There was a couple of TWAW comments before this as well, soI wasn’t even surprised but that unfair comment gave me a pause…like how can they even say something like that and believe it.
I used to think this before I got peaked. My reasoning was, the hormone treatment would make them weaker than other men so it wouldn't be fair to make them compete in the men's category, and ideally there would be a transgender category but there weren't enough trans athletes to make that feasible, so the women's was the best available option. I don't remember how I squared that with fairness to female athletes as this is going back a few years, but I think I didn't realise just how much of a physical advantage they still had even with lower testosterone than other men, nor how little commitment was actually required to be classed as transgender.
You have to remember as well that the people who hold these views, at least the ones without an agenda, genuinely believe that being trans is a fundamental part of people's identity that they have no control over. Imagine if, say, male Native American athletes naturally had a huge drop in testosterone levels in their early 20s, which meant they suddenly became much weaker than men of other races. There aren't enough Native American athletes to have their own league, so what do you do? Say "guess people of your race can't compete professionally anymore, sucks to be you"? Put them in the women's category when they reach the relevant age, even though on average they're still stronger than women? There isn't really a good solution. Obviously having hormone treatment is a choice even if people are born trans, but if you truly believe in the innate gender identity stuff, expecting people not to have it is like the equivalent of expecting people to completely renounce their ethnicity and live as a different race to the one they really are - it would be a huge thing to ask of people just to allow them to continue as professional sports people, so also not an ideal solution.
These aren't my views anymore btw, just trying to explain where I think the non-agenda-driven people who say these things are coming from. I think it's a combination of ignorance of the facts and wanting easy answers to complicated problems.
