J.C.MacSwell

You should address my arguments, not your incorrect assumption of my motivation for them.

First of all you really don't know all the sports I've competed in, coached in, or officiated in, never mind at what levels. Second, if I had your same attitude, I would suspect a vicarious excuse to be indignant if you were not yourself a female and/or transgender athlete wanting to compete. Some of the arguments here have not been thought through. This is a chance for us to do it.

You probably know this. Assuming you are talking about ice hockey, tryouts in Canada are, and have been for quite some time, open to girls trying out for boys teams. It's certainly important that they are allowed to compete for spots on teams that are appropriate for their level. The better ones often make the top travel teams sometimes well into their early teens. Others struggle around that time but so do some of the boys that go through puberty later than their teammates. Tryouts to make a category though, are fundamentally different from trying to avoid making one. Which is in part why I feel testing participants for eligibility for a lower level is fundamentally flawed. Really? Do you have to be a professional athlete to express concerns for women's sports or transgender inclusion?

No. Not at all. Conceptually only. Or choose your own example of a sport with a XY advantage where XX individuals also want to compete at what they would consider their highest level. I think we both (and certainly CY would as well, but he hasn't replied to me since I questioned his conceptualized solution) realize the potential performance curves of XY individuals, XX individuals, and other individuals, will be different in every sport, and that in the vast majority of physical sports with a well known XY advantage there will be significantly more (many times more) XY athletes capable of competing at the level coinciding with what is currently considered elite XX performance. And I think you further know that defining those curves with reasonable accuracy will be problematic. Yet somehow you think eliminating the female category and replacing it with a second tier otherwise open category based on choosing some cut off point will lead to an acceptable outcome. (for any group other than the sub-elite XY individuals that will no doubt dominate the category) I want to know why you think that is likely or even plausible; Why you think you have conceptualized a solution that others can't see. I don't need to know details at this point, and I don't need to know why it's important that society becomes less discriminatory...which I think everyone here agrees with.

...Orwellian hit job on the term notwithstanding...

Who though, would feel humiliated running 10.6 flat on the World stage at the Tier 2 Olympic Final (previously raced as the Olympic Women's Final)...even if a seemingly random 1, or perhaps 2, non XY individuals happened to make it to that final. And if the random 1 or perhaps 2 crossed the line ahead of you...it says alot about your peers if they look down on you. You might have also have barely qualified for Tier 1 in the 400 (so no realistic chance to make the Olympics), but done the sensible thing and followed the money...Aunt Sarah does need that operation...and you live in a country without universal health care. (I know you do live in a country that has it...I'm just talking about a very fast runner theoretical you...who might have a sister that's a better runner and more dedicated, but alas lacks the XY advantages) (you will be happy to know Dim, that though you crossed the line 4th in this fictitious scenario, you were given the Gold medal after the judges checked the recorded wind speed and found it to be neutral...and therefore DSQ'd the competitors ahead of you for running under 10.xx...an impossible result for a true Tier 2 athlete)

Currently their is a market at the elite female level in soccer, even though a good high school boys team could beat the World Champions. With no market, clearly viewership is not driving the compensation. There will be nothing like the potential for $500,000/year incomes and any compensation should reflect that.

You do mean (for physical sports where XY individuals dominate): "if someone "demonstrates the inability to compete at the top male level" do you not? Surely you are not filtering them out from competition at any level, correct? You're just removing the Tier 1 competitors from competing in Tier 2, to allow the Tier 2 competitors a chance to compete? Okay. So how is this going to work assuming you have a reasonable method of doing the filtering (which clearly you don't, even conceptually, without assuming best efforts in a trial...the potential reward for best effort being exclusion from Tier 2...a disincentive for anyone wanting to compete in that category) But let's say you have some reasonable method to do this...where are you going to draw your line dividing Tier 1 and Tier 2? Let's use the 100m as an example. Should we use the current women's 100m record? Or is that too fast? Let's say it's 10.xx seconds, with the xx chosen to allow elite females to compete, so you won't explicitly exclude the top current 10, 20, 40? females. How many more XY individuals would also be in this range? How would XY individuals not dominate this second tier, as well as the top tier? Is that okay if they do? (Let's not complicate things at this point, and consider also if they deserve equal pay)

Why even use gender? If we are going to be truly open for category 2, anyone that can demonstrate the right lack of attributes in that sport should be eligible...do we even have the right to question how they might prefer to identify?

Point 1 For most physical sports: Thank you (not being sarcastic, you are at least attempting it) for at least trying to address this one of the objections to this supposed solution that dissolves women's sport at elite level and replaces it with a second tier, and thank you for including almost all current elite women in it by making the bar high enough to allow them, even if very few are at that highest point of the current bell curve that are close to the bar, the cut off point if you will. Now juxtapose that bell curve on that of XY chromosome individuals? For those physical sports where XY individuals tend to dominate. How many XY individuals are close to the bar? How many that are beyond it will fall below it as their sporting careers decline? How many dishonest ones capable of exceeding it choose to measure below it? Is this really a satisfactory solution? Point 2 How, conceptually at least, are the qualifying measurements done? What level of effort are the participants obligated to give? Is it this level? 2012 Olympic Badminton scandal where players intentionally lost matches due to the incentives in the rules to do so: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hdK4vPz0qaI Point 3 Is everyone sure that none of this threatens women's sports at elite level. Point 4 Does anyone care?

