Well, everyone else here is specifically talking about testosterone. That's the "problematic" chemical. It's relevant because it's a normal endogenous chemical we make and some women naturally make more. It can help with more muscle mass and bone density. That it's testosterone is entirely relevant.
That's like speaking on Gaza and saying "it doesn't matter where it is." Like yes it absolutely matters. The context and specifics matter when discussing complicated topics.
All athletes that beat other athletes have a presumed physical advantage. A physical advantage isn't an issue. It's testosterone that's the issue according to the people bitching about it.
A physical advantage isn’t an issue. It’s testosterone that’s the issue according to the people bitching about it.
No, it's a physical advantages that derive from a condition that renders certain parameters (whatever they are) similar to stronger categories (in this case, men).
If it's just testosterone or a combination of hormones and other things it doesn't matter in the perspective of the discussion I was trying to have (which answered your question, by the way)...
So why would intersex get a special category that isn’t allowed?
But that's literally every condition. Thats everything a top physical athlete has - their entire physique is a physical advantage over others. How is it different than say, Michael Phelps producing less lactic acid which allows him to have greater endurance? Why is lactic acid okay to be different with, but not testosterone? Both are genetic abnormalities that confer an advantage.
The reason is that they can't be transphobic about lactic acid.
So why men and women should compete separately?
If you think they don't, then fine.
If you think the do, then the reason pretty much is "because men have physical advantages and make the competition unfair or even impossible for women". What gives this advantage is the kind of stuff that I am talking about.
Is lactic acid production a property that is advantageous to men (I don't think it is, just making an example)? Then if you have the lactic acid production of men, you effectively have some of the advantages that men have over women, hence competing against women creates question. This is not binary, it's a scale, and at some point there is a limit that is fixed in the rules.
I will answer your question once again: because there are categories based on gender, there are not based on lactic acid production.
Testosterone is one of the advantages that men have over women, and in fact there is a limit.
You specifically ignored my argument, which can be summed up like this: categories for sport are fairly arbitrary, but it's what is currently used. If you have properties of a stronger category, it is unfair for those of the category you compete in. Yes, there are other N genetic advantages within that category, but since they are not parameters that are used to slice competition, they are not addressed. I didn't make the rules and frankly I don't care. If in the future we are going to have height and feet size categories for swimming, with lactic acid production, and tens more, I honestly would have no problem. Today genders are used in most of the sports because it's a simple and effective proxy to a bunch of advantages.
There are sports that are designed in a way that give estrogen dominant people advantages. Testosterone isn't an advantage for every sport, and Testosterone in isolation isn't an "advantage men have over women," because it comes with a cost including lower lifespan. Cool that you think that way?
The way many sports are designed gives testosterone dominant people an advantage. That's patriarchy for ya.
Height isn't that important for swimming or even running - ShaCarri is like 5'1".
Lactic acid is not related to gender, that's my point. But you clearly believe in gender determinism and think sex chromosomes make up a huge part of genetic makeup when it is quite tiny. Women and men have more in common than we have different.
My criticism is that categories based on gender are unscientific. Which you agree with but say you can't be bothered with the details so its good enough. Well, some of us are smart enough to actually analyze this and know enough about medicine to criticize the heuristic of Testosterone as a metric for athletic competitions when there's more involved than just T.
Testosterone isn’t an advantage for every sport,
Is it for boxing?
because it comes with a cost including lower lifespan
How is this relevant when you look at advantages in a single competition? This is not a "is it good in life"-situation.
Height isn’t that important for swimming or even running
hence it doesn't have a separate category? BTW, swimmers are taller than average, because being tall is generally ad advantage. It's one of many factors, but it's there.
The way many sports are designed gives testosterone dominant people an advantage. That’s patriarchy for ya.
This seems...unlikely. I would say that combat sports have not been "designed" with this in mind, and many other sports are done in the only way they could: swim as fast as you can, run as fast as you can, jump as high/far/etc. as you can.
Lactic acid is not related to gender, that’s my point.
Then you should understand my answer: it doesn't break the boundary of established categories.
But you clearly believe in gender determinism and think sex chromosomes make up a huge part of genetic makeup when it is quite tiny.
Are you a medium? Do you read my mind on arbitrary topics? Can you give me 6 numbers for next lottery?
