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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Feminism: chat

See all MNHQ comments on this thread

Original poster

Trans Park Run Deletion

991 replies

TheUterati · 30/04/2018 12:25

Poorly played, MN, very poorly played.

The perspective that when male athletes identify as female athletes and on the basis of that are eligible to compete against women, they are cheating is an absolutely valid one that is deserving of discussion.

Points in its favour are:

  1. The context of cheating in sports as a whole - those self-harming activities that athletes willingly participate in to give themselves a competitive edge.
  2. The evidence that mediocre male athletes who identify as female manage to then carve out glittering careers where those would not be available to them had they continued to compete as males.

It is an absolutely valid perspective.

Accusations of cheating against specific individuals may well be against talk guidelines, in the absence of supporting evidence, but those individual posts can be deleted and a friendly warning from MNHQ posted on the thread.

Males identifying as females and competing in female sports is a key issue in GRA, whether it occurs at the 'social, fun' end of things or at at Olympic level. To silence this debate is an appallingly heavy-handed.

OP posts:
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Trousersdontmakemeaman · 30/04/2018 16:11

richmarr is getting close to bingo

busyboysmum · 30/04/2018 16:11

Yes I would agree with biologically female sports and then "other" as the other category.

Terfulike · 30/04/2018 16:15

What like Women and Non women?

Terfulike · 30/04/2018 16:16

The Green Party like that kind of clarity don't they?

OnTheList · 30/04/2018 16:18

I did consider women and non-women actually Grin I don't think men would go for that somehow. And obviously describing a transwoman as a non-woman would not go down too well either. So biologically female and other is the best phrasing I could think of.

AlecTrevelyan006 · 30/04/2018 16:21

Rich - there have been lots of studies why teenage girls drop out of sport and physical activity

Google is your friend

Sophia2222 · 30/04/2018 16:24

I wonder if Lily will be doing the women's race for life this year?

Trousersdontmakemeaman · 30/04/2018 16:24

This reply has been deleted

Message deleted by MNHQ. Here's a link to our Talk Guidelines.

Trousersdontmakemeaman · 30/04/2018 16:27

Who had the lemon curd recipe?

Rufustheconstantreindeer · 30/04/2018 16:31

trouser

thebewildreness

FloraFox · 30/04/2018 16:33

Exclusing people is directly damaging, so if you want that to happen I'd expect a high quality argument, and ideally evidence.

What's your evidence that this is damaging?

What exposure are you suggesting girls will have to trans athletes, and at what age, and in what numbers? In what other field has a similar effect been observed that we can use as a benchmark for this consequence you're predicting?

If you are proposing a change in the law to allow trans identified males to compete in women's sports, the onus is on you to produce the evidence that this will not harm girls' participation in sports.

SardineReturns · 30/04/2018 16:33

"I very clearly asked for a reasoned argument, ideally evidence. By that I don't mean that you should have a study, I mean that you should be able to explain the chain of events through which girls become disengaged with sport so that each part can be discussed."

Right-ho...

So, I wonder if anything like that exists? How could anyone possible find out?

here, let me google that for you

As per my post:

"It is difficult enough to retain engagement of girls with sports at secondary and past that, for a variety of reasons, some connected to our bodies (periods (swimming / martial arts outfits / pain etc), breasts (uncomfortable / embarassing / etc) and social reasons (girls not wanting to be seen red faced / sweaty / hair out of order etc).

This issue and the reasons are well known."

When posters say, this is reasonably well know, it is because it is reasonably well known. For anyone who has any intterest in women and girls, women's rights, that sort of stuff. As most posters in feminism chat might be expected to have.

So there you go, off you go and read that lot, maybe you can track back to some of the studies around this yourself.

ReluctantCamper · 30/04/2018 16:35

So taking self ID out of the equation, you are saying that fully transitioned males to females are still male?

Yes. Humans cannot change sex.

Can you not see that that is kind of the definition of transphobic?

No. Transphobia is prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed towards a trans person solely on the basis of the fact that they are trans. Understanding that humans cannot change sex and making judgements and decisions based on this fact is not transphobia.

