Caster Semenya could be forced to undertake hormone therapy for future Olympics

String said:
Isn't that a man identifying as a man?
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not sure if you're making a semantic argument

from another article
"The super-featherweight fighter, who is biologically female, beat Mexico’s Hugo Aguilar on points by unanimous decision on Saturday night at the Fantasy Springs Resort Casino in Indio, California, approximately 130 miles east of Los Angeles."
 
sinwave said:
not sure if you're making a semantic argument

from another article
"The super-featherweight fighter, who is biologically female, beat Mexico’s Hugo Aguilar on points by unanimous decision on Saturday night at the Fantasy Springs Resort Casino in Indio, California, approximately 130 miles east of Los Angeles."
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I don't think it proves the level playing field. This boxer has artificially increased testosterone in order to compete, therefore men identifying as women should surely artificially lower testosterone in order to compete? Caster's legal battle was specifically to prevent that.
 
String said:
I don't think it proves the level playing field. This boxer has artificially increased testosterone in order to compete, therefore men identifying as women should surely artificially lower testosterone in order to compete? Caster's legal battle was specifically to prevent that.
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fair comparison.
 
sinwave said:
https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/trans-man-wins-debut-pro-boxer-pat-manuel-771783/
is it fair game now?
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How many female sportswomen have you seen with natural bodies like that? he's obviously been pumped full of testosterone and spent a lot of time in the gym to compensate for a lack of male biological development, all credit to him for the gym work. The problem is on the flip side of the coin biological men competing in womens sports don't really have to lift a finger to be competitive because they're already at a huge physical advantage to the majority of biological women. The only way biological women will be able to compete is to builk up themselves and look like Soviet era steroid abusing women.
 
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mmj_uk said:
How many female sportwomen have you seen with natural bodies like that? he's obviously been pumped full of testosterone and spent a lot of time in the gym to compensate for a lack of male biological development, all credit to him for the gym work. The problem is on the flip side of the coin biological men competing in womens sports don't really have to lift a finger to be competitive because they're already at a huge physical advantage to the majority of biological women. The only way biological women will be able to compete is to builk up themselves and look like Soviet era steroid abusing women.
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tend to agree and in light of this I wonder where they draw the line on testosterone doping in the men's sport.
 
mmj_uk said:
How many female sportswomen have you seen with natural bodies like that? he's obviously been pumped full of testosterone and spent a lot of time in the gym to compensate for a lack of male biological development, all credit to him for the gym work. The problem is on the flip side of the coin biological men competing in womens sports don't really have to lift a finger to be competitive because they're already at a huge physical advantage to the majority of biological women. The only way biological women will be able to compete is to builk up themselves and look like Soviet era steroid abusing women.
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But it's not the same has having a male body, which will have much tougher bone structure and overall mass. You can't gain that as an adult by just injecting testosterone. It's a temporary boost and actually is poisonous for women in quite moderate amounts, so there will likely be consequences for doing it.
 
Semple said:
I feel sorry for all the female athletes who train for their lives to compete at these types of events, and knowing they don't stand a chance of even competing when they're up against a man who wants to identify as a woman.

It just makes the whole thing a farce!

He/she is free to identify as whatever gender they wish to identify as, but when it comes to competing in sports, he/she needs to compete against equals.
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There's part of the problem. Competitors in sports are not equal. If they were, then in each event there would be at least tens of thousands of people who could be winning world class competitions. A competitor ranked 1,000th would beat a competitor ranked 1st as often as not, so the whole idea of ranking would be meaningless. Professional sports might not even exist.

A person legitmately ranked 100th in a sport might well train as much as the world champion. They might well compete with as much determination as the world champion. But they'll never win because they are inherently inferior at the sport due to some aspect of biology. Probably only very slightly so, but the difference between 1st and 100th would probably only be a couple of percent.

So the question isn't about equals competing, it's about how unequal competitors are allowed to be and how to enforce that restriction. A simple sex restriction is a very crude approximation that doesn't account for sexual development disorders let alone the modern fad for pretending that sex and gender are the same thing.
 
