1y ago

Transgender swimmer Lia Thomas out of Olympics after losing legal battle

www.theguardian.com

The US swimmer Lia Thomas, who rose to global prominence after becoming the first transgender athlete to win a NCAA college title in March 2022, has lost a legal case against World Aquatics at the court of arbitration for sport – and with it any hopes of making next month’s Paris Olympics.

The 25-year-old also remains barred from swimming in the female category after failing to overturn rules introduced by swimming’s governing body in the summer of 2022, which prohibit anyone who has undergone “any part of male puberty” from the female category.

Thomas had argued that those rules should be declared “invalid and unlawful” as they were contrary to the Olympic charter and the World Aquatics constitution.

However, in a 24-page decision, the court concluded that Thomas was “simply not entitled to engage with eligibility to compete in WA competitions” as someone who was no longer a member of US swimming.

The news was welcomed by World Aquatics, who hailed it as “a major step forward in our efforts to protect women’s sport”.

193 comments

I know I'm gonna catch heat for this, but sex-segregated physical competitions is one of the very few places where trans women shouldn't be treated the same. Women's sports competitions aren't segregated by gender, they're segregated by sex. Trans women are women in gender, but their body isn't a biologically female body. That's the exact definition of transgender - when your body's biological sex doesn't match your sense of gender. So by definition, trans women don't have a biologically female body.
The whole point of sex-segregated sports is for people with female bodies to be able to have a fair competition, instead of them not even getting a chance to compete at all because if they had to compete against biological males then almost 100% of females wouldn't even make the team. This is the whole reason why sports competitions are segregated by sex.
TLDR trans women should always be treated as women - except for sex-segregated physical competitions
- The thing that really sucks is that tran women are gonna get absolutely dominated by cis men. HRT for long enough really does so so much to the body (hence why most sports allow trans people who have transitioned to compete). Tho trans men also would have insane advantage overs cis women if they competed together
  Maybe there isn't any good solution. But what you are saying leads to a conclusion that there is no place in sports for trans people. Then again, these conversations always fall apart when we talk about cis people with abnormal hormone profiles.
  End of the day, a lot of competitive sports come down to genetics. There isn't much room for someone with disadvantagious genetics to become the best in the world. For me, I don't see much difference in a trans woman who's transitioned being world class in swimming and a tall ass cis woman dominating in basketball. Especially when we don't see trans people sweeping in competitions as a wider trend
  
  There is a place for trans people in sport. Male, female, trans. Done.
  
  The problem is that fundamentally there are differences within the genders that favour one competitor over another.
  Take Michael Phelps -- "Michael Phelps’s height, wingspan, and large hands and feet give him an advantage in swimming. His body also produces less lactic acid than his rivals, which shortens his recovery time." According to that he should have been disqualified from competing as his body was fundamentally different from his competitors.Yet he was glorified for his achievements even though he had an edge nobody else had.
  Herein lies the biggest issue ... trans people are disqualified for the simple reason nobody in power wants to deal with them, so the anti-trans movement wins again.
- Trans women have been allowed in the Olympics for 20 years now. There have been zero trans medalists. If this advantage actually exists, why aren't they winning?
  
  If i had to guess I'd say it's simply numbers. Compared to the rest of the population, trans people are extremely rare, and so there likely just haven't been enough trans people to have been there yet.
- You knew you were going to catch heat for something that's extremely popular and common opinion?
  
  Bruh, I got cooked for voicing this opinion so many fucking times.
  
  Banned from many subreddits for voicing this opinion
- The real answer here is to do away with gender/sex separation and instead have classifications based of total mass, bone density, muscle fiber density, and maybe hormonal levels. Stop trying to deal with the generalistics and target the issues that actually matter.
  
  If it could be done in a reasonable way then I'd be totally fine with that
- On HRT, trans women have similar muscle mass to cis women. They do not have an advantage.
  
  Is it all about muscle mass? What about bone structure? Lung capacity? Heart size/volume? Stuff like that?
  I'm not a doctor.
  
