We've seen this before...

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/mar/02/vermont-school-basketball-team-forfeits-tournament-transgender

A Christian school in Vermont has decided to forfeit a basketball tournament due to its refusal to play against a transgender athlete.

On 21 February, Mid Vermont Christian school’s girls basketball team was scheduled to play an out-of-state tournament against Long Trail school. However, MVCS chose to forfeit the game due to a transgender player on Long Trail’s team.
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Read more

“We withdrew from the tournament because we believe playing against an opponent with a biological male jeopardizes the fairness of the game and the safety of our players,” MCVS head of school Vicky Fogg said in a statement obtained by the Guardian. “Allowing biological males to participate in women’s sports sets a bad precedent for the future of women’s sports in general.”

In response to the forfeit, the Vermont Principals’ Association, a multi-school organization that sponsors various sport activities, told the Guardian that it “reiterates its support for each student”.

According to its policy on gender identity which “supports transgender student athletes”, the VPA is “committed to providing all students with the opportunity to participate in VPA activities in a manner consistent with their gender identity”.

It added that VPA policies “prohibit discrimination and/or harassment of students on school property or at school functions by students or employees. The prohibition against discrimination includes discrimination based on a student’s actual or perceived sex and gender.”

The Vermont chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union has criticized MVCS’s decision to forfeit the tournament. In a statement to the Guardian, the chapter’s executive director James Lyall said: “All trans students deserve to attend schools where they feel safe in their gender identity and expression. That includes equal opportunity to participate in athletics and access locker rooms, restrooms, and other facilities consistent with their gender identity.”

Vicky Fogg makes a very unbiased statement based on biological facts.

Are you really surprised that such a complicated issue does not go so easily your way?

Even as a gay man I stand by the hockey players refusals.

I have a solution that will benefit trans and cis athletes and fans: repeat to yourselves "It's just a game, I should really just relax."

Of course, I think the biggest problem with sports is people take them way too seriously. And I grew up in Idaho; our girls basketball team were tougher than most of the guys I went to school with.

I don't know how this is going to get solved, but it seems mostly used to fan political flames.

I have some questions about sports like wrestling, boxing and others. Don't they group by weight already? Why can't they set weight, height, BMI muscle mass, bench press weight ability or something to set categories that define who plays who in the various sports? Whoever qualified to compete in a category will be competing against others in the same category, which may or may not have females, trans or males as a majority in a category. If being a trans means having a biological advantage, why can't they set some criteria other than gender for the sports so all athletes are on teams fairly with their physical peers?

We have Special Olympics. Is it coming that trans have to have their own sports because people view them as "other" athletes to be excluded from everything? I hope somehow this issue gets solved because it sucks a lot of political oxygen and gets used as an excuse to rage all the time against trans folks.

and not post-pubertal adults.

The height/weight class thing might be a thing in some sports for post-pubertal adults after the necessary twenty-four months of hormone treatment, but you then will have to exclude XY females with AIS/CAIS, etc, tall women, etc, etc. Big can of worms if you go down that road. The point is that schools aren't going to grab a kid and put him in a skirt to play field hockey or a bikini to play volleyball. It doesn't work that way.

They said the same thing when blacks started to compete in collegiate sports -- not fair to compete against "animals," not fully human, etc.

The Christian school is K-12 and, if that photo is accurate, the team is a high school team. At that level having women play against someone who has gone through puberty as a male is physically dangerous.

The "Christian" in this discussion is irrelevant. I would not want my daughters playing a violent game with lots of physical contact with someone who went through puberty as a male.

I'm with D&D and dagny on this. There must be a safe place for trans athletes to compete--I don't have a solution--but it cannot be at the expense of women.

LW, the point I'm trying to make is this:

Girls and boys have the same hormone levels before age ten. Mangled dead bodies of kids that age can't even be identified without DNA. It's after age ten when boys have the big hormone rush. If a trans female athlete never goes through male puberty, where is the advantage? I don't see any. Keeping them from competing in such cases is just predjudice.

So called (uber far right fundamentalist) "Christians" *are* pushing this kind of prejudice based on *their* views, not science.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 03/02/2023 03:51PM by anybody.

