A matter of months ago, the NHS were advising that puberty blockers were reversible.
It is not unreasonable for the average person to take this on authority and to share this as an authority view.
It is not unreasonable for medics, scientists and other relevant experts to question the NHS advice on puberty blockers, and to draw attention to inaccuracies or misrepresentations.
It is not unreasonable for the NHS to alter or update their advice on puberty blockers after a fuller assessment of the evidence laid before them.
It is not unreasonable for those people who rely on the NHS as an authority opinion to remove/alter what they may now consider outdated, inaccurate and/or potentially harmful shared information to reflect more recent medical advice.
I am not blind to the politics and motivations here. And I think it's reasonable to question why people we might expect to "know better" (i.e. to have conducted their own research into puberty blockers) maintained a "party line".
I am simply pointing out that there are many more who simply quoted the NHS medical advice. And that is a perfectly reasonable thing to do.
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This is a computer-generated series, transitioning between "hyper male" and "hyper female".
Where does your perception of the sex of the person shift?
Which face is the most ambiguous?
If you reply, please include your sex (the actual one).
OK, in the paper, the data was:
Faces 1-3: 100>97% scored "male"
Faces 5-7: 94>100% scored "female"
Face 4 was the transition face, with 68% scoring it "male".
FTR, I didn't hesitate on 4/male then 5/female.
Next set: same series, now skinned 🤣
I won't ask for responses. It is probably obvious that people were less able to detect any sharp transition from male>female, from face-on bone structure.
Note to archeologists: this doesn't mean you can't tell a male from female face, so stop pretending you can't.
In defence of Semenya et al, many argue: 1. athletes with 5ARD are female; 2. features associated with 5ARD are normal female variation; 3. these athletes should be included in female sports.
The first claim is incoherent.
To understand 5ARD, let's look at healthy reproductive development.
Both male and female development are well-understood.
Male development 1. Y chromosome carrying functional SRY that directs testes development 2. testes produce hormones, notably testosterone (T) 3. T first drives male internal genitalia development 4. T>DHT conversion drives male external genital development
In our recent paper (cited by World Athletics @sebcoe) calling for the reintroduction of sex screening in the female category, we make it very clear that this type of screening must be:
1. Cohort-wide | performed in all athletes wishing to enter the female category, regardless of skin colour, religion, nationality etc.
2. Early | to protect privacy and dignity, and avoid athletes being front-page news.
With these parameters in mind, the sex screen itself cannot be considered “racist”.
Citing historic ethical issues won’t wash. We all acknowledge these. Early, cohort-wide screening will avoid the failures of the past.
So the cry of “racism” must be aimed elsewhere, presumably anchored on the premise that previous targeted screening (which is precisely what I and others advocate against) brought multiple black athletes and very few white athletes to our front pages.
Now, let’s grant that and think about what that means.
The charge against me and others is that we are “policing sex” in a way that excludes black women (when measured against “white femininity”).
My friends, I am here to tell you that I - an adult human female with white skin - am precisely the same quality and amount of female as any adult human female with black skin.
Black women aren’t female by some weird voodoo. They are women in precisely the same way as white women are women.
In fact, it starts to look a bit racist on your part to suggest that black women aren’t women in the same way as white women are women.