As a trans woman, I find posts like this very problematic. It assumes that males have an advantage in sports and- last time I checked- trans women didn't win every single race. I recently entered a woman's only 10k after a spell of injury and I barely even podiumed. So quit the histrionics- trans women belong in sport and we don't need your permission.
I've read that testosterone blockers and estrogen will slow down a trans woman,dramatically. I don't know by how much,but i do know they don't run nearly as fast. Im curious as to how much.
I am actually quite a bit faster as a woman, but I did lose a lot of weight.
While one can argue that male and female exist on a biological level (setting aside the 2% of people born intersex), the definition of man and woman is purely a social construct.
"Women," for example, are not natural. They are made-up, surgically modified, shaved, groomed, bathed, perfumed, etc, etc. If you were to raise a male and female without any social constructs of gender norms, they would look remarkably similar.
Further, how a biological male or female expresses their made-up gender is up to them.
No one in their right mind would want the government to determine gender for you. No one wants the gov't to tell you how long your hair can or can't be. No one wants the government to tell you what soap you can use or what pants you have to wear. No one wants the gov't to tell you what name you have to use.
All that said, a reasonable person can look at gender separated sports and see the issue with mixing biological males into female events. I haven't seen a good answer yet but leave that to people who have thought through the issue better than you.
No, women are not at all "made-up, surgically modified, shaved, groomed, bathed, perfumed, etc, etc." That's regressively sexist claptrap.
Women are female human beings who've reached adulthood. Just as men are male human beings who've reaced adulthood.
Humans are a sexually dimorphic species because of nature. Just as most other species of animals that reproduce sexually, and only sexually are, and all other mammals are.
Humans came in two distinct sexes and it was easy to tell the men/adult males apart from the women/adult females long before human societies came up with the sorts of body care and adornment you mention.
Make-up, fashion, cosmetic surgery, shaving, grooming, bathing, perfume, hairstyling, body paint, tattooing, piercings, etc have been and are commonl y used in many cultures to accentuate the physical differences between men/boys and women/girls. But those cultural practices are not the source of the physical differences between the sexes in our species.
Photos and footage of adults held as prisoners in the Nazi concentration camps and the Khmer Rouge killing fields show that it's easy to tell women apart from men even when the two sexes are dressed identically; they're reduced to skin and bones due to starvation; no one has has bathed in ages; they're all bald-headed due to malnutrition or coz their heads have been shaved; and no one is wearing makeup, perfume, deodorant or has been able to engage in other grooming customs meant to accentuate their sex like removal, trimming or styling of underarm, leg and pubic hair, eyebrows, nose hair and whiskers.
Today, plenty of people who work in certain kinds of settings such as hospital operating rooms, ICUs, meat processing plants, high-tech labs, industrial factories - wear identical clothing, footwear, gloves, headcoverings, face masks and eye protectors. Yet it's usually very easy for observers to tell the women apart from the men, and to do so instantly based on just a quick glance.
Men and women have different gaits and ways of moving which are obvious to others that are based on the myriad differences in our anatomy. There are thousands of natural physical differences between men and women, natural physical differences large and small. The phsycial differences between the two sexes that make it easy to tell women apart from men are not all, or even mainly, the result of cultural "gender norms" and modern methods of grooming, hygiene and body adornment like you say.
None of this changes the fact that being able to guess someone’s body parts is irrelevant to policy, just like gaydars are irrelevant to policy on gays.
In any case, there are many cases of women passing off as men or the other way round throughout history, so your claim of ease of telling them apart is not even correct. Unless you focus on the common case because exceptions don’t matter, that is.
The very definition of man and woman has changed constantly over time. It is scarcely related to biology.
According to OED, the word woman has been in use and meant “An adult female human being; the counterpart of man” and “a female member of a family” for more than a thousand years.
The plural form - women - has been in use nearly as long, and has always meant “the female members of a family, household, or other group, etc.; womenfolk” and “in an abstract or generic sense, the female sex considered collectively.”
Since the late 15th century, woman has been used particularly in legal and formal contexts to mean “a female person who has reached adulthood or is considered mature” so as to distinguish a woman from a girl.