TheOracle said:
Why should she be discriminated against because of her biological makeup?
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For the same reason half the population is, to allow women to participate in athletics.

Not say men’s events and “women’s events” dominated by trans women and intersex people with male advantages but identifying as female.

I thought we were now living in this weird world where everything has to be equal?
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Why did you think that with regards to this area? Is that your personal view? Do you think we shouldn’t have rules separating men and women in athletics for example?
 
dowie said:
For the same reason half the population is, to allow women to participate in athletics.

Not say men’s events and “women’s events” dominated by trans women and intersex people with male advantages but identifying as female.



Why did you think that with regards to this area? Is that your personal view? Do you think we shouldn’t have rules separating men and women in athletics for example?
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No, my fault. I was mistaken in thinking she was a woman. That said, my views are at the minute pre 2018 so many probably won't agree with me.

I do think men should compete with men (I mean men, you know...men) and women with women. Some disagree, which was my original point I guess. Strange times ahead.
 
cheesyboy said:
I think referring to her as "he" illustrates quite well the lack of good faith in where you're coming from here.
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I might refer to someone by their preferred pronouns if addressing them, as a courtesy. But having had to wade through more articles than you imagine where it becomes increasingly difficult to track what is actually being discussed because the article insists on concealing biological sex deliberately, I'll just normally refer to someone according to the English language and biology. I recall one article on a transgender child I had to re-read one paragraph four times trying to work out what the child's actual birth sex was and which they'd switched to. And even then it was hard to tell with the way it danced around the subject. Caster is a male.
 
TheOracle said:
No, my fault. I was mistaken in thinking she was a woman. That said, my views are at the minute pre 2018 so many probably won't agree with me.

I do think men should compete with men (I mean men, you know...men) and women with women. Some disagree, which was my original point I guess. Strange times ahead.
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I guess part of it is the way it’s been reported. It’s often been reported that she’s simply a woman with a condition that gives her high testosterone, which in terms of gender/current identity politics is correct but then easily plays into the narrative that they’re out to get her because she’s too good etc...

The intersex aspect, essentially biological advantages of a man albeit her balls are undescended and her penis didn’t develop, is sometimes omitted when, with regards to sport, under current rules sex matters.
 
Nerusy said:
Of course I see the point that putting women with somebody who has male levels of testosterone makes the whole competition pointless as obviously the higher testosterone gives absolute advantage but then again, it was her genetic make up since birth. Should we punish Michael Phelps for his freak genetic make up that make him perfect for swimming?
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We don't segregate in athletics based on body proportions we segregate based on sex or gender (depending on the rules).

I guess some sports do practice other forms of segregation such as boxing segregating by weight class. I'm not sure there is huge demand for it but maybe you could segregate swimmers, though that is an entirely separate discussion really.

Complicated situation. Personally I think it is unfair for trans M to F compete with women, it just seems not fair but here we have Semenya who is not altering her body, she was born this way. I have conflicting view on the whole thing as I personally think her winning is unfair but at the same time why is it unfair, she was born this way and she is a female.
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That does indeed seem conflicted, you could make exactly the same argument about M to F trans people and claim they were born that way and they are female.

Yes both Semenya and M to F trans women identify as female, though they've got some obvious male advantages that they were born with and if we're segregating into male and female groups specifically as a result of those advantages then letting some people through as a result of identity is rather flawed and defeats the purpose of segregating in the first place.
 
dowie said:
letting some people through as a result of identity is rather flawed and defeats the purpose of segregating in the first place.
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very much this. was considering saying "defeats the purpose" but hadn't fitted it in and had no compelling reason to post again
 
String said:
I don't think it proves the level playing field. This boxer has artificially increased testosterone in order to compete, therefore men identifying as women should surely artificially lower testosterone in order to compete? Caster's legal battle was specifically to prevent that.
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Caster is not a man identifying as a woman. She is a woman with atypically high testosterone.
 
I am of the opinion that athletes should be allowed to take whatever drugs they like, this completely eliminates these concerns and would allow us to see the peak of human performance, I want to see the fastest 100m the longest long jump etc.
 
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