Miroslav Imbrišević
The Open University, UK
On the 31st October a group of UN Special Procedures mandate holders published a policy position urging states and other stakeholders ‘to uphold the ideal of sport that is inclusive of LGBT and intersex persons’. Special Procedures experts are part of the UN Human Rights Council. They ‘work on a voluntary basis; they are not UN staff and do not receive a salary for their work. They are independent from any government or organization and serve in their individual capacity.’ In the following I will focus on what the experts say about trans women athletes.[1]
Discrimination
The policy position is about ‘the protection of human rights in sport without discrimination based on sexual orientation, gender identity, and sex characteristics’. And here, in the title of the policy paper, is the first mistake: in sport we do discriminate (in the sense of ‘recognising a relevant difference’). Why? Because the categories in sport are sex-based – not gender identity-based. The female category is a protected category. If we allowed male-bodied persons (including trans women) into the female category, then girls/women would lose out to (mediocre) boys/men, because of the – on average – large physiological advantage of males. ‘Just in the single year 2017, Olympic, World, and U.S. Champion Tori Bowie’s 100 meters lifetime best of 10.78 was beaten 15,000 times by men and boys. (…) The same is true of Olympic, World, and U.S. Champion Allyson Felix’s 400 meters lifetime best of 49.26. Just in the single year 2017, men and boys around the world outperformed her more than 15,000 times.’ (Coleman and Shreve 2018).
The authors of the UN policy position fail to distinguish between lawful and unlawful discrimination. In Australian (and UK) legislation it is lawful ‘to discriminate on the ground of sex, gender identity or intersex status by excluding persons from participation in any competitive sporting activity in which the strength, stamina or physique of competitors is relevant.’ Where there are relevant differences between candidates it may be permissible (or lawful) to treat them differently – this is something Aristotle recognised a long time ago.
We need to highlight two main characteristics of human rights: they are important and, when violated, they are urgent. Many people live without sport, some actually hate it. So, sport, by itself, is not important; we can live happy lives without it.
What would be objectionable is arbitrary discrimination: i.e., treating one person/group differently on a whim, because of malice, or because of an irrelevant difference, such as the colour of one’s hair). Only if you take the position that there is no (relevant) difference between women and trans women could you claim that exclusion from the female category is discriminatory (i.e., wrongful or even unlawful). The UN experts do take this position, hence the use of the phrase ‘women, and girls in all of their diversity’. The suggestion is that trans women are just one of the many different manifestations of ‘women’: young, old, married, French, witty, etc. But this view is grounded in a particular ideology (trans women are women), rather than in material reality.
There are two scenarios we need to consider with regard to trans women in sport.
- Is male advantage neutralised by taking cross-sex hormones? According to research from the Rugby Football Union(2022): ‘[t]he reversal of performance advantages is thus only one-fifth of the initial advantage, which leaves a significant remaining advantage, particularly for attributes of strength and mass.’ And we also need to consider the safety issue in collision sports and martial arts (see Pike).
- Not all trans women opt for cross-sex hormones, surgery or any other bodily modification measures. This is in line with the latest guidance from the IOC (2021, 5.2): ‘athletes should not be deemed to have an unfair or disproportionate competitive advantage due to their sex variations, physical appearance and/or transgender status.’ This means that the IOC has abandoned any attempts at mitigating for physiological advantages by trans athletes.[2] Consequently, women/girls will face an increasing number of trans competitors who have only changed their gender identity, but whose bodies are the same as before transitioning. It is odd that the IOC wishes to maintain the sex categories at all. If we cannot assume that male (-bodied) athletes have an advantage over females, then we might as well abandon categorisation by sex.
Rights and Human Rights
The UN experts write (section 3): ‘The practice of sport without discrimination of any kind is therefore conceived as a human right’. This is badly phrased, because it conflates two issues. Sport is not a human right (regardless of what the IOC Charter claims), but unlawful discrimination may sometimes be a human rights violation (e.g., when the members of an ethnic minority are persecuted). Applying sex-based eligibility criteria, as we do in sport, is neither a rights violation – nor a human rights violation. However, the UN experts frame this as (section 8) ‘arbitrary restrictions of trans and intersex women and girls from women’s sports.’ There is nothing arbitrary about applying eligibility criteria consistently.
