Let’s talk about trans girls in sports.
In November 2023, we flipped the Central Bucks School Board to a Democratic majority, effectively saving it from the grips of an extremely political, agenda-driven school board. The new Board immediately suspended four problematic policies implemented by the previous Board.
As the final step, the school board plans to vote to retire the fourth policy that poorly outlined guidelines for who can and cannot participate in school sports. This move emboldened a few members in our community to speak out against transgender girls’ participation in sports. This also prompted me to finally put my thoughts about this topic on paper.
I’ve been thinking about this topic for the last two years, and I know many people feel very strongly about trans girls in sports and in private spaces, like bathrooms and locker rooms*.
Because it is important to me to be informed and to speak about any topic from a place of understanding and research (especially when in concerns kids and inclusion), I have been voraciously researching all sides of this debate for two years. I have been called transphobic for simply questioning some ideas and I have been called an extreme leftist for simply trying to understand this issue beyond knee-jerk reactions, including my own.
In addition to grappling with the research, studies, and hundreds of articles, I’ve been using first-principles thinking to build my understanding. First-principles thinking allows us to take a complicated problem, question our own assumptions, break it down into fundamental parts, and find solutions with the help of comparable situations we are already familiar with.
With some vulnerability, I will explain how my own thoughts and beliefs about this issue have evolved.
The argument: Trans girls/women have an unfair advantage and do not belong in women’s sports. Even with hormone therapy and other gender-affirming care, trans girls/women may retain some physiological advantages from male puberty, such as bone density, muscle mass, and cardiovascular capacity. Simply put, most men are faster and stronger than most women.
►Where I was: Agree. That seems obvious. Most men are physiologically stronger and faster than most women.
►Where I am now: It’s complicated and way more nuanced than I thought. And it doesn’t help that this issue has unfortunately become highly politicized.
The politicization of this particular issue makes it difficult to collect true data. Because politicians use culture wars to win elections, they create flippant policies not based on evidence and data to appeal to their base. So, one of the main issues here is that we lack significant data in this area. Since so few trans people participate in sports already and since policy in some states has prevented trans athletes from participating in sports that match their gender identity, we don’t have many examples to collect data from. Out of the few studies we do have, some find trans women have an advantage while others find that they don’t.
What we do know is that after puberty, and without any gender affirming care, boys and men have an advantage in performance over girls and women. We know research on long-term effects of hormone therapy is still evolving. We also know competitive advantage varies by age. In elementary school, before puberty, all kids perform about the same. We also know that puberty blockers play a role in this physiological advantage, depending on when they were started. We know that advantages in athletic abilities also include genetics, metabolic differences, and socioeconomics, like access to better nutrition, coaching, and training equipment. We also know individual variation in physiology exists among all athletes, regardless of gender identity.
Furthermore, the impact of these factors varies widely across different sports, events, and competitive levels. For example, the physiological demands and advantages in swimming differ greatly from those in wrestling, while rugby and gymnastics require distinct physical attributes. Given this complexity, a one-size-fits-all policy for transgender athletes in sports is inherently flawed. Instead, we should develop nuanced, sport-specific policies that account for the unique characteristics and demands of each discipline. These policies should also recognize the inherent variability within each sport and among individual athletes. This approach would allow for more equitable competition while respecting the rights and identities of all athletes, including transgender individuals.
Applying first-principles thinking to the issue, I searched for some comparable situations in athletics. I listened to Konstantin Kisin’s (a conservative pundit) interview with Neil deGrasse Tyson. During their conversation, deGrasse Tyson brought up wrestling, which provides a good comparable situation, at least as close as we can get. Wrestling addressed fairness concerns by implementing weight classes, ensuring that athletes compete against others of similar physical stature. Is it possible for our world to find similar solutions for all sports to accommodate trans athletes? Can we have performance-based divisions where we create tiered competition systems based on specific performance metrics rather than gender?Can we create hormone-based guidelines that consider the duration of hormone therapy required before competition? Can we develop tailored policies for each sport, similar to how wrestling did with weight classes? The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has already created a framework for inclusion and fairness based on the principle of no presumption of advantage, can we look to them?
We also know the motivation behind this recent movement is disingenuous and driven by political agenda. If those who all of a sudden claim to care about “protecting women’s sports” genuinely cared about integrity and fairness, we would see a long-standing commitment to advocating for equal pay, pushing for equal airtime and elevation of women’s sports, fighting for equitable allocation of resources, addressing and working to prevent high rates of sexual violence and misconduct toward female athletes, and promoting more leadership roles for women in coaching and sports management. Yet, historically, conservative movements have often downplayed or even opposed the advancement of women’s sports, arguing that men’s sports are inherently superior and/or more deserving of attention and resources. This track record further undermines the credibility of their current position on transgender athletes. This inconsistency in rhetoric tells me that the focus on transgender athletes is not at all driven by the desire to “protect women’s sports” and is simply just another culture war designed to hurt a marginalized community by pitting one underrepresented group against another in lieu of working to fix actual problems.
Another serious consequence with the politicization of this issue is that this rhetoric is hurting all girls. Blanket policies aimed at identifying transgender athletes can subject all female athletes to invasive physicals. In layman’s terms: Are we going to perform genital checks on all girls prior to them joining a team? These policies also reinforce gender stereotypes and put cisgender girls who don’t conform to these stereotypes at risk of harassment and violence. A month ago, a 9 y/o girl was accosted by a 65 y/o man because he assumed she was a trans girl and didn’t want her to participate in the track meet. This fear of scrutiny, false accusations, and harassment may discourage all girls from participating, and the intense focus on physical appearance will exacerbate body image issues among them. Further, this politicization and hateful rhetoric creates a hostile atmosphere for girls and affects team dynamics, causing division among teammates and competitors. And finally, these arguments rely on sexist assumptions about male superiority, indirectly undermining all women’s sports and potentially limiting how girls view their own abilities.
As my thoughts about this issue continue to evolve, I will say this: We should operate from a place of inclusion, especially when it comes to school-aged kids. We know that prior to puberty kids are about the same; therefore, blanket policies banning transgender children from playing on teams aligning with their gender identity are not only problematic but lack scientific justification. Second, throughout history, society has successfully found ways to include various groups, even when it initially seemed challenging or impossible. We created weight classes in sports, we added accommodations for our kids with special needs, we’ve integrated our schools and desegregated communities. The athletic community has repeatedly demonstrated its ability to evolve and create more inclusive environments while maintaining competitive integrity, so we should trust the process while we grapple with how to do this best. What doesn’t help is echoing rhetoric from people attempting to manipulate us. We know that participation in sports aligned with one’s gender identity can be crucial for the mental health and social development of transgender youth, so rather than implementing indiscriminate bans, we should focus on solutions and promote understanding and empathy among athletes, coaches, and within our communities.
If we really care about equality and fairness and believe in our capacity to overcome challenges, adapt to new situations, and think creatively, we can create an environment in athletics that is not only fair and competitive but also welcoming and affirming for all athletes.
I really love Neil deGrasse Tyson’s take on this issue. He said, “This requires more creative thought rather than saying no to at all. It’s an unsolved problem, yes, but it’s not unsolvable given what we know about human physiology. Why not rise to that occasion and solve it rather than take your older view of the world and force modern emergent conduct of people to fit that? Solutions to progressive change is not to regress it to how things once were. If that were the case, I would still be drinking from a segregated water fountain.”
*I’ll discuss private spaces in a different blog; this was long enough.
