New Ross Tucker podcast episode on Transwomen in Sport

[LillithTheLynx]

Just uploaded on Spotify - hopefully I haven't missed a previous thread. Not had a chance to listen yet, but given previous excellent episodes on the Real Science of Sport Podcast I thought I should flag!

Ross Tucker is great. Off to find it and have a listen.

It is excellent, just listening to it now. He knows his stuff. He really seems to get it beyond sports too.

Thanks Lillith. That is great.

Ross Tucker is a straight talker while being very respectful. The way he lays out the theory of just why males should not be allowed to compete in the female category is very clear. As he, and others, put it, you would not allow an adult to compete in the under 16s, and you would not allow an able athlete to compete in any Paralympic event.

I am off to have a listen.

“Ivy McKinnon is being extremely disingenuous and dishonest”

A brilliant podcast. Thanks for the recommendation.

Tucker is generally great, but it always niggles me that has never come out and been absolutely clear on the Semenya issue, rather he’s deftly skirted around the truth. Presumably this is because as a South African he knows if he came out and said “Semenya is male and in no way qualifies for women’s sport” he would be crucified, which is a shame as it would put the whole saga to bed, given his status. Still, I’ll give this a listen as he’s been good generally on this.

I think that he, like me, struggles to square the understanding of Semenya as a child, unknowing and eternally different, with the teen, being used by others who had a good idea but said nothing, and the adult, who knows but doesn't want to lose earning power.

I feel the child/early teen is fully deserving of sympathy and support.

The adult attitude just makes that too unsavoury.

But who kows how the adult would be if the child/teen had not been exploited?

The real science podcast

“Why transgender athletes threaten fairness in women’s sport” from 20th May 2021

Is the easy to listen to and best analysis of all the questions about fairness in sport that I have heard. Ross has clearly considered all the arguments in great detail. He started from a position of believing inclusion was a “good thing”. Then, due to becoming intimately acquainted with the evidence, he changed his position.

I was impressed by the depth and breadth of his knowledge and by the rigorous reasoning in his analysis of this topic. Clearly he understands the issues beyond his field of expertise and is up to date on the latest developments.

The podcast is really worth a listen and could be recommended to anyone who is into sport and as yet hasn’t formed an opinion on transgender athletes in sport.

He poses important questions such as how did we get to this point? How can women’s sports be protected? Why do we have a women’s category in the first place?

And of course the oft suggested by proponents of gender identity ideology “why not just separate by height and weight instead” and “but trans women are winning everything so obviously there’s no problem”.

He has heard all the arguments from the gender identity ideologues on sports and takes them apart one by one.

The power difference between a man’s punch and a woman’s is one of the facts which really impacted me.

So do look it up it is well worth a listen. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’d had a rethink on the issue of DSDs, he does touch on that subject briefly in this podcast. I need to listen again as I can’t recall precisely what he said about DSDs.

Sorry “transwomen are not winning everything so obviously there’s no problem” argument often proposed by gender identity ideologues.

This is a great resource, so clearly reasoned and respectful. They had a very useful point by point take down of Sarah Silverman's really stupid response to Jenner. Also useful, a data-led account of why the desire to be inclusive of all identity groups does/should NOT automatically override the need to provide fairness and safety in women's sports.