We need to highlight two main characteristics of human rights: they are important and, when violated, they are urgent. Many people live without sport, some actually hate it. So, sport, by itself, is not important; we can live happy lives without it. If we were to discriminate unlawfully, by denying a valid eligibility claim (by excluding somebody arbitrarily from competition), then this would be painful for that person. But it would merely be the denial of an ‘ordinary’ right, just like the right to join a dramatic society. But it would not have the urgency of being arbitrarily imprisoned or tortured – it is uncontroversial that we do have a human right not to be arbitrarily imprisoned and/or tortured. Claims that participating in sport is a human right are mere hyperbole.
The authors rely on the UDHR (Article 27), the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (Article 15) and various other declarations, including the IOC Charter, to claim that (section 3): ‘sports and games are at the core of cultural life and cultural rights. Within a human rights framework, pursuant to which all persons have the right to live with dignity, equality, and freedom, it is a laudable objective of humanity that the benefits of sport be made available to all, without discrimination.’
I have already explained that we do (lawfully) discriminate in sport (a Heavyweight is excluded from the Welterweight division), as well as in other areas of life (foreigners cannot vote in national elections). Secondly, trans women are not excluded from sport, only from the female category. Therefore, they are free to take part in sporting activities and the cultural life of sport. It is different in theocratic regimes that systematically exclude women (or other groups) from all public life (not just from sport). Here, we can say that their lives are diminished and their human right to fully participate in cultural life is severely curtailed. Some big sporting events have been awarded to such regimes, and one hopes that the UN experts will raise the issue of how women, trans people, and gay people (as well as political dissidents) are treated there.[3] In section 13 they address mega-sporting events, but they keep it general, without addressing recent attempts at ‘sportswashing’ (e.g., Qatar or Saudi Arabia).
In section 4 they state: ‘Sport is a celebration of the abilities of the human body: each human body is unique, and differences exist because of factors as varied as nutrition, proximity to coaches and training, access to adequate sports facilities, belonging to families or communities with resources and commitment to sport excellence as well as genetic differences.’ The first clause is correct: we test bodies. But it is interesting how the major differences between bodies, as recognised in sport, are not explained through belonging either to the male or female sex. Instead, the UN experts focus on socio-economic factors, and the last item in their list is ‘genetic differences’. This is a familiar move. If we side-line sex-based differences, then trans inclusion in the female category is easier to justify.
The authors write (section 5): ‘Categories for different sports are always under scrutiny, as evidence leads to new understandings of what factors have significant impact in the understanding of fairness.’ Here they prepare the ground for considering factors other than being male/female when it comes to categorisation. And by ‘fairness’ they don’t mean ‘fairness in competition’, they mean fairness in categorisation (i.e., having your eligibility claim accepted).
The experts continue: ‘Non-discrimination considerations demand that sports organizations remain committed to the fairness of competition by considering all relevant factors that may impact participation of persons on the basis of categories protected under international human rights law, including sex characteristics, sexual orientation and/or gender identity.’ There is a lot of conceptual confusion in this passage. If the eligibility criteria (who can play?) are fair, then this normally ensures that competitors are fairly matched in competition. Permitting a heavier boxer into a lighter category would, for example, undermine fairness on both counts. The same goes for admitting trans women into the female category. This would be unfair because they carry a category advantage (i.e., being male-bodied) into the female category (see Parry and Martínková). Furthermore, sports categories are not ‘protected under international human rights law’ – this is plain nonsense. What is protected in many domestic legislations are characteristics like: sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity. But this has no impact on the eligibility criteria in sport.
There is wide-spread ignorance about what ‘inclusion’ means. As long as we have categories in sport, we will have exclusion of those who don’t qualify, e.g., a 25-year-old cannot play for the U21 team. Denying an eligibility claim is not unlawful ‘discrimination’, nor a human rights violation.
Traditionally, we categorise by sex. But recently some sports governing bodies had adopted the idea that we should widen the eligibility criteria and categorise by sex – plus gender identity. However, more and more governing bodies are now insisting on purely sex-based categorisation and trans women athletes are given the option to compete in the male and/or Open category (FINA, British Triathlon, UCI, etc.).