I'm fully aware of the physiology. But the article you produced does not support your point.

In fact, the article supports the position of those who disagree with you. It presents a clear case of the physical danger to women--who themselves only gained the right to equal sports treatment a few four or five decades ago and still suffer all sorts of athletic discrimination--posed by people who went through puberty as men.

A solution to this problem of conflicting rights and needs must be based in facts and not on misrepresentations.

As recently as 2 years ago, a study showed that among transgender youth, 16.9% reported that they ever wanted pubertal suppression as part of their gender-related care and only 2.5% of them actually received it. This was a study carried out on people who were about 4-5 years removed from the high school age in question. Numbers now indicate that the percentage of trans youth who go onto puberty blockers may have gotten as high as 14%. That's still a long way from "the most part". It's considerably more likely statistically that this was indeed someone who has gone through male puberty.

"I don't know how this is going to get solved, but it seems mostly used to fan political flames."

Well put.

I'd be interested in how the transgender's parents feel about this. The last thing I would want for my child is to be in the middle of a giant controversy.

It's the trans student I feel bad for. It's not fun being the kid who's othered. And she has to put up with adults acting less mature than her teammates* arguing about her gender instead of just letting her play a game like a regular kid.

Here's another idea for solving the "trans sports" issue: Grow up and treat people how you'd want to be treated!

*Note for Done & Done, summer, and Lot's Wife: The last shred of respect I had for you three died on this thread. You're fair-weather allies at best, transphobes at worst.

Sportsmanship. Someone's missing the ship!

Chickens shouldn't be in the school business.

As a former student athlete, I am opposed to trans girls and women playing on all female teams. The trans girls have a physical advantage. IMO they should continue to play on all male or mixed gender teams.

There was a reason that Title IX came into existence. High school girls wanted an equal opportunity to play sports. Having to play against biological boys/men defeats that opportunity.

Lia Thomas, the UPenn swimmer:

https://www.foxnews.com/media/nbc-news-lia-thomas

If I remember the news from last year, international swimming authorities banned her, but did decide to allow trans girls who never went through male puberty -- which is the case for most of the small numbers of high school age trans female athletes.


Here's the deal.

To me, this would be a fair compromise (that wouldn't please everyone, therefore it's a good compromise) but you can't compromise with fundies because they simply do not want LGBTQIA+ people to *exist*.

That's the problem.

Reaching for a compromise is the right thing to do. I haven't thought the issue over enough to have an opinion about what the answer should be, but you are right that we need to find a societally acceptable accommodation.

I suggest that the first step in getting towards that is using information accurately. That's why I object to your use of the article in the OP.

The fact that it's a Christian school does not per se mean its positions are wrong. It's better, I submit, not to complicate the problem of trans people and their needs and rights by introducing biases that are not necessarily relevant.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/02/2023 05:50PM by Lot's Wife.

I could live with a method of fairly evaluating trans female athletes to ensure that their height, weight, muscle mass, etc. is in a competitive range with other female athletes of the same level in their sport.

To me, someone like Lia Thomas clearly spent too much time developing as a man to make competing against her fair to the other women.

When focus is on one sole issue and all other issues are relegated to circulating the sole issue waiting for a place to land and act as supporting players, then the big picture is blurred and integrity is lost.

To relate this to Mormonism, (contrary to the purpose of this post), we are here as exmos because we saw the big picture and how everything affects everybody, not just ourselves. And that suddenly mattered. This same principle can be applied to anything.

If you want to hate, fine, that's someone's choice.

But don't try to pass it off as "moral" and "good" under the aegis of religion and claim it's "god's will" as a cop-out.


There's nothing good about hate.

I am as anti religion as anyone, but, I don't paint it with a broad brush and I don't see it as a sole cause of everything which is an American disease currently.

How does what you want affect other people?

