Poll: 62% say “Trans women" should not be allowed in women's sport

[BlackForestCake]

New poll commissioned by Wings over Scotland:
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Q. The former tennis player Martina Navratilova recently expressed the view that "trans women" - biologically-male people who identify as female - should not be allowed to compete against women in women's sports such as tennis because their male physiology gives them an unfair advantage in sports where size/musculature/strength are factors. What is your opinion?

“Trans women” should NOT be allowed to compete against biological women in physical sports
Total 62%
Men 18-34 61%
Men 35-54 67%
Men 55+ 76%
Women 18-34 43%
Women 35-54 53%
Women 55+ 68%

“Trans women” SHOULD be allowed to compete against biological women in physical sports
Total 12%
Men 18-34 14%
Men 35-54 12%
Men 55+ 5%
Women 18-34 23%
Women 35-54 14%
Women 55+ 8%

Don't know
Total 26%
Men 18-34 24%
Men 35-54 21%
Men 55+ 19%
Women 18-34 34%
Women 35-54 32%
Women 55+ 24%

Panelbase, April 18-24, sample size 2,030.

This is the blog post with more details. Full data will be available somewhere on his website. wingsoverscotland.com/the-rights-of-women/#more-108873

I'm in that 55+ age group and despair at what I hear from younger women on this and some other feminist issues. This very day I overheard a conversation between two young women (25) about how TERFs are such a problem and something must be done to counter their voices. This was in the context of an art exhibition in a local public space.
Fwiw, I'm very much live and let live, but believe that the solution isn't "anybody not 'straight man' is 'woman' ". The trans agenda is extremely concerning.

Funny that women 18-34 are the biggest demographic in favour of TW competing on gender, not sex, considering that they are the ones with the most to lose here. I am guessing they have been brainwashed so much by third wave ‘intersectional’ aka male driven feminism that they can’t recognise a situation that threatens their own rights anymore

Or maybe they are people who identify as female.

Sex related stats are pretty useless if people are allowed to declare themselves to be whatever sex they want.

I'm in the same age group Kedgeree and was voicing some of my concerns to a young relative only to be told, 'If you read it on mumsnet it's not true, everyone knows they just make up extreme stuff'.

I don’t think the debate is treating transwomen or biological women fairly. It’s a bit all or nothing. Transwomen should be able to play sport, just like everyone else. We just need to find a way of making it fair and safe in competition, which might vary from sport to sport. I wish we could have a more nuanced debate about this.

Yes, I agree with this. Not all elite sports even have the same kinds of issues, so there does seem to be sense in looking at case by case basis. But maybe more importantly, a lot of sports aren't highly competitive, they are for fun and getting some exercise. I think we should be putting a lot more emphasis on this kind of sport, really, including for kids, for reasons totally unrelated to the trans athlete issue. There is a lot of room for making situational decisions for that kind of sport.

Transwomen should be able to play sport, just like everyone else.

They can play in the male category, no?

Either the sport is mixed sex, like shooting or dressage, or it is sex-segregated.

Nobody is stopping transwomen playing sport. They may have to play on men's teams or against other transwomen, that's all. Sport is still available to them just not "validating". So?

For example, gymnastics never validated me, I'm too tall and uncoordinated, I have learned to live with it. Currently the hurdles, which I love, fails to validate me as a woman: my stiff old bones can't take the jarring and my hormones are making my middle thick and my strength lower. Doing hurdles no longer leaves me feeling brave and stunning with my powerful womanly body. Should I be allowed to compete against ten year olds in the hope I feel validated? Or the paralympics in a division where my lack of the relevant disability lets me win? Of course not. Winning races and feeling fabulous isn't a human right.

It is damaging to perpetuate the idea that a woman is a weak man. To let men play sport against women you just have to decide how much to weaken him so he doesn't win too easily. No!

^Toorah no it wasn't a Twitter poll.
It's not clear from their posted results on Twitter exactly what their methodology was but it seems to be a genuine survey based on a cross section of Scottish people.^

I imagine it was a similar methodology to the other Wings polls on this issue, which involved a representative sample of a couple of thousand people.