The UN experts don’t understand that sport is special (see section 10). In most areas of life, having a gender identity which doesn’t align with your sex is irrelevant: it doesn’t matter whether the bus driver, bank manager, or accountant is trans or not. However, sport is different, because we test male bodies against male bodies and female bodies against female bodies. In athletic competition it matters what kind of body you have. That’s why we categorise by sex (and other factors related to the body: e.g., weight, age, level of disability).
The legal recognition of one’s gender identity (woman) does not translate into eligibility for a particular sex category (female) in sport. This is explicitly recognised in UK and Australian legislation. The law cannot transform your body (this matters in sport); it can only provide you with new documents (this matters in all other areas of life). In other legal systems, where there are no exemptions for sport, people easily get confused and believe that the legal recognition applies to all areas of life, including sport. But when the state recognises someone’s (trans-) gender identity, it creates a legal fiction (fictio legis)[4]. The state will treat the individual as if they were of the other sex. In sport it would be a mistake to do so, and to believe that trans women are literally ‘women’, because this would jeopardise fair competition.
In section 11 it becomes even more apparent that the authors have a limited grasp of the law and of sport: ‘The categoric or blanket exclusion of trans and intersex women from sport (including their segregation to trans or intersex-only categories) is a prima facie violation of their human right to live free from discrimination.’ What they mean here is the exclusion from the female category, not from sport as such. The experts argue that such exclusion ‘focuses only on assumed muscular strength, ignores the wider range of other factors that enable some athletes to perform better than others, and appears to rely on stereotypical notions of a woman athlete’s performance and body type.’ [Footnote omitted]. This is a common strategy: attacking what science tells us about the physiological advantages of males and/or adopting the mantle of ‘feminism’ in order to facilitate trans inclusion in women’s sport (see here and here).
The writers urge all stakeholders (section 17b) to ‘cease targeting trans and intersex women under the guise of protecting women’s sports’. This is a distortion of what sports governing bodies are doing. Nobody is ‘targeting’ these groups, and the aim of protecting women’s sport is not a ‘guise’. In reality, these governing bodies are simply applying the – well justified – eligibility criteria for the female category.
There is wide-spread ignorance about what ‘inclusion’ means. As long as we have categories in sport, we will have exclusion of those who don’t qualify, e.g., a 25-year-old cannot play for the U21 team. Denying an eligibility claim is not unlawful ‘discrimination’, nor a human rights violation. Instead, it is to recognise that there are relevant differences between candidates. That is the case when a trans woman makes an eligibility claim for the female category. If an athlete isn’t eligible, then the inclusion question doesn’t arise. This is something that many people fail to grasp.
Copyright © Miroslav Imbrišević 2023
[1] Note that intersex persons are often lumped together with trans athletes, but they deserve to be treated separately. They also need to be distinguished from people with DSDs, the majority of which clearly fall into the male/female dichotomy.
[2] This is actually the morally right policy by the IOC (but probably for the wrong reasons), because demanding bodily modification violates the right to bodily integrity.
[3] Iran has solved the ‘problem’ of homosexuality: it doesn’t exist. Gay people are considered to be transgender and urged to undergo sex-change operations.
[4] This is nothing unusual, we find legal fictions in Roman law.
[…] UN Experts Don’t Understand Sport (Nor Human Rights) […]
Just commenting because this type of transphobic articles shouldn’t be left as if we all agree.
It is interesting how the author only talks about trans women in sport but leaves trans men outside of his conversation. Misogyny? Men trying to decide over women’s bodies? Maybe this sounds familiar…
If we create a category for trans women, maybe we should also create a category for people depending on social class and access to funds and proper facilities to train. This certainly creates an unfair advantage in sporting competitions. Sport is unfair, we who work with/within it know it.
Furthermore, the exclusion of trans women from the female category is a solution to a problem that does not exist, trans women are not domination the female category, cis women are. The exclusion of trans women from the female category affects the integrity of all women, cis and trans.
As we are seeing, excluding trans women from professional competitive sport affect all the sporting culture, also the participation of trans girls in sports. And this is their right to a happy and social life.
