Why is the parkrun decision wrong?

[Getonnow]

It feels all wrong to me, but I've had lots of men tell me they thinks it's the right decision and the only thing they could do in the circumstances.

I think it's a cop out and they haven't dealt with the actual issue and also that they've lied about the real reason for the change, but I'm having trouble articulating it beyond that. Help me?

Do YOU?

I have been invited several times by my running buddies. But when I discovered they allowed males to run in the female category, I told them I wasn't going to join with them. I believe they have now dropped out too because of it.

Have I ever been to one? yes.

All the men and women run together so not sure what you're meaning by safety? I referred to safety as a general comment about female sports categories and why they are formed. Can you point to Can you clarify please, do you falafels believe that male people should be able to compete in a female sports category when the female sports category has been set up to give female athletes fairness and safety? that specifically refers to Parkrun?

However, there is actually evidence that women who have to push their bodies harder and further than is medically safe to achieve impossible records set by male athletes is 'unsafe'. Or doesn't that qualify because it doesn't fit your 'safety' perspective?

Unless you mean women are automatically unsafe just from being next to men? Excellent. I think this really does qualify as a cognitive distortion and it really is not convincing. I hope that it felt good typing it out though.

Care to answer the questions I asked first now? Or has it passed you by that you have insisted I answer your questions before you asked yours.... I did ask mine at 14.49 whereas yours were asked at 16.38. And insisted I answer yours first at 17.07.

Times are important for accuracy, no? I am sure that you, supposedly as a runner telling me how hypocritical I am because I chose not to join Parkrun, understand how times are important to runners of all skill levels.

And can you now clarify why 'Parkrun' doesn't qualify in your eyes as a sport with a female sports category?

Because ..... running is not a sport? Did I miss something integral about running that it has suddenly became not a sport? And did you miss the history of Parkrun where it releases times split by sex category, even AFTER its announcement apparently from reports, people who ran this weekend got their results - by SEX CATEGORY?

Did I miss something where running was NOT a sport?

Or have you got another reason for not answering the question with honesty and integrity?

Oh ok - I do understand it now. Still failing to see how anyone can get annoyed about this. Why does it matter who is ahead of you? Allowing trans women to participate in the category that fits their identity might mean you slip down a few places but so what!

What do you mean 'So what?' What's the point of timing it or letting people know their placing at all if it doesn't matter? I'm sick of this attitude that fairness doesn't matter if you're not a professional athlete. You don't use your identity to run, you use your physical body, which is either male or female. There are sexed categories in sport for a reason. In Parkrun you're not even running in a separate men's or women's race, so a trans person isn't going to have the discomfort of running with the 'wrong' group of people.

@NoMoreFalafelsForYou

I do go to park runs.
So do my daughters.

The safety aspect may not be relevant to park run but the fairness aspect does.

Money has been given to park Run to promote women accessing sport and fitness.

The fact it's a fun run is unimportant. The records and times have always been published and I know both myself and my children are very keen to use the stats to see where we place within our categories. As soon as you allow biological males into my category the stats are skewed. I believe I deserve the same rights as men, to see where I sit within my category. Otherwise why publish them at all?

Maybe someone can correct me if I'm wrong but I think the current Men's record for Park run is held by a biological male and the current female record is also held by a biological male.

The stats matter, you only have to read the responses from hundreds of men and women who want their times bac, if the stats matter the stats should be accurate and fair.

I read that this weekend a new entrant into an age and female category is male and beat both the MALE and the FEMALE record for that category.

Hooray! So now we have the fake story that a 'woman' is now beating 'men' in that age category.... go Parkrun!

I wonder whether @NoMoreFalafelsForYou feels that's inclusive to women.

The fact it's a fun run is unimportant. The records and times have always been published and I know both myself and my children are very keen to use the stats to see where we place within our categories

Well quite. And presumably Parkrun had always provided these stats because they thought this was a valuable feature of the runs too... until suddenly they didn't think it was valuable any more. For reasons apparently totally unconnected to the gender issue .

If your entrenched ideological framework is that any male person who says they are a woman for what ever purpose is a woman, then logic dictates that this is an 'inclusive' result.

That it is devoid of ethics, evidence and critical thinking and purely ideological based on philosophical theory only will not matter. Because your view of the world is that people are who they say they are and that a male who says they are a female should be prioritised above all other female people who can legitimately compete in a particular category.

Hooray! So now we have the fake story that a 'woman' is now beating 'men' in that age category.... go Parkrun!

It's like the prisons/crime stats thing all over again, where mixed-sex stats purporting to cover only "females" can then be used to argue that sex-based categories aren't even needed ("because there are just as many 'female' sex offenders", "women are just as fast as men", etc).

"If your entrenched ideological framework is that any male person who says they are a woman for what ever purpose is a woman, then logic dictates that this is an 'inclusive' result."

Just to add, the very same people that celebrate a male holding any female sports record, or winning a place in a race as being 'inclusive', are the very same people that celebrate when a panel that is supposed to be balanced by sex has 75% male panel members, as we have already seen happen. They are the very same people who celebrate male people becoming 'Women's Officers' to then represent women's needs when influencing policies that protect women's safety.

