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Culture War Roundup for the week of July 29, 2024

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At some point you have to discriminate. I am totally ok with "only people with XX chromosomes and normally developed female reproductive system are allowed to compete in the female olympics" and "only people with XY and normally developed male reproductive system are allowed to compete in the male olympics" and "tough luck if you don't fit"

But yes - I am also pissed off at the ability of people to talk before learning all the facts.

Also my twitter found different angle - Racism. This is because the white girl got beaten. So this why is everyone reacting like that. Not the most hinged take I have seen.

I don't see any reason to forbid people with XX chromosomes from competing in the XY division.

The XY category can be open to anyone. If and when gender transition somehow allows a woman to kick Mike Tyson's ass we can revisit that question.

The XX division can be restricted to only chromosomally and hormonally normal women. There can be a maximum amount of testosterone, which can be established at the same time as the authorities check the participants for performance-enhancing drugs.

This seems like the fairest option, involving the fewest unnecessary changes.

In practice, most trans men will fall afoul of doping rules to compete in the men's league.

Probably because a lot of dudes will have reservations to hit or body slam a woman when it is not a combat situation? Both sexes are fine with segregation, and being exclusionary is not such a terrible thing and we won't be excluding many people anyway. We may open a third category in which it is anything goes.

Putting this binary issue aside, perhaps the Olympics need more mixed-gender sports. Maybe add in floorball, mixed badminton, korfball?

At some point you have to discriminate.

Why? We should just put everyone, including women, in a single open category and be done with it. Nicely solves all the problems.

Women's Sports exists much for the same reason the Special Olympics exists. It carves out a place for athletes with specific limitations to compete against others with the same specific limitations.

Then they belong in the Special Olympics with all the other carve-outs.

Women's Olympics is the carve out though. It just happens to be broadcast at the same time and place.

It just happens to be broadcast at the same time and place.

And is considered equivalent to. Olympic medal counts add together those won by Men and Women of some country, but do not add those won by disabled people.

Or there are some people who like to watch women's gymnastics

That is just the foot in the door. If women atheletes wear burkas they will not be relegated to the special olympics nor is olympics OK with promoting beauty which appeals to straight men.

It just happens to be broadcast at the same time and place.

"Just happens"? No, that's on purpose to make it seem like less of a carve out to mitigate the shame of needing such a carve out.

Ok, sure. Or there are some people who like to watch women's gymnastics and there is a market reason to have both on at the same time.

What is your point here? You accept that woman's sports are a carve out but demand they stay X feet or Y days away from a no-carve out sport?

No, I demand that they be explicitly recognized as a carve out for people who can't cut it otherwise instead of some kind of deserved response to perceived unfairness that some disadvantaged people are entitled to. I see the whole argument of whether or not to allow trans-women to participate as a red herring, as it ignores the fact that the choice of exactly which people who would badly lose in an open tournament instead get to stand up and pretend to be among "the best in the world" is arbitrary anyway. EDIT: If it is truly about "fair" competition, then there should be no problems facing off against trans-women or even men who perform at the same level. That there is a desire to exclude shows this is entirely about the resulting status.

the choice of exactly which people who would badly lose in an open tournament instead get to stand up and pretend to be among "the best in the world" is arbitrary anyway

I am a woman and I can recognize that the athletes in women's competitions have a similar strength as myself. I don't really have a problem looking at a female Olympic swimmer and saying, "Yeah, she's way better than me at swimming. She trained very hard to get there." She is "best in the world" in a category I belong to.

Meanwhile, I could look over at the high school boys team and say, "They are going through the exact same training regimen as myself, I'm even practicing in the same lane as some of them, but their race times are still faster than mine. Sexual dimorphism is weird." It's like we were two different species. I wouldn't try to race a barracuda.

I'm not arguing "fair competition" though some are in this thread. I'm arguing largely "freedom of association," our long lost freedom's last vestige. It should be possible for people with particular handicaps to set up leagues that only people with those specific handicaps can participate in. Why might they do this? if it doesn't appeal to you, don't worry about it. It appeals to a lot of people, hence Women's and Paralympic Games.

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That logic taken to the extreme leads to "go away with separate sports and have 10000 people battle royale". Sport is a mix of showmanship, rivalries, sportsmanship, capabilities of the human body, and capabilities of the human spirit. To achieve optimal mix of those - we need rules even if they are somewhat arbitrary. And well - arbitrary rules means that some people are on the fence and some are on the other side of it. Also more even chances leads to better fun betting.

I think most "mens" sports events are technically open?

I vaguely remember some paralympics athlete with synthetic legs who wanted to compete against people with regular legs, but I don't know how it turned out.

Oscar Pistorius.

He raced in London in 2012, murdered his girlfriend early 2013, and was released on parole this year.

An eye for an eye...

I don't want to see Brock Lesnar sit on Mighty Mouse.

I'm convinced that 95+% of attacks on "white women" in progressive spaces are just laundering misogynistic attacks through a racial lens to let wokies say "Women cry to get their way" or "women are frivolous and stupid" without getting called out.

I'm not sure what my feelings on chromosomes are. My general default is that physical presentation (ie visible genitals) rule first along with organic social presentation (though this is less telling as trans ideology spreads), and any other medical testing for natural conditions is a little squicky. I suspect if we tested male competitors we would find higher than expected incidences of xyy syndromes, which lead to greater height and higher test levels. It would seem ridiculous to ban those men. I'm not sure how to translate it back.

I suspect if we tested male competitors we would find higher than expected incidences of xyy syndromes, which lead to greater height and higher test levels.

Of course, this opens up other possibilities. Other athletes might then convincingly argue that they are suffering from single-Y syndrome, and require additional testosterone to compete on a level playing field.

I'm in favor of allowing mild test supplementation.

I'm convinced that 95+% of attacks on "white women" in progressive spaces are just laundering misogynistic attacks through a racial lens to let wokies say "Women cry to get their way" or "women are frivolous and stupid" without getting called out.

While I imagine even progressives can get all-so-tiresome’d out from Women’s Tears, if it’s not okay to criticize someone in her capacity as “woman” but okay to criticize someone in her capacity as “white + woman,” I’m going to apply some Occam’s razor here and say this has more to do with the “white” part of the equation than the “woman” part.

Since white women are often some of the staunchest allies of progressive causes and idpol policies, if not one of their core constituencies, perhaps these are cases of leopards eating faces.

if it’s not okay to criticize someone in her capacity as “woman” but okay to criticize someone in her capacity as “white + woman,” I’m going to apply some Occam’s razor here and say this has more to do with the “white” part of the equation than the “woman” part.

I'm not understanding where Occam's razor comes down that way.

All the things White Women are criticized for in woke spaces are things Women are criticized for in TRP spaces. I tend to hold the view that these are accurate stereotypes of women, generally, regardless, so the simplest explanation is that the use of the qualifier "white" is meaningless, it is used to provide cover.

IIRC the "white women's tears" thing iirc started as a way for black women to bully white women who responded to "woke" bullying over race by crying/seeking sympathy. That was obviously not something that could be allowed. But it may have now become a license for misogyny.

I suspect if we tested male competitors we would find higher than expected incidences of xyy syndromes, which lead to greater height and higher test levels. It would seem ridiculous to ban those men. I'm not sure how to translate it back.

Isn't the standard response to this problem that the male category can just be the "open" category while the female category is specifically a carve out due to female deficiencies (i.e. disguised special Olympics)?

Does that fail as a solution here?

Cries of "misogyny" seem to just be ways to cast shade on those objecting to a real issue.