I’m happy to read about the UN policy position towards a more inclusive sport.
Including transwomen in female sport categories means including males with retained male advantage in the one category designed to include females. This contravenes the human rights of female athletes to equal competitive opportunities with male athletes however they identify. This is the epitome of sexism and/or misogyny. The reason the focus is on transwomen is that this is an asymmetric rights claim on behalf of some males (transwomen) which disbenefits all females including transmen and non binary female athletes. All female athletes, including transmen (not on testosterone) and female non-binary athletes rely on female sport categories in order to uphold their equal human rights on the basis of sex. Whether or not transwomen dominate is beside the point. Being male gifts all transwomen an unfair advantage. There is no human right for males with trans identities to compete in female sport. Btw calling female athletes ‘cis’ is disrespectful given it forces upon them an unwanted feminine ‘gender identity’. Many female athletes reject hegemonic sex stereotypes which are, once again, the height of sexism.
Your argument is not founded by actual research (eg.: 2023, Transgender Women Athletes and Elite Sport: A Scientific Review). Only three studies have used trans athletes as subjects (research done on cis men is not valid for considering trans women athletes’ performance). They indicate that any potential performance advantages are negated through testosterone suppression after 12 months (and sometimes sooner) (Harper, J. (2015). Race Times for Transgender Athletes. Journal of Sporting Cultures and Identities, 6(1), 1-9. & Harper, J., O’Donnell, E., Khorashad, B. S., McDermott, H., & Witcomb, G. L. (2021). How does hormone transition in transgender women change body composition, muscle strength and haemoglobin? Systematic review with a focus on the implications for sport participation. British Journal of Sports Medicine, 55(15), 865-872. & Roberts, T. A., Smalley, J., & Ahrendt, D. (2021). Effect of gender affirming hormones on athletic performance in transwomen and transmen: Implications for sporting organisations and legislators. British Journal of Sports Medicine, 55(11), 577–583.).
Further, the majority of sport policies are not evidence-based and have participation requirements that are arbitrary and/or not clearly linked to performance. This is clear when we see that trans women are now not allowed to compete in the female category in chess. Are trans women also more intelligent than cis women, or what is your excuse?
Arguing that the use of cis is disrespectful is the same as saying that the use of heterosexual/straight is disrespectful. In the female category there are cis women, trans women and non-binary people, I’m not using cis to refer to all of them, only to cis women.
Hi Bart, my argument is absolutely based on peer reviewed research which I have outlined in my own peer reviewed research here: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/10126902211021559 and here: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17511321.2021.1993982 and in my book chapter in this edited collection: https://www.routledge.com/Sex-and-Gender-A-Contemporary-Reader/Sullivan-Todd/p/book/9781032261195. The first article you reference has no author, has not been peer reviewed and is not published in a peer reviewed journal. It is, instead an ideological hit piece. There is no peer reviewed science which shows no advantage for transwomen after T suppression. Please see this excellent summary by two exercise physiologists: https://www.sportpolicycenter.com/news/2023/4/17/should-transwomen-be-allowed-to-compete-in-womens-sports. No, arguing that ‘cis’ imposes a sexist stereotype upon biological women is nothing like the use of heterosexual/straight which relates to biological sex not the language of gender identity ideology. Again, please see my publications for further elaboration.
I read your linked research, and none of those articles are studies about changes in athletes’ performance after hormone replacement therapy. The ones I linked, do study this. You should check Joanna Harper: https://www.sportsintegrityinitiative.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/R15_47780_RaceTimesforTransgenderAthletes_FinalOF.pdf She’s also currently working on studies of transgender athletes in the UK with a goal of obtaining data on changing athletic attributes as trans athletes transition. There’s not much research done on trans women athletes, so there’s not really a lot of data to argue that it is unfair.
Also, as you might know, research is never objective, but rather partial and situated. Your position influences your reading and knowledge. And you state very clearly your position here: against the inclusion of trans people in sport.
Cis only refers to people who identify with the sex and gender assigned at birth. It doesn’t relate to their gender expression nor it imposes any sexist stereotype.