  Doesn’t that depend on when they start?
- this is not correct, on average trans women don't perform any better at competitive sports than cis women
  check the results section of this review paper for more info: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10641525/
  
  Quote right from the opening paragraph:
  it is important to understand the level of physical fitness/performance [trans] individuals possess relative to their cisgender counterparts. Unfortunately, there are few studies investigating this topic, and several complications that confound this research.
- I wonder what you would think of trans men dominating their cis-female competition while having periods
  
  So, monthly periods. Then exclude irregular women, women who have had a hysterectomy and such.
  I agree with the point of trans women having an unfair advantage, but your reductionist point of view is moronic, unless you meant it as a joke, which certainly did not land.
  
  So... After they have been on HRT for a while? Periods are triggered by hormones, and there's a lot more to a period than just bleeding. Many trans women experience cramps, bloating, mood swings, etc. on a monthly cycle. There are also some cis women who have irregular or no periods; would they still be allowed to compete or would you ban them as well?
- Dude, hormone blockers exist. They don't have any advantages if they're on hormones/ hormone blockers.
  Edit: I'll die on this hill. Enjoy being evil the future.
  
  My understanding is that's true for muscle mass. However, if they transition after puberty like Lia Thomas did, height and wingspan will remain; both of which confer huge advantages in swimming. Apparently that's a major reason why Michael Phelps did so well, his arm span is ridiculous.
  
  What do you mean by "being evil in the future"?
  
  If Shaq took hormone blockers, would she still have an advantage?
- Kind of a contradiction in that trans women aren't female bit lol. Very much depends on how you define that and how you measure it.
  The categories are also not called female categories, they're called women's categories, which is effectively the same thing in this conversation. Female is a loose category encompassing people with many typed of bodies and many hormonal levels and many degrees of feminization and masculinization. This is effectively excluding one group of women specifically and ignoring all other groups that have advantages.
  
  Trans women are not biologically female - that is not up for debate. Gender and sex were used interchangeably for the majority of the Olympics' existence so you can't "well ackshually" about the definition of women's sports here - they meant biologically female and you know it. There is no contradiction unless you completely ignore the context.
Well this comment section is awful.
- Lot of good choices for blocking and making your Lemmy experience less hateful. There are def some terfs and terf-adjacent types in here.
Obviously the solution is to have a separate trans Olympics.
/S
- Or send them to the mens side, which is ironically is open to everyone.
  
  I'm scared to reply, but is this not a plausible outcome? She is still a she, but could she compete on the men's team?
- Actually that should be fine
- I hate that idea, but if that's all trans people can get I guess it's better than nothing. :/
  
  There aren't enough trans people to facilitate such an event. Most of us are also impoverished and have extremely poor life outcomes as adults by comparison with cisgender people of the same relative class. So there are very few of us to begin with, fewer who are interested in athletics, and much fewer who have any real ability to compete in athletic competitions.
Post locked. Too many inappropriate comments.
For a while I've been thinking that all sports should get rid of gendered male/female competitions and replace them with ~~weight~~ categories that take into account physiological characteristics like muscle mass, testosterone levels, weight, height, etc. This would result in, say, three to four categories ranging from lightweight to heavyweight.
Why wouldn't this work?
- A 150 lb male will almost always out-perform a 150 lb female. The genetic differences are still vast even in the same weight category.
  
  That's why they would need to take more into account than simply weight. Surely multiple physical and hormonal factors could also be measured and an aggregate total value be applied to each athlete.
  
  It's not a genetic difference, for one, it's a hormonal one. Children pre-puberty are effectively identical in terms of physiological gender differences aside from environmental factors.
- Fallon Fox. Look her up.
  Yes, she eventually got beat by another professional female fighter, but not before she seriously injured multiple opponents, including skull fractures. Those types of injuries are not common in men's MMA, although they do occur, but they're extremely uncommon in female MMA.
  Testosterone blockers don't reverse the effects the hormone had on a bodies development prior to medically transitioning. So differences such as bone density are locked in, even if their blood test shows a hormonal balance that aligns with their preferred gender at the time of competition.
- Genetics are predominantly on the favor of the male side unfortunately.
  
  I have a lot of trouble accepting claims like this when Lea Thomas is beaten by cis women all the time.
  