I'm curious to know who in this scenario used religion to justify hate? I read the article. The ones accused of doing it, didn't mention their own religion at all. They mentioned a legitimate concern, which this message board demonstrates is shared by many rational minded and non-religious people. How is this an example of what you are "sick of"?

having margaritas ~



with a dude wearing a dress ~



what could go wrong ? ~

...is the location of the story. The Christian school is in the middle of Vermont, a rural but very liberal state. The school with the objectionable athlete's state is not named, but I'm betting that it's either in New York, New Hampshire (a conservative state), or Massachusetts. Despite its conservativism, New Hampshire is not known as a religious-fundamentalist haven.

I guess what I'm saying here is Vermont is the wrong location for this to be going on, especially if you're trying to get the fundamentalist Christian crowd up-in-arms about it. I would more likely suspect something like this to occur in either Florida or Texas where the fundamentalist-platform supporting governors would attempt to use the arguments posted by LW and others to their advantage in upcoming political campaigns.

Long Trail School (the one with the trans athlete) is also in Vermont.

...probably has something to do with the syrup...

Why am I laughing at that? I shouldn't be laughing at that. And too hard.

It's Friday...?

summer Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Long Trail School (the one with the trans athlete)
> is also in Vermont.

...which means that the initial story (see original post) got a crucial fact (location of opposing team's school) wrong.

It's a very nuanced conversation. Yes, we want to make sure everybody feels included and nobody gets discriminated against.

But there should be no boy-to-girl trans athletes playing against girl teams. I don't care what age.

I remember boys being different from girls at a very young age. Boys are much more aggressive and willing to take risks than girls. Yes, boys and girls vary. Some boys will be more timid and some girls will be more aggressive.

But the average boy is more aggressive than the average girl. Let's not make rules out of the extremes.

Then again, maybe it is the syrup. I'm just a guy on the internet. Don't listen to me.

Your view is anecdotal but a lot of us agree with you.

The more I agree with myself, the better the world becomes.

Are you still planning to go serfing tomorrow? I hear the weather will be great.

This transgender none sense is going to put women back to having nothing. If people can’t see the insanity in it then society is toast. Everyone is follow the science these days until it comes to gender.

"Everyone is follow the science these days until it comes to gender."

So true, I thought.

But--I would have to open it up a bit---everyone is "follow the science" until it conflicts with getting what they want personally in many arenas and facts become the enemy in our society that worships the top of the heap. Then we declare what "we want" to be where science missed the boat. We compartmentalize like the Mormons do who have doctorate degrees but still buy the bull.

Oddly without science there would be no gender re-assignment. Or, no a lot of other things. And science can be used for good or evil or simply as our personal assistant.

I know a lot of happy people who simply accept the hand they are dealt and work with what they have, often with great success. But we live in a society that makes it possible to deal your own hand. So science is their friend from augmenting or de-augmenting their butts to to their chests and beyond.

Science like many things can be used for good or evil, or for dealing your own hand and, "Screw NATURE!" Isn't our new M.O.?

I read a review of a new show about people working menial jobs waiting for their big break in Show Biz or some other Glamorous Biz. The reviewer wrote one line that hit me deeply as being in my ancient years I knew the idea to be true as my antique brain parades the past by my cerebellum in spurts and fits and it is the little memories that charm and warm now, not those that came with my "big break".

The paragraph in question: "The show is more interested in the unlikely sweetness and meaning and friendship that can come from all the time that's not supposed to count, moment to moment, day to day, year to year, before some imagined big break."

Appreciation of the "Liminal Life" is a great gift. A gift that does not come from a scalpel or a pill bottle but comes from a place where we tend to fall into being ourselves.

Increasingly difficult to live in a world where you can have your hand re-dealt as many times as you like? Complicated.

Rubicon Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> This transgender none sense is going to put women
> back to having nothing. If people can’t see the
> insanity in it then society is toast. Everyone is
> follow the science these days until it comes to
> gender.


No, Rubicon.

You are *not* following "the science."

You are denying it.

I've read all the negative comments with interest.

I hope they arise out of ignorance instead of hatred.

The brain defines what a person is, not their parts.

Trans boys are boys, and trans girls are girls, period.

Why does it bother you so much? Fear?

I grew up watching all of "Star Trek" and "Babylon 5," so the concept of someone not being what they physically look like is not alien to me (pun intended).

