Possibly the most dishonest article I've seen about transwomen in sport

[ControversialOpening]

I don't think even OJ couldn't keep up this level wilful ignorance for this long:

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/jun/29/sports-trans-participation-transgender-women-swimming

‘what-if scenarios’ - yes, that’s right.

‘What if we let males compete in women’s sports?’

’Well, that would be unfair.’

’Let’s not do it then.’

’Genius.’

“Policies about trans inclusion have been in place at the highest level of sports for decades with no issue.”

No they haven’t 🤣

Using every argument except the most obvious as to why there are two categories for men and women.

Athletes of both sexes are routinely tested to ensure they’re not doping - which they presumably agree to in the terms of competition. There’s very little that’s actually accurate tbh, it’s a very poor article: ironic that he complains of ‘misinformation’ really 🤔

I think the maths is wrong. 0.6% of 220,000 is about 1,300 but not all of them will be tw.

I thought it'd have to go some to beat yesterday's frothing Guardian article but it might just have pipped it.

Ok, hands up-has any one, ever, anywhere, anytime read an article by a TRA that wasn't an incoherent mess of gobbledegook, obfuscation, waffle, distraction and whataboutery? This is a serious question because one major side effect of buying into this utter garbage seems to be that your brains turn to mush.

I just knew from the title of this thread that it was going to be about the Guardian.

@dropthevipers

No, but that’s the point of this post-modernist nonsense. It doesn’t have to make sense. The claim is supposed to be sufficient.

Chris Mosier is the person whose got that bullshit assertion pinned at the top of their twitter account; you have a trans child or you have a dead child.

I would like to be surprised that twitter let's it stay there.

Well fuck that for a lark. If believing patent nonsense becomes de rigeur than we really are bollocksed.

@dropthevipers

It’s exactly it, though. ‘How can you comment on someone else’s lived experience?’ ‘Of course it’s essentialist to limit yourself to a single definition of anything.’ ‘How dare you, a c*s woman, gatekeep the definition of womanhood against queer women?’

All of it just means there’s no such thing as objective truth.

I happened to see a TRA thread on Twitter this morning, which was claiming that pre-1969 and Stonewall, there was a law that people could only wear clothing appropriate to their gender; and if you wore more than three items of clothing that were from “the other gender” the police would do a “genital check” on you to “enforce your gender”. And hundreds of people were just lapping this shit up!

I mean it’s so ridiculous it’s funny; but it’s also an object lesson in how gender ideologists have no regard for basic fact, and there are thousands of credulous dumbos out there just hoovering it all up.

Typical disingenuous nonsense of the kind that comes out of the north end of a bull facing south. The author claims that Fina's decision is unscientific, but offers no evidence. And, of course, from the opening sentence onwards falsely claims that transgender competitors are being "excluded" and "banned".

I think there was some sort of local law (may have been a bar licensing requirement) in New York, which was similar to this and people were strip searched in gay bars.

I remember reading about it before the rewriting of the Stonewall riots - so some time ago 😛

“Policies such as this suggest that we don’t believe in the power and strength of female athletes”

So if we all believe hard enough then the fastest woman will be able to run the 100m faster than the fastest man? The current differences between male and female athletic performance are because women just aren’t trying hard enough??

I believe tinkerbell!!! I believe!!!

As I always say, it is worth writing to both the letters page and the readers’ editor pointing out factual inaccuracies - they do amend articles if they are wrong so pointers and evidence is useful. They did amend the WiSpa piece … eventually

Even a cursory read of the FINA report shows that this: and it was immediately clear to me that swimming’s new policy is not based on science, facts or human rights is completely untrue. Challenge the facts, the research and the science but just to deny them....

I can live with some people becoming completely unchained from the truth, but when these people are given public platforms to write not just an opinion piece but a piece that completely denies facts and evidence in a once leading media source, then it's a worry
And yes dropthevipers, what it says about the state of their brains I dread to think.

Ah Chris who despite the headlines competes within an older age group and even then ranked 26th in their 35-39 age groups

if you read the headlines you’d be forgiven that Chris was out there smashing the men in a regular basis

Chris is also wrong about numbers in the Olympics - there were 3 Olympic competitors in women's events that were born male that we know about - Chris has left out Stephanie Barrett the Canadian archer, presumably because Stephanie has chosen to clear her record of all references to her sex. I'm not sure how many female Olympians there have been, but in any generation there aren't many. 3 places to males in one Olympics is 3 too many.

I thought this was going to be about the Jonathan Liew article.

It is a competitive field.

Lots of smoke and mirrors with his facts. They all seem to relate to other areas not actual science or biology.

It's a bit like that scene on zootopia where the bunny shows the fox how to answer awkward questions but just giving an unrelated answer to something else. Everybody is too busy listening to remember what was being said or asked initially.

Why is there an issue with a third space? Presumably it will contain other trans women who, as he argues are women he shouldn't have an issue?

Now here is a much better article by Mara Yamauchi

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/jun/29/ministers-fairness-females-sport-swimming-policy

I remember when the Guardian used to be a respectable and interesting newspaper. ‘Facts are sacred’.

oh dear.

The full quote is, "comment is free, but facts are sacred". Try making any sort of GC comment and see how long it takes to get banned, we are talking seconds here.

Indeed. At the bottom of the article it says "Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a letter of up to 300 words to be considered for publication, email it to us at [email protected] ", though I don't recall posters here having much success with that route in the past.

But I'll definitely be dropping a line to the Readers' Editor: [email protected]