[Gay] Gay News from Around the Gay World That is Gay

[viper37]

How about instead of men's and women's teams, you have one set of teams that are only for those with a Y chromosome, and the other for those without a Y chromosome?

Men and women with a Y chromosome in one set, men and women without one in the other.

Problem: solved?

It's how it's done in the Olympics, I think.  And it also created problem there, for some runners mainly.

[Sheilbh]

More of the strange politics of trans rights in the UK.

The UK trans legislation as in 2004 and at the time considered ground-breaking internationally. It's now seen as out of date and behind countries like Argentina, Ireland and Spain. A lot of the issues around women's spaces etc are already protected under equalities legislation and a lot of the fear around self-ID is strange because the current law operates on the basis of self-ID (in fact it's mandatory to get a gender recognition certificate).

Anyway - the latest strange bedfellows side of things. The Labour Party has launched an investigation into the chair of Young Labour over anti-TERF tweets she made - it's worth noting that there's a wider problem with Young Labour (that's always existed) - basically it boils down to are they the youth wing of the Labour Party who exist to help Labour get elected, or are they a sort of affiliated group for young socialists. At the minute they're very in the latter camp and going in a very different direction to Labour on things like China, Cuba and Israel-Palestine. They're basically a little bit tankie and full of self-proclaimed communists at the minute which doesn't sit well with a parliamentary social democrat party. But apparently it's always been an issue, back in the 60s and 70s it was apparently full of Trots and anarchists who mainly liked lengthy  meetings to debate how precisely the USSR was a deviant state as opposed to, say, canvassing or campaigining for local Labour candidates

On the other hand the Labour MP for Canterbury has got into a big fight with the local Tory council leader. The Tory council leader is gay and a strong supporter of trans rights - it's worth remembering the proposed amendments to the Gender Recognition Act are from 2016-7 when the Tories had a majority, are based on recommendations from a Tory chaired committee and were supported by Theresa May's government. The Labour MP, Rosie Duffield, is a "gender critical" feminist - she's also a former victim of domestic violence who spent some time on a shelter and speaks particularly strongly on that issue. Anyway due to the online Twitter fight she had with the local council leader, she's received threats and will now have police security at Labour conference later this month which is not great.

But as I say it's not dividing on clear party lines as it seems to in the US and there is a far more genuine fight within the left - both in England (Labour and Greens) and Scotland (SNP - broadly) over this issue. I don't know why it's gone that way here but it's almost not really like a "culture war" issue it is in the US but something different.

Edit: And another example the Scottish government (SNP and Scottish Greens) are proposing a reform to the Gender Recognition Act which is a bit like that proposed in England. The Scottish Greens have now issued a public statement condemning the English and Welsh Greens (I think the women's group) as transphobic for their response to the consultation on the reforms.

[Malthus]

How about instead of men's and women's teams, you have one set of teams that are only for those with a Y chromosome, and the other for those without a Y chromosome?

Men and women with a Y chromosome in one set, men and women without one in the other.

Problem: solved?

No. It relies on the misconception sex is a simple binary based purely on xx/xy.
Cisgender xy women are more plentiful than many realise.
Then there's various other chromosome patterns. Not all of which automatically lead to severe disabilities.

Certainly it's curious with all the techniques professional sports have tried to decide if someone is a woman or not they haven't tried this one.
It could just be down to difficulty? Which is another issue...

The issue is that people with a Y chromosome have certain physical advantages in playing sports, which make it unfair if they complete with any other chromosomal arrangement.

It makes sense therefore to say such people may not compete on the same playing field with those who lack the y chromosome (though presumably anyone could, if they do wished, compete with them).

Not seeing why this is problematic. Solves the fraught issue of telling people they aren't "real men" or "real women", by unpinning the issue from gender.

There may well be lots of different chromosomal patterns, but that isn't relevant. Anyone can play on the Y chromosome team, if they want to - but those with a Y chromosome must do so, because the presence of a Y chromosome is strongly correlated to certain physical advantages in sports.

[Josquius]

Labour and terfs- the thing that really annoys me about it, more even than these hypocritical terfs existence, is that labour will still be branded as being all about the Internets vision of radical left wing students aggressively enforcing trans superiority.
All the bad sides of having them spread their hate whilst still getting the culture war bollocks.

How about instead of men's and women's teams, you have one set of teams that are only for those with a Y chromosome, and the other for those without a Y chromosome?

