Nic Williams on Woman's Hour (Tuesday) talking about sport and gender identity

[OrchidInTheSun]

twitter.com/fairplaywomen/status/1069731404488077318?s=21

Nic Williams will be debating with Beth Jones, who is an academic at Nottingham Trent www.ntu.ac.uk/staff-profiles/social-sciences/dr-beth-jones

Sponsors and collaborators
Beth’s main collaborators are Prof Jon Arcelus and Prof Walter Bouman from the University of Nottingham. She has also worked internationally with Dr Tim van de Grift (Amsterdam University Medical Center), Dr Cecilia Dhejne (Karolinska Institutet), Dr Griet De Cuypere (Ghent University).

Beth has also worked collaboratively with the Nottingham Centre for Transgender Health, Gendered Intelligence, Leicester LGBT center and Cancer Research UK

Title IX in the US was originally brought in to balance the spending on men and women’s sports. Thanks to Obama’s intervention Title IX has been reinterpreted to apply to gender. That means in order to satisfy the rules funding can go fifty percent to men and fifty percent to transwomen. Natal women don’t have to receive a cent.

I just read the Woman's Hour thread on this. They're all so whiny and petulant. It's all about how mean WH is for discussing these issues on the programme. I mean, imagine women discussing issues that affect women! How dare they! And then some shit about how it's not "transwomen", it's "trans women", and implying that Dr Nic isn't an expert, and that they ought to talk to a trans woman who play sport.

I honestly don't know which is worst: the extreme stupidity, the extreme narcissism, or the quite exceptional degree of petulance. It's like being on a Twitter thread full of Violet Elizabeth Botts.

I'm thinking that many Unis must have got rid of their critically thinking older staff as too expensive .........

Are Unis really fit for purpose anymore at delivering high-quality thinking and research?

Looking at the way that piece of research and it’s conclusions are explained, the language is very interesting. Because it talks specifically about research into trans individuals in competitive sport as a specific group, about which there is little evidence relating to competitive advantage in sport. Which is true.

So despite an overwhelming body of evidence to demonstrate that males will have an advantage over females, you could argue that if we are taking trans people as another (and completely separate) group for research purposes, then there is no research and therefore no evidence.

I was watching Sky Sports News the other night and they featured a trans woman who plays in a women's football team. It was all 'this is great' and 'everyone is so accepting' apart from the one nasty team that targeted them with sly tackles etc. Nothing at all was mentioned of their physical advantage, bigger lung capacity, bigger muscles etc. I was more surprised that only one team had appeared to object, the team has a distinct advantage, what is stoping any women's team of being made up of trans women.

Oh and they couldn't play on a men's team, as men are mean and nasty. Sort it out men.

It is good that sport is open to all, and it should be, but current policy is doing women a massive disservice.

How can someone come out with this with a straight face? It's absolutely ridiculous.

Can anyone link to WH's Twitter feed about this? I'm not quite up to speed with Twitter yet 😳.

BBC WH: twitter.com/BBCWomansHour/status/1069924328387592193

This should work:

twitter.com/BBCWomansHour/status/1069728063255134208

mobile.twitter.com/BBCWomansHour/status/1069897614697684992

Thanks 🙂!

@arranbubonicplague,

"(e.g., sprinting didn't turn up for women until the 1960s for the Olympics"

The 100 metres for women was introduced at the 1928 Amsterdam Olympics.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athletics_at_the_1928_Summer_Olympics#Women

It is true that a parity between women's and men's events has only been a recent thing.
I think that the East German women used to hold the overall World record for small bore rifle.

The 100 metres for women was introduced

Agreed, I unintentionally deleted the relevant info. of the 400m event when I was editing it.

The 1964 Summer Olympics were the first to feature the women's 400 metres.[1]

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athletics_at_the_1964_Summer_Olympics_–_Women%27s_400_metres

So despite an overwhelming body of evidence to demonstrate that males will have an advantage over females, you could argue that if we are taking trans people as another (and completely separate) group for research purposes, then there is no research and therefore no evidence.

and drive a coach and horses through fact - historical and biological as well as common sense. Presumably, this is why Nic agreed that more research was needed into that group - but why then is the elephant in the room not mentioned? That doesn't mean that the default position is that there should be no more single-sex sport

The sports bodies are like all other organisations dominated by men - blind to women

We can argue back and forth with them till the cows come home

It comes down, as it always comes down, to the belief 'transwomen are women'.

