OT: Fair or not ?
Papi_Chulo
Miami, FL (or the nearest big-booty club)
Transgender boy moves within 1 win of girls Texas title
Mack Beggs pinned Kailyn Clay to improve to 56-0, putting him in Saturday afternoon's championship match.
Beggs is a junior from Euless Trinity in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. His family has said he would rather be wrestling boys. Some girls and their advocates agree.
They say the testosterone Beggs has been taking while transitioning from female to male has made him too strong to wrestle fairly against girls. But state policy calls for students to wrestle against the gender listed on their birth certificates.
So Beggs beat Taylor Latham and Mya Engert handily on Friday before his victory over Clay that sent him to the finals.
In the semifinals, the match was halted for a couple of minutes because Beggs had a bloody nose. Trainers finally managed to stop the bleeding and the fight resumed. Not long after, Beggs slammed Clay on the mat and pinned her.
He and Clay shared a long hug before an official raised Beggs' arm to signal victory, and the wrestler scurried off the mat. Clay's coached shouted to reporters that she "did not have permission" to talk to them after her loss and both of her parents declined comment.
Beggs, who reached the state tournament after two opponents forfeited, will face Chelsea Sanchez for a shot at a state title.
Beggs' participation comes at a crucial moment, with the public and politicians debating the growing belief that gender is fluid. Just this week, the Trump administration announced an end to federal protections that allowed transgender students to use facilities based on their gender identity, leaving states and school districts to determine their own policies.
And in Texas, lawmakers are considering a bill similar to HB2, the North Carolina law that prompted the NBA to move this year's All-Star Game out of that state. If passed, the Texas version, called SB6, would require transgender people to use the bathroom of their "biological sex."
The University Interscholastic League, which oversees athletics in Texas public schools, enacted the birth certificate policy Aug. 1.
Attorney Jim Baudhuin tried and failed to get injunctions before both the district and regional meets to prevent Beggs from competing while he transitions. He told The Associated Press earlier this week he doesn't blame Beggs for the situation, but faults the UIL.
"The more I learn about this, the more I realize that she's just trying to live her life and her family is, too," Baudhuin said. "She's being forced into that position. Who knows, through discovery we may find out that's not the case. But every indication is, the way the winds are going now, the blame rests with the UIL and the superintendents."
Despite criticism of the policy, UIL executives don't envision a change.
"Ninety-five percent of the school superintendents in Texas voted for the rule as it was proposed, which was to use birth certificates," UIL deputy director Jamey Harrison said. "So any rule can be reconsidered, but ... given the overwhelming support for that rule, I don't expect it to change anytime soon."
http://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/more-spo…
Mack Beggs pinned Kailyn Clay to improve to 56-0, putting him in Saturday afternoon's championship match.
Beggs is a junior from Euless Trinity in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. His family has said he would rather be wrestling boys. Some girls and their advocates agree.
They say the testosterone Beggs has been taking while transitioning from female to male has made him too strong to wrestle fairly against girls. But state policy calls for students to wrestle against the gender listed on their birth certificates.
So Beggs beat Taylor Latham and Mya Engert handily on Friday before his victory over Clay that sent him to the finals.
In the semifinals, the match was halted for a couple of minutes because Beggs had a bloody nose. Trainers finally managed to stop the bleeding and the fight resumed. Not long after, Beggs slammed Clay on the mat and pinned her.
He and Clay shared a long hug before an official raised Beggs' arm to signal victory, and the wrestler scurried off the mat. Clay's coached shouted to reporters that she "did not have permission" to talk to them after her loss and both of her parents declined comment.
Beggs, who reached the state tournament after two opponents forfeited, will face Chelsea Sanchez for a shot at a state title.
Beggs' participation comes at a crucial moment, with the public and politicians debating the growing belief that gender is fluid. Just this week, the Trump administration announced an end to federal protections that allowed transgender students to use facilities based on their gender identity, leaving states and school districts to determine their own policies.
And in Texas, lawmakers are considering a bill similar to HB2, the North Carolina law that prompted the NBA to move this year's All-Star Game out of that state. If passed, the Texas version, called SB6, would require transgender people to use the bathroom of their "biological sex."
The University Interscholastic League, which oversees athletics in Texas public schools, enacted the birth certificate policy Aug. 1.