  In general, sure, but not all men are more muscular and stronger than all women.
  Furthermore, even if, say 90% (or even 100%) of the heavyweight category were men, it would still be fairer for everyone.
- teristics like muscle mass, testosterone levels, weight, height, etc. This would result in, say, three to four categories ranging from lightweight to heavyweight.
  Same weight, but it's distributed that men have more muscle mass and less fat. Same muscle mass, but women carry more fat generally (it'd be like adding a 10 pound plate on their back). Same height but men are more muscular generally. Just doesn't work.
- I
Eliminate all competitive sports? Is this the answer they seek?
So we cant compete if we have ever had testosterone in our blood, even though cis women also have blood testosterone and can undergo testosterone related hormonal puberty if they have certain conditions, and also we are not allowed to transition before the age of 16 which would mean we had undergone some measure of testosterone hormonal puberty. Also, the concept of "male puberty" is awfully ill-defined isnt it. Have cis women with PCOS gone through "male puberty" ? What specifically constitutes "male puberty"? What hormonal levels are necessary to qualify for "male puberty"? Can Cis men with hormonal deficiency disorders compete in womens sports? To what end does this ruling "protect women's sports"? This does nothing in a sport that has 1 single trans female athlete except specifically ban her from competing under some misguided notion of "fairness". I'd love to see them describe how excluding anyone is meant to protect anything, let alone fairness. When will height categories be instituted? When will we make wingspan brackets? How exactly is this competition meant to be fair to begin with?
So this is just a de facto ban on trans women participating in any sports under this organization. Nice. Just say that then. No woman is going to accept being forced to compete in a men's category, so all you have done is single out and exclude one group of women based on their status as transgender. Creating an "open" bracket does nothing either, as there are probably only 1 or 2 trans athletes who would be competing in this organization anyway.
- So this is just a de facto ban on trans women participating in any sports under this organization.
  In the womens side of things, yes. The mens side is still open, always has been. And they were very clear and open on that.
  
  But she isn't a man, so whatever is happening on the mens side isn't fucking relevant, is it?
- Play victim harder, daddy!
  World Aquatics insists it is doing all it can be inclusive and has introduced an “open” category for transgender swimmers. However, plans to debut it at the Berlin World Cup last October were cancelled after no entries were received for any of the 50m and 100m races across all strokes, which were due to take place alongside male and female races.
  
  "Separate but equal" where have I heard that before.. 🤔
  
  World Aquatics insists it is doing all it can be inclusive and has introduced an “open” category for black swimmers. However, plans to debut it at the Berlin World Cup last October were cancelled after no entries were received for any of the 50m and 100m races across all strokes, which were due to take place alongside white races.
  Phrenologists had a lot to say about all the "physical differences" of the races also. Trans people have just exposed a glaring hole in the way we segregate sports. Maybe instead of appealing to tradition, we can find a better way to introduce fairness into sports?
- Why wouldn't a woman compete in a men's category?
  
  The categories are gender segregated. It's not that no woman would ever do so or want to; it's that banning a woman from women's sports is saying that she's not a woman. That's the very point of the category to begin with. Forcing a woman to compete in men's category is declaring her to be a man, which is something the overwhelming majority of women would not stand for.
  Recall the controversy surrounding Caster Semenya. She was very much declared not to be a woman by an international sporting organization.
- Trans people can still enjoy sports and compete on other levels as well as be a part of it in many other ways. Competing in sports for sure isn't a healthy path to gender selfactualization. Not only because of the public resistance to change in established categories.
Just one of many ways in which conservative politicians and institutions run by them are trying to exclude trans people from society.
Competition rules forbid participation after undergoing “any part of male puberty” while laws forbid any sort of prepubescent transition or even blocking of puberty.
In closing, I would like to relay the following message to World Aquatics and the Court: FUCK you and your oppressive bigotry! 🖕🖕🖕
- Trans women are not fucking testosterone brutes. We're women. I have literally 0 blood testosterone. I am post op and do not produce literally any testosterone.
Sounds like the sort of compromise where both sides are unhappy, which is usually a sign of fairness.
- In what way are both sides unhappy?
  
  Trans women athletes who have had male puberty are unhappy they can’t play in women’s leagues.
  TERFs are mad some trans women are allowed.
why can't sports just be weight class? why do the genders even need to be split up? this is just stupid. I will continue to not watch the olympics.
- why can’t sports just be weight class? why do the genders even need to be split up?
  In a specific weight class, top males will win the vast majority of the time over top females. Things like wide hips are not optimal for running, for example.
  To bring actual data into the conversation, check out Olympian Women vs High School Boys. High school boys still take the vast majority of the records despite the otherwise crazy disadvantage.

193 comments