Laurel Hubbard is the beginning of the end of women’s sports

[steakandcheeseplease]

Not sure if another thread has been started on this. This really is the end. I spent ten years being a sports coach to children. I know males and females bodies are physically different and behave different in sport. This is an absolute tragedy for our young aspiring female athletes. A mediocre male weightlifter rising to the top of the womens ranks purely because of his physiology. Stealing a place that is rightly a females. This is my actual WTF moment.

[https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/laurel-hubbard-is-the-beginning-of-the-end-of-women-s-sports]

This is a valid issue Lou

There has been discussion in the tests and assessments done to try and figure out the difference in performance between TW athletes and W athletes, where it has to be acknowledged that this cannot be done without the TW being under high pressure to under perform to produce the results that would support their choices.

If we're going to exclude female athletes for male athletes to take their place in an event (and am using sex classifications not to be offensive but because it is the sex classification that unfairly excludes and disadvantages women athletes, not the gender) and those male athletes will then under perform and avoid winning because of it creating negative attention..... what is the point of even bothering to continue with women's sports for anyone? TW or W? Who gains what, other than the obviously very valued personal emotional experience of competing publicly in a chosen gender identity? And is that experience for a TW and the nice publicity, a proportional, justifiable reason to exclude female athletes from the competition and to damage the international furthering of female sports, titles, records and the whole point of female competition for half the human race?

The name for this is male supremacism.

Indeed it is, Redapplewreath. Indeed it is.

As of course it always has been.

I agree. So depressing. Can anyone link to a petition to sign?

@LouHotel

I don't think Laurel will win. I expect they know the backlash if they do and there's more profit and exposure for them if they get to be the flag bearer of transwomen in sport because hey they didn't win like those nasty feminist said they would.

Laurel is 43 years old, surely that fact alone should already show the world "her" advantage over the women

FondofBeetles posted this on twitter:

Chances of a 43 year old female appearing in super heavyweight Olympic weightlifting?

1 in 308,000.

Hubbard is three times more likely to be struck by lightning than a 43 year old female is to appear in this event.

I don't think it's acceptable that people are saying that see Hubbard will make this more visible and the public will see. The public already see, I know it's different but they saw Semenya and whilst something has happened now it's not all over and it hasn't been properly addressed

Semenya Was a bit different though - the narrative was “thought she was a woman, always told she was a women, lived as a woman all her life, these tests now are a total surprise to her, poor thing”

Now as we know that was kinda lies, but at the time that was the narrative.

Whether Hubbard gets a medal or not, a young woman has been denied the opportunity to become an Olympian

@ArabellaScott

Baffling that anyone can argue this is fair. Utterly baffling.

I know.

It's Doublethink though. It's Orwellian. The whole thing is Orwellian.

None of it makes any logical sense, or scientific sense, or is truthful in any way.

@crumpet

Whether Hubbard gets a medal or not, a young woman has been denied the opportunity to become an Olympian

I saw someone argue on Twitter that it's OK because at least those who are placed second, third have 'had the opportunity to compete in the Olympics' and therefore haven't been denied anything. It's crazy the mental gymnastics at play here.

@TedImgoingmad

FondofBeetles posted this on twitter:

Chances of a 43 year old female appearing in super heavyweight Olympic weightlifting?

1 in 308,000.

Hubbard is three times more likely to be struck by lightning than a 43 year old female is to appear in this event.

There’s no way it’s 1/300,000. Population of australia is 27m (I think) , we send maybe 2 super heavy weight women weightlifters to the Olympics every 4 years… so just the chance of being 1 of those is more like 1/ 2,000,000.

Now, none of those women have ever been in their 40s. Most are 20s. So the probability is more like 1/100,000,000. Hubbard is approx 1000 x more likely to be struck by lightning. Assuming that example got the lightning probability right. Obviously I’m approximating but australia is not especially populous so not a terrible example.