Men and women with a Y chromosome in one set, men and women without one in the other.

Problem: solved?

No. It relies on the misconception sex is a simple binary based purely on xx/xy.
Cisgender xy women are more plentiful than many realise.
Then there's various other chromosome patterns. Not all of which automatically lead to severe disabilities.

Certainly it's curious with all the techniques professional sports have tried to decide if someone is a woman or not they haven't tried this one.
It could just be down to difficulty? Which is another issue...

The issue is that people with a Y chromosome have certain physical advantages in playing sports, which make it unfair if they complete with any other chromosomal arrangement.

It makes sense therefore to say such people may not compete on the same playing field with those who lack the y chromosome (though presumably anyone could, if they do wished, compete with them).

Not seeing why this is problematic. Solves the fraught issue of telling people they aren't "real men" or "real women", by unpinning the issue from gender.

There may well be lots of different chromosomal patterns, but that isn't relevant. Anyone can play on the Y chromosome team, if they want to - but those with a Y chromosome must do so, because the presence of a Y chromosome is strongly correlated to certain physical advantages in sports.

And how do you propose to enforce this?
Every single girl who wants to get involved in anything remotely sporty undergoes genetic testing to validate she doesn't have a y chromosome?
It just sounds monstrously expensive and impractical. Not to mention potentially intrusive and a complete nightmare for those who have privacy concerns on genetic testing.
The question stands as to why professional athletics, despite struggling for decades with defining women, haven't tried this one?

[Admiral Yi]

I was unaware of professional women's sports struggling for decades to define women.  I'm only aware of the Renee Richards controversy.

[Josquius]

I was unaware of professional women's sports struggling for decades to define women.  I'm only aware of the Renee Richards controversy.

I think I posted this already. Worth a watch. Pretty interesting.

https://youtu.be/MiCftTLUzCI

[Barrister]

I was unaware of professional women's sports struggling for decades to define women.  I'm only aware of the Renee Richards controversy.

There were reports / suspicions that various eastern block female athletes were actually men, or at least were using testosterone.  The East Germans were particularly suspected.  They did gender testing at the olympics for many years.  At first they just had the athletes show their genitals, but then moved on to blood tests.

[Admiral Yi]

OK, so not really about professional women's sports. 

And all that Olympics stuff is about intersex athletes, which is not the same thing as transgender.  Of course intersex is going to be tricky.

[Malthus]

Labour and terfs- the thing that really annoys me about it, more even than these hypocritical terfs existence, is that labour will still be branded as being all about the Internets vision of radical left wing students aggressively enforcing trans superiority.
All the bad sides of having them spread their hate whilst still getting the culture war bollocks.

How about instead of men's and women's teams, you have one set of teams that are only for those with a Y chromosome, and the other for those without a Y chromosome?

Men and women with a Y chromosome in one set, men and women without one in the other.

Problem: solved?

No. It relies on the misconception sex is a simple binary based purely on xx/xy.
Cisgender xy women are more plentiful than many realise.
Then there's various other chromosome patterns. Not all of which automatically lead to severe disabilities.

Certainly it's curious with all the techniques professional sports have tried to decide if someone is a woman or not they haven't tried this one.
It could just be down to difficulty? Which is another issue...

The issue is that people with a Y chromosome have certain physical advantages in playing sports, which make it unfair if they complete with any other chromosomal arrangement.

It makes sense therefore to say such people may not compete on the same playing field with those who lack the y chromosome (though presumably anyone could, if they do wished, compete with them).

Not seeing why this is problematic. Solves the fraught issue of telling people they aren't "real men" or "real women", by unpinning the issue from gender.

There may well be lots of different chromosomal patterns, but that isn't relevant. Anyone can play on the Y chromosome team, if they want to - but those with a Y chromosome must do so, because the presence of a Y chromosome is strongly correlated to certain physical advantages in sports.

And how do you propose to enforce this?
Every single girl who wants to get involved in anything remotely sporty undergoes genetic testing to validate she doesn't have a y chromosome?
It just sounds monstrously expensive and impractical. Not to mention potentially intrusive and a complete nightmare for those who have privacy concerns on genetic testing.
The question stands as to why professional athletics, despite struggling for decades with defining women, haven't tried this one?

