World Athletics

[rioseco]

Press conference by Seb Coe stating that male to female transgender athletes who have gone through male puberty will be excluded from female competition!
At last.

Did you hear Stonewall’s, “There is no evidence…” statement regarding why they are very disappointed.

Keir Starmer - do you really still believe TWAW?
If so what's the issue with them competing in women's athletics?

Sharron, Martina, Kelly Holmes, Mara Yamauchi, Paula Radcliffe speak out... "look at those bigots"

Sebastian Coe speaks out... "he's got a point actually"

This is huge and I'm delighted. Buy it took a man to be allowed to flick the switch didn't it

*but

I'm delighted with the ruling and with Seb Cole, but yes, it does bring into focus that women are only allowed the rights men grant them.

Nah. I reckon it's being claimed as that but it's actually 'as Men, we don't see why mediocre men should get trophies and money for beating women - why should elite men have to #bekind to anybody, let alone cheats?'

Mermaids uk had a post up too.. Disappointing? No one is stopping them setting up their own trans trans or play in men's sports (where they won't have a huge psychical advantage over the other competitors). They need to stop trying to bully their way into women's sports, prisons & all other designated women's areas. This is a start, the tide is changing & hopefully an end will be put to this dangerous lunacy.

Well it is. Very disappointing that male people have been prevented from using female people and their sports in a way that they really enjoyed doing. It's very disappointing for them. It's very disappointing for me too when feelings dictate something I would really like to do, but consideration for others and social boundaries require that I don't just demand to serve my own interests and fuck everyone else and what harm I do in the process.

That^^

Hence this whole shitshow. Women have never had rights or equality , they just had temporarily loaned privileges until men wanted them back.

This all the way. Sometimes if I am stuck in a motorway traffic jam and the other carriageway is empty and clear I think to myself “ what would Tom Daley do?” But I guess I am so browbeaten by generations of women like me being told to stfu, be kind and crawl back up my vagina that I just stay in my lane.

The ripple effect:

twitter.com/schoolathletics/status/1638978785948192783?s=46&t=3vhG_KDq77qvuwlnTiE6jg

Waves to US 👋
Look what's happening over here. Come and join us.

Give your young female athletes the opportunities and scholarships they deserve.

I've just read some of the comments on the Sky post on FB. Most are questioning why this was ever allowed to happen. A few lone voices of TWAW, but no one is buying it.

Same on the BBC Sports and News posts. The vast, vast majority of comments are in support of World Athletics and most say some variation of "common sense at last" or "of course; it's a travesty they were allowed in the first place". And there are very few angry/sad faces but thousands of likes and loves.

The Twitter meltdown is glorious. I’ve lost count of the accusations of being right wing, transphobic, bigoted etc being levelled at World Athletics.

How long before the UCI follows the lead of FINA, World Rugby and World Athletics?

I welcome the statement that the overarching principle is that protection of the integrity of the female category is paramount. This policy could have been worse but it's not good enough.

There should have been a principle that women's sport is for women only. That was the entire point of creating the category. To include women in all the societal and personal benefits of sport.

"We're not saying no for ever" - ie leaving open the possibility of participation of males in women's sport in the future, is infuriating. Males and females are different and have been for several hundred millennia. This will not change. How much money and time and energy are being wasted on this:
The Council agreed to set up a working group for 12 months to "further consider the issue of transgender inclusion". An independent chair will lead the group, while it will also include up to three council members, two athletes from the Athletes' Commission, a transgender athlete, three representatives of World Athletics' member federations and representatives of the World Athletics health and science department.It will consult specifically with transgender athletes, as well as review and commission research and put forward recommendations to the Council.
There is no mention of a representative for female athletes, and the group will consult specifically with transgender athletes but not specifically with female athletes. How is that fair?

Male athletes with DSDs will still be permitted to compete against females, despite having male advantage, if they lower their testosterone levels to 2.5 nanomoles per litre. This rule is both nonsensical and unfair. Apart from the fact that blood testosterone levels can be gamed, so it would be tricky to enforce compliance, if male athletes are banned from women's competitions even if they have lowered their testosterone levels, why are male athletes with DSDs allowed in on that basis? All people who live with DSDs are male or female. If they are male they do not belong in the female category. The podium of the women's 800m in the 2016 Rio Olympics was entirely occupied by males. This is the future unless the DSD rule is changed.

This is not terrible but it is not a big win.

Start shouting back womenphobe & women haters. Women can't be silenced any longer.

CAIS women are classed as male. They produce the hormones of a normal male puberty but cannot utilise the benefits. They do not go through female puberty. They never have to cope with periods and the associated problems which affect training like pain, secretion of relaxin which renders ligaments looser at certain points in the cycle. They also grow significantly stronger and taller than women though they not as strong on average as men. This may seem like an "edge case", but at the end of the day CAIS women are male. They have a clear advantage in sport, though not as dramatic as other males do, therefore should not be in female competition.
Incidentally this is another problem with framing the policy as excluding males who have gone through male puberty.

😂
Nice one!

Yes those who support Semenya keep going on about "white tears" and how it is all racist because white women can't bear being beaten by black "women". They seem to have forgotten about all the non-white women who have been kept off podiums and out of races, finals, teams, etc by Semenya and the others.

I did risk looking at Twitter yesterday and only saw largely positive comments.

I agree - I'm just anticipating potential areas for fudging around the WA choice of formulation "has gone through male puberty".

Yes, like all athletes, Africans mainly compete in their own continent, so the women who have lost out are predominantly themselves Africans.

Debbie Hayton in the Spectator:

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/why-did-it-take-seb-coe-so-long-to-see-sense-over-transgender-athletes/

I read a while back Caster Semenya has 2 biological children - so there must have been functioning testes. I can’t find the article now. Is this correct? Apologies that the question is invasive but it is relevant to whether he should have ever been able to win women’s races.