Tom Daley in The Times "trans women athletes have to have testosterone levels which are often lower than natural female athletes, so it's hard to compete"

[Sarkyharky]

Is this true?

It’s hard because if you are male to female trans you have to have a certain level of testosterone, which is often a lot lower than the natural female athletes. You end up doing sport because you love it, but you can’t easily compete.

-it may well be that Tom has particular friends he knows through competing for whom the recent change in IOC is an issue.

-It seem odd too though that the nature of 'fair/unfair advantage' is solely focussed on the testosterone level.

Having seen so many call outs for 'allies' and especially 'powerful allies' recently though...who knows? It seems there are a number of ways to successfully lobby for trans rights.

I love Tom, he has done a lot of growing up with a lot of scrutiny but he is still soooo young and clearly not aware of hyperandrogegism and of why the level is not the only element to consider. he probably hasn't spent a huge amount of time trying to see life through a female view point.

Gah! This conflation of LGB and T. Your sexual orientation doesn't make you want to cheat at sports by competing against people naturally smaller and weaker than you.

Yes, this. Thank you.

Nice of him to explain what athletes who are not him should be willing to give up and how they should be graceful about potentially losing out on their own ability to compete because someone else matters more.

Easy to say when what you're suggesting will have no impact on your career whatsoever, eh?

Thank God a man cometh to explain to female athletes why their erasure needs to happen! Utter wanker

I despise men who rent wombs and clearly men who rent wombs despise women.

Wanker.

He's not thought it through has he, poor love.

To be fair, he’s only 23 years old and most men of all ages are clueless on the concerns of women about transwomen competing. That’s not an excuse I guess.

In the same article he claims that public objections to his and his DH’s use of a surrogate mother were homophobic.

I am not homophobic but strongly object to commercial surrogacy.

So I am confused... why then do these 'transwomen' athletes keep winning against actual females? The 'disadvantages' seem somewhat overstated. Hmmm.

Yeah there was no mention in that article of transmen having to compete against natal men who they stand no chance of beating either. Just the poor TW who will happily shit all over women's sport.

Also wildly unimpressed about his comments about criticism of womb rental being homophobic.

It's a shame because I like Tom and think he's a great ambassador for sport and for LGB.

Can we not just make this simple, if you have or ever have had possession of a willy you can't compete in the female arena. You have a male bone structure, years of testosterone, are not hampered by periods, are bigger and it's cheating.

Many transsexual women are uneasy about male to female people in championship level sport. Whether the testosterone level is down to that of a normal woman is not the full story; the athletes built up aspects of their physique, especially the long levers of the skeleton, and a longer than normal for a woman trunk, where much power is generated. Even if the testosterone is low ( Tom Daley was right about that) there can be, and could be expected to be, advantages. And it is awful for women athletes to have to compete with this. Altough it is not simple, as throughout athletics history some female champions have had medical conditions of which they were not aware, but would have produced " testing " complications today.

I think most right thinking people would support separate races for trans people. The self identifying women and men could race together. After all the ‘women’ would have no advantage over the ‘men’, as the ‘men’ would have been born female. It’s nit like the ‘women’ could possibly beat the ‘men’. 😒

I think I’ve managed to confuse myself. 🤪

Sport should have a XX category and a XY category. End of.

please can we have that "Lo, a man has appeared" cartoon now?

I love it so.

And just another example of society's expectation that women should be content with a walk on part in men's productions of The amazing story of me

Oh this sums his attitude up so well.

We need that on tshirts.

please can we have that "Lo, a man has appeared" cartoon now?

Your wish is my command

www.mumsnet.com/uploads/talk/201408/large-991536-behold.jpg

I no longer believe that sporting bodies believe it's fair. They just don't care. That weightlifter being allowed to compete against women was the giddy limit, but NZ was 100% behind the 'fairness' of it.

NZ was 100% behind the 'fairness' of it
I had a really interesting conversation with a Kiwi relative. She started from this position since it was fair for Hubbard to compete within the rules
The strength of New Zealanders' support of national sporting teams and individuals is well-known.
Those who criticised Hubbard were viewed (I think) primarily through this lens.
There have also been individuals in public life who are also transgender for quite a long time & my relative felt that in general Kiwis were more accepting.

So the Kiwis that your relative knows are quite happy that women are losing to natal men in sports? Women’s happiness being sacrificed in order to please men. No change there.

And this is why it's problematic to have professional sportspeople at all. Tom Daley has done something harder than most of us will ever do, for years, but he has lived a skewed and distorted life where he is always at the centre and his needs come first. If you live that life for ten years plus it's bloody difficult to grow up IMO and see other people as perhaps having needs that could mean yours won't be met. See also footballers, rugby players (in Ulster and elsewhere) etc.

We used not to have that many professional sportspeople but twenty years ago decided to buy more Olympic medals. I wonder what kind of father Tom will be to a completely dependent and demanding new baby that disrupts his life and training.