For the vast majority of professional athletes, it will not be necessary to test, because they already know whether they have a Y chromosome or not.

Really it simply deals with the issue of those who identify as different from the sex they were born with, or the extremely rare cases of those for whom there is some doubt.

Point is that it provides a sound scientific basis for divorcing the idea of sex and gender from performance. No nightmares of impracticality or invasive-ness required. Point is that those who are now female but who have a Y chromosome (and you can be sure they know it without the necessity of testing) compete with their Y chromosome counterparts, even though they are women and most other Y chromosome people are men.

This makes sense, because the important thing from  performance point of view is the average advantages that chromosome have them for performance of sports, not the state of their genitalia.

[Sophie Scholl]

I feel like a lot of you have zero idea how much months of hormone treatments do to change a person's body and base strength level. Or how hormone blockers will prevent any "advantage" for younger athletes. Also, why is the trans discussion like 99.9% focused on trans femme folks when there are also trans masc and non-binary trans people, too. The obsession with trans femme people whenever trans people are discussed speaks a lot more about those framing the arguments than those whose very existence and equality is being debated. This discussion has a very "Feminism Panel With No Women On It" feel to it. 

[Syt]

I feel like a lot of you have zero idea how much months of hormone treatments do to change a person's body and base strength level. Or how hormone blockers will prevent any "advantage" for younger athletes. Also, why is the trans discussion like 99.9% focused on trans femme folks when there are also trans masc and non-binary trans people, too. The obsession with trans femme people whenever trans people are discussed speaks a lot more about those framing the arguments than those whose very existence and equality is being debated. This discussion has a very "Feminism Panel With No Women On It" feel to it. 

[Eddie Teach]

Nobody cares about trans-men in sports because they don't exist, to our knowledge.

[Josquius]

For the vast majority of professional athletes, it will not be necessary to test, because they already know whether they have a Y chromosome or not.

Really it simply deals with the issue of those who identify as different from the sex they were born with, or the extremely rare cases of those for whom there is some doubt.

Point is that it provides a sound scientific basis for divorcing the idea of sex and gender from performance. No nightmares of impracticality or invasive-ness required. Point is that those who are now female but who have a Y chromosome (and you can be sure they know it without the necessity of testing) compete with their Y chromosome counterparts, even though they are women and most other Y chromosome people are men.

This makes sense, because the important thing from  performance point of view is the average advantages that chromosome have them for performance of sports, not the state of their genitalia.

What about amateurs? Where is the line between them?

Iirc didn't the discovery she was intersex come as a complete surprise to Caster Semenya?
I really don't think it's safe to say the majority of athletes are aware of this. That's a known thing with the sex spectrum, most people who don't neatly fit 100% on one extreme aren't aware of this fact.

And even beyond the practicalities... what's the science that it's having a y chromosome which makes the difference?
And will this be universal across all sports? - Caster has been banned from short distance running unless she takes drugs but I believe she is still allowed in longer distances (though no doubt had that been her event instead they'd have arbitrarily done the opposite) 

OK, so not really about professional women's sports. 

And all that Olympics stuff is about intersex athletes, which is not the same thing as transgender.  Of course intersex is going to be tricky.

Intersex athletes are far and away the main area where gender in sports has been an issue.
They're also typically far more an edge case than trans people, they highlight the incorrect science beloved of the transphobes that sex is as simple as an xx/xy binary. They are who you have to consider when thinking about where to draw the line.
Yet oddly there's a huge reluctance from those who think trans people in sport is such a big deal to even consider their existence despite it being key to the whole question.

[Sheilbh]

Caster Semenya had no idea - and not only that but I think the decision/finding actually leaked from the IOC so she found out via the media. The whole situation was pretty horrendous and as I've said before I cannot imagine a worse, less sensitive or considered group to be making decisions in this area than international sports bodies like the IOC, FIFA etc

[Admiral Yi]

Intersex athletes are far and away the main area where gender in sports has been an issue.
They're also typically far more an edge case than trans people, they highlight the incorrect science beloved of the transphobes that sex is as simple as an xx/xy binary. They are who you have to consider when thinking about where to draw the line.
Yet oddly there's a huge reluctance from those who think trans people in sport is such a big deal to even consider their existence despite it being key to the whole question.

Apart from the fact that transphobes are very bad people, I don't know what you're trying to say.  What do you mean by edge case?  How are intersex people the key to the whole question?