Jokes aside, I didn't talk about chromosomes, I didn't talk about testosterone (only once you brought it up), I specifically referred to functional difference, whatever the origin, and also mentioned that the reality is not so easy (not binary).
My criticism is that categories based on gender are unscientific.
Perfect, this is a completely separate discussion, one I might agree with even. I wouldn't know how to make it better, it's not my area of expertise. What I know is that in many sports women holding record would barely qualify if they were to compete against males, and I think that would not be fun nor fair for anybody. I also think that in combat sports that would be potentially dangerous. Happy to see alternatives in the future.
My argument is that if testosterone is considered an advantage in a sport, then athletes shouldn't be banned for their anatomy, but instead the sport should adapt and sort athletes by T levels if it truly matters. Men shouldn't be getting hurt by other men with higher testosterone, either. And we should be MORE inclusive of athletes who don't fit the gender binary by getting rid of these men's/women's categories that aren't really helpful or accurate anyway.
If a sport included both men and women at the higher level, then they will compete at lower levels. It's not like we'd be asking women to box men for the very first time in an Olympic setting, if we organized the groups by testosterone and some women and men ended up competing.
Some sports including fighting sports can have rule changes or be redesigned to give women advantages. If we look at those warrior challenges, many of that has to do with center of gravity. If women can get their hips over stuff, they are good, but for men it's often their shoulders. If women run the course a little differently, they can often do really well. That's not because they are "worse" athletes, they are just athletes different than men.
but instead the sport should adapt and sort athletes by T levels if it truly matters
I may even agree with you here, but I think this is going to be a nightmare. Continuous testing, plus, while sex is a proxy for many attributes at once, testosterone is only one. Then you need many more parameters to compare and create categories, on a global scale. This assuming we actually understand such parameters well enough.
Men shouldn’t be getting hurt by other men with higher testosterone, either.
I guess the difference between low testosterone men (assuming there are many in high competition levels) and high ones is smaller than high testosterone women and low testosterone men. So yes, I agree, but this is hardly a problem in practice.
If women can get their hips over stuff, they are good, but for men it’s often their shoulders. If women run the course a little differently, they can often do really well.
I really don't see how you could do this in most sports and make it fair and interesting. Sure, you jumped 20cm lower, here is your gold medal because there is an estimated disadvantage for you of 25cm. Yes, you arrived 45s after, here is your gold medal. It seems like a terrible idea and even harder to implement in sports with points (football, tennis, volleyball etc.).
Considering the relative low amount of "corner cases", keeping sex as a category seems more reasonable imho, although with its limits. I am interested in what women athletes think.
That’s not because they are “worse” athletes, they are just athletes different than men.
There is nothing moral behind "worse". There are differences that simply provide advantages to men and make them faster/stronger/taller which is an advantage in many sports.
So which is it that's an issue? Is it sex or is it testosterone? And how do you define sex? What if someone has testosterone but isn't responsive, in the case of people who are XY and appear to be cisfemale and are simply nonresponsive to testosterone?
We weigh people continously.
We aren't asking for other parameters. Stop strawmanning. I asked for testosterone and weight for combat sports.
Why must this fully be accurate and correct when you're completely fine with the less precise heuristic we have currently going based on gender?
It's not a problem in practice because we force a false gender dichotomy that literally disqualifies these specific athletes.
They are only "corner cases" because you define gender as red and yellow and thus leave out orange, green, and purple.
Women athletes think a variety of things because they are a variety of people.
There are advantages to men when the only men allowed to represent men are high testosterone and the only women allowed to represent women are low testosterone.
Are you misunderstanding my argument on purpose?
You and I both know that testosterone is not the only thing. There are people who have different sensitivity (low reception) to it, for example, then there is the problem that testosterone (and probably other stuff too!) has an historical effect on development that is not captured by a snapshot in time. I am not strawmanning, I simply assumed that since both of us know that testosterone level at time T is insufficient data, you would need at least more parameters to make fair categories.
If that's not the case and you actually meant just using testosterone level and weight, than I think this is a bad idea. Actually, I think this is worse than the sex categorisation. This way you are 100% bundling together people with high T and low reception (I.e. didn't get most of the benefits) with people with low T and high reception. You are also exposing yourself to men artificially lowering testosterone levels after having gotten all the historical developmental advantages to compete in "lower" categories (similarly to how it happens today with weight).
