Well, I myself think that this is a win/win solution...

By Ponderer

June 9, 2025 11:06 am

Category: Sports

(0.0 from 0 votes)

As you all here know, Donna and I are not in favor of trans athletes taking the places in competitions from cis women athletes. But I think that this is an excellent idea that should satisfy pretty much everyone.

The whole brouhaha was about trans women athletes taking medals out of cis female athletes' hands. This way keeps that from happening while allowing the trans athletes to compete and still be recognized.

Does anyone have a problem with this? And if so, what is it?

Transgender athlete wins, shares state honors, creating questions about inclusion

Unrattled by the controversy around her participation in girls' track and field events, AB Hernandez, an openly transgender student-athlete, achieved two first-place victories and a second-place win in the state championship on Saturday. She shared the podium and recognition with cisgender females as a result of new rules hurriedly adopted last week.

Sparked by threats from the federal government, just days ahead of this past weekend’s California Interscholastic Federation Track and Field State Championship, the CIF changed its rules regarding the number of girls who could qualify for and would win in events with a transgender athlete.

The state faced backlash over Hernandez’s participation, with President Donald Trump threatening to cut federal funding to California and demanding that the state bar her inclusion. In response, California officials tweaked the rules to expand the number of cisgender girls who could qualify if a trans athlete was participating. Under the changed rules, a cisgender girl displaced by a transgender competitor was awarded whichever medal she would have claimed had the transgender athlete not been competing.

Local leaders in the conservative-leaning Clovis, which hosted the championship, called it unfair to include a transgender female in sports with cisgender females, The Fresno Bee reported.

Hernandez, a junior at Jurupa Valley High in Southern California, was unflappable in the Veterans Memorial Stadium at Buchanan High School in Clovis, even when insulted or met with silence in the packed venue.

She has "consistently displayed more dignity, maturity, and grace than the many adults, from the president on down, who chose to attack and bully her to score political points," said Tony Hoang, executive director of Equality California, the state’s LGBTQ+ civil rights organization. "We could not be prouder of the way this brave student-athlete conducted herself on and off the track."

Hernandez qualified as the top competitor in the long jump and triple jump on Friday, outperforming others by 6.25 inches and 9.75 inches, respectively, and in the high jump, scoring the same as five other athletes.

During the championship round on Saturday, she was outperformed in the long jump and continued to tie with other athletes in the high jump.

Even though she is not ranked as a top athlete nationally, she held on to California’s top marks in the triple jump.

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Comments on "Well, I myself think that this is a win/win solution..."

by oldedude on June 9, 2025 11:52 am
I think it's a "step." I would expect having "Trans" games in the future or maybe awarding in different divisions. I see this is either going to go away or become huge. That's a guess of course. The biggest thing for me. is that you're still making the CIS medal winners, the first losers (or second or third). So I'm not (by any means) throwing the idea away. Like most changes there are steps along the way. I'm willing to start here and I wait to hear from athletes... And for now, I'm supportive. You have my answer.

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by HatetheSwamp on June 9, 2025 11:54 am

Why can't the transies just compete with boys?

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by meagain on June 9, 2025 12:18 pm
Ingenious! Actually, I wonder if the inclusion of Transgender athletes will not lead to better performances by the others. Sort of Pacemakers.

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by Curt_Anderson on June 9, 2025 12:34 pm
I may be missing something. Does sharing honors mean the trans athlete and the cis athlete shared first place honors (presuming the trans athlete finished the race first followed by the cis female)?

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by Donna on June 9, 2025 1:21 pm

Yes

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by HatetheSwamp on June 9, 2025 1:35 pm

So, why would a trans person who is biologically male compete with females, not males. Believe the science, man.

Biology, baby!

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by Indy! on June 9, 2025 3:55 pm

Nobody likes records with asterisks. It might work as a temporary solution, hard to see it working long term. But you know what? My athletic competition days are long behind me (unless I take up shuffleboard) so my opinion doesn't really matter.

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by Curt_Anderson on June 9, 2025 5:11 pm
I don't think it's a good solution at all. It works, sort of, in track where the two top finishers can "share" first place. But the cis female missed out on breaking the finish line tape. I don't think sharing the podium with a competitor who was recently a male with male height and male musculature is a fair solution.

What about other sports in which the competition is one-on-one, wrestling or tennis for example? Do the final two competitors in tournament share first place? Same for team sports like basketball. If one team has a dominant trans center and they crush the female competition are there two "winning" teams? Then why have the final game, match, etc.?

