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March 28, 2024

Sport and gender

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Gregory McKay states (Echo, 29 June) there is ‘prejudicial fear masquerading as false concern about transgender women competing unfairly with cisgender women’, and suggests we should all ‘just be kind’.

That’s all very well from the transgender point of view, but ignores the scientific fact that men who have gone through puberty have bigger hearts, longer, stronger bones and more muscle mass and upper body strength than biological women. That is an undeniably unfair advantage when competing in sport. It seems to me that once again, biological women are being asked to make room for others, in this case for men who identify as women. 

Biological women have fought for equality in all areas of life and still don’t get the same recognition as their male counterparts. Now we have, yet again, men muscling in on our space and telling us how to behave. 

Mr McKay cannot know what it is to be a biological woman, to wrestle daily with discrimination in a sexist society. He says that Cate Campbell ‘and her ilk bleat’ (an interesting choice of words) about unfairness, when all they are asking for is an equal playing field. 

Of course, men and women should be able to live as they wish and assume whatever gender they choose, but inclusivity doesn’t mean taking advantage of others. Many biological women are concerned by the insidious attempts to erase our biology, to render us neutered, just to satisfy the demands of some very strident trans women. We have recently heard of midwives in the UK being instructed to use the term ‘chest milk’ instead of ‘breast milk’, lest they offend. This would be risible if it were not so sinister. Biological women of all political persuasions and backgrounds are increasingly alarmed at being required, yet again, to sacrifice their interests in favour of others, alarmed at this new form of female-directed oppression.

L Andrews, Lennox Head 

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1 COMMENT

  1. Thank you L Andrews for offering a well balanced view. Some people actually have a scientifically based opinion as to the unfairness of trans-women competing against women born and raised female. People denying the unfairness of such competition show a naive view of equality as well as ignorance of both the biological and sociological factors that shape the lives of women born, raised and living as females.

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