Making a distinction between girl and woman has played a crucial role in the course of human history for determining at which age a female human being is regarded as old enough for betrothal, marriage, PIV sex, pregnancy, childbirth, mikveh rituals, menstrual huts/the red tent, nunneries, harems, concubingage, sex slavery, prostitution and various other kinds of work - and for deciding exactly when female humans become subject to the mandatory veiling, chaperoning and cloistering rules and other restrictions traditionally imposed on female people in many societies once we reach a certain chronological age or stage of physical development.
You made the outrageous and offensive claim that
"Women," for example, are not natural. They are made-up, surgically modified, shaved, groomed, bathed, perfumed, etc, etc. If you were to raise a male and female without any social constructs of gender norms, they would look remarkably similar.
Without providing a shred of evidence. Now you're doubling down by claiming that
The very definition of man and woman has changed constantly over time. It is scarcely related to biology.
If that were true, then it should be easy to show some proof. So please provide receipts showing that through the course of history the definition of man and women have been "scarcely related to biology" the way you claim.
No one in their right mind would want the government to determine gender for you. No one wants the gov't to tell you how long your hair can or can't be. No one wants the government to tell you what soap you can use or what pants you have to wear. No one wants the gov't to tell you what name you have to use.
All that said, a reasonable person can look at gender separated sports and see the issue with mixing biological males into female events. I haven't seen a good answer yet but leave that to people who have thought through the issue better than you.
That is implicitly what the phobes here are rooting for: for the government to determine gender. If one insists that there are only two classes and everyone has to be straitjacketed into one or the other, there will be conflict at the edges that the government will have to adjudicate.
While one can argue that male and female exist on a biological level (setting aside the 2% of people born intersex), the definition of man and woman is purely a social construct.
"Women," for example, are not natural. They are made-up, surgically modified, shaved, groomed, bathed, perfumed, etc, etc. If you were to raise a male and female without any social constructs of gender norms, they would look remarkably similar.
Further, how a biological male or female expresses their made-up gender is up to them.
No one in their right mind would want the government to determine gender for you. No one wants the gov't to tell you how long your hair can or can't be. No one wants the government to tell you what soap you can use or what pants you have to wear. No one wants the gov't to tell you what name you have to use.
All that said, a reasonable person can look at gender separated sports and see the issue with mixing biological males into female events. I haven't seen a good answer yet but leave that to people who have thought through the issue better than you.
No, women are not at all "made-up, surgically modified, shaved, groomed, bathed, perfumed, etc, etc." That's regressively sexist claptrap.
Women are female human beings who've reached adulthood. Just as men are male human beings who've reaced adulthood.
Humans are a sexually dimorphic species because of nature. Just as most other species of animals that reproduce sexually, and only sexually are, and all other mammals are.
Humans came in two distinct sexes and it was easy to tell the men/adult males apart from the women/adult females long before human societies came up with the sorts of body care and adornment you mention.
Make-up, fashion, cosmetic surgery, shaving, grooming, bathing, perfume, hairstyling, body paint, tattooing, piercings, etc have been and are commonl y used in many cultures to accentuate the physical differences between men/boys and women/girls. But those cultural practices are not the source of the physical differences between the sexes in our species.
Photos and footage of adults held as prisoners in the Nazi concentration camps and the Khmer Rouge killing fields show that it's easy to tell women apart from men even when the two sexes are dressed identically; they're reduced to skin and bones due to starvation; no one has has bathed in ages; they're all bald-headed due to malnutrition or coz their heads have been shaved; and no one is wearing makeup, perfume, deodorant or has been able to engage in other grooming customs meant to accentuate their sex like removal, trimming or styling of underarm, leg and pubic hair, eyebrows, nose hair and whiskers.
Today, plenty of people who work in certain kinds of settings such as hospital operating rooms, ICUs, meat processing plants, high-tech labs, industrial factories - wear identical clothing, footwear, gloves, headcoverings, face masks and eye protectors. Yet it's usually very easy for observers to tell the women apart from the men, and to do so instantly based on just a quick glance.
Men and women have different gaits and ways of moving which are obvious to others that are based on the myriad differences in our anatomy. There are thousands of natural physical differences between men and women, natural physical differences large and small. The phsycial differences between the two sexes that make it easy to tell women apart from men are not all, or even mainly, the result of cultural "gender norms" and modern methods of grooming, hygiene and body adornment like you say.
