Like many, I've been saddened to see the undermining of women's sports by the participation of those who are chromosomally male but who now identify as women. That females have been asked to move aside for males sounds to me like . . . the same old patriarchy we females have been fighting for millennia.
A go-to site for me is SaveWomensSports.com, and they have several excellent fact sheets on the differences between female bodies and male bodies that have gone through puberty. Here's a great one, for example:
Today I stumbled upon a great site called BoysVsWomen.com . It compares the performance of the best high school boys medalists and the best Olympic women medalists in 2016 in running and swimming events (also shotput, high jumps, and other track and field events). The site is very well done, with eye-catching animations, and I encourage you to view it. For most of the events, none of the female Olympic medalists met the qualifying time needed to even enter the high school boys' competition. Here's one representative chart--notice the clear demarcation of over 40 seconds between the boys and the female Olympic medalists:
It is increasingly apparent that the immense physical advantage accrued by males who have undergone normal male puberty is irreversible. To give but one example, new research has shown that depression of testosterone through hormonal manipulation does not undo this advantage.
This is not simply an issue of fairness, though fairness is extremely important for females in a world in which women have always been treated unfairly. It is also a matter of safety when we speak of contact sports such as rugby.
Though I am not on Twitter, someone sent me this particular thread which I found very interesting. The author of the thread points out that girls are being told that if they object to males competing in their sports, the message to them is "be kind and step aside for them." That's what females have always been told to do, step aside for males and be nice while doing so! This is progress?
I hope our Congress has the courage to protect women's sports. But I admit that I don't have faith that it will. How is it possible that the Democratic Party, the party that consistently supported the aspirations of females and the party that has profited most from their votes, will not stand up for them?