Ffs. It’s the same argument over and over again.

Nobody is saying transwomen can’t take part in sport.
Nobody is saying transwomen can’t exist.

How do we get past this? Why doesn’t everyone see that it’s nothing more than emotional blackmail and manipulation?

Wings uses Panelbase for his polls. His polling archive here.

The results are similar to the Fair Play for Women poll I posted some time ago: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3554649-Fair-Play-for-Women-poll-on-transgender-issues

I, too, was disgusted at the relatively high trans support from women and wondered if these results included transwomen. However, I think there are too few tw to have made such a difference.
The FPFW poll was explicit in explaining that the questions meant intact biological men, so that excuse was eliminated.
It's just women being nice and non-judgemental, as usual. Same old same old.

I did that survey via Panelbase. I did this one and one a few months ago that was basically the same. There were a lot of other questions too about Brexit and Scottish indepence. I wonder how the screening works for it. It was clear that I got into the survey because I'm a resident in Scotland but that would mean there would be no responses from the rest UK. Maybe the survey has more questions for Scotland residents.

If you mean the Wings poll, he usually only polls people in Scotland, because the focus of his blog is very much Scottish independence and Scottish politics.

There is a new W Series (Formula 3) for women starting on 4th/5th May on Channel 4. David Coulthard, Ted Kravitz and Lee McKenzie will be doing the commentating. First race is at Hockenheim in Germany.
I will certainly be watching it.
I am trying to keep positive about women's sports, hoping that the ruling bodies will see sense, so I decided to put this on here.
A bit of a dreail but at least it is positive.

www.autosport.com/w/news/143052/w-series-recruits-f1-presenters-for-tv-coverage

Sadly, very few young women aged 18-34 participate in sport themselves or even watch it. So my guess is that that’s a combination of “ let’s be nice to these poor opressed people “ and “ personally I don’t give a fuck, it won’t affect me “.

Wings uses Panelbase for his polls

And presumably only anyone following him Twitter or his website will know about them?

18-34 females 😕 sad but not surprising, the ones that I know that have been to uni are the ones likely to be in favour of TWAW and those that haven't more likely to think TWAM.

I have a family member who went, school - uni - masters - PGCE - teaching never really left education system and is SOOOO woke it's sad. Every single woke fad she gets obsessed with and her friends are as bad - she dare not even tell them she has no student debt (parents funded her uni) as they might stop being her friend!!! Total group thunk no individual thoughts allowed.

Unless they defined what 'trans woman' means, or discussed the different criteria used to define 'trans' in sport, the survey is meaningless.

I agree with Merry.

Most people on the street believe a transwoman is a woman transitioning to male. They also treat as utterly ludicrous that anybody would even consider letting a male-bodied person complete as a woman. The survey is therefore suspect unless they explained up front what they meant by TW.

I have been pondering this a lot recently and I think so much of this is down to 'exclusion' being considered an evil, evil thing. Tied in with current parenting trends of never dealing children hard truths and always having to be kind and fair, and you end up with stats like 23% of young women thinking it's fine to send women's sport down the swanney, and everyone getting up in arms about 'meanness'.

Looks like those of us raised in a rather more brutal world are more able to see what's what, and not care so much if feelings are hurt when the truth is spoken.

I share Stephen Fry's views on the proper reaction to "I'm offended".

Most people on the street believe a transwoman is a woman transitioning to male

Really? Even after Caitlin Jenner? I have no time for Stuart Campbell and Wings Over Scotland but I doubt very much that the site's coverage of trans issues has not been quite clear as to what he is referring to.

It's by no means the first time the site has covered trans issues.

I think most people on the street think a transwoman means a person has had what is called 'bottom surgery'.

They would be aghast if they knew beardy Bob from accountants in his suit with a wife and children is 'a woman'.

I did that survey. The term transwoman was defined on every page just like in the question in the OP.

Again with this weird take that objecting to males in female sporting categories means you don't want anyone who is trans playing sport.

Literally no one has that stated aim, just as no one who says they don't call a man 'she' is wishing death upon that man.

FFS.