The strangest thing in a world of strange things is happening now. We are having a debate as to whether transgender girls, who are birthed as boys but choose to change gender, should be allowed to compete with birth/gender (b/g) girls in sports. Who says sustained prosperity doesn't lead to a mental decadence that dismisses reality?
A group of medical experts in a jaw-dropping letter to The Forum stated that “there is no categorical advantage being male has over being female in athletics.” They must have missed anatomy day in med school. At puberty and beyond males typically grow taller, heavier, stronger, quicker, and with greater lung capacity than women and remain so for life. Of course these traits lead to dominance in sports. Did you ever wonder why football teams aren't half female? Or, more darkly, why rape is so one-sided if women are as strong as men?
RELATED
- Missouri Dad Testifies Against Trans Youth Athlete Ban
-
Forum Editorial: There’s no need for transgender sports ban laws. Period There's a rash of bills to ban transgender sports participation. These meddlesome bills aren't needed because athletic associations and sports federations have policies that work well.
Evidently these medical professionals haven't. Behold the power of ideology and the corruption that political correctness work upon the mind: simple observation of the world from childhood on conveys the near-universality of the physical difference between men and women. Reality lately has been booted out the door or, as Professor Steven Goldberg wrote, wish is replacing thought.
If it's still permissible in our deranged society to indulge in sequential reasoning then it follows that transgender girls will have a noticeable advantage over b/g girls in sports. Not every time, but typically. It's grotesquely unfair to girls to pit them against physically superior athletes born as males. That's why some states are considering laws that forbid such competition. North Dakota's HB bill 1298 is such an example. Among other things it would require that transgender athletes only compete against those of the same sex which was “assigned” at birth to them. (As if assigning an identity could change the reality of what that new creature is anyway—like denominating a newborn human a banana or otter.)
Expectedly haters of the reality nature forces upon us are upset with such laws. Their criticisms are hollow. A common one is that transgender girls will be rare, so what's the problem? That an injustice might be uncommon is irrelevant—is it OK to do the wrong thing if it's only rarely done? Others lament that ND could lose money from contests not held by sports groups who might reject Bill 1298, money evidently being more important than doing the right thing and defending womens' right to not have to compete athletically against men. One writer to the Forum brings up the case of an undefeated transgender boy wrestler who's taking testosterone supplements. He's obliged by Texas law to wrestle girls. He now needs to shave. “Juicing” and steroid use were once frowned upon, but apparently hormone treatment is all right.
ADVERTISEMENT
Lastly, critics call up their trump card: emotional extortion, i.e., transgenders already have enough trouble in their lives, so let's be inclusive and let them compete against other sexes. By all means we should help them fight their depressions and psychic dark tunnels, but that help shouldn't include unfair treatment of girls and women.
Nelson lives in Casselton, N.D., and is a regular contributor to The Forum’s opinion page. Email him at dualquad413@gmail.com.
This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Forum's editorial board nor Forum ownership.
