“Period,” he said in a statement
This is so maddening. Go ahead, guys, say you’re trans and presto you can compete against women and be guaranteed to win.
The Biden administration has withdrawn government support for a federal lawsuit in Connecticut that seeks to ban transgender athletes from participating in girls’ high school sports.
Notice what that doesn’t say – that the suit seeks to ban boys from competing in girls’ sports. That would make the reasons way too obvious, whereas if you say “transgender athletes” instead of “boys” it sounds cruel and vaguely homophobic.
Connecticut allows high school athletes to compete in sports according to their gender identity. The lawsuit was filed a year ago by several cisgender runners who argue they have been deprived of wins, state titles and athletic opportunities by being forced to compete against two transgender sprinters.
Same again. The issue isn’t “transgender” this and “transgender” that, the issue is boys competing against girls. Carefully not saying that is dishonest and also sexist as fuck.
The Trump administration’s intervention in the case last year came as state legislatures around the country debated restricting transgender athletes’ participation to their gender assigned at birth. Seventeen states considered such legislation, and Idaho passed a law. The Republican-controlled Mississippi legislature overwhelmingly approved a similar bill earlier this month.
Again, carefully obscures the issue. This isn’t accidental; they know damn well the issue is much clearer if they state it accurately.
Supporters of restrictions on transgender athletes argue that transgender girls, because they were born male, are naturally stronger, faster and bigger than those born female.
Finally they spell it out…but they do so implying it’s some wack minority view that males have physical advantages over females.
Connecticut Attorney General William Tong said Tuesday he was pleased with the Justice Department’s decision to withdraw Barr’s statement.
“Transgender girls are girls and every woman and girl deserves protection against discrimination. Period,” he said in a statement.
Period yourself. (“Transgender girls” don’t get them.) Transgender girls are boys, and every girl and woman deserves fair competition in sports.
“Gender assigned at birth?” What happened to “sex assigned at birth?” The whole point is supposed to be that one’s gender is innate and immutable, but sex is a vague, unreliable category consisting of a confusing set of variables which go all over the place (intersex) and can therefore be changed with hormones and surgery. We assume someone’s gender by looking at things like genitals and assigning sex, but true gender is brain based and self-reported.
They change their terminology at will, apparently.
Not guaranteed to win… merely an unfairly high chance.
It was clearer when they were known as crossdressers and transsexuals. The good old days.
Holms @ 2 – come on. “Unfairly high chance” is way too mild. There’s very little chance about it, which is the point. Their advantage is so massive that it doesn’t matter how shit they were when they competed against boys.
I know what you meant, but the problem I have with absolute phrasing (no matter the topic) is that even a single example of a failure renders such a claim false, taken strictly. And a TRA – bad faith arguers in general – will take the failure of the strict claim as disproof of every claim of unfairness. They will point to a trans athlete coming anywhere other than first and say “see?? No advantage!” And so I avoid absolute claims like they are the plague.
Of course this brings other problems: phrasing becomes longer and sometimes turgid, and the claim looks weasel-wordy rather than strong and clear. Still, I have an aversion to absolute claims.
I do too, but I don’t take “guaranteed to win” to be an absolute claim. It gives me a rash when people claim to be “certain” about something it’s not possible to be certain about, aka when they mean “very sure” or “convinced,” but I don’t think this is that. A guarantee is formal rather than absolute, which makes sense in this context because letting boys compete against girls is a manipulation just as hobbling a racehorse would be.
Would it be useful to argue this in terms of unfair advantage (aka privilege) rather than “guaranteed to win”?
eg. “Transwomen and transgirls are privileged relative to females (in the context of athletics).”
I say this only partially because it’s amusing to invert the claimed dynamics of privilege.