Either you hold it, or you don't. If you do hold it, then in the words of Dickens, nothing hereafter will make sense. But that's ok, because TWAW. It's an article of faith regardless of fact or logic. Hence the bullying and nagging about the damned space and where to put it because trans_women is about servicing and enforcing the belief that TW ARE W. It's insidious.

But as a faith and belief, no organisation has any business enforcing this belief on others, or making massive, unilateral changes to national services and activities such as sport in line with a belief that others - the majority of others - quite reasonably do not share in. It is quite reasonable to believe that transwomen are men, and for your reality to function accordingly.

Freedom of belief.

the androgenisation of Easter European athletes in the 1970s. That was not fair. And it is now unacceptable. What is the difference between this and making it acceptable for trans women to complete in sports against women?

There is no difference as far as I can see either (and welcome to you, andy and other delurkers)

If testosterone makes no difference, please can someone explain these stats to me?

These four women's Olympic records are suspected to be drug enhanced, but as this has never been proved they remain on the record books. They are:

100m - 10.49 sec
200m - 21.34 sec
400m - 47.6 sec
800m 1:53.28

I looked at the US Youth Olympics all time records to see how they stack up against the fastest boys. In other words, if these women (all competing in the prime of their careers, running times that women have not been able to achieve since) had been running alongside boys / young men, how would they fare?

These are the records for boys aged 13-14:

100m - 10.94 sec
200m - 21.84 sec
400m - 47.16 sec
800m - 1.56:36

These are the records for boys aged 15-16:

100m - 10.51 sec
200m - 21.10 sec
400m - 45.99 sec
800m - 1:50.51

The records for boys aged 11-12 (ie before puberty takes effect )are significantly slower

If it's not testosterone and male physique, why are 13-14 year old boys running faster than elite, trained women (possibly) with additional help?

If scientists have jumped to the conclusion that testosterone is not such a big factor, they need to tell us what is. Because otherwise they just look like inept, weak, idiots who are happy to see the end of women's sport

@arranbubonicplague,

Great link, that was the first Olympics I watched. Ann Packer got silver in the 400m and gold in the 800m.
When you think of the damage that this movement/cult could do to women's sport.
Just imagine if Usain Bolt was to come out of retirement and identify as a woman, it would be laughable if it wasn't so serious.
This didn't happen in the end (I hope) but would anyone have known if it had?

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3671937/Transgender-British-athletes-born-men-set-make-Olympic-history-competing-games-women.html

eu.usatoday.com/story/sports/olympics/rio-2016/2016/07/19/out-transgender-olympics-rio-caitlyn-jenner-chris-mosier/87188798/

I don't even know how many folks realise that the IOC is pushing through all these rules which make it easier for transgender atheletes to compete.

Do they have a dispensing machine for PhDs these days?

Look, you just need to take ANY athletics event. Let’s say the great north run. Plot Male times and Female times. Averages and winning times. What does that show you? Doh...

‘Only been around since 1964’ isn’t an argument ffs. Unless you’ve got people who were born in 1964 or before running...

It isn’t ‘level of testosterone on the day’ that dictates performance. It’s the fact that the male body has been sculpted by testosterone since birth, a process which becomes even more pronounced in puberty. Men have a more robust skeletal system. They have a higher VOmax, they have longer levers (limbs) bigger hearts, deeper chests, bigger lungs. A more robust muscular with stronger muscle attachmemts. The angle of the thighs to pelvis alone gives men an advantage in running. If you reduced a man’s testosterone to the lowest level of the women’s range he would STILL have all those advantages. A man matched for height and weight will still be stronger and have those advantages.

and yes of course trans people should compete in sport. Sport is great.

In their own categories. Not in the women’s