Thank you for writing, Bart. But I don’t think you have read my essay attentively. Just because people disagree with you doesn’t mean they are ‘transphobic’. As I explain in the essay, Australian and UK legislation permit the exclusion of transwomen from female sport. Are they all transphobic? Many sports governing bodies (FINA, World Athletics, British Triathlon, World Rugby, etc.) do they same. Are they also transphobic?
You write: ‘Just commenting because this type of transphobic articles shouldn’t be left as if we all agree.’ We philosophers don’t expect everyone to agree; disagreement is healthy for truth and democracy. British women, for example disagree with your views. Are they all misogynists?
(Click this link to access diagram: https://idrottsforum.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/mi-diagram.jpg)
There is a reason why people focus on transwomen in this debate and not and transmen. The former have a physiological advantage, the latter don’t and they are therefore free to compete in the male category: ‘men typically have 40-45% more lean body mass than women, and testosterone suppression reduces lean body mass by ~4-5%. Men typically have 30-60% higher muscle strength than women, and testosterone suppression reduces muscle strength by 0-9%.’ [https://www.sportpolicycenter.com/news/2023/4/17/should-transwomen-be-allowed-to-compete-in-womens-sports] The IOC has (in their latest Framework Document) dropped the requirement of hormonal treatment for transwomen, so the physiological advantage isn’t diminished at all.
Sports governing bodies are not creating ‘a category for transwomen’; it’s an Open category – for everyone who wants to compete.
You write: ‘maybe we should also create a category for people depending on social class and access to funds and proper facilities to train. This certainly creates an unfair advantage in sporting competitions.’ You mixing up several different things. 1. We need to distinguish category advantages from competition advantages: a male competing in the female category takes a category advantage (being male) into the female category. 2. There are small physiological differences between competitors which we accept, because they are not decisive (some boxers who are tall have a longer reach than their shorter opponents). 3. There are socio-economic differences between competitors. The exciting thing about sport is that it is merit-based. People from disadvantaged backgrounds can succeed in sport; the body can often overcome such disadvantages. Rest assured, the people who work in philosophy of sport are former athletes and/or coaches – we know what we are talking about. But I did get the impression that the UN experts don’t understand sport at all.
You write: ‘trans women are not domination [sic] the female category, cis women are.’ The problem is not whether transwomen dominate or not in the female category. The problem is that it is unfair – they carry a category advantage into the female category. Secondly, every transwoman distorts the ranking within a competition, even if they don’t win. It pushes women down in the ranking.
Lastly, there is a lot of confusion about ‘inclusion’ – see here: https://idrottsforum.org/feature-imbrisevic220623/.
Addendum:
In your latest post you claim: ‘Your argument is not founded by actual research (eg.: 2023, Transgender Women Athletes and Elite Sport: A Scientific Review).’ This publication by the CCES is pure propaganda (it’s actually from 2022 – not 2023). We have debunked it here: https://idrottsforum.org/devineetal221129/.
Note, there are no ‘cis’ women – there are only ‘women’. Trans activists try to suggest that the category ‘woman’ is made up of two sub-classes: ‘cis women’ and ‘trans women’. That would make women a subclass of their own category: ‘women’. And that is conceptually confused – and it concedes far too much to trans activists. The term ‘cis’ woman is necessary in order to facilitate the subsumption of trans women into the category ‘woman’. This is merely a political strategy, but it has no basis in material reality. There are women (biologically female), men (male), trans women (male), trans men (female), non-binary (who are either male or female), etc. ‘Cis’ women only exist in the imagination of trans activists – trans women are a sub-set of the category ‘men’.
I’m going to answer your statements, I’m going to try to keep it as short as possible:
– Australian and UK legislation permit the exclusion of transwomen from female sport. Are they all transphobic? Many sports governing bodies (FINA, World Athletics, British Triathlon, World Rugby, etc.) do they same. Are they also transphobic?:
Yes, governing bodies can be (and quite often are) transphobic. In the same way as they are racist, for example. Precisely the UK is on of the worst European (as in geographically Europe) countries to be trans right now, so yes, their legislation is not precisely transfriendly. Gymnastics Australia, for example, allows the participation of trans women in their competitions.
