I know some posters here have been wondering where the evidence is for including transwomen in women’s sport and sadly so far nobody has produced any. I went looking for some and found nothing with any actual evidence at Mermaids, Pride Sport, Gendered Intelligence or GIRES, although they might have something I didn't find. I did find this document from Athlete Ally:
www.athleteally.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/The-Future-of-Womens-Sport-includes-Transgender-Women-and-Girls-Statement_7.14.21_v5.pdf
There’s 8 pages of the statement so it won’t take you too long to read. They say that their document uses ‘a close reading of peer-reviewed, credible sources’ and also state that ‘The consensus among scholars from multiple disciplines, including human biology, kinesiology, law and policy, and gender studies, is clear: the future of sports for women and girls includes both transgender and cisgender women and girls’, although there’s no reference as to where this consensus came from.
There’s plenty about how doing sport is beneficial, which I’m sure we agree with, and how transgender people are often under-represented in sport, which is a shame and worth addressing, which I’m sure we also agree with. There are sections on sports policies and what they say, and the legislation around them. The document states that ‘most organizations have removed unscientific and exclusionary restrictions that prevent access’, referring to transwomen in women’s sport. There is no evidence provided to back up the assertion that these policies were unscientific.
On page 7 they deal with the science (don’t get excited!). They start by saying that the majority of studies on trans athletes are inconclusive, rely on false comparisons, use cherry-picked studies to support an ideology, and that they are ‘laden with limitations, flaws and biases’. So what are these limitations, flaws and biases, and why are the results so unreliable? They don’t seem able to elaborate on that at all. I was hoping for a good critical review of the research here but none is forthcoming.
Then they list a variety of factors that affect sports performance such as ‘aerobic capacity, cardiac capacity, flexibility, height, lean body mass, limb length, muscle mass, and red blood cell counts’ without any mention that these factors are affected by sex, but not by gender. They criticise the concentration of sports bodies on testosterone levels and say that ‘the link between testosterone and athleticism is inconclusive at best, and inherently flawed, at worst’, but don’t even consider the details about the difference between a testosterone-driven puberty and its effects, versus adult serum levels and the effects of maintaining/increasing/lowering them on performance. Again, where is the critical review of this literature?
On the last page they state ‘transgender inclusion in sport is fundamentally an ideological, rather than a scientific, issue.’ Which is interesting as they’ve claimed policies excluding transwomen from women’s sport are ‘unscientific’ (no evidence supplied), they’ve claimed the scientific evidence that transwomen have an advantage over women is flawed and unreliable (no evidence supplied) – so why not say the science doesn’t support the women’s category being for females only?
Finally, although they produce evidence for the benefits of sport and for increasing participation of transgender people in sport, they produce no evidence as to why transgender people should be included in a category for people of the sex they identify as, and not for the sex they are.
There are issues I’m sure others will pick up on, but while they’ve made a case for transgender people benefitting from participating in sport more, which I agree with, they haven’t addressed fairness or safety for female athletes, or made any coherent case as to why anybody should be included in the sex category that isn’t theirs. My overall impression is that it’s very disappointing and doesn’t really address the science at all.
I'm still interested in seeing the evidence if anyone has it though!