I still run in distance races (10K, etc) where they have various categories of age and gender. I am fine with competing against males who are 70 years and older. I wouldn't want a 30 year old to win my category. That's because 30 year-olds have a biological advantage over 70 year-olds. If post adolescent trans athlete want to compete, they should compete in a post adolescent trans category.

If there was any doubt that it is unfair for trans athlete to compete against women, consider that you never hear about women who transitioned into males competing against male athletes.

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by Navy2711 on June 9, 2025 5:30 pm
Ridiculous. If they receive separate awards, then they're not competing against each other, and there's no reason for them to be on the field at the same time. This is one area where I actually agree with the "facts don't care about your feelings" crowd.

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by meagain on June 9, 2025 7:30 pm
What is not being considered is that less than one-third of one per cent of the population are trans. There would be no separate tournament for them to compete in.

How is that fair?

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by Curt_Anderson on June 9, 2025 8:36 pm
Meagain,
So what if they are one-third of one per cent of the population? I am in a larger category of the population and they won't let me participate in the Special Olympics. Boo!!! Trans athletes and their supporters can set up their competitions.

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by Navy2711 on June 9, 2025 9:00 pm

lol @ "fair"

I'm going to take up boxing and insist on competing in classes far below my weight. And you better believe that when I crush some dude that I outweigh by 70 lbs., I'm gonna let him stand up on the podium with me.

Because that would be fair.

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by ROB3RT on June 9, 2025 10:24 pm

I'm a big believer in sex.

And by that, I mean biological sex. Gender is fiction. Sex is real, sex is scientific, sex is quantifiable. There are only two sexes, and you're either born one or the other. You can undergo cosmetic surgery to hide your biological sex, but you cannot change your sex.

For so many things in society -- restrooms, prisons, spas, locker rooms and sports leagues -- there are legitimate reasons to separate the sexes. And sex seems like a much more clear cut and verifiable difference than a person's self-perceived identity.

Male puberty confers enormous benefits that cannot be erased through hormone therapy. Male bodies are different and have a huge advantage. Females can't compete and that's why there are different sex-based divisions.

I'm tired of hearing males who identify as females complaining that they're excluded. There's an obvious solution -- one division for people born female, and one division for everyone else, males and all trans athletes. If all a trans athlete cares about is having a right to participate, isn't that enough?

I have lost all patience with people born male who ignore their obvious biological privilege and insist on competing against female athletes. It's not fair. More than 80 percent of Americans understand this. I am done with trans pseudoscience, and so are most Americans.

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by Navy2711 on June 10, 2025 12:27 am
Robert,

"There are only two sexes, and you're either born one or the other."

What sex is a hermaphrodite?

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by Donna on June 10, 2025 8:18 am

Good question, Navy. Abd btw, there are over 20 variations of sex chromosomes. Not everyone falls neatly into xx and xy. That's science.

With that said, allowing transwomen to compete with genetic females is a losing issue for Democrats. Almost 70% of registered DEMOCRATS oppose it. I wish that Democrats like Tim Walz understood that. Good grief, Tim, read the fucking polls!

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by Donna on June 10, 2025 8:40 am

"Gender is fiction." -ROB3RT

Unfortunately, Rob3rt, that opinion is so imbecilically wrong that it completely invalidates anything else you have to say as totally meaningless regarding the subject of transgender people. In all honesty, I didn't even read pat that asinine remark.

You are ignoring... denouncing many decades of global psychological research. You are taking what is right and natural for you and imposing it on the rest of humanity, regardless of what science and psychology have established.

So, fine. Let's focus on you then. Since that is the only basis upon which you base your opinion.

Would you be able to describe for us the moment in your life when you decided to be straight instead of gay? Or when you knew that you were male?

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by Indy! on June 10, 2025 9:04 am

My solution would be simple. Either you compete in the division you were born in - or you don't compete. If changing your sex is that important to a person, they should understand beforehand that one of the disadvantages is they give up is competition in sports OR they play in the division they were born into. That - imho - is not unfair. We all have to deal with issues based on sex - I'm a male, I can't have children. Is that unfair? Or just the way of the world we are all born into?

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by Indy! on June 10, 2025 9:05 am
*bear children.

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by HatetheSwamp on June 10, 2025 10:17 am

"Unfortunately, Rob3rt, that opinion is so imbecilically wrong..."

Donna,

You want to know why TQs are in trouble with the culture? Arrogance, sanctimony, condemnation. It's the ole catch flies with honey thing.

I agree with Rob3rt that gender is fiction, a fiction written to justify deviance from sexual norms... to normalize mental illness, IMO. But, after all these years, I'd be happy to let you make your case and convince me.

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by Indy! on June 10, 2025 11:15 am

Racism is a mental illness. Welcome to your own world, Brown Shorts.

