Guardian article - interesting use of pronouns

[aliasundercover]

Here's the article. CeCe Telfer cannot go to the olympics because Telfer i̶s̶ ̶a̶ ̶c̶h̶e̶a̶t̶ has not met the eligibility requirements www.theguardian.com/sport/2021/jun/24/cece-telfer-transgender-runner-olympic-trials

What I found interesting is that the article refers to Telfer as 'Telfer' throughout, only calling Telfer 'she' when giving direct quotes. Are they coming to their senses over there?

The picture is worth inspecting as well. Another one where CeCe could have used a bit of airbrushing.

Interesting that Telfer can still be NCAA champion without having taken any testosterone blockers.

What an achievement to beat all those women as (in every literal and factual sense) a man.

“I believe that this is my way of being the change that I want to see in the world.”

Is the ‘change’ all women in sport being replaced by transwomen?

The Guardian realises it cannot win this one.

Certain domestic governing body guidelines are definitely more lax than the standards set internationally. I learned the following about Canada today and posted it on another thread:

This is how fucked up Canada is. In 1988, Canadian sprinter, Ben Johnson, won the 100m Olympic title, but was subsequently disqualified and banned for doping violations. Such was Canada's national shame, that various ethical organisations cropped up to tackle the issue of cheating in support, which then merged to become the Canadian Centre For Ethics In Sport. This was the main governmental organisation ensuring that Canadian athletes stayed clean and competed on an ethical footing. In 2014, however, in their annual statement, they said that male athletes who identified as female should never have to take a single hormone or have any surgery, and should be allowed to identify as a male in one sport and a female in another. This is now U-Sport Canada's (their sports governing body's) official policy. Men can flip back and forth between male and female sports in Canada. Just unbelievable.

Those lax domestic standards, however, serve to stymie the career of any natal woman before she even gets anywhere near to an Olympic qualifier. How many girls will give up, because they can't stand or afford to hang on in there, just on the off chance that the CC Telfers of this world fail a testosterone test.

That article reads like posts on here. We're not allowed to say the truth, refuse to lie, so end up with a slightly clunky looking compromise.

It’s certainly a very clunky way to write, my suspicion is that the people who read the sports pages of the Guardian aren’t the same demographic that read the rest of the paper and wouldn’t stand for it.

@donquixotedelamancha

Interesting that Telfer can still be NCAA champion without having taken any testosterone blockers.

What an achievement to beat all those women as (in every literal and factual sense) a man.

AFAIK the testosterone level requirement only applies to a certain standard of competitions, ie at international level.

The sports department have allowed reality to bleed though for a while - Sean Ingles has been writing & tweeting reality wrt women's sport in particular.

@EndoplasmicReticulum

That article reads like posts on here. We're not allowed to say the truth, refuse to lie, so end up with a slightly clunky looking compromise.

Exactly what I thought! "Telfer’s manager, David McFarland, said Telfer would respect the decision." Nobody actually writes like that.

I noticed the byline was "Agencies", so either the agency copy came written like that, or they've rewritten it to take out the pronouns.

my suspicion is that the people who read the sports pages of the Guardian aren’t the same demographic that read the rest of the paper and wouldn’t stand for it.

There's an interesting piece in the current issue of Private Eye about how Kath Viner made cuts to the sports pages because the readers who were clicking through to sports stories on the website weren't then paying to subscribe. So perhaps there's a bit of resentment between the sports writers and the rest of the paper.

AFAIK the testosterone level requirement only applies to a certain standard of competitions, ie at international level.

Indeed, rather my point. So Telfer isn't trans enough to undergo any treatment or present as female but is trans enough to win US national (albeit amateur) title.

How many girls will give up, because they can't stand or afford to hang on in there

This.

I really feel for those who signed that nasty letter about Suzanne Moore, they must be feeling terrified in the office now.

Very interesting indeed. And a carefully chosen picture IMO.

Is there a little rebellion happening at the Guardian?

@jay55

I really feel for those who signed that nasty letter about Suzanne Moore, they must be feeling terrified in the office now.

They might be ashamed, but why 'terrified'? Afaik it's only one side of all this that's a vindictive cancel culture.

@TheRebelle

It’s certainly a very clunky way to write, my suspicion is that the people who read the sports pages of the Guardian aren’t the same demographic that read the rest of the paper and wouldn’t stand for it.

I disagree with this, I think the vast majority of readers across the Guardian actually see this nonsense for what it is. It’s why comments aren’t allowed any more: whenever they are, and if people can word it correctly to get past the moderators, comments that are critical of this sort of thing get the majority of recommendations easily. And not just sport, anything.

It’s the editorial teams, not the overall readership. They want to keep the woke US readers happy and don’t want negativity on Twitter, because like the Labour Party and its supporters like Owen Jones, they think Twitter represents the real world. Whenever they open comments on such articles they get an insight into the real world and they don’t like it, and quickly close the comments again. They seem shocked people aren’t thinking how they’re supposed to, like the Hartlepool by-election.

In 2018, in the NCAA Division II Championship 400m women’s hurdles final, a runner called Minna Sveard raced her best and came 8th. No doubt she trained like crazy for 12 months. She raced again in 2019 and came 2nd. She should be able to call herself a college champion, but she can’t. She was beaten by Telfer.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/4175263--No-Trans-Olympian-List-of-women-and-girls-disadvantaged-in-sport-resource-thread

A picture paints a thousand words. No one can look at that without seeing the unfairness that is right there.

And I reckon they want to keep advertisers happy, like somewhere else I know .

On the guardian tangent, rather than Cece, there is an interesting opinion piece by Martin Kettle about how institutional groupthink and defensiveness gets in the way of doing the right thing. He uses the BBC and the Met police to illustrate is point, but the pint he makes also applies in so many situations around the gender mess we're in.
This does get pointed out in the comments very carefully but clearly
It would be good for the editorial team for f the guardian itself to have a look at themselves with this in mind-

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jun/24/bbc-met-police-perils-groupthink?CMP=ShareiOSAppp_Other

So many girls turn away from sports at higher levels and who can blame them. Then there are schemes trying to encourage girls to continue with sports & yet nobody has joined the dots as to why they don't......

What the sports articles need is a sentence that says ‘x is eligible for the men’s events but needs a qualifying time of y. Her fastest time this year is z’

@ErrolTheDragon I was being sarcastic, as they felt unsafe from a few written words before.

That pronoun dodging gives me hope that all is not lost at the Graun

I’m pleased that Telfer has been brought up short by physical reality, and I hope it continues to happen.

That Canadian policy is barking

@jay55

I really feel for those who signed that nasty letter about Suzanne Moore, they must be feeling terrified in the office now.

You mean because having to deal with truth/reality is literal violence and literal violence is soo much worse than actual violence or trying to destroy someones livelihood?

Sorry, misread your tone jay!

The same sort of pronoun avoidance can be seen in Jenner's wiki page, in the sections about the olympics etc. Wiki is of course notorious for globally editing pronouns as soon as a sleb declares being NB, so I found it quite noticeable. Of course that's a different case - Jenner was competing entirely fairly in the correct sex events. Maybe using 'she' in the context of the decathlon would be too much for some people's cognitive dissonance...