Attorney Jim Baudhuin tried and failed to get injunctions before both the district and regional meets to prevent Beggs from competing while he transitions. He told The Associated Press earlier this week he doesn't blame Beggs for the situation, but faults the UIL.
"The more I learn about this, the more I realize that she's just trying to live her life and her family is, too," Baudhuin said. "She's being forced into that position. Who knows, through discovery we may find out that's not the case. But every indication is, the way the winds are going now, the blame rests with the UIL and the superintendents."
Despite criticism of the policy, UIL executives don't envision a change.
"Ninety-five percent of the school superintendents in Texas voted for the rule as it was proposed, which was to use birth certificates," UIL deputy director Jamey Harrison said. "So any rule can be reconsidered, but ... given the overwhelming support for that rule, I don't expect it to change anytime soon."
http://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/more-spo…
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34 comments
In my opinion, not fair. Once an athlete decides to start taking performance enhancing substances they should forfeit their eligibility to participate in legitimate athletic contests as a way to keep a level playing field. Hormones are performance enhancing.
To me it comes down to making a decision. Either participate in sports or the regimen to change sex, but not both. We all have to make sacrifices in life, some more difficult than others.
For myself: on the one hand, I've always been a strong supporter of the right of LGBT people to live with dignity and respect, be afforded the same rights as everyone else in regards to family and employment, be free from discrimination, etc. On the other hand, plain and simple, I believe gender is absolutely inextricably linked to biology, and no matter how much I might believe I'm a woman, one look in my skivvies pretty much proves I'm a man (at least, after you stop laughing). So I understand why a state might pass a rule "you compete in the same sex as your birthcertificate/actual-gender/biology". Of course there's an exception for medications, but they probably never foresaw that there'd be a case like this, where they'd catch a student mid-transition.
I don't believe the above situation is fair, it is absolutely not fair that those girls who have worked so hard at what is the most grueling sport on the planet, are having to go up against someone who has a huge advantage in having artificially male levels of testosterone -- and importantly, even the young-man-in-transition doesn't seem to believe it's fair, but he's as stuck as everyone else. Going forward, it seems like the fair and sane thing to do is to exempt female-to-male trans student, in mid-transition, from the law, if it can be done in a way that's constitutional (maybe worded specifically along the lines of "if the medication is meant to bring hormones to male levels).
Then he leave the choice parts in the sun a few days for me to eat. Then the rotting hairless ape is yummy yummy yummy in my tummy tummy tummy. Squawk!
So you'd have this funny circle: fighters would take PEDs illegally, then they would stop, but by then their testicles were fried and their testosterone levels were permanently reduced. THEN, they'd get tested, prove that their T levels were low, and be given permission to take hormones to raise their T. And as long as those hormones did not raise their Test levels above normal, that was acceptable. That loophole might have been closed, but it definitely existed at one point.
I think FAIR would be to allow him to take a punch at a Nazi of any gender, that douche bag Transgender trashing, Pedophile excusing Milo Yinnopoulous being the first on the list.
Someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but I *think* if the hormones are administered to the normal range for boys that age, there won't be any advantage. The advantage comes when guys are pumping their hormones way up. If he's in the normal range, no advantage... anyone know differently?
To me, this goes back to what the framers of this Law, the framers of our Union (US Constitution, federal overreach, States rights, individual liberty, protection from gov't, etc) -- what is the intent? That is the important part.
Also this citizen has certain rights and freedoms as a lawful US citizen. Plus, if that citizen has been given something prescribed and administered under the order and guidance and observation of a licensed Physician, then that doctor relationship trumps anything the school or sports organization wants to say. But the licensed physician needs to work within the law. He or she appears to be. I do not want to set a precedent where a school or a sports organization can dictate my healthcare choices, so long as I pay for them myself. I feel the trans boy's testosterone therapy falls under this and they can STFU.
Now, with that said, we have a compromise here. The Federal Gov't has wisely realized this should be an individual choice or a states rights issue and not a federal issue. I like that compromise. Good. The State of Texas has passed a "birth certificate" gender law, a law which has specific wording and a specific intent. The intent and wording are both important. To me this law and the wishes of the boy and instructions from the physician trump the organization, in so much as the boy in participating according to the rules (rules, which are coincidentally not laws, but merely rules).
