An iconic athlete has spoken up against allowing “trans” athletes with male bodies to compete in women’s sports. See if you can guess who said this:
Current rules allowing “male-bodied people presenting as women, who live as women, with varying degrees of medical intervention and in some degrees, no medical intervention” to compete against women have “crossed the line,” and “it’s a slap in the face to women.”
She said denying the impact of testosterone on athletic performance “is obviously utter rubbish…Anyone with any basic understanding (of) biology and the difference between men and women knows it’s ridiculous. It’s male puberty that really grants boys and men that physical performance in sport. And I think it’s irrefutable — it’s ridiculous to suggest otherwise.”
You probably didn’t guess that that was the opinion of Danish golfer Mianne Bagger, who made history in 2004 as the first transgender athlete in a pro golf tournament at the Women’s Australian Open.
Bagger acknowledged she’ll be attacked as a hypocrite because restrictions on trans athletes might have prevented her from playing, but she says she’ll just take the abuse and criticism. She said she would be open to trans athletes competing under tougher rules, but not the “current, softened policies that are requiring less and less medical intervention of a male-bodied person entering women’s sport.”
So it’s official: we’ve now reached the point where the push to allow transgender athletes in women’s sports has gone so far beyond ridiculous that it’s actually offending transgender athletes.
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