But don't take it from me. As a friend and an ally, the best that I can do is let you hear the real story straight from the horses' mouth:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_gCASi58Ps

A self-identified feminist mom tells her story of coming to recognize her son for who he is rather than who she assumed he was based on his sex assigned at birth. Gender non-conformity is something often championed by feminists, but trans identity is something else entirely.

Amber Briggle is a small business owner, a community volunteer, a political junkie, and the mother of two incredible children -- Lulu (age 3) and MG (age 8), who have brought many surprises along the way -- including MG's revelation at the age of 2 that he was mislabeled at birth and identified not as a girl, but as a boy. Through trial by fire, Amber has quickly and earnestly become an advocate for transgender rights, helping her son navigate the world of boy/girl while simultaneously challenging society's gender stereotypes. She is also a board member of the League of Women Voters of Texas, a proud member of Rotary International, and she has a rescue dog named Bluebell who still hasn't figured out how to fetch Amber a glass of wine, but they're working on it.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d3M2kd_VmeM

MEET Rebekah Bruesehoff - the 10-year-old transgender girl ‘the media warned you about.’ Mum Jamie Bruesehoff, from New Jersey, and her daughter Rebekah are spreading awareness of transgender people one rally at a time. Since her transition started over two years ago, the young girl has been campaigning, attending marches and speaking at rallies to stand up for transgender rights.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wf3XVujK4wA

Mack Beggs made history by becoming the first transgender male wrestler in America, but his journey to the mat was far from easy. This is his story...

A trans woman may mentally be a woman, but also have spent many years physically developing as a male once puberty hits. That is the problem. Those who are born physically female simply don't have that extended exposure to male hormones during the critical development phase. This is the entire basis of girls' and womens' sports. Females develop differently. Otherwise you would have women comprising around 50% of the NFL, men's NBA, etc.

It might be one thing if trans women are able to have puberty blockers or a similar treatment. Or failing that, if they can prove that they fall within an average range of women in their sport for height, weight, muscle tone, etc.

I don't know if you remember all of the speculation about the East German female swimmers back in the day. There was a lot of speculation that they were being given male hormones. They were noticably taller, heavier, more bulky, etc. They looked like men!

Again, there is a reason that womens' sports exist, and that everything that can be done is being done to ensure a level playing field.

summer Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> A trans woman may mentally be a woman, but also
> have spent many years physically developing as a
> male once puberty hits.

So naturally then you would think everyone would be in favor of allowing trans kids access to puberty blockers, right? Problem Solved!

So why not?

I've had this argument many times with people, and after going around, and around, and around, it winds up boilling down to something along the lines of "well, I just don't want people like that to exist."



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/04/2023 01:45PM by anybody.

That's absolute nonsense.

1) If you want to block the male physiological advantage, you need to block the hormones in utero. That was summer's point and she is correct.

2) You are characterizing those of us who disagree with you as not wanting trans people to exist. That is as offensive as it is reductive.

Thank you.

Lot's Wife Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> That's absolute nonsense.
>
> 1) If you want to block the male physiological
> advantage, you need to block the hormones in
> utero. That was summer's point and she is
> correct.


That is how trans people originate naturally.


You said previously that you understood the physiology, so are we talking about the "womyn born womyn" thing here?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/04/2023 05:22PM by anybody.

>>So naturally then you would think everyone would be in favor of allowing trans kids access to puberty blockers, right? Problem Solved!

No, not necessarily. There is an issue of lack of capacity to consent to medical treatment due to being a minor.

>>I've had this argument many times with people, and after going around, and around, and around, it winds up boilling down to something along the lines of "well, I just don't want people like that to exist."

That's not true for me. It's an issue of fairness. I was one of the initial group of athletes to benefit from Title IX. Until my girl's team got a coach, I had to go to the boys for training in my sport. I know what it's like to go without. Girls and women deserve an equal opportunity to compete and to benefit from sport. Having to compete with someone that has been exposed to large amounts of male hormones over the years defeats the purpose. Hence my comment about the East German female athletes above.

Did you need Title IX protections in order to practice a sport for your school, Anybody? I'm thinking not.

summer Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> No, not necessarily. There is an issue of lack of
> capacity to consent to medical treatment due to
> being a minor.

