Australian Guardian employed H. Mouncey to write articles.
Demonstrating disregard for safety and fairness in women's sports.
Maybe simply disregard for women's sport?
2018 by Hannah Mouncey for The Guardian:
"AFL's trans participation policy sets a dangerous precedent for women
With weight being used as a measure for exclusion, women are yet again being body-shamed
(extract)
ate last week, the AFL released its long-awaited policy on transgender participation in Australian rules football. In it are a set of requirements trans women need to follow if they aim to play at AFLW level. These include having your testosterone below a certain level for two years, which I have no problem with, as well as the requirement that trans women undertake number of physical tests designed to ascertain if they have an advantage over cis women playing AFLW – the presumption being that this is because they are trans.
The reasons I’m critical of the AFL’s policy are not the reasons people may assume. Essentially, every physical requirement the policy asks me to meet I will. I know what I can do, and I know how I compare overall. Yet, there are still a number of issues surrounding how the policy is applied.
It is not yet clear, for example, if the data being used by the AFL to compare cis and trans women can be independently verified. Nor can we be sure the clubs have accurately reported their data. The question that has been answered by the AFL, however, is that if a trans athlete and a non-trans athlete were both to perform above average on their testing regime, the trans athlete would be excluded from AFLW, but the cis athlete wouldn’t. Not very consistent, or fair." (continues)
My biggest concern is the fact that weight is being used as one of the key physical measures for possible exclusion. Forget the fact that in a game that has such an emphasis on endurance and speed, being heavy is not necessarily an advantage and think about the message it sends to women and girls about their bodies: if you’re too big, you can’t play. That is incredibly dangerous and backward.
It is an especially dangerous message for girls and teenagers (trans or not) who may not understand the difference between fat or muscle: they will simply get the message that being bigger is bad. If you don’t fit a certain stereotype, or possess a certain body shape, that’s bad. This is a message constantly reinforced through all types of media and the last place it needs to be coming from is sporting organisations: the very people who are currently engaged in a conscious push to increase physical activity for women and girls, which .
The AFL should know better, as a number of its own female playing cohort – including Western Bulldogs captain Katie Brennan – have come out since the AFLW started to speak about their own prior issues with eating disorders." (continues)
www.theguardian.com/profile/hannah-mouncey