I would say that preferring to believe that a person wishing to dress or behave according to stereotypes traditionally associated with the opposite sex has changed sex than rather accept them as a gender non conforming individual is in fact transphobic.

SardineReturns · 30/04/2018 16:36

I mean if we are to start at sqaure 1 here, with facts like girls in school in UK being disengaged with sports being challenged then we are never going to get anywhere.

I suppose the desire to get women to produce evidence and studies to support each and every well known and accepted fact they they state is a distarcting technique.

ReluctantCamper · 30/04/2018 16:37

and this
If you are proposing a change in the law to allow trans identified males to compete in women's sports, the onus is on you to produce the evidence that this will not harm girls' participation in sports

we have a well established, fair method of dividing people into categories for certain sports. If you wish to change that the onus should be on you to explain why, and how fairness is retained.

CadyHeron · 30/04/2018 16:43

Transphobia is prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed towards a trans person solely on the basis of the fact that they are trans

Making them feel excluded from an inclusionary, for everyone event, kind of is discriminating against them though.

Ereshkigal · 30/04/2018 16:44

they don't have an attempted suicide rate of 40%, so this is not an area where I personally am comfortable coming to hasty judgements.

That is not a reliable statistic for several reasons which have been frequently discussed here.

Ereshkigal · 30/04/2018 16:45

we have a well established, fair method of dividing people into categories for certain sports. If you wish to change that the onus should be on you to explain why, and how fairness is retained.

Yes. Your move.

Ereshkigal · 30/04/2018 16:45

Making them feel excluded from an inclusionary, for everyone event, kind of is discriminating against them though.

But you think it's ok to "discriminate" when it's a competition?

LangCleg · 30/04/2018 16:47

Making them feel excluded from an inclusionary, for everyone event, kind of is discriminating against them though.

How is saying please classify yourself as assisted so that other participants can accurately measure their performance against the average for their sex and age excluding them?

Ereshkigal · 30/04/2018 16:47

By the way, no one is suggesting that they shouldn't participate. Just that they shouldn't do it in the wrong sex class.

AngryAttackKittens · 30/04/2018 16:47

"I very clearly asked for a reasoned argument, ideally evidence. By that I don't mean that you should have a study, I mean that you should be able to explain the chain of events through which girls become disengaged with sport so that each part can be discussed."

I'm sorry, I think I missed the part where anyone here volunteered to be your research assistant?

OnTheList · 30/04/2018 16:48

Making them feel excluded from an inclusionary, for everyone event, kind of is discriminating against them though.

Id it really excluding someone, to ask them to correctly identify their sex?

Though, from the other thread, it seems they ask for 'gender', which is problematic in itself as it makes no sense at all to record gender.

While we split athletes and such by sex, it makes no sense to...not split them by sex in some cases. Same as the sex segregation thing, if its been deemed necessary, then it again makes no sense to say that its not necessary if the person just says they are the opposite sex (with no changes, I do personally think transitioned transsexuals are a different kettle of fish, so to speak)

Mumtobe25 · 30/04/2018 16:49

This actually makes me feel a lot better I read about how the conversation devolved into transphobic remarks regardless of any civility that may have preceeded, as a member who has benefited so much from this wonderful network especially with my partners visa stuff and childcare advice it always saddens me when I hear some of the worst transphobic men and women claiming to speak for mumsnet. I even avoided coming on here for a long time because I hate the hostile environment towards trans people it seemed to have become. I'm sure lots of transmen & transwomen out there will be fantastic parents and they shouldn't feel alienated they should feel welcome to ask the advice of so many great parents.

Sorry to ramble but I came back online recently and decided to check this out as it was an active thread about trans people yet again but pleasantly surprised you took a stand against trans hate good on you MNHQ.

AngryAttackKittens · 30/04/2018 16:50

I don't really bake, but if anyone needs to know how to make spicy stir-fried things I'm at your service!

If you're nice and polite, that is. Not providing recipes for those who make a list of demands and then stand there tapping their foot all "hop to it, skivvy".