This is also incorrect.

This isn't like the crazy preacher who falsely claimed a teacher put litter boxes in class for students who identified as cats.


Most know when they are 3-4 years old, and the only difference nowadays is that parents listen to their kids when they tell them so.


Again, listen to people, get the straight story:


This girl's mom was a born again big "E" evangelical preacher.

She's twelve now, and they had to flee TX because of death threats, hate, and Draconian laws.

Trans In America: Texas Strong is an intimate portrait of Kimberly and Kai Shappley, a mother who has to confront her religious community while her 7-year-old transgender daughter navigates life at school— where she’s been banned from the girls’ bathroom.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cuIkLNsRtas

summer Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> Did you need Title IX protections in order to
> practice a sport for your school, Anybody? I'm
> thinking not.


Oh, yes, I did.

I was over six feet by ninth grade, and the coach called my mom to get me on the basketball team. I hate basketball.

My height (over six feet two) puts me in the one tenth of one percent range of the female population of the USA.

I went to a posh prep school back East where most of the girls were barely five feet four, and people said it was unfair to put me on the team. Go figure. I also did track, swimming, and volleyball (the only team sport I could figure out), and they said the same thing.


Again, silence about trans boys and men here. There are even fewer trans female athletes than are tall women in America, and there's not going to be a "flood" of "And Frankenstein Created Woman" -ish "boys being turned into girls" to cheat at sport like the East German swimmers you mentioned (BTW, Germany tried that with a trans athlete back in the 1936 Olympics).


There's no advantage, perceived or otherwise, for trans girls who never went through male puberty. You can look this up for yourself.


The real issue here is fear and prejudice.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/04/2023 06:19PM by anybody.

We have more in common than I thought. :)

>> There's no advantage, perceived or otherwise, for trans girls who never went through male puberty. You can look this up for yourself.

I will take your word for it. The rub is, "never went through puberty." Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, which is trans-friendly, won't authorize hormones until age 16. I think that's likely rather typical. I personally am leery of giving hormones or puberty blockers to teens younger than 16, which I know is problematic for trans people. But there is that issue of legal consent.

An old yogi addage says, "We become what we hate".

Often true. On the flip side, that which we hate does not become us as is our intention. No reciprocity there. So they win.

Arguing over how much discrimination against trans folks is acceptable? And over something as childish as sports?!

These are real people you're calling "mentally a woman," "a dude wearing a dress," "biological boys/men." How do you think a questioning trans Mormon would feel if they wanted support for leaving and read things like this?

"But sports . . ."

You talk of development in the body but forget life experience and physical training are also part of human physical development. Should a cis girl who weight lifts be barred from competing against cis girls who don't?

As for level of development to compete, you calculate the level of HRT and development required to treat trans and gender non-conforming folks with basic decency? Because most of you seem to think they're exempt from that altogether.

Plus, isn't basketball a TEAM sport?

"Rationality . . ."

What good is rationality without humanity? What is rational about working to make the world a less friendly place? Or will the Rational(TM) reply be, "Not my problem."

Forbidding kids from playing games just because they're trans isn't a logical move, it's a cruel one. Are you "rational" folks ignorant of that?

Or is being cruel just a perk to you?

And this is personal to me; would you all say the things you post about trans girls to my face or my girlfriend's face?! Would you have the backbone to look us in the eye and tell us all that?

Or is it fine as long as you don't have to deal with consequences yourself?

Will you keep arguing like toddlers over a ball over how much someone's gender makes them human, like I think you will, or will you prove me wrong and start treating people like people?

Anybody, dagny, and moehoward: thank you for being the rational adults on this thread.

>> And over something as childish as sports?!

I have female friends whose college education was 100% paid for courtesy of their sport. I know women who have competed internationally at the elite level including the Olympics. They have traveled to countries that most people only dream of. They have received sponsorships for their competitive years and beyond. There is nothing childish about sports, nothing at all.

In the large, urban school district where I teach, not even two-thirds of non-student athletes graduate from high school. However, well over 90% of student athletes *do* graduate. For many kids, organized sports provide a reason for them to come to school, and to do well in school. I've also seen disadvantaged city kids get scholarships to private schools courtesy of their sport.