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by meagain on June 10, 2025 12:56 pm
Perhaps you should get a leg amputated, Curt. Then, you may be allowed to attempt to qualify for the Special Olympics.

What I said stands. The numbers are so small that there would be nowhere else for competition.

Dismissing them as not mattering is a brutal answer. In fact, the answers so far show contempt and a callous lack of concern for a demographic whose lives have been difficult enough.I wish that I could think of a solution.

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by Curt_Anderson on June 10, 2025 1:32 pm
Meagain,
My mother always said I was "special", but the rule sticklers at Special Olympics still won't let me participate. So unfair!

I have no objections to early transitioners participating in female sports.

However post-puberty transgender women athletes retain physical advantages over cisgender women in sports due to the lasting effects of exposure to testosterone during puberty. These advantages include increased muscle mass, height, higher hemoglobin levels, larger heart size, and potentially larger lung capacity.

Life is intrinsically unfair. Being rich, tall, handsome and or smart is an advantage in life. Society is not not more fair if we give one group a benefit that comes at the expense of another group.

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by HatetheSwamp on June 10, 2025 1:46 pm

meagain,

If a biological male, who suffers from gender dysphoria or autogynaphilia, competes with male athletes and medals, I don't think the male athletes would squawk.

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by Indy! on June 10, 2025 2:03 pm

Curt:
Life is intrinsically unfair. Being rich, tall, handsome and or smart is an advantage in life. Society is not not more fair if we give one group a benefit that comes at the expense of another group.

Yes, and this applies to athletics as well. Is it unfair that I wasn't born with an NFL QB's arm so I could be getting a $55M per year contract too? The reality is if the (now) female transgender "athletes" didn't transition in the first place - they wouldn't qualify as "athletes" most of the time. We're seeing players "winning" contests where they wouldn't even make the first cut if they had remained male athletes. So if anything is "unfair" it's that being transgender has now allowed them to go from being totally irrelevant as athletes to now winning races they wouldn't have been included in if they were still their birth gender.

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by Navy2711 on June 10, 2025 2:08 pm
"... the answers so far show contempt and a callous lack of concern for a demographic whose lives have been difficult enough. I wish that I could think of a solution." - Meagain

This is so typical. This makes me understand why rightists often view liberals as being too far into their feelings and thus divorced from reality. As long as people like Meagain continue to read things into our responses that aren't there, they're not going to be open to what we're saying.

For the record, when a biological woman trains her entire life for a CHANCE at the fulfilling experience of winning a competition, only to have that dream snatched away by being forced to compete with someone against whom she has zero chance, and someone like Meagain refuses to recognize this injustice, I don't see it as them being uncaring and callous. I don't know WHAT the fuck is going on in their head, but I don't simply assume that they're being an uncaring person. Because that would be .... *side eye at Meagain* ... ridiculous.

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by Indy! on June 10, 2025 3:04 pm

Ds are playing a little game. The older Ds are still these touchy feely emotions rule the day like meagain (and the other Ds on the board too if we're being real - maybe to a lesser extent). This opens the door for the Ds to continue running campaigns based on nothing more than DEI and "we're not as evil as Trump" instead of offering up some real solutions to the problems most Americans face. Let's be real - if the only problem you have in life is worrying whether or not the miniscule amount of trans athletes are getting a fair shake at the Olympics - you're already living a charmed existence. This is the same argument against the Rs being obsessed with DEI and trans athletes - this is the only problem you have? Then you should not be involved in the politics of running the country because you're already good.

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by ROB3RT on June 17, 2025 6:48 pm

Navy2711 wrote: What sex is a hermaphrodite?

The scientific definition of sex used by biologists around the world is based on sexual function. Males produce the small gamete (sperm) while females produce the large gamete (egg). This is the case with all mammals, and virtually all animals (unless you identify as a Clownfish or a worm).

“Hermaphrodite” is a dated term. The preferred term nowadays is “intersex”. According to Google, 1.6 or 1.7 percent of humans are “intersex,” meaning they display ambiguous visual sexual anatomy. Of these, however, almost all will mature into a person who either produces egg or sperm. I have not heard of a single documented case of a human body producing viable eggs and sperm.

I am going to go out on a limb here and say that your perception of a hermaphrodite – someone who is both male and female at the same time, producing viable eggs and sperm – probably does not exist.

However, if we someday discover that person, I would have "them" play sports in the men’s category. After all, they produce sperm, while women do not. Women’s sports were created to provide opportunities for women.

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by oldedude on June 17, 2025 9:42 pm
I'm going to out on a limb and agree with you. When we get down to the details I may disagree. So far so good.

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