They are only "corner cases" because you define gender as red and yellow and thus leave out orange, green, and purple.
No, I don't. They are corner cases because we can look at the reality and observe that this is a problem with a relative small incidence. I think your proposal will present way more corner cases and problematic situations.
Did you read the article I linked? I am aware of these issues with testosterone. But this is the issue people have with men competing against women - testosterone. It's what they do blood tests for.
So your solution to this issue is to be regressive and keep the bad gender heuristic which forces an arbitrary gender binary on us and excludes otherwise legitimate athletes from competing because they don't fit this arbitrary mold? Tell me what's ideal here. What's fair?
I don't have a solution. I started this whole conversation by simply answering "why being intersex is different from having scoliosis", and we are at this point where you proposed a completely alternative way to slice competitions in sports. In my opinion your solution is impractical at least, let alone there might be tens of scientific issues that I am not aware of. A quick search shows that your idea has been suggested already in informal conversations, and even in a non-scientific forum received objections of missing advantages deriving from hemoglobin, reaction times, biomechanical advantages and sizes, all properties for which sex is a good proxy. This should be addressed somehow, and I am not in a position to do that, I am simply not an expert.
That said, I am not against finding a better way to make sport both inclusive and fair/entertaining in principle. I simply believe, based on some reading and a basic understanding that your suggestion might not be it.
Okay so you're just here to be regressive, got it.
You cannot address any of the problems around this situation, you cannot debate a scientific answer, you do not even know what a scientific answer for this might look like, you neglect how this incorporates into a greater discussion about what we define as "ableism" (I didn't ask ONLY about how it is different than scoliosis, but also about any other difference in biology).... Like not only are you unable to debate the science of it, which you admit, but you are also so sure I'm wrong, even though you don't know anything about this topic.
I've already provided multiple examples where the physical advantages, resulting from a neurochemical anomaly, exist and no one had an issue. Why is testosterone special? And if testosterone ISN'T special, then why aren't they testing for other enodgenous neurochemicals like lactic acid and banning based on that? Why doesn't this group of lactic acid anomalies get kicked out and refused placement?
Again, it's transphobia.
You are arguing a point I specifically didn't make. So I don't know what to answer you, since none of it has to do with my actual opinion.
Your argument is that intersex conditions blur boundaries for sex in sports. My argument is that these categories are arbitrary and I'm explaining why.
You: the color orange messes with the boundaries we have in place for red and yellow! It can't be involved!
Me: the boundary for yellow and red is arbitrary and visible light exists on a continuum anyway!
Me: the boundary for yellow and red is arbitrary and visible light exists on a continuum anyway!
Actually me:
This is not binary, it’s a scale, and at some point there is a limit that is fixed in the rules.
I fully recognize that this is arbitrary, I fully recognize that any "limit" is somewhat arbitrary. The only difference is that I acknowledge that sex is a "good enough" proxy for now.
I still don't understand how would you avoid that women will never see a medal again in any combat sport, athletics, swimming, tennis and many other sports if you stop using sex as a category. What categories would you use, and are they pragmatic enough that they can be implemented easily?
You see how when you demand orange not exist, and that's apparently "good enough" for you, that it doesn't represent reality? Instead of demanding these boundaries, if testosterone matters, then organize people into classes by testosterone. This allows women with higher T to compete as well as men with lower T. For many categories, testosterone will be unnecessary to test anyway.
"Women will never see a medal again," hmm don't be so confident about that.
It's often the way sports are designed that keep women out intentionally
You see how when you demand orange not exist, and that’s apparently “good enough” for you, that it doesn’t represent reality?
I am saying that it's better to have 10 corner cases that can be dealt with than 2000 corner cases.
It’s often the way sports are designed that keep women out intentionally
I am really curious how you would design running in a way that having stronger muscle doesn't help, or combat sports in a way that power doesn't help etc. Also, women have their own category with almost in all cases same rules. How does this keep women out?
hmm don’t be so confident about that.
Go check all time-trial based sports, let me know if any women would have won anything.
