On Transgender athletes and performance advantages

Ok, here goes. I’ve been meaning to write this for a while, but time and energy have not allowed it. But I’ve just been involved in some lively Twitter discussions, ultimately productive, so I’m going to try to share some thoughts around this issue of transgender females (male-to-female transitioning people) competing in women’s sport.

It’s a supercharged, emotive issue. No matter what one says, the “other side” will criticize it. That, to me, is why it has to be discussed from as many perspectives as possible, because so many conflicts require that the issue be held up and examined from as many sides as possible.

I’m going to try my best to offer the full 360 degrees on the issue of male to female (MTF) transgender athletes. So bear with me – my intention is to explain, not to convince. I have no specific ideology on this, just an opinion, and it’s an opinion that matters less than the logic of how we discuss this issue.

I want to offer my insights (for what they’re worth) and offer suggested next steps and predictions. This means I have to work around to the ‘dark side of the moon’ to see the issues, to ask questions and to play devil’s advocate. I cannot possibly do them all justice, but I hope it helps a little.

It’s a complex issue with many threads, so forgive me if I don’t link them all as elegantly as I hope to in the future. I’ve gone overboard with sub-headings, which I hope makes reading this easier (or skipping big sections possible), but here’s a first attempt at it.


https://sportsscientists.com/2019/03/on-transgender-athletes-and-performance-advantages/


This is an excellent article by a sports scientists. Which is fair, balanced and lays out the arguments on both camps of this issue.
Well worth reading to the end