None of that is the joke that you take it to be. I labor hard every working day to give urban youth the best possible opportunity to succeed in life. I could just as easily say that *you* are insulting *me*.

No one of us wishes to forbid trans women from playing sports. However, due to many years of having the benefit of male hormones, a boys or mens team is IMO, often the better fit for them.

"I support trans women in sports, but I don't want to play with them." How does that *not* sound childish?

Plus, as I said before, I thought basketball was a team sport. Wouldn't teamwork and coordinated training be more important than what the players have in their shorts? Also, I thought the idea that cis women can't rise to the "challenge" was insulting.

As for Title IX, could you clarify your stance on expanding that for trans women? Because the answers you gave earlier sounded an awful lot like, "Screw them! I got mine!"

And you're right, I don't know much about sports paying for college. I went the *other* route for kids without much chance of paying for tuition; the United States Navy. My girlfriend tried a similar approach in the United States Air Force, but she broke both shins in a training accident. She still walks with a cane and has to frequently stop and rest while walking. I'd complain, but I like holding her close when we rest.

She's also trans.

So, is she one of "the good ones?"

I disagree with your stance on how to handle trans female athletes for the numerous reasons that I have stated. I will have to leave it at that.

A little more substance in your scold might have given it some weight. Rather than speaking from your own agenda, speaking from fact and reason as you look at the big picture can have more impact in a discussion.

Insults to those who have a differing view are lazy thinking.

Agenda, agenda, where did I put . . .

Ah, it fell behind my desk! It reads, "Make jambalaya, try to write a short story, catch up on "One Piece" with my girlfriend."

I'm not writing from an agenda, I'm just pissed off at you lot. Especially you, Done & Done. I thought you of all people would support trans folks. That Stonewall Riot you love to lord over the youth? A trans woman was there throwing bricks at the start. The name "Marsha P. Johnson" ring a bell?

https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/marsha-p-johnson

Is the problem that you don't know much about trans folk? Because it's crossed my mind that you like judging people. You imply I speak from an agenda to keep from arguing over what I say all in a condescending tone. You hide behind "a differing view" while insulting me and trans folks. You berate anybody for suggesting treating trans kids like people; that's the differing view I'm supposed to try to understand?

Such a view seems selfish, cruel, and hypocritical. I hope I don't understand it well in my life. But, then you have the option of hiding behind a smug, detached facade. You might be able to live like that, but I can't.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/04/2023 06:12PM by ookami.

Remember, casual indifference and intolerance has consequences.

You tacitly enable those who have sinister plans.


https://www.huffpost.com/entry/cpac-trans-kids-eradicated-transgender-michael-knowles_n_64038d23e4b0c78bb7430b1c

Sebastian Gorka, an alleged member of a Nazi-collaborating political order in Hungary who served as an advisor to former President Donald Trump, kicked off proceedings Friday morning from the main stage inside the Gaylord Convention Center. Democrats, he warned the crowd, are “mutilating boys and girls” and “sacrificing them on the altar of their transgender insanity.”


Donald Ruthig, a 73-year-old retiree from Onancock, Virginia, told HuffPost he recently left the Episcopal Church over its decision to support transgender youth. He drove three hours to CPAC to “meet people that think the way I think” who are “dedicated to restoring the Judeo-Christian morality that we’re losing.”

Part of this restoration, he explained, is to “stop torturing our children with gender transitions, to stop this whole LBGTQ alphabet nonsense, and start treating people like God’s people created in God’s image. We are all alike. We don’t need to partition everybody by their little fetishes.”

Meanwhile, I just want to increase the time I spend cuddling with my girlfriend and find a job that would let us live more comfortably. Ensuring she's treated with basic decency by others would also be nice.

And I think it's the "Love one another" value that folks should try restoring. Because if that's not a priority, what would be the point of restoring Judeo-Christian morality?

It's the same problem as transphobes who hide behind "facts and rationality"; the one question they keep forgetting to ask is "Why are we doing this?"

Call me a sap, but my reason for why is love.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/04/2023 06:29PM by ookami.