Cue the Cool J.
Transphobia and misogyny hurt all of us, not just the targets of the bigotry. I hope more people understand that now.
I like to think that I’m a better critical thinker than most, but I fell for the initial news story about her being trans or intersex and the fight being unfair. Then I saw the pictures of her over the years and as a kid, and I dug deeper into what actually happened and I honestly feel dirty. I’ve since been unsubbing to a lot YouTubers.
Another misconception people have is that trans women are inherently stronger than cis women, which isn’t true. I know from anecdotal evidence, that it is extremely difficult for me to open jars now that I’ve been on estrogen and t blockers for over a year. My t is actually under the normal range for cis women, and usually I have to get my cis sister to open jars because she’s stronger than me now.
Also newer studies have shown trans women don’t actually have the competitive advantage conservatives say they have.
https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/olympic-trans-women-ioc-study-rcna148437
Would this be different if someone were to transition at a later age (say mid 20s - 30s)? Honest question, trying to learn something here.
I do think their muscle would still be significantly reduced by the hormones, but the older someone is the more their body is “set in place.” This means any changes will take longer to occur and they may not happen to the degree that they would have if they started younger. So someone starting mid 20s - 30s likely won’t have skeletal changes, since that part of their body has already finished growing. (Someone starting as a young teen definitely will have skeletal changes though.)
It’s a great case of how tempting doubt is, and how people will automatically believe that accusations wouldn’t be made if something were not happening, so we have a 55% starting bias to believe “guilty.”
In college I was once the object of a salacious rumor that was 100% fabricated by someone and spread throughout my circles in school. By the time I heard about it, friends-of-friends and the entire faculty in my department had as well. Closer friends said things like “I never bothered to ask you about it because I figured it wasn’t true. And if it was true I didn’t care. Is it true?”
It was very frustrating how ready everyone was to believe it. People not very close to me ALL believed it. To this day I bet some people I know doubt whether I have just been lying this whole time to defend myself. But I know what I did and didn’t do, and I learned that people will absolutely get up one day and decide to manufacture something out of thin air and then spend energy spreading it around as if true.
I no longer think “well something must have happened if there’s this much hubbub about it…”
Happy you did!
Also, afaik, there are guidelines for trans athletes in most major sports competitions, in terms of testosterone levels etc., to ensure fair play, so this wouldn’t matter anyway.
And also, Algeria is officially a Sunni Islam country where gender transition is outlawed.
Check out the podcast “Tested”. It’s three episodes and goes into the history of testing female athletes to make sure they are “female enough” to compete.
terms of testosterone levels etc.
So why is it if a man has elevated testosterone levels it’s allowed for him to have that advantage, but if a woman has elevated testosterone levels that’s not?
If we’re interested in fair play shouldn’t all competitors be tested and those with less testosterone be given more so that they are on an even playing field?
Yes or at least organize athletes by testosterone like we do with weight if it’s truly that big of a deal. Then men with lower T shouldn’t be against men with higher T either.
I have noticed that YouTube by default pushes a lot of right wing-esque stuff. My YouTube recommendations are fucked when I am not logged in, so much misinformation and clickbait all over the place. So I can see why it’s easy to fall for misinformation.
I do not have that experience at all. Mine is all video games and science. Its based on what you interact with, even if its negative. Engagement is engagement. Even just hovering over a video can result in it being recommended again.
They literally said it pushes those things when not logged in. So when YouTube doesn’t know your tastes it pushes things like that.
Youtube’s recommendation algo is insane.
I get 2nd amendment nutcases telling me the dems are gonna steal my guns and trans women are gonna rape all my family in public toilets.
I’m British, living in Britain, but I sometimes looking up what the best gun attachments are on call of duty…
When I watched the video, I was shocked this even was a thing that happened.
I heard about the controversy for a while, heard some people say when they saw the fight they “understood why there was questioning”, and heard something about a punch. As an avid MMA fan, I expected a scary knockout, like those where you hold your breath until you see the person start moving again.
Imagine my surprise when I finally saw the video, and watched an Olympic boxing fight for the first time. I see of them wearing headgear, one of them gets hit with a few good punches, gets to pause to adjust headgear, gets hit with a few more good punches and calls off the fight without her knees ever even buckling or getting stunned, and doesn’t even have a mark on her face. Perhaps the neatest, least harmful fight I’ve ever seen.
To be clear, I don’t hold it against her for realizing she probably won’t be winning and quitting before taking unnecessary damage, I’m just shocked anyone would think Imane is trans or a man based on that fight. Imagine if those people ever saw Amanda Nunes, or Dakota Ditcheva, or Zhang Weili. But I’d guess most of those people never actual watch women compete in any sports unless there is a controversy like this one, at which point they become experts.
She basically told the transphobic bigots to fuck themselves.
Transphobia hurts literally everyone, not just transgender people. Unfortunately this statement hits a little too close to home.
