "foregone conclusion".

What would you describe as scientific evidence? There are well documented physiological differences between men and women. I can state authoritatively that height and weight and general fitness being equal, the balance of probability is firmly in favour of the man being a faster sprinter, a higher jumper, further throwing shot-putter.

And age, that's a factor too.

There are well documented physiological differences between men and women.

Well of course. There are also a wide variety of physiological differences between all women*, and equally between all men. The question is whether a transwoman achieving the qualifying criteria of a particular sport competes more equally amongst the men or the women.

On the basis of the scientific evidence available to those sports, they may deem it more appropriate to include them in the erstwhile female-only leagues with those strict entry requirements than in the male leagues. They deem their altered physiology to be better integrated into the diverse range of female physicality than into that of the male spectrum. And that's their prerogative.

*Interesting fact on the side; I had my lung capacity assessed in my early 20s and have 50% greater lung capacity than the average woman, so the equivalent of a whole extra lung! Lucky me, huh?

I don't think you can look at a transwoman's body - or any person's body to be honest - and, from a point of no scientific evidence at all, assess that what you see is the basis for significant advantage that will result in a "foregone conclusion".

Can you not actually see with your own eyes, the advantage that the transwoman has in this basketball team. Or could you not tell which one was the transwoman? Do you need science to check their dna before you can say, 'oh yeah, they're a lot taller?

Don't try to emperor new clothes me.

Also (and apologies if I articulate this badly, I'm not too sure how to word it), I don't see how trans competitors can have it both ways.

"If you think about it we're even more downtrodden and have more barriers in our way than 'cis' women ... but also we're just ordinary and have no quantifiable or qualifiable distinguishable advantages or disadvantages whatsoever."

If they are actually facing more barriers than a woman, that's all the more need to be able to distinguish and offer different types of support isn't it?

Oh come on Fairenuff, how about Teaira McCowan or Malgorzata Dydek, both pictured here? Yes it's clear to see they have an advantage, just like I have an advantage with my extra large lung capacity!

The question is do those physiological advantages and disadvantages (everybody has them!) result in what is essentially a foregone conclusion in that particular sport?

Clearly not! Being tall is not the only thing you need to be to be a great basketball player. It helps, and yeah a transwoman may be more likely to have it, just as black people of West-African ancestry have, as a group, more "fast-twitch" muscle fibres than white people. That's an advantage. Doesn't mean there is a foregone conclusion. Doesn't mean it isn't within the realm of expected variation. Doesn't mean it can't be "fair" in the context of what sport is trying to achieve.

Hope that helps.

Women's sport is a sporting institution, and was created to further the fundamental sporting aim of inclusivity - allowing as many people to participate as possible - and allowing everybody to participate in such a way that remains safe and promotes fair competition

Women's sport was created by feminists so that women could compete at all. Men and spirting associations have always opposed it. Called it radical or inappropriate.

Women's football was banned in the 1920's by the FA after it became more popular than football (it wasn't called men's football it was just called football). Women's football was not recognised by the FA (Football Association) until 1993.

Introducing males into women's sport it is a total reversal of feminist logic. Men have always hated women having anything that doesn't include them.

Haha I didn't mean spirting/spurting associations. Sporting.

It's daft to think women's sport didn't happen with no fierce opposition from males.
We always had to fight for it.

Introducing males into women's sport it is a total reversal of feminist logic. Men have always hated women having anything that doesn't include them.

this^^

FWIW anything involving women (or the lack of) is a feminist issue, don't belittle feminism as a passing thought!

The FA are, in my opinion, the very worst and most backwards of associations Ophelia, and famously corrupt! But funnily they're actually one of the stricktest regarding trans participation criteria - I think it's 1nmol testosterone if I remember rightly.

It is removing women's sport from women, however you want to dress it up.

GE GROUP MEN WOMEN
18-34 3hrs 05min 00sec 3hrs 35min 00sec
35-39 3hrs 10min 00sec 3hrs 40min 00sec
40-44 3hrs 15min 00sec 3hrs 45min 00sec

Above are the qualifying times for the Boston Marathon 2019. As you can see they are different for men and women. The acceptance of official race entrants will be based on qualifying time, with the fastest qualifiers (in relation to their age and gender) being accepted first until the race is full.

A man can (and did) self ID as a woman with no medical interventions - no hormonal treatment, no surgery, no change in phsyiology - and qualify for the female times - taking a place from a woman. Presumably the different standards for men and women were decided on for a reason? How is this inclusive to women?

I also dispute the idea that women's sports are not a feminist concept and are there to simply promote inclusion. In most cases women's sports are there to combat exclusion - women were excluded from sports in places such as schools and colleges and were definitely excluded from men's sports teams.

If there is allegedly a "fundamental sporting aim of inclusivity", for women to be included in sport at all we need to be able exclude men. So what does "inclusivity" really mean?

It's not just the FA who vehemently opposed women competing. Only as recently as 1928 were females represented in gymnastics and athletics but no other areas.