Martina has answered!

[Yeahnahyeah]

Basically saying there needs to be open debate.
www.martinanavratilova.com/

The narrative being forced around what exact criteria can we use to let men compete as women, is bringing me out in hives.

It took eighty years for women to be included in the Boston Marathon, the most prestigious race of all time. Because men said it was too arduous and they didn't want women's legs to 'get big'.

Women have consistently trailed behind men in terms of investment, resources and exposure in sport.

The male domination of sport is well documented. People are surprised when Andy Murray has to point out that female tennis players are actually included in tennis statistics, ffs.

Athletes like Kelly Holmes, Navratilova, Paula Radcliffe, and Sharron Davies are huge role models for girls and women.

The hast tag ThisGirlCan has been highly influential.

Girls need female role models in sport. They need to aspire to their sporting heroes. They need to hear about their journeys, the ups and downs, the barriers they faced, and why. They need the shared characteristics of being female to relate to the success.

Artificially weakened men pushing to beat women in sport is the opposite of empowering women. It's the opposite of aspirational to girls.

No girl on earth is going to be inspired to women's sport, by watching a drug advantaged man beat her.

The likes of McKinnon need to be told no. This is not about you, or trans, or even whether you have an advantage or not.

This is about women.

No.

EweSurname
I predict there will be a zero overlap between the groups of 'children who are transed before puberty and 'children who go on to be professional athletes'

Mainly because children from one group will be showing physical dedication to pushing their bodies to the top limits, in order to perform at their peak fitness.

These goals will not be shared with the other group of children who have issues with their natural bodies and often struggle with co existing conditions. Plus their bodies will be damaged by puberty blockers and cross sex hormones.

However a male child who is transed before puberty will still have a larger left ventricle, different pelvis type and different angled between their pelvis and legs than female child. All three of these physical differences will give a transed before puberty boy a physical advantage over a girl.

There is no way to completely remove the biological male advantage, whatever is done to the child and we should not even try.

Standard biological women (no feelings or intersex) need to compete together and an open competition for every one else.That is fair solution, which I hope we come to eventually.

Has Sharon mentioned hands and feet? Men usually have bigger hands and feet than women and both are important in swimming to move water. No hormones are going to turn a pair of size 12 feet into a pair of size 5s. Ian Thorpe has huge feet that would be like the best women swimmers wearing flippers.

Sharron dyac.

To be clear, an enumeration of 'those with male advantage', with objective scientific standards, would very likely turn out to be inclusive of all biological males, plus some intersex people and transmen on T.

Bowlofbabelfish the massive problem with the first paper is that all their cases are same-sex attracted, and their controls are opposite-sex attracted.

So all they've discovered is another genetic contribution to being gay, which is nothing particularly new. They've discovered nothing conclusive about being trans. Haven't read the other two yet.

There will never be a top athlete who transed before puberty. Athletic kids are busy obsessing about their sport (or being driven to it by their parents) from an early age. Building the skills and training and practicing, depending on the sport.
Trans kids are trailing around therapists and doctors, having their bodies drugged and the health impacted. Sitting on YouTube and tumblr and making their own clips.

Never going to happen.

Good point, Heathen - the relevant bit of the paper is:
"The association of each polymorphism with transsexualism was studied with a twofold subject-control analysis: in a homogeneous population of 549 early onset androphilic MtF transsexuals versus 728 male controls, and 425 gynephilic FtMs versus 599 female controls."

It would be interesting to see what the results looked like for gynephilic MtF.

heathen yup - I missed that! Doh! poor controls are a feature of trans studies it seems.

They also seem to accept the fmri studies we’ve seen critiqued here as evidence of a gendered brain when they are not.

The study id like to see done (which won’t be done) is looking at genetic influences in dysphoria in general, with groups of all dysphorics, within/between types and against decent controls. Then a comparison of any signals found with other conditions with fragile sense of self. And some sort of descriptive narrative alongside about societal influence on how dysphoria presents (v complex and I’m not sure how you’d do it.)

Lots of the study population are also using steroid hormones and they’re looking at steroid receptors. While obviously taking hormones isnt going to change the DNA itself, it could result in some kind of self selection within the study populations as well.

