Trans women in sport and why you can take your basic science and F&£k off

So I am a trans femme, that means that apart from having to be an expert biologist and social scientists. I also need to be a sport scientist and a master debater……(yeah, it’s a cheap pun)

Today, I am tackling the Trans women in sport thing and tossing in my two cents, because I love healthy debate (well, I actually don’t like healthy or unhealthy debate about trans people, I like existing without debate about that existence but here we are and since cis people are kinda being dicks about I guess it’s debate time)

here is the thing everyone is missing. I want you to read the following very slowly, then read it again, absorb it. If you don’t like it, take the device you are reading this on, crunch it’s up really small, knock down the sharp corners, butter it up with your fav lube and stick that MotherF&£ker right up your bigoted ass.

Trans women are women.

That’s it, that is the guiding principle, this guiding principle dictates the framework by which trans women compete in sports, use the bathroom and exist in society. It’s the same principle that shows FINA, World Rugby and the United Kingdom to be discriminatory shits who can (you guessed it) F&£k right off.

Let me explain.

Women compete as women, and trans women are women. Sure, a trans women may start with an “unfair biological advantage” in her pre hrt period, but the onus is on the sporting body to find a way to create standards that protect the right to privacy of the individual (as codified in most constitutions) as well as mitigate that “advantage”. That means outing a trans person is a no no and I think that should a legal challenge be brought against FINA, it would be successful and shut down any ideas they have about forcing trans women into a trans league. After all, legal woman is legal woman. So the best a sporting body can ethically do is enforce mitigation and that mitigation may not be made public without the athlete’s express consent.

There is a very valid conversation to be had on how to mitigate the advantages testosterone and testosterone puberty grant trans women. Maybe 1 year of testosterone suppression is not adequate, perhaps there are surgical criteria that need to be set due to inadequate testosterone suppression, Maybe additional monitoring of the individual’s hormone levels are required, and that’s all acceptable. And we can have that conversation.

But if you cannot start with the premise that trans women are women, belong in women’s spaces, society and sport then you can go sit in the corner and contemplate your transphobia, and yes you are transphobic. It’s quite normal to be transphobic, society is so soaked in transphobia it’s hardly your fault, it is however your fault when you decide to not work on your transphobia.

In closing, I am not interested in your comments about “it’s not fair”. Sport, just like life, is not fair. Neither I nor anyone can make it fair, the Bolsheviks tried and it didn’t take and besides, if you wanted fair, you would be watching clones of a single person compete against each other. I am not interested in your “biological women and biological males” crap, refer back to my trans women are women statement. Don’t tell me “but the cis women trained hard and trans women are taking their opportunities”, trans women train just as hard and are deserving of the same opportunities.

This all means that one day a Lia Thomas or some other trans women is going to win and if you can’t be happy for them, return to the corner and contemplate your transphobia some more because now is the time you get to make up for the life and career destroying manner in which society dealt with Fallon Fox (trans), Caster Semenya (black, yes that’s all she did wrong, she is black) and Lia Thomas (trans, and all the trans people you know took note of your comments, we saw your character in your words and we were hurt).

Ladies, gentlemen and those beyond the binary, it’s 2022. No matter what Matt Walsh, Jordan Peterson and British people tell you, we ain’t going back in the closet and you should grow up and start dealing with that. Because according to the Pew Research Centre, there are a lot more of us than you figured and you will be alienating a substantial part of society and that dear cis normative society will hurt not just our feelings, but your wallets as well.