Øyvind Sandbakk, a professor of sports science at UiT The Arctic University of Norway and the director of the Norwegian School of Elite Sports (NTG), has found together with colleagues that the gaps in the average performance between elite female and male athletes have tended to plateau at around 8–12% difference in world-record results in favour of men. The gap can be significantly smaller for ultra-endurance swimming and larger for sports involving substantial upper-body strength, the study found.
There isn't a clear linear relationship between testosterone levels and performance, says Mertens, a journalist focusing on sports and gender. "In fact, a lot of very elite male athletes have pretty low testosterone levels overall on average." One endocrinology study found low testosterone concentrations in one-quarter of men competing in 12 of the 15 Olympic sports analysed. And Mertens says even women with hyperandrogenism, who can have testosterone levels that reach typical male ranges, don't have the same level of performance as men.
I give up. You have tons of data available that you can still compare from Olympic games that just happened. I specifically didn't mention "every sport ever invented", but I mentioned "most sports" and you quote something that is supposed to prove...what? Lol
Nevermind.
Continue living in a fantasy world in which Phelps swims slower than Ledecky (at 15, but who cares?!), because denying reality is a great way to approach problems.
Well, everyone else here is specifically talking about testosterone. That's the "problematic" chemical. It's relevant because it's a normal endogenous chemical we make and some women naturally make more. It can help with more muscle mass and bone density. That it's testosterone is entirely relevant.
That's like speaking on Gaza and saying "it doesn't matter where it is." Like yes it absolutely matters. The context and specifics matter when discussing complicated topics.
All athletes that beat other athletes have a presumed physical advantage. A physical advantage isn't an issue. It's testosterone that's the issue according to the people bitching about it.
No, it's a physical advantages that derive from a condition that renders certain parameters (whatever they are) similar to stronger categories (in this case, men).
If it's just testosterone or a combination of hormones and other things it doesn't matter in the perspective of the discussion I was trying to have (which answered your question, by the way)...
But that's literally every condition. Thats everything a top physical athlete has - their entire physique is a physical advantage over others. How is it different than say, Michael Phelps producing less lactic acid which allows him to have greater endurance? Why is lactic acid okay to be different with, but not testosterone? Both are genetic abnormalities that confer an advantage.
The reason is that they can't be transphobic about lactic acid.
So why men and women should compete separately? If you think they don't, then fine. If you think the do, then the reason pretty much is "because men have physical advantages and make the competition unfair or even impossible for women". What gives this advantage is the kind of stuff that I am talking about.
Is lactic acid production a property that is advantageous to men (I don't think it is, just making an example)? Then if you have the lactic acid production of men, you effectively have some of the advantages that men have over women, hence competing against women creates question. This is not binary, it's a scale, and at some point there is a limit that is fixed in the rules.
I will answer your question once again: because there are categories based on gender, there are not based on lactic acid production. Testosterone is one of the advantages that men have over women, and in fact there is a limit.
You specifically ignored my argument, which can be summed up like this: categories for sport are fairly arbitrary, but it's what is currently used. If you have properties of a stronger category, it is unfair for those of the category you compete in. Yes, there are other N genetic advantages within that category, but since they are not parameters that are used to slice competition, they are not addressed. I didn't make the rules and frankly I don't care. If in the future we are going to have height and feet size categories for swimming, with lactic acid production, and tens more, I honestly would have no problem. Today genders are used in most of the sports because it's a simple and effective proxy to a bunch of advantages.
There are sports that are designed in a way that give estrogen dominant people advantages. Testosterone isn't an advantage for every sport, and Testosterone in isolation isn't an "advantage men have over women," because it comes with a cost including lower lifespan. Cool that you think that way?
The way many sports are designed gives testosterone dominant people an advantage. That's patriarchy for ya.
Height isn't that important for swimming or even running - ShaCarri is like 5'1".
Lactic acid is not related to gender, that's my point. But you clearly believe in gender determinism and think sex chromosomes make up a huge part of genetic makeup when it is quite tiny. Women and men have more in common than we have different.
My criticism is that categories based on gender are unscientific. Which you agree with but say you can't be bothered with the details so its good enough. Well, some of us are smart enough to actually analyze this and know enough about medicine to criticize the heuristic of Testosterone as a metric for athletic competitions when there's more involved than just T.
Is it for boxing?
How is this relevant when you look at advantages in a single competition? This is not a "is it good in life"-situation.
hence it doesn't have a separate category? BTW, swimmers are taller than average, because being tall is generally ad advantage. It's one of many factors, but it's there.