Nothing wrong with that, I guess, assuming Boris identifies as six years old... (kidding)

I say this very tongue in cheek and it might be out of place during yet another tragic event, but it might be time to pry the guns from their cold dead hands.

I guess that's the price you pay when you stand up to a dicktator.

Where and how do you draw the lines for this supposed Tier 2 that formerly would have been referred to as female sport. How many of the US women's soccer team manage to stay under the bar, and yet still just manage to make the Team? What is this practical solution? Why is it not obvious to everyone that it is fundamentally flawed? Do you think the US women's Team is not elite at all, but just happen to be currently accepted in the lower category? Are some of them simply weak Tier 1 players in this new scheme?

What females make the male junior varsity teams? It seems to me they are male athletes that don't quite make the varsity teams. Then explain how it works at elite level. Barring that, how can you claim it's practical at that level. INow has done nothing but handwave an explanation. If you are making the same claim then explain it.

How are they the same group, and the US Womens and mens hockey teams are not? No. As you pointed out, the women brought in similar revenues to the men. Close enough that the men felt compelled to support your World champion team, and to proceed to work together to grow the shared revenue. The Law did not support them in getting equal pay with the men. (though the Law certainly should have, and no doubt would have, supported that they deserved more than they were getting, including based on what the men were getting) If the law supported them for equal pay, they would have had to prove equal work. Their deal will set no precedent in Law for other sports, or even in their own when they negotiate the next contract. They simply settled on a win-win deal with the men, and possibly/possibly not also a win-win-win with US Soccer, for a set term. We were discussing the effect of incentivizing womens sports for transgenders, as per how it reflects on the thread topic. +1...and they deserve to challenge that potential brain and muscle memory just as men do. Citius, altius, fortius...not watchus from the sideus...

Gotta like that capitalization of "Whoever"...no pun intended. Democracy certainly needs a firm foundation. It can't just be taken for granite...

Canada maybe. We have more women, Christine Sinclair in particular, that are household names than that of our male soccer players. Not sure if that generates enough revenue to make a difference but we are certainly one of the rare countries where it could.

"Nobody does it" is your objection so you can't get past that and see the point? Why consider equal pay if nobody does it? No country has so far paid equally to their men's and women's soccer teams. ...and if you can follow the argument, equal pay just happened to be very close to what was deserved based on gate receipts and similar revenues. Do you not think they would have asked for more if they could have? You think they would have fought for the right to share with the men if the men's revenues were significantly lower? They happened to be in a very unique situation in the world of soccer. Other countries are extremely unlikely to follow their lead. I'm going to go out on a limb without looking and guess that of the 14 different G7 bell curves based on gender, there's probably a middle of a male one that's pretty damn close to a female one (and yes, I thought of that prior to replying to Dim, and no I wasn't trying to suggest an exact midpoint)

No. Nor does any other National team have men and women share revenues. Your point? The women generated slightly more revenue but their contract wasn't tied to that, or they automatically would have received more. They did in fact deserve more, but not based on "equal pay". They certainly would not have chosen that argument if they were underpaid in the same manner but the men's Team was earning less. I didn't claim there wasn't. I said I'd still be in the middle of a G7 bell curve if I decided to change, with the caveat that I am really only aware of the two main genders. (not claiming I'm well versed in all the possible curves, but aware enough to know my statement is valid) At high school level the top XY athletes are already producing what would be World Record performances for females, and many are competing for scholarships. So the top high school level is beyond what I would consider recreational and top college well beyond that. That of course should not exclude trans athletes from competing at recreational level past middle school or even for life. How do you ascertain that someone capable of skill level 1, is only willing to demonstrate skill level 2? (Just asking on behalf of former East German coaches hoping to revive their careers, and many current Russian ones) People cheat. What you are suggesting are criteria incentivized to stay under. Sandbagging is well known in recreational level sports where the stakes are low. What makes you think it won't be used when the stakes are high? What if this argument had been used, and given weight, when women were trying to gain access to sports of their own? We'd still be back in the 1920's (okay, maybe no one would have known what you were on about back then)inviting females to watch from the sidelines. The pee thing you keep going on about: There's good reasons men tend to pee standing up and women tend to pee sitting down. The Good Lord (read evolution) chose to hand most of the burden for the proliferation of our species on women. This doesn't mean that they are inferior athletes. It means that you can't measure it in the same way when some carry that well known burden and others do not.

True. There may be some gender category somewhere, that I am not aware of, that if I joined I would not be in the middle of the bell curve. Can we leave it at that?

It holds regardless of any gender choice I choose to make.

As someone in the middle of a G7 member bell curve...I think I'm very fortunate.

World bell curve? Or G7 member bell curve?

If you are wealthy enough to consider half a million extra a year (making the Team) to nothing extra at all (displaced from the Team) a slight pay cut, I'm very happy for you Dim.