Am now rambling... but there just isnt much rigorous science in the area (probably because no o e wants to touch it with a barge pole...)

Wonderful Martina no backing down!
Yes Datun the whole premise that some weakened men can be equivalent to women makes me seeth.

Males with CAIS (complete androgen insensitivity, ie testosterone present but can’t be used, so the same as zero testosterone) are STILL closer to expected male heights. There are other factors, testosterone is a market for maleness, not the sole determinant of it.

datun and others are correct - forcing the narrative to testosterone alone, or criteria for men to compete is a wedge argument. The criteria are simple - single sex competition. No men. Again, our NO is being taken as the start point of a negotiation

The VERY rare truly intersex (0.017% of the population) atheletes can be taken case by case. If they are genetically Male they don’t compete. If they are have any unfair advantage they don’t compete against women. Harsh, but fair

PP who mentioned similar areas of the brain involved for schizophrenia - certainly born out by my family experience of schizophrenia I can say with certainty if born 20 yrs later they would have identified as trans (they identified as gay for a while despite being totally straight...the label, the grouping & the escape/reinvention were the appeal)

Am now rambling... but there just isnt much rigorous science in the area (probably because no o e wants to touch it with a barge pole...)

The ever-present danger when science gets coopted by political authoritarianism. I remember a Russian colleague of mine speculating that this was one of the reasons why Russia produced so many superb mathematicians - that during the Soviet era, maths was one of the "safe" subjects to study because it was so hard to politicise it (you wouldn't have wanted to do evolutionary biology for example and find yourself more or less forced for political reasons to sign up to Lysenko's theories.)

There will never be a top athlete who transed before puberty. Athletic kids are busy obsessing about their sport (or being driven to it by their parents) from an early age. Building the skills and training and practicing, depending on the sport.

Yes. I get the feeling that most people do not understand what it takes to become a top athlete, even a top athlete at a county or country level never mind internationally.

I have a young relative who is a hugely successful athlete mostly at a county/country level currently. That has involved training 6 days a week, competitive events at least monthly since the age of about ten. She is incredibly disciplined and also bear in mind this all fits around conventional schooling and exams too.

The thought that males can waltz in and make all the years of dedication count for nothing makes me feel righteous anger like nothing I've ever quite experienced.

I worry that the "those who have gone through male puberty can't compete" will be weaponised by trans activists into "see this is why we should give children puberty blockers and cross sex hormones earlier".

They already claim that the only reason feminists are against giving kids lifechanging drugs is because if more kids were on blockers, our arguments about men in womens sport would fall down flat Of course, thats the reason people are against giving cancer drugs to kids because they like the 'wrong'toys/colours/etc.

Well the news on radio 2 has just said Martina has apologised for using the term 'cheating' and made it sound as if she's accepted she was wrong about the issue. Which wasn't my understanding of her response

Looking at twitter last night, I saw Martina having the cotton ceiling explained to her.

She was incredulous. And outraged.

www.bbc.co.uk/sport/47433144

Typical Beeb headline and first par. One sentence cherry picked to try and negate the thrust of her argument.

Why didn't the BBC print the blog in full and let readers decide?

And why is Rachel M's picture on every fucking article?

I think BBCgate is about in implode. Someone will whistlebow.

Peak transing hard

twitter.com/Martina/status/1102199188362874880

OvaHere agree. The training is so hard. I was at school with a county swimmer, she had special permission to miss assembly to allow for morning training sessions. In the pool by 7am every day, rush to school, then two hours training most evenings. Somehow fitting in school work and nutritious meals!
Then there are all the weekend competitions. Same for practically any sport. Colleague was driving a silly distance after work yesterday for her daughter's hockey match starting at 8pm.

I can't help think if some of the "trans" children were packed off to sports school they might find they don't have time to be trans.

Yes Iused my relative is a swimmer. That's the kind of schedule I'm talking about from a very young age.

It's highly unlikely that anyone's life who was consumed by trans ideology, blockers, hormones, surgery and medical appointments could hope to commit to that rigorous lifestyle.

Oh she’s found Amy - excellent! Fantastic writer & passionate