I’ve mentioned it before but there should be an argument made for a female athlete to use testosterone to bring her levels up to that of a trans women taking hormones, as a level playing field. An older, previously retired athlete could make this argument. Not cause it has any merit but because it makes the point.

Laurel Hubbard is representing New Zealand time so from an even smaller population.

From a country that promotes fair play as being the most important aspect of sport - every Kiwi child is taught this from a young age - this is especially awful.

At 1pm on Sunday 27th June Kellie Jay Keen ("Posie Parker") is going to stand outside the New Zealand embassy with a stepladder, a loudhailer and a banner to protest that Laurel Hubbard has denied a deserving sportswoman a place in the Olympics. And will probably steal a woman's medal.

It would be great if people who care about women's sports could go along to support her.

I see the argument for the women athletes all refusing to compete but I hope they won't. That's partly because they've all trained and worked so long and hard for Tokyo and deserve to show what they can do; it's also because the IOC need to know who to give the medals to when all this nonsense is over and Hubbard is retrospectively disqualified.

I wouldn't advise women to compete against transwomen in contact team sports like rugby or ring events like boxing or wrestling, though, just because of the massively increased risk of life changing or fatal injuries like spinal or skull fractures or crush injuries. It's a good cause but it shouldn't take a martyr to endorse it.

As a PP suggests, retired sportspeople of both sexes are best placed to create the publicity and steer the discussion s they have less to lose.

This awful, completely ridiculous that this should be allowed.

What satisfaction could Hubbard even feel from taking a medal?

They are not achieving a thing !

Think there is a couple more trans athletes going to Tokyo.

@Imasoulman

This awful, completely ridiculous that this should be allowed.

What satisfaction could Hubbard even feel from taking a medal?

They are not achieving a thing !

Money and notoriety I guess

Smugness, maybe.

Plenty of men seem to think that physical strength somehow = moral superiority over women.

I saw someone argue on Twitter that it's OK because at least those who are placed second, third have 'had the opportunity to compete in the Olympics' and therefore haven't been denied anything. It's crazy the mental gymnastics at play here.

That’s because men can become women but women can’t even register as human.

Out of pure curiosity, I would be really interested to know Jacinda Ardern's real views on this as her statement could be read two ways, as 'them's the rules, nothing to argue about, it's all fair and square', or 'those are the rules, nothing has technically been done wrong so I'm not in a position to really say anything otherwise'.

@underneaththeash

The other weightlifters in the competition should just refuse to compete with her. Completely unfair.

Completely agree. If I was a female weightlifter I'd definitely refuse to compete. Laurel competed as a MAN as recently as 2012 FGS. How can this be allowed????? It's cheating, pure and simple.

My DH who isn’t been very aware of the TWAW debate is shouting at the tv
“ He He “
Me & the dog thought he was watching some weird interactive tv show .
Then I realised he was angrily shouting at the tv where they are talking about LH competing in the Olympics -
My DH is shouting at the tv that “it’s a he not a she” - he even said he noticed that LH armpits has more hair than he has and he is struggling to get his head around this how he is able to compete in the woman’s category 😂😂

His brain is really hurting him at the moment .

As a male who has competed in high level MMA & boxing for many years he’s been in a right strop since watching this on tv today mumbling WTF is going on and he is suddenly starting to understand what I’ve been telling him for ages .
Previously he was well if they aren’t hurting anyone why are you getting so annoyed - now it’s like a little lights gone on in his head and he actually gets what the problem is .

I can only hope that a lot of people who have felt similar to my DH get their lightbulb moment

@Majorfluff

Think there is a couple more trans athletes going to Tokyo.

9 known, iirc.

I can only hope that a lot of people who have felt similar to my DH get their lightbulb moment

Me too. I'm delighted though that all the crap recently being thrown at women has turned both my DH and DS1 into GC feminists. They suddenly get it and that's what we need - not just women yelling about stuff, because who the f* listens to us - we need men, male allies in this fight.