This seems...unlikely. I would say that combat sports have not been "designed" with this in mind, and many other sports are done in the only way they could: swim as fast as you can, run as fast as you can, jump as high/far/etc. as you can.
Then you should understand my answer: it doesn't break the boundary of established categories.
Are you a medium? Do you read my mind on arbitrary topics? Can you give me 6 numbers for next lottery?
Jokes aside, I didn't talk about chromosomes, I didn't talk about testosterone (only once you brought it up), I specifically referred to functional difference, whatever the origin, and also mentioned that the reality is not so easy (not binary).
Perfect, this is a completely separate discussion, one I might agree with even. I wouldn't know how to make it better, it's not my area of expertise. What I know is that in many sports women holding record would barely qualify if they were to compete against males, and I think that would not be fun nor fair for anybody. I also think that in combat sports that would be potentially dangerous. Happy to see alternatives in the future.
My argument is that if testosterone is considered an advantage in a sport, then athletes shouldn't be banned for their anatomy, but instead the sport should adapt and sort athletes by T levels if it truly matters. Men shouldn't be getting hurt by other men with higher testosterone, either. And we should be MORE inclusive of athletes who don't fit the gender binary by getting rid of these men's/women's categories that aren't really helpful or accurate anyway.
If a sport included both men and women at the higher level, then they will compete at lower levels. It's not like we'd be asking women to box men for the very first time in an Olympic setting, if we organized the groups by testosterone and some women and men ended up competing.
Some sports including fighting sports can have rule changes or be redesigned to give women advantages. If we look at those warrior challenges, many of that has to do with center of gravity. If women can get their hips over stuff, they are good, but for men it's often their shoulders. If women run the course a little differently, they can often do really well. That's not because they are "worse" athletes, they are just athletes different than men.
https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTNG16aYg/
I may even agree with you here, but I think this is going to be a nightmare. Continuous testing, plus, while sex is a proxy for many attributes at once, testosterone is only one. Then you need many more parameters to compare and create categories, on a global scale. This assuming we actually understand such parameters well enough.
I guess the difference between low testosterone men (assuming there are many in high competition levels) and high ones is smaller than high testosterone women and low testosterone men. So yes, I agree, but this is hardly a problem in practice.
I really don't see how you could do this in most sports and make it fair and interesting. Sure, you jumped 20cm lower, here is your gold medal because there is an estimated disadvantage for you of 25cm. Yes, you arrived 45s after, here is your gold medal. It seems like a terrible idea and even harder to implement in sports with points (football, tennis, volleyball etc.). Considering the relative low amount of "corner cases", keeping sex as a category seems more reasonable imho, although with its limits. I am interested in what women athletes think.
There is nothing moral behind "worse". There are differences that simply provide advantages to men and make them faster/stronger/taller which is an advantage in many sports.
So which is it that's an issue? Is it sex or is it testosterone? And how do you define sex? What if someone has testosterone but isn't responsive, in the case of people who are XY and appear to be cisfemale and are simply nonresponsive to testosterone?
We weigh people continously.
We aren't asking for other parameters. Stop strawmanning. I asked for testosterone and weight for combat sports.
Why must this fully be accurate and correct when you're completely fine with the less precise heuristic we have currently going based on gender?
It's not a problem in practice because we force a false gender dichotomy that literally disqualifies these specific athletes.
They are only "corner cases" because you define gender as red and yellow and thus leave out orange, green, and purple.
Women athletes think a variety of things because they are a variety of people.
There are advantages to men when the only men allowed to represent men are high testosterone and the only women allowed to represent women are low testosterone.
Are you misunderstanding my argument on purpose?
You and I both know that testosterone is not the only thing. There are people who have different sensitivity (low reception) to it, for example, then there is the problem that testosterone (and probably other stuff too!) has an historical effect on development that is not captured by a snapshot in time. I am not strawmanning, I simply assumed that since both of us know that testosterone level at time T is insufficient data, you would need at least more parameters to make fair categories. If that's not the case and you actually meant just using testosterone level and weight, than I think this is a bad idea. Actually, I think this is worse than the sex categorisation. This way you are 100% bundling together people with high T and low reception (I.e. didn't get most of the benefits) with people with low T and high reception. You are also exposing yourself to men artificially lowering testosterone levels after having gotten all the historical developmental advantages to compete in "lower" categories (similarly to how it happens today with weight).
