The International Olympic Committee’s plans to create stricter guidelines for transgender athletes before Toyko 2020 have come to a halt, according to a report from The Guardian.
Scientists on the case had been expected to recommend halving the currently permitted testosterone level for trans female athletes competing at the Games. Sources told The Guardian that the talks stalled because of the subject’s sensitive and “politically charged” nature.
Currently, as per IOC rules put in place in 2015, athletes who transition from male to female can compete in women’s competition without requiring surgery as long as their testosterone level has been below 10 nmol/L for at least 12 months. Women’s testosterone levels typically fall in the range of 0.12 and 1.79 nmol/l, and men’s between 7.7 to 29.4 nmol/, according to the report. Thus, the 10 nmol/L level has proved controversial over its percieved leniency, and the IOC was considering lowing the amount to 5 nmol/L.
However, new studies have shown that testosterone suppression in transgender women actually does little to reduce muscle strength, even after the recommended year of treatment.
A Guardian source said that an IOC proposal had “had gone around the houses” without making any progress and that a resolution was unlikely to be reached before Tokyo. However, there will be meetings between now and the Games to try to get individual sporting federations to implement their own policies on transgender athletes, according to The Guardian, but those governing bodies may be reluctant to act without the IOC doing so first.
USA Swimming, for example, announced last year it would allow age group swimmers to compete in their stated gender category. To make a junior or senior national team, however, athletes must still comply with the IOC’s medical requirements.
Proponents of more stringent testosterone policies, including Olympic swimming medalist Sharron Davies, say that the efforts to be inclusive of trans women in Olympic sports will hurt women’s athletics. Opponents of the policies look to the aforementioned argument that testosterone is potentially not a key determinant of athletic performance. Both sides generally agree that more research is necessary before making a decision.
Why can’t it be handle like the way swimmers with disabilities are? It will never be fair to allow transwomen to compete against women. You can’t take away the male advantage over females with testosterone or surgery. I believe everyone has the right to be who they want to be but in sports where biological attributes are not the same between the sexes, transwomen should not be allowed to compete against women.
How about an open division that allows transgender people to compete against one another?
I would like to see phelps swim with the women. Would be fun. Maybe smash some records. And sun yang racing Ledecky will be lit. Let this happen.
I don’t know the answer to any of these questions but I hope people smarter than me proceed with compassion to solve it. I have to say I have D 1 swimmers and also a 12 year old daughter who plays lax and swims. For lax – We find she has started to travel and compete against teams where there is a biological male player who identifies as female who competes for the other team. Soccer friends have shared similar instances. It’s scary in a sport like lax or soccer where there is contact and you are a girl and clearly against someone with different muscle fibers and bigger build. I agree that a boy child who identifies as a… Read more »
I’m seeing a lot of talk on here about basically a fear of cismen pretending to be trans for athletic gain but that wouldn’t actually happen. The way transitioning is set up is very medically difficult that it takes many years for trans people to be allowed to transition by medical professionals and on top of that comes the massive amounts of social stigma. Being trans isn’t easy and it’s not something would just fake.
Additionally, a discussion of “biological women” is also outdated because grouping people into biological man/woman completely ignores the issue of intersex people. People need to be allowed to compete with their identified gender and having hormonal guidelines works.
People aren’t thinking that it will be done specifically to win sporting events. People think that once it is done a side effect will be an advantage in sporting events. Which it is.
What has cis to do with that??
Talking about biological sex is not outdated, and attempting to conflate the issues that affect intersex individuals with those that affect individuals who identify as a gender different to their biology is disingenuous at best.
Being trans may not be easy, but having a male biology, and being bigger, faster and stronger than someone with a female biology (even with hormonal restrictions) is too easy for the IOC to pretend the advantage isn’t there.
just a matter of time before TG can compete – as well they should!
Yes as they should. Against each other. At the same meet but scored separately in their own division. Dont see why that can’t be a viable solution.
You’re talking about half a percent of the population, if that (I don’t think it makes much sense to classify ftm and mtf together, either). I don’t think trans-only classification is even vaguely plausible.
We ought, I think, to rename the men’s division to the open division, and make clear that having to compete in it is not some kind of societal value judgment that the competitor is “really a man.”
I’m shocked that more female swimmers are not more vocal about this issue. While I think female athletes are amazing if I just take my small sample size of just my family (3 females and 2 male children from the same parents) there is no way that my girls could compete with my boys in the same event. My girls are an average of 4.5” shorter than my boys and they are 42lbs less- and they are all teenagers (and my youngest is a boy to help skeu the results more). You can’t undo puberty and the vast difference between the boys and girls physically and mentally. I have no issue with someone being trans either way but not in… Read more »
Lots of female athletes aren’t more vocal, because it’s not really a huge concern. Most aren’t super worried about tons of men transitioning to women just to win a swimming race.
No one is suggesting they are doing it just to win a swimming race.
They are suggesting after they do it a side effect is that they have an unfair advantage in a swimming race.
Simply responding to So Confused’s shock that more female swimmers aren’t more vocal. Pretty sure it’s not a huge concern.
This is a difficult moral issue, but the answer is very simple; Biological women should not have to compete with mtr trans women.
I don’t think it’s right to focus solely on testosterone either; Biological men and women’s bodies change unrecognisably during puberty, and many of those changes in biological men can’t be undone. Bio men have 10% increased lung volume and increased bone density. Not to mention, no disrespect to ladies, but bio men have a physique that lends itself to athletic prowess (lower body fat percentage, higher muscle mass, broad shoulders, narrow hips, longer limbs etc) and a lot of those things can not be undone by lowering testosterone years after puberty.
Sometimes the right thing to… Read more »