In fact, I believe that some of these posters celebrating male participation in sport are fully supportive of male people in women's prisons. Because that is how much they care about female people.

I mean, even on this thread we have had posters fail to acknowledge that female athletes overexerting their bodies to beat an unbeatable record set by a male athlete is a safety concern. It is like maybe some posters supporting this either lack an understanding of sports and the science of sports, maybe because they don't run at all. Or they have an attitude of 'well, it doesn't matter to me, so why should it matter to any other female runner'.

When a person fully supports Bryson being placed in a female prison, can you ever expect that person to give an intelligently considered answer as to why they feel female sport categories should be open to male people?

@Helleofabore

This is the truth of the matter.

Some people don't run and some people who do don't care about their time or position. Some of those people can not understand that they do matter to others. You only have to see the uproar now the timings and stats have been taken down that they matter to so many people.

If there are stats available they should be fair.
If the stats don't matter do not send emails to me stating my position within my sex because this is inaccurate information.

I'm not saying the trans woman is more important that other women just that the positive for her is greater than the negative for others.

You literally are saying this male is more important than women. You're not qualified to decide how important it is for individual or collective women and that this hypothetical male must need it more.

I read that this weekend a new entrant into an age and female category is male and beat both the MALE and the FEMALE record for that category.

Hooray! So now we have the fake story that a 'woman' is now beating 'men' in that age category.... go Parkrun!

How very typical. It's like "the first woman" to do this or that traditionally male thing stories, often you find that they are not a woman at all.

And crime, where violent males (like for eg top parkrunner and attempted murderer Lauren Jeska) are frequently presented to the public as "women".

Here's a brave PCC calling one such recent misrepresentation out:

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-oxfordshire-68268552.amp

None of this is fair to women and girls.

Quite.

In essence: the happiness a man will feel is more important than the unhappiness of any number of women.

Fgs do people like this look their little girls in the face and tell them their birthright is of service to penises? And they and their feelings and ambitions and inner lives mean nothing, they must live selflessly and seek only the reward of a man being happy?

Are we living in the pages of a 1950s magazine or something?

I would also encourage the starry eyed maternal types, who are sentimentally envisaging the beauty and the beast type gift of a happy glow to a poor vulnerable male bravely struggling through life, to read Hayton's book as the account of a male with a TQ identity. Some of these men are not brave, sad little soldiers who need mummying. Some of them - many of them- are just plain getting off on the situation, and as Hayton is, are quite open about this.

Is helping a man have a happy penis more important than women's inner lives and sport ambitions?

If there are stats available they should be fair.
If the stats don't matter do not send emails to me stating my position within my sex because this is inaccurate information.

I agree Mysterious. If it is a pure 'fun run' based only on people running for the fun of it... Parkrun should stick to their announcement.

The truth is, runners fucking care about these things despite some runner eloquently declaring it doesn't matter to them and shouldn't matter to others. Running is a SPORT. The psychology of sport applies to these 'fun runs' just as it does where results are considered important.

It is time, I think, for Parkrun to declare they will not collect any times or record any records and see just how many people stay. They really need to put their 'funding' where their mouth led them last week. But, I don't think that they will. I suspect they realise those saying, it is just for 'fun' are a minority. I know my running buddies who are still there are not there 'just for the shits and giggles'.

It is time, I think, for Parkrun to declare they will not collect any times or record any records and see just how many people stay
What would that achieve?
People can want to see how long it took them to complete the course without feeling the need to compare themselves to others.

People can run without knowing the time

After all its a "fun run", why does it matter how long it takes?

Is helping a man have a happy penis more important than women's inner lives and sport ambitions?

The fact that you even ask

...shows such innocence. Of course men's happy penises are the ultimate goal of everything.

I'm not saying the trans woman is more important that other women just that the positive for her is greater than the negative for others.

How are you measuring that? Why do you get to determine how great the negative is for the women runners? The transwoman gets to participate in the runs anyway, alongside women as well as men. So what is the benefit to the transwoman of having their stats recorded (albeit privately now) as a woman? Oh... only that they will look better because they are being ranked against runners without male physical advantages!

People can want to see how long it took them to complete the course without feeling the need to compare themselves to others.

Perhaps they could wear a watch?

oh. Hang on …

Are you just going to avoid answering the questions after you so hypocritically insisted I was dodging yours while missing the fact that I asked you questions directly first hours before?

Gosh… please do keep posting as it is really entertaining knowing everyone on the thread is watching your answer avoidance.

Is it because you don’t want us to know what your answer to those questions are? Because it would show that either you believe and understand that male people have physical advantages over female people, and transition doesn’t remove those? Or because it will show that you don’t care at all about female fairness and safety in sport?

Either way, I would suggest your calling me a hypocrite is clearly projection and laughable for anyone who is familiar with your posts.

Perhaps they could wear a watch?

Suppose, would rather it was recorded and sent to me though rather than relying on myself to look at my watch and set a timer as knowing me I'd forget 😬

That is your own issue to find a solution to then. Isn’t it?

Why do you want to know your time? It is just for fun and not to be taken seriously.

Therefore, you demanding to know your time is hypocritical.