That is implicitly what the phobes here are rooting for: for the government to determine gender. If one insists that there are only two classes and everyone has to be straitjacketed into one or the other, there will be conflict at the edges that the government will have to adjudicate.
As a trans woman, this post is violence. Your use of the term 'Straitjacketed into one or the other' suggests that trans people are mentally insane. Shame on you.
The very definition of man and woman has changed constantly over time. It is scarcely related to biology.
Some info about the history of the words man and woman in English, and the languages that English grew out of, from Douglas R. Harper’s Etymology Online:
Man (n.) "a featherless plantigrade biped mammal of the genus Homo" [Century Dictionary]
Old English man, mann "human being, person (male or female); brave man, hero;" also "servant, vassal, adult male considered as under the control of another person"
from Proto-Germanic *mann- (source also of Old Saxon, Swedish, Dutch, Old High German man, Old Frisian mon, German Mann, Old Norse maðr, Danish mand, Gothic manna "man"), from PIE root *man- (1) "man."
Sometimes connected to root *men- (1) "to think," which would make the ground sense of man "one who has intelligence," but not all linguists accept this. Liberman, for instance, writes, "Most probably man 'human being' is a secularized divine name" from Mannus [Tacitus, "Germania," chap. 2], "believed to be the progenitor of the human race."
Specific sense of "adult male of the human race" (distinguished from a woman or boy) is by late Old English (c. 1000); Old English used wer and wif to distinguish the sexes, but wer began to disappear late 13c. and was replaced by man.
Universal sense of the word remains in mankind and manslaughter. Similarly, Latin had homo "human being" and vir "adult male human being," but they merged in Vulgar Latin, with homo extended to both senses. A like evolution took place in Slavic languages
woman (n.) "adult female human," late Old English wimman, wiman (plural wimmen), literally "woman-man," alteration of wifman (plural wifmen) "woman, female servant" (8th c.),
a compound of wif "woman" (see wife) + man "human being" (in Old English used in reference to both sexes; see man (n.)).
It is notable that it was thought necessary to join wif, a neuter noun, representing a female person, to man, a masc. noun representing either a male or female person, to form a word denoting a female person exclusively. [Century Dictionary]
The formation is peculiar to English and Dutch. Replaced older Old English wif and quean as the word for "female human being," as in Jesus's answer to his mother, in Anglo-Saxon gospels la, wif, hwæt is me and þe? (John ii:4 "Woman, what have I to do with thee?").
This post was edited 1 minute after it was posted.
The very definition of man and woman has changed constantly over time. It is scarcely related to biology.
Some info about the history of the words man and woman in English, and the languages that English grew out of, from Douglas R. Harper’s Etymology Online:
Man (n.) "a featherless plantigrade biped mammal of the genus Homo" [Century Dictionary]
Old English man, mann "human being, person (male or female); brave man, hero;" also "servant, vassal, adult male considered as under the control of another person"
from Proto-Germanic *mann- (source also of Old Saxon, Swedish, Dutch, Old High German man, Old Frisian mon, German Mann, Old Norse maðr, Danish mand, Gothic manna "man"), from PIE root *man- (1) "man."
Sometimes connected to root *men- (1) "to think," which would make the ground sense of man "one who has intelligence," but not all linguists accept this. Liberman, for instance, writes, "Most probably man 'human being' is a secularized divine name" from Mannus [Tacitus, "Germania," chap. 2], "believed to be the progenitor of the human race."
Specific sense of "adult male of the human race" (distinguished from a woman or boy) is by late Old English (c. 1000); Old English used wer and wif to distinguish the sexes, but wer began to disappear late 13c. and was replaced by man.
Universal sense of the word remains in mankind and manslaughter. Similarly, Latin had homo "human being" and vir "adult male human being," but they merged in Vulgar Latin, with homo extended to both senses. A like evolution took place in Slavic languages
woman (n.) "adult female human," late Old English wimman, wiman (plural wimmen), literally "woman-man," alteration of wifman (plural wifmen) "woman, female servant" (8th c.),
a compound of wif "woman" (see wife) + man "human being" (in Old English used in reference to both sexes; see man (n.)).
