Do trans women have to have had HRT to compete in women's support?

[Sprockerdilerock]

Just wondering if anyone knows the answer to this.

I have been reading the debates in the news about Biden allowing trans women to compete alongside women in sports.

However I also know that not all of those who consider themselves trans women suffer from gender dysphoria or go down the medication/surgery route.

So would these non medicated TW be allowed to compete with women too, or are there certain conditions they have to meet?

Sorry if this is a silly question, its just I can't find the answer anywhere but on Twitter so many people are claiming its fine for TW to compete because the medication removes any physical advantages of them being male bodied.

Thanks

As far as I know no they don't

At high school level in the USA there is no need for any physical changes or hormone treatment.

In terms of actual regulations it varies depending on the sport and the level - e.g. in rugby trans women are banned from women's sport at elite level because it is too dangerous to women to have male-bodied people on the pitch. www.theguardian.com/sport/2020/oct/09/world-rugby-bans-trans-women-from-elite-womens-game-due-to-injury-risks

The medication does not remove the physical advantages of being born male or going through male puberty, and as you quite rightly note, plenty of trans women do not undergo any medical or physical intervention.

So doesn't the whole argument about MTF being indistinguishable from women fall down here?

many people are claiming its fine for TW to compete because the medication removes any physical advantages of them being male bodied

No hormone treatment on earth will change their bone structure. So their claim is untrue anyway.

This might also be useful: www.researchgate.net/publication/346774077_Transgender_Women_in_the_Female_Category_of_Sport_Perspectives_on_Testosterone_Suppression_and_Performance_Advantage

"...the performance gap between males and females becomes significant at puberty and often amounts to 10–50% depending on sport. The performance gap is more pronounced in sporting activities relying on muscle mass and explosive strength, particularly in the upper body. Longitudinal studies examining the effects of testosterone suppression on muscle mass and strength in transgender women consistently show very modest changes, where the loss of lean body mass, muscle area and strength typically amounts to approximately 5% after 12 months of treatment. Thus, the muscular advantage enjoyed by transgender women is only minimally reduced when testosterone is suppressed. Sports organizations should consider this evidence when reassessing current policies regarding participation of transgender women in the female category of sport."

When males take female hormones they are not replacing anything.

It's hormone therapy, but it isn't HRT.

Some sports require Athletes who were born male to take drugs to suppress their testosterone levels.
Their levels will usually still be higher than amongst female competitors and remember, they have also gone through male puberty, benefitting from the physiological benefits in terms of height, lung capacity and strength.

Trans-identifying men/TW don’t have “HRT” because they aren’t “replacing” hormones that would naturally have been present but have diminished through age or illness. There is no requirement outside professional sport for reduced T levels, and even with prof sport, the proposed level vastly exceeds the normal female range.
This also doesn’t take into account the ‘mechanical’ differences between men and women-from differently angled pelvis, to lung and heart capacity, to different muscle response time. None of these advantages are affected by either reduction of male hormone (T) or by the addition of non-naturally occurring female hormones.
The same is true, in reverse, for trans identifying women /transmen.

At top level the Olympic rules are testosterone suppression to under 10 nmol/l for at least 1 year.

Many sports follow that, some use 5 nmol/l.

Women's typical level is around 1.5 nmol/l. A woman at 5 nmol/l should be seeking medical attention.

But there's no mechanism in place to enforce that that I'm aware of.

At lower levels, there's no realistic chance of testing - just as you can't necessarily expect drugs tests, and many sports have not been mandating any hormone treatment. Many males competing in college sports have been doing so unmedicated.

And it is almost certainly far from true that lowering testosterone removes any physical advantage. Masculinisation is accumulated - stopping the testosterone doesn't make a man's body suddenly start dissolving.

And males have fundamentally different skeletal structure regardless - even if they were castrated/puberty blocked.

It's no more reasonable to believe that giving drugs to a man will make him perform like a woman than giving drugs to a man will make him perform like a boy, or giving drugs to a horse would make it perform like a man.

A woman is not just a man without testosterone.

Here's one of the key academic papers on the subject recently - a review of previous research

link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40279-020-01389-3

Hopefully someone else can find one of the easy-to-digest visual summaries of the paper.

Conclusion:

We have shown that under testosterone suppression regimes typically used in clinical settings, and which comfortably exceed the requirements of sports federations for inclusion of transgender women in female sports categories by reducing testosterone levels to well below the upper tolerated limit, evidence for loss of the male performance advantage, established by testosterone at puberty and translating in elite athletes to a 10–50% performance advantage, is lacking. Rather, the data show that strength, lean body mass, muscle size and bone density are only trivially affected. The reductions observed in muscle mass, size, and strength are very small compared to the baseline differences between males and females in these variables, and thus, there are major performance and safety implications in sports where these attributes are competitively significant.

So doesn't the whole argument about MTF being indistinguishable from women fall down here?

It falls down on every level...

