My position is that just because a man wears a dress doesn’t mean he should compete with females.
As stated above there are some rare cases that do require specific rules and discussions.
But i don’t agree with having a special board of people helping and advising for future rules simply because of feelings and how they want to be addressed.
Especially when on a lot of their bios they want to break the " system " and remove the whole concept of gender.
There are rules in sports to make competing fair for everyone.
We all agree with that last part. That’s why the committee is being formed: to think about how to make the rules fair.
So, let’s let these volunteers think about this point and, in the meantime, we should resume our lives as we’ve done so far, don’t you think so?
Just a quick remark as past event organizer, since I saw this idea being thrown around: adding a third category (for example an open one) is close to impossible for big events (Unicon for instance).
It adds costs:
medals (don’t laugh, it IS a big budget element)
infrastructure time
And what’s mostly unrealistic is that it adds competition time. We would not be able to accomodate it (except if we mix categories during competition, and sort them out afterwards, but it is not always possible).
I had written a long reply simply expressing my thoughts, decided it would serve no purpose.
But,
For me any X,Y man competing in any event with X,X female is just unfair and unacceptable!
Lia Thomas competing as a man, then as a woman might, is an example of the complete
wrongness of this!
How to screen, easy tests.
To be honest I cant believe we even have to consider this!
uk
I agree. I want unicycling to stay in the fun and simplicity as it has been, without adding in politics and things that could offend people. If you are born a man, you cannot change who you are biologically, and going by different pronouns or having surgery doesn’t change your athletic ability. You can say you are a woman, but we shouldn’t change IUF and Unicon rules because of it. Everyone should just compete in their biological categories, no matter what gender you go by, for anything else should be considered discrimination.
@unikyt & @ManiusTerentiusPullus > If you’re keen on learning new things, I’ll let you read a single Wikipedia page:
The portion of the population that is intersex has been reported differently depending on which definition of intersex is used and which conditions are included. Estimates range from 0.018% (one in 5,500 births) to 1.7%.
So, what about these people who’d like to compete in an Unicon but are not born exclusively male or female? Should they compete as male or female?
Also, there are cases where females are equal or better than males. Please have a look at freestyle unicycling for example. Another famous example is the climber Janja Garnbret who is usually described as being able to compete with men while she is strictly born as a woman. If she has the same level as the male athletes, why should she compete in what is usually seen as a lower competition? That’d be more fun for everyone if she could compete with men, don’t you think so?
Above are a few examples of how it is not simple. So, we definitely have to consider this. Being stubborn and stay in the past is rarely the way to go to build a better world for everyone.
I won’t add any personal opinion on what should be done or not, but I’m glad that these things can mostly be discussed with open-mindedness and empathy.
My own biases and prejudices have changed over many years. Beause of a lack of education on certain topics at start. Because the society evolves and allows discussions of sensitive subjects, because I read book, because I talk with people. I like to think that overall, this has been a net positive, and has made me more welcoming and open to differences.
These discussions should always be grounded in morals and ethics, not on judgement and prejudice. I reckon that making certain decisions is sometimes very difficult.
Nonetheless, I believe it’s always valuable for minorities, who are often persecuted on many grounds, to have a more welcoming place in this world.
Good luck and goodbye.
I choose to believe way more towards the ultra small %!
What a shame might have to have an open competition section!
And interesting that my post was in no way personal, yet met with such and subtly condescending, to be expected!
Over and out.
uk
A friend of mine from a sexual minority once told me: “When you confront people who are, by default or by upbringing, rather traditional, they always react first in terms of order, not morality. Morality only comes later in the discussion, if any discussion is allowed”.
I am not of a sexual minority, but am a minority in some respects, and I think I can corroborate this experience to some extent.
I don’t fully agree to this. Some peeps who are born one way take hormones if they feel they should have been of another sex. Men who feel they should have been born a woman, would take those drugs/medication or even operations to become more like a woman and vice versa.
Possibly they get weaker by such changes as they try to change their biology. And even though ever sport has competitions where they have just women or just men, like for instance soccer, I believe that since we are all human that with enough drive, women can just as easily beat men in any sport.
Personally I don’t care much for competitions. I only participated in the Unicycle Championships once, because I thought it was a fun thing to experience, but I didn’t care to win - just didn’t want to end last. It is just too stressful and I ride unicycling because I love the feeling and the various things you can do with it. In NL we have Roos who has won several trials competions/championships. It is great just to watch her do her tricks in a very professional way.
Possibly when doing away with gender groups in Unicycle competitions, it doesn’t automatically mean only men win those competitions.
I think everybody should just accept people for who they are and if they happen to be into unicycling then that is a great plus. There are too few unicyclists in the world.
They should compete in the one closest to how they are. But also, there are not many unicyclists, and not many intersex people either. We don’t know if there are even any intersex unicyclists, and if there where, it would not be enough to make a whole category for them.
Great point! So, now, how do you define how close someone is to a sex/gender? Do you have to look at everyone’s genitals? In such a case, I don’t want to be the referee
I hope this conversation helps you understand why we need such a committee: it’s not an easy question. Whether you are for open categories or not, there are good points in each side. The idea is here to think about and discuss what’s best for everyone, and how not to make competitions unfair. So, please stay away from “things should be like that” or “it’s the way it has always been done”, because it doesn’t help anybody. As you’ve said, there are not many unicyclists. Let’s try to learn and grow together! This is also a chance, as it makes it easier for the community to try new rules, whereas other sports are much more constrained.
The male/female categories were set up when there was a rudimentary understanding of biology.
The main issue is that we try to categorise people into binary categories, when biological sex is not binary. There are people who are phenotypically female, but have male chromosomes (full androgen insensitivity syndrome). There people who are neither karyotypically male or female (45XO, 47XXY).
That’s even before you get into chimerism and microchimerism. The reason we can do blood tests for prenatal testing is because some foetal cells go into the maternal circulation, with some forming permanent cell lines. The mother can can carry 46XY chromosomes even after giving birth.
The main difference in performance between male and female is the degree of androgenisation. Even then, there are both acquired and congenital conditions that affect this (adrenal hyperplasia, polycystic ovararian syndrome).
There are not many people with red hair either. Each one of us will have traits unique to us.
Sport, at the elite level, selects for genetic outliers. Many of these won’t even know they have a DSD until they are tested.