– British women, for example, disagree with your views. Are they all misogynists?: Are you really saying that all British women are TERFs/anti-trans? I can tell you that there are a lot of British cis women who would not agree with that statement.
– https://idrottsforum.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/mi-diagram.jpg They are asking everyone about that? When they first asked about the right of women to vote, people didn’t agree either. Were they right?
– The IOC has (in their latest Framework Document) dropped the requirement of hormonal treatment for transwomen: The IOC went from a regulation to a framework. They did not drop the requirement, as you can read in point 6. of the framework (I’m sure you have the document and can look this up). Further, in point 1.6 they say that these decisions “should be done in consultations with a cross-section of affected athletes”. This has not been done by the sport governing bodies you mentioned above.
– Open category: Are they also funding this category? Can people who compete here live professionally from sport? I want to see those open category football international competitions…Really, you cannot create a category for a handful of people, this is not viable in the long run. If you look at sports history, black athletes weren’t allowed to compete against white athletes. This is nowadays clearly (and luckily) racist. I believe that in some years, this will be the case with the issue that we are discussing.
– You mixing up several different things. 1. We need to distinguish category advantages from competition advantages: a male competing in the female category takes a category advantage (being male) into the female category:
I mixed it up on purpose. I’m saying that we could also create other categories (not only the ones we know now), because a person from a family with money should not compete in the same category as a person with a poor background, it is not fair. I believe that, in the same way as we do not do that, we shouldn’t create a category just for trans women, nor should trans women (on hormone replacement) compete against men. There are also sports with categories based on weight, btw.
– The problem is that it is unfair – they carry a category advantage into the female category. Secondly, every transwoman distorts the ranking within a competition, even if they don’t win. It pushes women down in the ranking:
Is a ranking distorted when a tall woman enters a high-jump competition? Surely, on average, a woman who is 1,80 will jump higher than one who is 1,60. Is it unfair for the later one? Maybe we need to accept that sport is just unfair, but a trans woman placing 8th is not going to make it more unfair.
– This publication by the CCES is pure propaganda: It’s a founded scientific review, not propaganda.
– ‘Cis’ women only exist in the imagination of trans activists: I can respect you on your other comments, but this is just a directly disrespectful and harmful attack, also to my person. There is a fully grounded and based theoretical knowledge around gender studies, this is not my imagination, sorry. And yes, I’m a trans activist, a PhD scholar, a sports scientist, and a trans masculine person (btw, competing in the male category. I’m also displacing other cis men further down in the category, so unfair of me…). I know perfectly what I am talking about.
The law-makers in the UK and Australia were realists. They understood that legal recognition of a trans woman (or man) didn’t make them into a female (or male). The law can only change the documents (birth certificate, passport, etc.) but it cannot change the body – or birth sex of a person. All transgender legislation is based on a legal fiction (fictio legis). The state will treat a transgender person AS IF they were of the other sex. This doesn’t matter if you drive a bus or work in a bank, but it does matter in sport (it also matters in prisons and in certain female-only spaces). In athletic competition we test bodies: male bodies against male bodies and female bodies against female bodies – we do not test gender identities. That’s why the UK and Australia have the exceptions in the transgender legislation. Some countries (Canada, the US) don’t have such exceptions and that has led to confusion. It is an error to believe that the label ‘trans woman’ provides eligibility for the – protected – female category. Fortunately, more and more sports governing bodies are waking up to reality. This is not about ‘inclusion/exclusion’, it is about applying eligibility criteria consistently.
Something similar to the type of categorisation you are suggesting has been put forward by Torres et al [https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/17511321.2020.1856915], but this is a non-starter for many reasons, as my colleagues and I have explained here: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/17511321.2021.1974530. If you really want to test gender identities rather than sexed bodies, then we could inaugurate the ‘Transgender Games’.
It isn’t unfair for you to compete in the male category because you don’t carry a category advantage into another category (unlike a trans woman who competes in the female category or a Heavyweight boxer competing in the Welterweight division). On the distinction between ‘category advantages’ and ‘competition advantages’ see here: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17461391.2021.1943715.