It is notable that it was thought necessary to join wif, a neuter noun, representing a female person, to man, a masc. noun representing either a male or female person, to form a word denoting a female person exclusively. [Century Dictionary]
The formation is peculiar to English and Dutch. Replaced older Old English wif and quean as the word for "female human being," as in Jesus's answer to his mother, in Anglo-Saxon gospels la, wif, hwæt is me and þe? (John ii:4 "Woman, what have I to do with thee?").
Always funny to see Verbosa go nuts ablaze typitty typitty type.
Now do history for words describing people not falling along strict man/woman lines, as well as women described using masculine qualifiers and men using feminine ones throughout history.
So you think the concept of "man" and "woman" have remained static? How willfully ignorant can you be?u
Until the last roughly 100 years the overwhelming majority of humans were preoccupied with getting enough food and resources to stay alive. Self-obsessional navel-gazing about gender was not something people had the time or inclination to do.
The very definition of man and woman has changed constantly over time. It is scarcely related to biology.
The first comprehensive written dictionary of the English language used in modern times was Samuel Johnson’s Dictionary published in 1755. It’s available for free online, as is Johnson’s second edition published in 1773. Here are the definitions in both editions:
WOMAN (noun) 1. The female of the human race. 2. A female attendant on a person of rank.
MAN (noun) 1. Human being. 2. Not a woman. 3. Not a boy. 4. A servant; an attendant; a dependant. [sic] 5. A word of familiarity bordering on contempt. 6. It is used in a loose signification like the French on, one, any one. 7. One of uncommon qualifications. 8. A human being qualified in any particular manner. 9. Individual. 10. Not a beast. 11. Wealthy or independant person 12. When a person is not in his senses, we say, he is not his own man. 13. A moveable piece at chess or draughts. 14. Man of war. A ship of war.
The very definition of man and woman has changed constantly over time. It is scarcely related to biology.
The first dictionary of American English was published by Noah Webster in 1828. It’s available for free online too, just like Samuel Johnson's British English dictionary from 1755 and 1773 is.
Here are the definitions Noah Webster gave 200 years ago:
WOMAN, noun plural women. [a compound of womb and man.]* 1. The female of the human race, grown to adult years. 2. A female attendant or servant.
*(NB: Webster’s view that the noun woman originated as “a compound of womb and man” turned out not to be true.)
MAN, noun plural men. 1. Mankind; the human race; the whole species of human beings; beings distinguished from all other animals by the powers of reason and speech, as well as by their shape and dignified aspect. 'Os homini sublime dedit.' 2. A male individual of the human race, of adult growth or years. 3. A male of the human race; used often in compound words, or in the nature of an adjective; as a man-child; men-cooks; men-servants. 4. A servant, or an attendant of the male sex. 5. A word of familiar address. 6. It sometimes bears the sense of a male adult of some uncommon qualifications; particularly, the sense of strength, vigor, bravery, virile powers, or magnanimity, as distinguished from the weakness, timidity or impotence of a boy, or from the narrow mindedness of low bred men. 7. An individual of the human species. In matters of equity between man and man-- Under this phraseology, females may be comprehended. So a law restraining man or every man from a particular act, comprehends women and children, if of competent age to be the subjects of law. 8. man is sometimes opposed to boy or child, and sometimes to beast. 9. One who is master of his mental powers, or who conducts himself with his usual judgment. When a person has lost his senses, or acts without his usual judgment, we say, he is not his own man 10. It is sometimes used indefinitely, without reference to a particular individual; any person; one. 11. In popular usage, a husband. 12. A movable piece at chess or draughts. 13. In feudal law, a vassal, a liege subject or tenant.
This post was edited 1 minute after it was posted.
here's the deal. buried beneath the bull patties is you want them not just out of sports but browbeaten back into what they were. this is over. times have changed. you conservatives need some sort of progressive solution other than "back in the closet." to me the way that makes the participants happy without conservative crybabying is a 3rd category.
This is one heck of an assumption. You have to counter the arguments people actually make, not just invent motivations or decide for them what their "real" argument is.
But if he has to do the hormone treatments... he isn't going to be a 4:15 miler anymore. Which is one reason why I think AT LEAST the hormone/testosterone level thing needs to be in play. I think this would be a deterrent (at least to some degree) to keep some of the top people from pulling this stunt.
I'm firmly against trans girls participating in sports created for genetic girls, but I'd say we never even consider opening the door based on hormone therapy alone.
Literally have everything that God gave you removed and then we can talk.
