FA Policy

[aaarrrggghhhh]

www.thefa.com/news/2016/mar/22/guidance-trans-people-in-football

This was referenced in the TransPark Deletion thread but I thought in and of itself was worthy of consideration.

My own view is that its great that the FA has a policy to protect the rights and interests of a section of the population that does indeed suffer from awful discrimination and abuse. However, my concern is that the policy is very much based on a particular ideology of transgender.

More articulate people than me can articulate why aspects of this ideology shits all over the rights and women and girls.

And tbh I don't think its particularly helpful to many trans people either - especially the emphasis on it not being a mental illness - gender dysphoria sounds horrific to me and something that people need huge amounts of trained medical support for.

My own view is that many arsehole men in power in football - consciously or not - would have been delighted to be allowed to champion a policy to put women in sport back into their place. I doubt they care in the least about transgender people.

I assume that these are all drafted by transgender policy consultancies - what amazes me is how uncritically this ideology is accepted.

Just had a quick skim of the guidelines.

For over 19s:

This policy is broadly that:

• a player will almost always be authorised to play in the team of their self-identified gender if they can show:

• their hormones have settled in the range ‘typically’ associated with their self-identified gender,

• their gender has been reassigned through surgery.

Seems like they have seen the male-bodied man self-identifying as a woman thing coming and tried to close the door.

But it looks like men can play in a women's team if they have surgery and take hormones.

Will read more later.