The data in Tables 1 & 2 show that pre-T suppression trans women cannot be compared to cis men (while closer to cis men for height, weight is lower & seemingly closer to cis women’s) Also trans women have bone density lower than natal males, natal females. @RogerPielkeJr
Research finds trans women have bone density lower than natal males, natal females, and FtMs, as a group, BEFORE hormone therapy even begins (sample=711, FAR larger than any of the studies Hilton uses)
Male and female muscle is the same strength when comparing equivalent cross section/size (Costill et al., 1976; Schantz et al., 1983). Something never considered by Hilton et al.
Tucker, Hilton etc cite Q angle, lung size, bone density & height in XX women – confer a performance advantage for XY trans women, but there is NO support in the literature that these factors confer any such advantage
There is ZERO substantial research evidence of any biological advantages that would IMPEDE the fairness of trans women competing in any women’s sport not even Q angle, lung size, bone density & height, muscle mass, strength, endurance or T levels!
Hogshead-Makar , Hilton and Davies says that women like Semenya need to be kept out of competition to “give women’s bodies an equal opportunity to participate,” which isn’t true.
Hogshead-Makar has been arguing that South African runner Caster Semenya is not a woman. It began on, when Hogshead-Makar responded to a tweet about Semenya by saying “We must protect women’s sport for women’s bodies.”
White Privilege
At 51 seconds #SharronDavies claims #CasterSemenya was misdiagnosed as a child because she is from a 3rd world country. This is #Interphobia with a capital ’i’ from Davies.
The human rights framework controls this “debate.” The practice of sport is a human right (IOC Charter), sex is a matter of legal recognition (CAS), & trans women can be legally recognized as female. Therefore, trans women have a HR to participate in competitive sport as women.
Trans women don’t have to justify our inclusion. The burden of argument is entirely on those who seek to exclude us. And, as I’ll briefly prove, that burden has not yet been met, and is unlikely ever to be met.
There currently exists NO evidence to suggest that trans women who elect to suppress testosterone (through, for example, gender affirming hormone therapy and/or surgical gonad removal) maintain disproportionate advantages over cis women indefinitely.
Elite women athletes are considerably stronger than the average cis man, and certainly the average trans woman.
The average height of the 2016 Rio Olympics women’s high jump podium was 6’1.7”. The 10th place woman in the final is 5’5”; the gold medallist is 6’3.6” and was the tallest in the competition.
The global average height for men is around 5’9”. Moreover, height is not uniformly distributed around the world. The average Dutch woman is 5’6.5”, whereas the average Indonesian woman is 4’10”.
Look at how fucking resilient we are. Look how strong. Look at all the shit we’ve gone through and we’re still here❤️ #Transgender
Every single trans person I know has been through traumatic experiences. Family rejection, healthcare discrimination, job loss, sexual assault, denial of services, substance abuse, and the list goes on.
Being trans is hard.
If you’re trans and reading this, I know you’re tired. I know your resilience only keeps you going for so long. I know you need a break from being you. Because I feel the same way all the time. It’s OK to get angry, it’s OK to be exhausted,..
Policies that impact the practice of trans women in competitive sport emanate from the parallel history of efforts to define the female category in ways that excluded those women whose bodies were deemed to not conform to normative standards of femininity.
The women's sports category is the result of the historical exclusion of women from competitive sport, which was underpinned by pathologizing discourses about their bodies and the harms of their participation in physical activities.
Forbidden to take part explicitly in sports from the end of the 19th century, women organized their own competitions during the 20th century and gained some access to sports that were prohibited to them (Prudhomme-Poncet, 2003; Rosol, 2004; Vilain et al., 2017).
Sport is divided into 2 categories, male & female, that are distinctly different & easily understood. Nature, however, is not. Policies determining athletes’ eligibility for men’s and women’s sports should not pretend that every athlete’s sex fits neatly into one of two boxes
or that sexual variation is the sole determinant of competitive advantage.
Instead, we must acknowledge the variability between and among the sexes, deescalate overblown concerns about sex and competitive equity in sport, and include as many athletes as possible in the sex category most meaningful to them.