Sectors of the American sports community went into an uproar right after Joe Biden became president of the United States. In his first two weeks in office, Biden fired off dozens of Executive Orders, including one aimed at “Preventing and Combating Discrimination on the Basis of Gender Identity or Sexual Orientation.” This sudden move caught the ire of many athletes, including 18-time tennis Grand Slam champion Martina Navratilova, a staunch gay activist since she came out in the early 1980’s. Though the order primarily extends protection against abuse to the transgender community (among others) in schools, the workplace, on sports teams and so on, critics say that it would create an unfair playing field by allowing transgender athletes to compete in sports based on their gender identification, not what they were born as. More precisely, Navratilova and many others believe that this will allow naturally born men – who have gone through male puberty – to compete against natural-born women in amateur and professional sports, which would obviously be unfair.
In the 1970’s, pro tennis player Richard Raskind had gender reassignment surgery, became Reneé Richards, and was allowed to compete among women. A few years earlier, 1962 Asian Games gold medalist sprinter Mona Sulaiman was being forced to strip and take a gender test at the start of the 1966 Asian Games, simply because she did not fit the traditional svelte look of a female runner. She opted to retire at her peak at age 24, rather than face the indignity.
The past few years have seen instances of mediocre male athletes identifying as women, making physiological changes, then suddenly dominate their sport on the distaff side. We’ve seen this in mixed martial arts and athletics, just to name a few sports. Each major sporting organization has different eligibility requirements. The International Olympic Committee, for its part, requires an athlete’s testosterone level to be below a certain point to be allowed to compete as a woman.
Studies have shown that muscle size is not the only major difference between men and women, as in “Gender differences in strength and muscle fiber characteristics” authored by A E Miller, J.D. MacDougal, M.A. Tarnopolsky and D.G. Sale of the McMaster University in Canada in 1993. Their research showed that women’s upper bodies are 52 percent as strong as men’s, while their lower bodies are roughly 66 percent as strong. Other data corroborate these findings. So, a naturally born male would have larger and stronger muscles, and other advantages over women, even with female hormone injections and the like.
Meanwhile, at least a dozen US states are trying to install their own regulations to prevent transgender minors from playing on school sports teams under the gender with which they identify.
State lawmakers in Montana and other places are proposing restrictions on athletics for trans minors beginning this year. This is similar to a 2020 law in Idaho which was blocked by a federal judge. In Connecticut, female athletes and legislators are challenging the policies allowing transgender athletes to compete against them. The American Civil Liberties Union, meanwhile, promises to sue if the moves in Montana and other places succeed.
Most of us will always defend the civil rights of those who identify with a gender other than their birth identity. They are people, who have the same freedoms to work where they want to work, be with whomever they choose to be with, and have access to the same public resources as everyone else. In that regard, there is no argument. But while we are all for equal rights and accommodation for everyone, there are three significant factors to consider. First, gender reassignment is elective; it is the person’s (or parents’) choice, not that of whomever they will be competing against athletically. Secondly, transgender athletes are a very, very small minority in sports. People ask: why should the overwhelming majority (and long-standing sports institutions) bend over backwards for them in this case? Third, when men transition to the opposite sex, they cannot eliminate all their lifelong characteristics of having been male. Even if they make significant physical changes through surgery and / or medication, they will still manifest an advantage.
Though this issue has not really touched the Philippines yet, developments in America bear close observation, as they could set a precedent for the rest of the world.