Testosterone is complicated. Women athletes have higher than average testosterone. Some have higher than athletes who are men! Also T-levels don’t accurately correlate to performance, so there’s a factor of hormonal responsiveness as well.
But yeah, boxing also has weight classes, so we already know that sometimes we have to segregate leagues in order to keep contests among near peers and exciting.
The “problem” is that gender is a spectrum and there doesn’t exist any real metric to discern or categorize people into a social binary. Honestly, I’m surprised this topic is even popping up again when I thought this was hashed out several years and Olympics ago when right wingers were bringing this up back then. Trying to categorize and disqualify women by testosterone content just doesn’t work. This is all ultimately a method of trying to police and control women’s bodies.
In a similar vein, why aren’t men looked at in the same manner. Why not say that any particular man either has too much estrogen and is either too womanly or not manly enough to qualify or compete. It’s because these people aren’t looking for fairness, safety, or any other dog whistle they might cry about. It’s all just about controlling women.
I don’t want to disqualify anyone, I want them to compete with people at their level. It has nothing to do with women, this should be done to men too, and everyone else.
The issue is that these athletes are already exceptional. If I, a 6’ tall man, got into the ring with any of these women I’d get my ass handed to me. I’m not asking them to make a division that I could win though.
I don’t know what the best solution is, but there should be an open “Premier league” that anyone can compete in. If we decide to have other leagues then that gets complicated. Should we have one for class differences, hormone levels, mental capacity, or all other conditions? I’m unsure. The playing field can never be leveled though.
Testosterone is complicated. Women athletes have higher than average testosterone. Some have higher than athletes who are men! Also T-levels don’t accurately correlate to performance, so there’s a factor of hormonal responsiveness as well.
But yeah, boxing also has weight classes, so we already know that sometimes we have to segregate leagues in order to keep contests among near peers and exciting.
Here’s an interesting article about that: https://daily.jstor.org/gender-incommensurability-in-sports/
For sure, I have no clue how all that works but there has got to be a better way to do it than just separating by genders.
The “problem” is that gender is a spectrum and there doesn’t exist any real metric to discern or categorize people into a social binary. Honestly, I’m surprised this topic is even popping up again when I thought this was hashed out several years and Olympics ago when right wingers were bringing this up back then. Trying to categorize and disqualify women by testosterone content just doesn’t work. This is all ultimately a method of trying to police and control women’s bodies.
In a similar vein, why aren’t men looked at in the same manner. Why not say that any particular man either has too much estrogen and is either too womanly or not manly enough to qualify or compete. It’s because these people aren’t looking for fairness, safety, or any other dog whistle they might cry about. It’s all just about controlling women.
I don’t want to disqualify anyone, I want them to compete with people at their level. It has nothing to do with women, this should be done to men too, and everyone else.
The issue is that these athletes are already exceptional. If I, a 6’ tall man, got into the ring with any of these women I’d get my ass handed to me. I’m not asking them to make a division that I could win though.
I don’t know what the best solution is, but there should be an open “Premier league” that anyone can compete in. If we decide to have other leagues then that gets complicated. Should we have one for class differences, hormone levels, mental capacity, or all other conditions? I’m unsure. The playing field can never be leveled though.