Legal action over Rugby Union's ban on transwomen playing competitive women's rugby

[zanahoria]

The Rugby Football Union have been rocked by a legal challenge against their ban on transgender women from female contact rugby.

The governing body’s council narrowly voted to ban trans women “assigned male at birth” in a bid to “prioritise fairness of competition and safety of players” in July this year.

But Telegraph Sport can reveal transgender player Julie Curtiss has issued the RFU with a pre-action protocol letter - a legal document written to resolve a dispute before court proceedings are commenced - following the controversial decision.

The legal challenge - which the RFU says it will 'robustly defend' - is being brought by London-based law firm Russell Cooke on behalf of Curtiss, one of the seven registered trans women in England who is no longer eligible to play following the ban.

www.telegraph.co.uk/rugby-union/2022/09/03/exclusive-rfu-hit-legal-action-transgender-women-ban/

That's 7 places taken away from female athletes in a women's sport. That's 7 too many.

I welcome this lawsuit.

Males can play with their sex. There's no ban.

How can you make a policy on a case by case basis? That's the very definition of 'not a policy'!

And yeah, they're not actually banned.

It's interesting that 'she' talks about barring an entire section of the population from taking part in the sport. Doesn't 'she' realize that this will exclude a much bigger section of the population from taking part i.e. women.

That is how law works, it's the first few WTF cases that make it obvious we need a law for something we had assumed wouldn't happen. If there were no TW in rugby, you'd use that a reason not to have a rule.

I have a shampoo with a "not to be eaten" sticker on it. It was probably only a couple of people who drank shampoo thinking it was a smoothie and complained but it still opened the "we need to do this as we'd over estimated human behaviour" conversation.

To most people it seems so obvious that middle aged men have no place in women's rugby.

In reality it's a blanket ban on males. Males comprise 50ish % of the population so a lot more than 7. Females who identify as men and non-binary would still be eligible to play with females so the idea of "trans panic" is a myth. It's not the optics that are important but the integrity of the female category. It's good this is being challenged because at last sporting bodies will be able to see clearly that they are acting within the law.

Here we have the usual 'just a few' tactic.

It is 'just a few', why worry. Nothing to see here. Just some males having fun and you are all just haters.

Yes. 7 males. How many would be enough for you to consider that females deserve to have their needs for safety and fairness prioritised over those males?

Care to give us a number? No? Didn't think so. It is always n+1.

And then we have the polarising and catastrophising tactics lumped into that one phrase, 'current trans moral panic'.

Disagreement that any male should be allowed to be playing in a female sporting category is ramped up to the hyperbolic 'trans moral panic' in shut down discussion. To shame posters for discussing it because on this forum it is a way to say 'STFU'!

Is it new? No. Not even remotely new.

God, have you seen the size of Curtiss?? Surely in no shape to play any sort of competitive sport? And the size to do a lot of damage to a woman in a scrum.

Why should even one woman be hurt to validate a transwoman's perception of themselves?
Just so that they can enforce the make-believe that they are still elite athletes?

Besides as has been pointed out they are not banned, they just don't want to play with the men.

The Australian transwoman that played Aussie rules women's football boasted in an interview that 'she could fold the opposition like a deckchair' its almost as blatant as fallon fox saying that 'she likes hitting women'.

RFU have explained why the case-by-case approach has been rejected.

www.englandrugby.com/news/article/rfu-council-to-vote-on-gender-participation-policy-for-rugby-union-in-england

"However, the case by case assessment is not without difficulties and can result in players not being permitted to participate. In light of the research findings and work of World Rugby and the UK Sports Councils, and given the difficulties in identifying a credible test to assess physiological variables, it is recommended that this is no longer a viable option at this time and does not necessarily ensure inclusion."

Jon Pike elaborates further on the issues with this approach here - twitter.com/runthinkwrite/status/1552687701173964801

I think that is a UK rugby player.

www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union/49298550?

Not saying that an AFL player did not say it as well though.

I play mixed sex social football against men. Both they and I hold back in our tackles (in a way I do not when playing against other women) to avoid injury to me. I still once ended up with a cracked rib.
Are these transwomen rugby players doing that in competitive rugby games? Somehow I think not...

The comments are brilliant shame we can’t comment in the same unfiltered way here.

No. It's the standard of discourse enforced here that makes this board - and MN generally - so important. Relentlessly courteous posters here easily expose the weakness and irrationality of genderist arguments.

If TRA/MRA posters start posting unfiltered rants they get deleted and eventually banned (although I and many others don't report the worst posts so as many people as possible see them).

Shocking that a blanket ban was put on trans women

That's because they are male, and the female sex category in sport is for female people, hope this explanation helps it be less shocking for you.

And yeah, they're not actually banned.

This too.

I would love this to get to court! The sunlight would be epic 😁

plus it would mean more of Ross Tuckers demolition jobs
twitter.com/scienceofsport/status/1566368541162569731?s=21&t=TNBd3EXcJ6jAA-_pK-36mg

I think "blanket classification as male" is the expression you're looking for. And it strike me as anything but strange given, y'know, the obvious.

"Female players are asking for it" is a bit of an unfortunate choice of words from this player really.

You are correct.

It was Morgan, on the positive side for me it makes it more relevant, especially as the "skipper" found it funny.

It doesn’t affect 7 people - it is all the women on opposing teams who are risk of increased injury if they play against men.

It's all the women who choose not to play at all because they don't want to encounter male bodies (in the changing room or on the pitch) .

Truthlokeness - very true

But what about the poor 7 transwomen who just want to playyyyyy

My daughter plays rugby at u16 county level and is training with professional clubs this year. If the RFU allow biological males to play contact against her she won't play - along with a lot of her team who feel the same way. Just in this example girls rugby would gain one male player and lose at least 6.