Pecker? Gone
Balls? Gone
Then we can think about a conversation that includes hormone therapy.
The number of trans girls in high school sports would be reduced to ZERO overnight.
sounds cute except you meanwhile have the supposed "compassionate friends" types -- alongside these absolutists -- who will act like they care but argue that talking about or taking any of the steps you are discussing, is a sign of mental illness or shouldn't be allowed while they are minors, when the effects are easiest limited. and you have states outlawing treatments for minors, etc.
you surely can see where the 2 of you working together has a pincer effect, the one says chop your bits and you're allowed, the other says make it illegal to chop bits. net effect: general exclusion. one cannot achieve the requirement until perhaps senior year, or perhaps not even within HS, depending when your birthdate falls and if you speed through school.
here's the deal. buried beneath the bull patties is you want them not just out of sports but browbeaten back into what they were. this is over. times have changed. you conservatives need some sort of progressive solution other than "back in the closet." to me the way that makes the participants happy without conservative crybabying is a 3rd category.
This is one heck of an assumption. You have to counter the arguments people actually make, not just invent motivations or decide for them what their "real" argument is.
no, i am just dreaming up the folks who think it's all an abomination, or mental illness.
i kind of don't buy there are a ton of folks who "get it" on the general trans issue but whose response to sports is then either "exclusion" or "back in the closet."
i say back in the closet because, let's be real, the game here is jane is jane 7 hours a day in class, then you want them back to joey for the meet.
you're trying to pretend insisting on that is not political or religious disgust and is instead just some limited sports integrity concern. bull.
to me if you actually believed what you're suggesting you would have zero problem with a third category or would be coming up with some solution other than race as a dude. race as a dude tends to have other baggage with it you're not admitting. religious ideas of gender, disliking trans, not believing it should happen. and it's usually not just "sports," it's "bathrooms," it's "boys in class dressed as girls," it's "pronouns."
it's a list. it's kind of like the hard core anti-abortion folks tend to not really be just that in isolation, but also anti-contraception, anti-condom, anti-IVF (right wing protestant) or anti-death penalty, anti-war, etc. (left wing catholic).
So you think the concept of "man" and "woman" have remained static? How willfully ignorant can you be?u
Until the last roughly 100 years the overwhelming majority of humans were preoccupied with getting enough food and resources to stay alive. Self-obsessional navel-gazing about gender was not something people had the time or inclination to do.
this. and let's be real, we started confronting a lot of the "trans" type issues last 50 years after stonewall and gay rights. so folks are now officially out of the closet, circulating in public, and by doing so that opens a variety of other issues about what their self expression is.
the deal is even 20 years ago these kids would either be self denying or closeted, or tip toeing into it in some subculture. no one fully lived it. and since no one was fully living it, we weren't confronting what that means for sports.
it is very typical of conservatives to be referring to the bible or a dictionary, in the sense that in a world of science -- of actual answers -- you want to go back to religion or logic chains that assume their own truth.
re dictionaries you can make logic chains as you want. have you not read wittgenstein? the question in the modern age is we can actually compute the truth of the logic chain. the difference between hypothesis and result.
GOP politics is rife with this. little moral aphorisms assumed as true but not assessed as, "does an economist believe this?" or "does this actually happen?" surely people in the trump era get saying something doesn't make it true.
last point on this one, but on one of the usual "spam every time we find one" posts about a trans competing at their state meet, the runner happened to be in hawai'i. in that context it struck me as more obviously culturally specific. polynesians think different on third gender. it then struck me as more obviously a cultural thing, both sides, one trying to impose on the other. not obvious.
Until the last roughly 100 years the overwhelming majority of humans were preoccupied with getting enough food and resources to stay alive. Self-obsessional navel-gazing about gender was not something people had the time or inclination to do.
this. and let's be real, we started confronting a lot of the "trans" type issues last 50 years after stonewall and gay rights. so folks are now officially out of the closet, circulating in public, and by doing so that opens a variety of other issues about what their self expression is.
the deal is even 20 years ago these kids would either be self denying or closeted, or tip toeing into it in some subculture. no one fully lived it. and since no one was fully living it, we weren't confronting what that means for sports.
I am surprised nobody has referred to the Stan/Loretta scene in Monty Python's Life of Brian as to the historical precedent for the navel-gazing.
