Fina bans trans swimmers from women's elite events
www.bbc.com
Fina, swimming's world governing body, votes to stop transgender athletes from competing in women's elite races if they have gone through any part of the process of male puberty.

Shout out to the BCC for doing what is essentially journalistic terrorism with this absolutely trash article. I guess this is like the online right's number one culture war battleground so of course they've been posting this everyone on :reddit-logo: . Anyway, some highlights:

"Testosterone in male puberty alters the physiological determinants of human performance and explains the sex-based differences in human performance, considered clearly evident by age 12."

Which is legal in exactly zero countries on this planet! I'm sure they will be advocating for easier access to medical transitioning pre-puberty though.

"Fina will also aim to establish an 'open' category at competitions for swimmers whose gender identity is different than their birth sex."

So basically, a dead category. There are what, a handful of elite trans swimmers? And swimming has so many fucking different race types, this is essentially going to kill off any competition for them.

"Former Great Britain swimmer Sharron Davies, who has argued against transgender participation in women's elite swimming, said she was "proud" of her sport and Fina."

BBC quoting a terf as their first "expert" opinion, a classic

"Some of Thomas' team-mates and their parents wrote anonymous letters supporting her right to transition, but added it was unfair for her to compete as a woman."

God damn that is just gross. I know swimming isn't much of a team sport but I used to swim and if anybody turned their backs on a teammate like this there would be absolute hell to pay.

Also, the vote was conducted in Budapest, Hungary :sus-deep:

    • aaaaaaadjsf [he/him, comrade/them]
      ·
      2 years ago

      Don't they regulate the T levels of women now in certain competitions though? Meaning it's all worthless because you have to drop below a certain level. Isn't that why Caster Symenia is effectively banned from competition?

      All this decision sounds like to me is that trans women aren't allowed to win anything in women's sports. If you do you get banned.

    • TerminalEncounter [she/her]
      ·
      2 years ago

      No this is dumb because athletic competition has literally never been fair.

      Imagine you watch a 100m dash. Then by some byzantine Harrison Bergeon-ass algorithm, they conclude the person who crossed the line last was actually the winner after accounting for testosterone level, socioeconomic class, adverse childhood events, confidence from dick size, calories consumed while in 6th grade, etc. No, all that other crap just gets rolled into "fairness" - even though socioeconomic forces have a huge impact on sport, same with sports culture from home nation (Canadian hockey players vs South korean hockey players in the 2018 winter olympics, should the South Korean team have been awarded a 5 goal handicap in the interest of "fairness"?). I get banning performance enhancing drugs and doping, that isn't healthy.

      The basis of banning it for not being "fair" is really dumb and not internally logical and in the end it's just an excuse to exclude trans excellence because cissies don't like it when we're better than them at something.

      • wtypstanaccount04 [he/him]
        ·
        2 years ago

        Then by some byzantine Harrison Bergeon-ass algorithm, they conclude the person who crossed the line last was actually the winner after accounting for testosterone level, socioeconomic class, adverse childhood events, confidence from dick size, calories consumed while in 6th grade, etc. No, all that other crap just gets rolled into “fairness”

        :I-was-saying:

    • RION [she/her]
      ·
      2 years ago

      Cool, so we're axing Michael Phelps and every other athlete with a physiological advantage in their sport, right? Right?