No, I don't. They are corner cases because we can look at the reality and observe that this is a problem with a relative small incidence. I think your proposal will present way more corner cases and problematic situations.
Did you read the article I linked? I am aware of these issues with testosterone. But this is the issue people have with men competing against women - testosterone. It's what they do blood tests for.
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20240731-the-sports-where-women-outperform-men
So your solution to this issue is to be regressive and keep the bad gender heuristic which forces an arbitrary gender binary on us and excludes otherwise legitimate athletes from competing because they don't fit this arbitrary mold? Tell me what's ideal here. What's fair?
I don't have a solution. I started this whole conversation by simply answering "why being intersex is different from having scoliosis", and we are at this point where you proposed a completely alternative way to slice competitions in sports. In my opinion your solution is impractical at least, let alone there might be tens of scientific issues that I am not aware of. A quick search shows that your idea has been suggested already in informal conversations, and even in a non-scientific forum received objections of missing advantages deriving from hemoglobin, reaction times, biomechanical advantages and sizes, all properties for which sex is a good proxy. This should be addressed somehow, and I am not in a position to do that, I am simply not an expert. That said, I am not against finding a better way to make sport both inclusive and fair/entertaining in principle. I simply believe, based on some reading and a basic understanding that your suggestion might not be it.
Okay so you're just here to be regressive, got it.
You cannot address any of the problems around this situation, you cannot debate a scientific answer, you do not even know what a scientific answer for this might look like, you neglect how this incorporates into a greater discussion about what we define as "ableism" (I didn't ask ONLY about how it is different than scoliosis, but also about any other difference in biology).... Like not only are you unable to debate the science of it, which you admit, but you are also so sure I'm wrong, even though you don't know anything about this topic.
So I take it you're here in bad faith.
I've already provided multiple examples where the physical advantages, resulting from a neurochemical anomaly, exist and no one had an issue. Why is testosterone special? And if testosterone ISN'T special, then why aren't they testing for other enodgenous neurochemicals like lactic acid and banning based on that? Why doesn't this group of lactic acid anomalies get kicked out and refused placement?
Again, it's transphobia.
You are arguing a point I specifically didn't make. So I don't know what to answer you, since none of it has to do with my actual opinion.
Your argument is that intersex conditions blur boundaries for sex in sports. My argument is that these categories are arbitrary and I'm explaining why.
You: the color orange messes with the boundaries we have in place for red and yellow! It can't be involved!
Me: the boundary for yellow and red is arbitrary and visible light exists on a continuum anyway!
Actually me:
I fully recognize that this is arbitrary, I fully recognize that any "limit" is somewhat arbitrary. The only difference is that I acknowledge that sex is a "good enough" proxy for now.
I still don't understand how would you avoid that women will never see a medal again in any combat sport, athletics, swimming, tennis and many other sports if you stop using sex as a category. What categories would you use, and are they pragmatic enough that they can be implemented easily?
You see how when you demand orange not exist, and that's apparently "good enough" for you, that it doesn't represent reality? Instead of demanding these boundaries, if testosterone matters, then organize people into classes by testosterone. This allows women with higher T to compete as well as men with lower T. For many categories, testosterone will be unnecessary to test anyway.
"Women will never see a medal again," hmm don't be so confident about that.
https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTNG16aYg/
It's often the way sports are designed that keep women out intentionally
I am saying that it's better to have 10 corner cases that can be dealt with than 2000 corner cases.
I am really curious how you would design running in a way that having stronger muscle doesn't help, or combat sports in a way that power doesn't help etc. Also, women have their own category with almost in all cases same rules. How does this keep women out?
Go check all time-trial based sports, let me know if any women would have won anything.
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20240731-the-sports-where-women-outperform-men
I give up. You have tons of data available that you can still compare from Olympic games that just happened. I specifically didn't mention "every sport ever invented", but I mentioned "most sports" and you quote something that is supposed to prove...what? Lol
Nevermind. Continue living in a fantasy world in which Phelps swims slower than Ledecky (at 15, but who cares?!), because denying reality is a great way to approach problems.