Transsexual Athletes: The Great Debate

I can understand the division on more contact-y sports like football, but why tennis or, especially, golf?

This is really what you want to talk about on CHUD?

Best player wins has always made more sense to me anyway. When you get down to it there are way too many variations within gender for that method of division to make a lot of sense.

Sure, overall men tend to be physically stronger than women. But when I walk around the city I sometimes see Chinese guys I could throw over my shoulder and carry around easily, and women who tower over me and are probably more than twice my weight. It doesn't make a lot of sense for a man who weighs under 90 pounds to automatically be physically ranked higher than a woman who weighs over 200 pounds.

If we're throwing transsexual athletes into the mix it gets even more confusing, it seems an updated system needs to be put in place. I really don't know a lot about sports but couldn't people be organized by height and weight or physical ability rather than gender?

Also when a male has his gender reassigned to female the end result is not simply dude with a pussy.

Men have more advantages then just strength. They are much tougher too. A 90 pound man may be weaker then a 200 pound woman, but he is tougher then most women even close to his size. It simple biology women are build for having babies men are build for combat. I have had a couple women try to kill me, but like Jake I have never hit a woman, because I fear, I might kill them. I not even sure I could hit a woman, if my life depended on it. I feel I would have a better chance shooting said woman, then hitting her.

The people in my family are very athletic. The women in my family can probably hold her own or take the average in a fight. The men in my family can take multiple men in a fight. My father was not afraid to face five other guys of bigger then him in a fight. My uncle and his cousin took out 50 guys in a fight. Said cousin took on 3 Mob enforces at once, and put two of then in the hospital. There are some really athletic people out there. That are over 1 in 100,000 some may be over 1 in 10 million, but for every athletic woman there are an equity athletic man, and she is simple not his match.

I'm not really sure how you would measure 'toughness' but I don't think having a penis would give a 90 pound guy much of an advantage over a physically fit woman over twice his size.

Automatically assuming all men could always physically best all women isn't really helpful for this discussion, especially when we're including transgendered people into the mix.

Why wouldn't ranking people based on physical ability rather than gender work? The fastest person to win a race is the fastest person to win a race no matter what genitalia they have, it would make a lot more sense than lumping people into broad confusing categories.

because there's no such thing as a bad time to drop some ZAZ:

"Now run along Billy, and next week I'll show you why women can't play professional football."

Organizing the NBA, MLB, NFL and the rest of the leagues based on height and weight simply wouldn't work. The point is to see the best athletes in their sport regardless of height or weight competing against each other. In some cases the size differences play a part in the sports strategies.

In the NFL for example 300 pound players are typically found on the offensive and defensive lines. The smaller players are usually found at the skill positions (QB, HB, WR). The NBA is similar with the tallest players usually playing center and the shortest playing guard. Size and weight have less of an effect on Major League Baseball and I honestly think you may one day see women players in MLB.

If women are to make it in these leagues they will have to compete against male athletes of all sizes. The leagues couldn't survive being broken up based on height and weight and the sports would lose much of their appeal. And at a collegiate and high school level it would be economically and logistically impossible to organize separate teams and leagues based on height and weight.

Werewolf Girl, we're not talking about shmoes on the street, we're talking about professional athletes. On that level women cannot compete with men. The best female athletes might be talented enough to play in men's leagues but they'd mostly be dregs and it would be embarrassing. Which is why it doesn't happen.

That makes sense, sports aren't an interest of mine so I don't know a lot about how they work.

So then what would the solution for our transsexual players be? It seems sad that sports are so based on gender they couldn't be included.

I'm not sure what the actual rules are in each professional sport (i.e., are women actually banned from playing), but I'm sure there would be a lot of resistance either way.

Looking at it another way, though, I think it would actually hurt women to try to combine leagues too early.

One reason women are behind men is that women play less sports and have been playing less sports over the years. To remedy this, we would need to get women playing sports more often. Combining leagues would give them less opportunities.

I think if you left leagues separate until it became possible for a reasonable % of women to make the leap into the men's league, you might have a shot, but doing it to early could kill the women's leagues (and the interest in sports).

Also, this is NOT limited to physical sports/games. Chess has a female division. My first instinct was horror and incredulity... but I listened to the top female chess players interviewed, and they all WANT the all-female league to continue. They say without it, they couldn't survive as professional chess players (they would need second jobs, and thus couldn't train as much), and then there wouldn't be role models for young female chess players. There hope was that once they make chess interesting enough to women that more women start playing at a younger age, they can eventually bridge that divide.

But back to the topic at hand, there are only two ways to do it. Not allow men in the women's leagues (because of a possible physical advantage), or alter the rules. As long as that rule is in place, though, I completely understand why women would be upset with transgender athletes competing in their league.

Take the example and extend it to a different rule. Maybe a banned substance. What if there was a disease that required a performance enhancing drug of some sort to be taken in order to survive. If that person tried to play in a professional league, should he/she be allowed? They are violating the rule, are they not?

I realize that there is a lot more baggage (and prejudice) associated with gender/sex issues, but if being a man gives an advantage, and the transgender player has those advantages, should they be allowed to drop to a lower league where they have a potentially unfair advantage?

Complete integration would basically relegate women to the minor leagues of the various sports, which then brings us to the chess example above. Most high performing women would have to quit (not making enough money), and then less female athletes in the spotlight to be role models for younger women, and that would dampen women's athletics.

Now, all of this comes from a guy who thinks great thinkers should be up on the pedestal that athletes currently get to stand on in our culture. I also very rarely go to sporting events (and even more rarely go if I have to pay for the ticket), but I do love to play sports.

Cutting off a man's genitals and giving them hormone treatments doesn't make them a woman. A man becoming a woman won't be allowed in women's sports and a woman becoming a man wouldn't stand a chance in men's sports. Not that huge a deal, sorry prospective shemale WNBA point guards.

If it makes you feel better, pretend this is specific discussion that grew out of the Juwanna Mann Post Release Thread.

And if we want to solve the problem, let's just introduce transsexual athletic leagues.

Yeah, but then to keep it fair, you'd have to segregate those and have a league for women who became men and another for men who became women.

I know which one I'd watch!

Neither, just like everyone else.

Can white guys who dress like urban black youth and listen to gangsta rap qualify for the Negro college fund? Nope. BUT... What if they received "pigmentation alteration" surgery to darken their skin (ala TROPIC THUNDER), and moved to Detroit inner city where they found a black family to adopt them?

Both sports still require strength and endurance. Woman's golfers use lighter clubs, which I think alters the distance of their drives. As well, the golf course is altered for woman, meaning the tees are closer than the mens. If a woman were to play at a mens tournament, she'd would be playing on a tougher course.

Mens tennis has become tough to the point where players can overpower each other with their serves. That sport relies on strength and stamina even more than golf. If a male tennis player has a more powerful serve, than a female player might not be able to return it. I can understand some of the more dominate female players want to play at a tougher level, but in most cases they would be fighting for a chance at mediocrity.