Texas intent here is not to create law to dictate how wresting is to be ruled. But rather this law applies to other friction points like bathrooms, locker rooms, and gender segregated facilities where women would be in danger from men posing as women. This wrestling conference is not the case. And knowing what I know I about Texas legislature and judiciary, I doubt the State of Texas is going to throw the baby out with the bath water just become one trans boy is pinning cis [sic] girls in one wrestling tournament 56-0. They just aren't. This doesn't even register to them. They are playing long ball.
Let's put this in perspective one more time. No one was being assaulted. No one was being harassed. Some girls (not boys) were being pinned just because one participant was stronger. If you think for a minute Texas with let a trans gender mixed with cis gender, I have a bridge to sell you. This will all simply blow over.
Personally, I don't agree with this. I think the trans boy should be allowed to wrestle with the cis boys. But the athletic organization does not agree with me. And Texas law does not agree with me.
We have to think compromise here. It's fair. It's fair because it is not unjust. To be unjust, what this trans boy is doing would have to 1. be against the rules and 2. be against the law.
The trans boy is within the rules because they said a trans boy just wrestle according to the gender on his birth certificate, which is female. He and his parents would prefer the boy wrestle with the cis boys. The organization will not let him. Therefore he is following the rules. So it is just. So it is fair.
The trans boy is within the law because because the State of Texas has a birth certificate gender law. When facilities are gender segregated, he must follow the gender that appears in his birth certificate, which is female.
We are a nation of laws. Dallas702 told me so. ;)
I can almost guarantee that was a huge part of it -- those stories are exactly what have been making the news in sports and getting people outraged, particularly in combat sports.
Again, it is absolutely not fair a biological girl who has artificially male-levels of testosterone, compete against girls (and again, even the boy agrees with this -- I don't blame him one bit). It's a corner case that was perhaps unforeseen, but I imagine that the unfairness is now clear to everyone, and if there is a way to address it in a way that will hold up in court, then it won't be repeated.
Girls wrestling has gotten quite popular. When I wrestled in high school, there was one girl in the entire league. Today, many high schools have girls teams -- they can't always fill out all the weight classes, but there's lots of girls teams. The varsity girls obviously can't compete with varsity boys of the same weight class, but it's not uncommon that coaches will enter varsity girls into boys JV tournaments, and high level varsity girls will usually win those tournaments, which is pretty impressive, I think.
Second, = = the "transgender" bullshit is just creepy!
I am tired of the constant, "I your face" promotion of this mental illness, but if they would stay out of my life it is not a big deal. As long as they don't try to force me to "share" their feelings, I don't care if grown men and women want to dress like the other gender - I don't care if they want to take drugs to make them seem more like the "other" gender - I don't even care if adults mutilate themselves to look like the "other" gender.
But when they do it to children - that is sick. Parents of these "transgender" children should be prosecuted for child abuse!
Flagooner, excellent insight. That’s a very likely side effect. I don’t agree with the Texas law. Apparently the Texas people either didn’t think of this, don’t care if it’s exploited, or they have bigger fish to fry. But I agree with you. But the law is the law. And the people of the Great State of Texas have their reasons.
Papi_Chulo -- > “w.r.t. the birth certificate law, I wonder if the intent was to not have males identifying as women and them competing against women in sports.”
Papi_Chulo, exactly. But I also think it was the bathroom thing, too. Rape, assault, or as rickdugan puts it, “dudes with balls dressing up as women going into the same bathroom as my little girls with male urges.”
What we have here is the less common case of a woman identifying as a man and taking male hormones for a valid medical reason. This is far less common that the other edge cases Texas wasn’t to prohibit.
Personally, I think Texas will offer up these cis girl wrestlers as sacrifices for the greater good. In the grand scheme of social fights, this loss doesn’t even register to the electorate and to the legislature. It’s the defense of traditional values. That’s what’s at stake.
Snowtime -- > “I wrestled for four years in high school almost 50 years ago. I did not even realize that female wrestling exisited outside of WWE. Must not be very widespread or I am living in a hole.”
I wrestled 20 years ago. There was the odd girl who wrestled but we didn’t have separate teams for girls they had to wrestle against the boys.
There appears to be credible evidence that the gender identity may be set at early as kindergarten (5 yo) rather then puberty (12-13 yo) as previously thought. So the humane and appropriate action would be to, if diagnosed correction, would be to undergo gender reassignment (incl. surgery and hormone therapy) as young as possible rather than postponing it to 18 yo to avoid the emotional response of "mutilating children" which sounds like the girly squeals from a woman or some progressive rather than a level-headed man. Open your mind.