It is excluding women and girls from their own category
Some notable female athletes have said transgender athletes should not compete in female competitions.
They claim women who were born biological males retain a competitive advantage in some sport and have called for more research into the issue.
They don’t “claim” that, they simply point it out.
Ex-swimmer Sharron Davies said it will take female athletes “being thrown under the bus” at Tokyo 2020 before changes are made to transgender rules.
Prominent trans rights campaigner McKinnon has defended her right to compete, but said: “I’ve thought about giving up about half a dozen times a year at least.
“It’s so stressful to even show up for me given the sort of attention I get.
“Every athlete has physical advantages and we’re all trying to exploit them. So to single out a trans woman, when I lose most of my races, is a little unfair.”
Of course it’s not. It’s not any amount of unfair to “single out” a man who insists on competing against women. It’s the man doing that who is unfair, and not a little. Just imagine being the woman who was bumped down to silver because of him. Imagine being the woman who won no medal because of him.
Former British Masters champion Victoria Hood, who competes in the same category as McKinnon but is currently injured, told BBC Sport that other riders “sacrificed” the opportunity to compete at the World Championships because “they don’t want to compete” against McKinnon.
“The science is there. The science is clear – it tells us that trans women have an advantage,” she said.
“The world record has just been beaten today by somebody born male, who now identifies as female, and the gap between them and the next born female competitor was quite a lot.
“The world record was two tenths of a second. I know that doesn’t sound like a lot but it is.
“The gap between them and the next female competitor was four tenths, which to put into perspective in a sprint event like this, that would be 15m of the track, when sprint events are usually won by centimetres.
“It is a human right to participate in sport. I don’t think it’s a human right to identify into whichever category you choose.”
Earlier this week, athletics’ governing body the IAAF said trans female athletes must lower their levels of testosterone.
But Hood called on sports’ governing bodies to “step up”, saying they were “excluding” athletes born female.
“If people want to push this through some misguided idea that they are being inclusive, it is not inclusive. It is excluding women and girls from their own category. It’s not fair,” Hood said.
“The IOC need to make fair policies that are based on the science that we have, because if they can’t then they are not fit for purpose.
“They are washing their hands of it and it is becoming more political than it is about science and biology.”
So that’ll be what prompted DOCTOR McKinnon’s self-important “statement” and “press release” then.
But if I declare I’m a lady, aren’t my size 15 feet then lady feet?
The tone of that article is more sympathetic to McKinnon’s critics than I would have expected from the BBC. Even just a few months ago, I would have been very surprised to see an outlet like the Beeb or the Graun quote Victoria Hood at length criticizing male trans athletes in women’s sport — and here we are now: the Beeb even gave her the last word.
The ship is slowly turning around.
Why do I suspect McKinnon is dissembling? The good doctor appears to live for attention.
And why doesn’t he say what he is really thinking? If sport is a human right, it could be engaged in by competing in the category that you fit physically. He wants to divert us from his real purpose, which is that he feels winning is his right. Why? Because he wants to win, I guess. So the women that have worked hard and who might also want to win must step aside. Because cis privilege.
Do you think it’s narcissism? Rhys was enamored with the idea that he was special and unique, but as a dude he was second-rate. The only way he could actually be number one (confirming his grandiosity) was to compete against women. Thus the exhibitionism.
I sure as hell think it’s narcissism (which needn’t mean it’s not other things too), and have said so noisily several times. He spends so much time demanding extra attention – how could that not be narcissism?