Head of UK Sport backs funding for trans athletes

[LittleWhingingWoman]

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/5722632a-b66d-11ec-8ba8-f6bf3099f5f6?shareToken=7e0a954195d8703a8189443e75b9e0e1

Not sure if this was previously shared.

Technically, I think that’s the right position. If transwomen are allowed to compete in female sports, they shouldn’t be discriminated against in terms of funding.

But (for me) obviously the first issue needs to be decided based on fairness, and there doesn’t seem to be a way we can have both fairness and inclusion.

I agree. If someone is allowed to compete, they should be treated equally when it comes to funding.

However, I have issues with who is allowed to compete and in which categories.

I'd support them in having funding for a new category.
Not for being funded to colonise the the womens category.

Yeah so long as funding is allocated so that transpeople get to participate in sports in their own category I'll support funding for transpeople in sport.

@Linguini

Yeah so long as funding is allocated so that transpeople get to participate in sports in their own category I'll support funding for transpeople in sport.

I would fully support athletes competing in their sex class or the 'open' category if that is the form that were to replace the men's category.

Women aren't even funded equally to men so the limited funding they do get should be spent on actual women.

Like with everything, if the time and money invested in gaining access to things that they shouldn't be granted access to, had been spent ok creating a third category the problem would have been.solved by now.

Why should we care abiut people who don't give a crap about the women they are stealing money and opportunities from.

Compete with your sex class. Simple.

Of course there should be funding. However, where will that funding come from? It has to be new money put into the sport, not a siphoning off money from the already small kitty allocated to women's sport. And then won't it be telling if they can rustle up a nice fat kitty just like that while the women have had to be begging and borrowing for years and are still nowhere near on equal pay.

More funding is a great idea. Third space facilities where necessary. Research on impact of trans potions medication on male body performance. More noise about how transwomen athletes are welcome in men's sport because transmen athletes are obviously already welcome in women's sport. I'm pretty sure

But we all know that anything that isn't validation is literal violence.

So women get less funding than men. At which level will TW be funded?

What an interesting article.

Firstly, my issue is not with category-eligible TW being eligible for funding too, rather that no male, TW or othwrwise, should ever be eligible for the female category. So the funding point is moot (and isn't it telling that rather than divert some of the massively larger male funding pot be allocated to the male, the meagre female provision gets siphoned off to men as well).

But I am also interested in how much 'safeguarding' and 'support' and care about Bridges' 'vulnerability' is being provided by the cycling bodies according to this article, in comparison to what is being offered to a junior female athlete who has been sexually abused by a coach and yet all the same cycling bodies suddenly have nothing to say and can't do anything to help.

Does rather highlight the differences that sex causes in cycling, doesn't it.

I'm confused: they back funding for "trans" athletes to do what?

I'm not really sure what the point of the organisation is, either. The representative says this below, so what do they actually do? Sounds like they just pass the buck!
"Where inclusion bumps up against fairness and safety, it’s down for an individual sport to consider and make the decisions that are most appropriate for that sport.”

The article quotes Munday at length, but I have to say there's a whole lot of words saying not much at all. All the usual soothing noises and not much substance.

"What is really important is that we make sure as a sporting industry we are inclusive, that we are welcoming, that we enable everyone who wants to play sport to play sport. Where inclusion bumps up against fairness and safety, it’s down for an individual sport to consider and make the decisions that are most appropriate for that sport."

That could all have been shortened to 'I'll be passing the buck and abdicating responsibility at every opportunity'.

As has already been pointed out, women's sports are not funded to the same extent as men's sports, so if they're going to fund transathletes I'm fine with that; just as long as it comes out of the men's pot and not the smaller women's.