Trans women do not pose any threat in female-only spaces. For example, since 2007 trans women go to women’s prisons in Spain. Trans women are safer in women’s prisons. Do you understand that the threat here are cis men? Cis men are the ones killing women, both trans and cis women. Cis men are the one sexually assaulting women. Cis men are the problem, not trans women. Cis men legislating about women’s lives is the problem. Cis men should shut up a little bit, to be honest.
By the way, the US has dozens of bills against trans women’s participation in sports, also trans girls. Girls! We are talking here about having a social life through sport as children. You are denying these to girls, just because they happen to be trans. This is unfair.
Trans women may be safer in women’s prisons, but the female inmates are not: ‘A trans woman who sexually assaulted two inmates in a female prison has said transgender prisoners should be banned from women’s jails.’ [https://archive.is/xoOlE#selection-2573.0-2573.135]
More here:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-63823420
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/oct/11/transgender-prisoner-who-sexually-assaulted-inmates-jailed-for-life
https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/18973/pdf/
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-bristol-65549530
https://www.lawsociety.ie/gazette/top-stories/2021/12-december/ex-inmate-gives-account-of-sex-assault-by-trans-prisoner
Let’s not just look at the trans perspective: what would be good for them, what do they wish? Let’s look at the female perspective: how does trans inclusion affect them? 1. Part of a prison sentence for women is NOT that you may be assaulted by a trans woman with a history of violence against women, while you serve your time. 2. Girls playing sport should not compete against biological males – that is unfair.
Good, there was one case, so let’s discriminate all trans women because of that. You know who commits sexual assault in prison? Prison staff, with a majority of male prison staff. I think part of a prison sentence for women is NOT that you have a very high chance to be assaulted by the people who are supposed to protect you. Just a couple of different articles/reports, there are hundreds of these:
https://psycnet.apa.org/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2Flhb0000239
https://abcnews.go.com/amp/Politics/senate-report-documents-widespread-sexual-abuse-female-inmates/story?id=95157791
“He Acted as If He Owned Me”: An Exploratory Case Study Analysis of Correctional Staff Sexual Misconduct Against Women on Parole DOI: 10.1177/10778012211019051
Going back to sports. Let’s think about what women’s sport needs. Better equipment, good trainers, good training hours and access to sports facilities, equal pay, possibilities of imagining a future in sport, no sexual assault by trainers (there’s also a lot of literature about this, you know it surely), no sexual violence in sport, no discrimination in prizes, the list can continue endlessly. However, one thing that doesn’t threaten women’s sport, is trans girls wanting to play with their friends.
Trans people are human beings, don’t forget that. Do not dehumanize us. (And I will close my argument with you here).
“Good, there was one case”. No, if you go through the list of links I provided you will see that there are many more cases – and this is just in the UK. But even if it were just ONE case, that would be one case too many.
Yes, male prison staff can be sexual abusers of female inmates, but why compound the injustice and increase the risk by bringing in trans women who have a history of sexual violence against women. Let’s just exclude such offenders outright from the female prison estate.
“However, one thing that doesn’t threaten women’s sport, is trans girls wanting to play with their friends.” Yes it does. Fairness first – inclusion follows from this/depends on it. Inclusion is not an independent value; it is a function of good categorisation. As long as we have sex-based categorisation, trans women/girls don’t belong in the female category. There are, of course, sports which are not sex-affected (shooting, equestrianism, sailing, etc.) – trans athletes could try these. We don’t test gender identities, we test sexed bodies in sport. As long as that is the case, trans women either compete in an Open category or in the male category. Rejecting an eligibility claim is not an act of ‘dehumanisation’ – it’s a fact of life. We get excluded and included all the time.
The problem with trans claims in sport is their myopia. They are only focusing on themselves, rather than thinking how this will affect others (women/girls). What about Muslim or Jewish orthodox girls who want to play sports; for religious reasons they cannot play against male-bodied persons. What about women who have experienced male sexual violence? Why can’t they have a female-only space for sport? A trans women, no matter how well-meaning, will trigger their trauma. Why shouldn’t women/girls have female-only spaces? Why should teenage girls undress and shower with biological males. They are body-conscious as it is – why make it worse for them? This will lead to more and more self-exclusion from sport by girls. [I will follow your lead and end the conversation here.]
Interesting exchanges in the comments – thank you!