Kathleen Stock asks:

Have you heard about the latest injustice in women’s sport? No, I don’t mean the disparity in pay or prize monies in comparison to men’s professional teams, or the relative lack of access to high-quality facilities.

Hell no, who cares about that? No, the burning injustice is keeping men out of women’s cycling.

Such is the tear-jerking tale presented to us by the cyclist and trans woman — that is, biologically male — Emily Bridges in this month’s edition of Vogue, objecting to British Cycling’s recent move to make the elite female category actually do what it says on the tin. Alongside a photogenic selection of newsreaders, entrepreneurs and nepo-baby models, Bridges is the only sporting figure featured as a member of “The Vogue 25” power list of the “women defining and redefining Britain in 2023”. And there’s an accompanying opinion piece in which Bridges argues that trans women should be admitted into women’s cycling in order to “diversify” an elite sport. Doing so, we are told, would also help “challenge” other inequalities, such as those involving “power, class, money and capital”. The athlete is pictured wearing a Ralph Lauren sweater (£300), satin trousers (£229) and a titanium watch by luxury brand Audemars Piguet (price available on request).

Plus, he’s a man. He’s a man woofing about challenging inequalities, like for instance by letting him do women’s cycling so that he’ll be sure to win. (He doesn’t actually want lots of men to do women’s cycling. You may be able to work out why if you think hard.)

[I]t seems some kinds of perceived unfairness are harder for this young cyclist to tolerate than others. Racing against people whose genetics mean they have little hope of catching you at full pelt? Fine. Politely asking people with penises to compete against other people with penises? Completely unacceptable, apparently. The piece closes with a rousing commitment to fight British Cycling’s decision “in the courts and the streets”.

Allons enfants eh?!

Contrary to what Vogue apparently thinks, allowing males to compete in women’s sport doesn’t “diversify” it, just as letting cheetahs run in men’s sprint races wouldn’t diversify male sport. As a political value, diversity is not an end in itself, and has no particular value for its own sake. 

But it’s a buzzword. Without our buzzwords we are lost. It goes with “community” and “inclusion.” We must be a diverse incloosive communidee.

Vogue doesn’t care, though. The fact that its power list contains Bridges but no female athletes — none of Britain’s brilliant running, footballing, cricketing, tennis-playing or hockey-playing heroines — shows just how seriously it takes women’s sport, which is not at all. Professional sport is where a woman gets obsessive, fierce, sweaty and shouty and loses herself in pursuit of winning — caring not one bit if her hair gets out of place, her clothes torn, or if she gets a ball or an elbow in the face. If every woman behaved like that, where would high-end women’s magazines be?

In a clinch with Luis Rubiales, no doubt.