Physiological, anatomical, biomechanics, anthropometric, cellular, endocrinological, reality, truth, semantics, ethics, opportunity, fairness, logic...

How long have you got?

A woman with a TW’s history or level of testosterone would be banned for life.

doesn't the whole argument about MTF being indistinguishable from women fall down here

I'm not sure it ever got up in the first place. Have you seen many MTF?

Sure, some can pass in well-posed pictures, but in an athletic setting?

Have you seen the footage of Yearwood and Miller in the Connecticut college events? You wouldn't know they were supposed to be female other than long hair and the fact they've been placed in a girls' race.

They're obviously not physically the same - they're able to easily win despite much poorer running form.

UppityPuppity

Ah, here's a good video based on that paper:

Thank you for all the links! I will have a read.

And here's a good panel discussion, featuring Dr Emma Hilton, one of the co-authors of the paper:

Other guests:

Dr. Kristopher Hunt - ER Physician and Medical Director for USA Powerlifting
Colin Wright - Evolutionary Biologist
Inga Thompson - U.S. - former Olympic cyclist
Sharron Davies - U.K. - former Olympic swimmer

Hard as it is to believe, a whole bunch of the political class, including sporting bodies, has taken leave of their senses, particularly in the U.S. This drive for "inclusion" has caused people to totally deny reality, make unfounded claims about the effects of testosterone suppression, and even lose track of what separate women's sport is for.

It's taken a little time for people to realise this, but the correction is underway. World Rugby is currently in the lead. Here's a presentation about World Rugby's conclusions by Ross Tucker:

vimeo.com/475933330

boysvswomen.com/?fbclid=IwAR2s1izxSCo3TxjnbPLh54-wXZyKbVo-nTolCMK3AU7WjDqUpt9hxglK-DA#/

The UK Football Association's guidance on trans inclusion is a complete car crash. First they define trans people, explicitly including 'people who may cross dress some or all of the time' and saying people don't need to have done anything to transition (i.e. hormones or surgery) - it can be purely social.

It then goes on to completely misstate the protections in the Equality Act and lists as examples of discrimination such things as ''refusing to let a trans woman play on the women’s team."

It says "Trans people should have access to the toilets, showers and changing rooms of their self-identified gender" and "Some trans women may be happy to change or shower in open facilities alongside other women." Remember, this explicitly includes part time cross dressers.
In order to accommodate non-binary people it recommends "Ideally, making all toilets, showers and changing cubicles gender neutral . This would be best practice ."

While the FA acknowledges that the law says that trans people may be treated differently in relation to sport if it is necessary to ensure fairness of competition – or safety of competitors in a ‘gender-affected activity’, they say those who have reduced their hormone levels and had surgery will almost always be cleared to play as the gender they choose because "their physical capacity is likely to fall within the range expected of that gender."

We are then treated to a text-book example of 'the range' argument.

"We might consider whether a trans woman’s physical capacity falls outside the entire spectrum of women . Or whether a trans man’s physical capacity falls outside the entire spectrum of men . For instance, we say that all women can play women’s football – we do not say that only women of average physical capacity can play women’s football . Likewise we say all men can play men’s football – we do not say that only men of average physical capacity can play men’s football .
Footballers come in all shapes and sizes . That’s the beauty of the game . consider the wide range of physicalities of players such as Peter crouch and Lionel messi, Diego maradona and Joe hart in the men’s game . Likewise England internationals Jill Scott and Fran Kirby are 5 ft 11 inches and 5 ft 1 inch respectively ."

However, my absolutely favourite part is this paragraph.

"On occasions a trans woman may be a better player than some of her team mates, or even the best player on the team . as with any other player, this may reflect a range of factors including her physical capacity, her temperament, past access to playing opportunities and coaching, and the time and effort she has invested in practice and skills development . her status as a woman should not be questioned simply because she is good at football – being good at football is to be celebrated."

Fucking hell, truthlikeness that’s a mess

I said a couple of years ago that following the reasoning used for including transwomen in women’s sport, there was no logical basis to exclude male bodied non binaries from the women’s categories. I was roundly told, by some very impressively bearded chaps to stop being silly, of course that wouldn’t happen! This was only for transwomen.

Oh, look.

The FA is a Stonewall diversity champion, as is Sport England (who oversee the policies of the sport my DCs used to play)

@NancyDrawed

The FA is a Stonewall diversity champion, as is Sport England (who oversee the policies of the sport my DCs used to play)

Seems to me that the FA, failing miserably to counter homophobia (how many openly gay players at last count?) are delighted to find an alternative way to achieve 'diversity'.

Exactly, errol. It’s much, much easier to emotionally blackmail and guilt trip women for not being nice than it is men. I’ve always found women’s sport to be extremely welcoming to gay and bisexual women, but the same cannot be said of men’s sport.

There are very high numbers of gay women in football. The forced inclusion of even small numbers of transwomen could be devastating for the camaraderie we enjoy, quite apart from the increased risk of physical harm and being utterly demoralising in terms of performance.