Ireland (7 Viewers)

[rettucs]

No woman has ever broken the 4-minute mile

Thousands of men have done it. Like US high school boys can do it somewhat regularly.
It's not even close.

Part of the reason women's protecting women's sport from men is so important.

given that elite level sport is dirty as fuck, I would suggest there are bigger issues that should be prioritised.

 

[magicbastarder]

just out of curiosity, i checked strava for a popular segment - the climb from howth village to the summit pub. i'm 615th out of nearly 9k cyclists who have had a go; but my time would have me in 6th (out of 800) if i was a woman.

interesting to note that men to women ratio on its own - more than 10 to 1 in terms of those who've attempted it.

 

[ann post]

No woman has ever broken the 4-minute mile

Thousands of men have done it. Like US high school boys can do it somewhat regularly.
It's not even close.

Part of the reason women's protecting women's sport from men is so important.

they can't event run away from us*

*men

 

[JohnnyRaz]

they can't event run away from us*

*men

It's all the women running towards me that's my problem, wha?*

*not even remotely true, even when I had all my hair

 

[Deadmanposting]

given that elite level sport is dirty as fuck, I would suggest there are bigger issues that should be prioritised.

Plenty of drugs out there for sure.

Just page after page here of the major differences here between men's and women's bodies, and the distinct female experience dealing with men.
It's not for nothing that women want their discrete activities and safe spaces.

I know I'm kind of bringing another topic into it.
Just striking how people can forcefully make the case for the differences in one discussion and massively push back on those manifest differences in another discussion.
So I couldn't help myself.

 

[rettucs]

Just striking how people can forcefully make the case for the differences in one discussion and massively push back on those manifest differences in another discussion.

just maybe one difference is that, in sports, a common form of cheating among female competitors is to take testosterone, basically making themselves more masculine. So its not really comparing apples with apples.

And I don't think for a second that there's a simple solution to it. I just don't think its a big enough problem in sport to warrant the level of outrage that we've seen.

Weightlifting is the only sport I know of where a trans athlete has had success in a female competition. And weightlifting is a fucking joke, so I wouldn't give it a second thought.

 

[Deadmanposting]

just maybe one difference is that, in sports, a common form of cheating among female competitors is to take testosterone, basically making themselves more masculine. So its not really comparing apples with apples.

And I don't think for a second that there's a simple solution to it. I just don't think its a big enough problem in sport to warrant the level of outrage that we've seen.

Weightlifting is the only sport I know of where a trans athlete has had success in a female competition. And weightlifting is a fucking joke, so I wouldn't give it a second thought.

Yeah, I'm all for leaving it as it is too; separate and distinct.

Not sure what the drugs have to do with any of it.
College and amateurs aren't juicing on that level.
We'd probably agree that Lia Thomas wasn't on drugs when she won her medals against female athletes.

Anyways, it just undercuts the bromide or article of faith that Trans Women Are Women.
Cos it's more and more widely accepted by sports bodies openly investigating the fairness of it all, that in sports, they're just not.
As we've all in one way or another attested to here while discussing the Crotty case.

 

[rettucs]

Not sure what the drugs have to do with any of it.

I wasn't the one who brought sports into the discussion. Conflating safe spaces in sport, with safe spaces in life in general, is not a like for like situation. My referencing testosterone was making that point. Many female competitors don't respect that 'safe space' in the first place. In the second, its just sport. Safe spaces in life can be a matter of actual life or death.

 

[Cormcolash]

they can't event run away from us*

*men

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[Deadmanposting]

I wasn't the one who brought sports into the discussion. Conflating safe spaces in sport, with safe spaces in life in general, is not a like for like situation. My referencing testosterone was making that point. Many female competitors don't respect that 'safe space' in the first place. In the second, its just sport. Safe spaces in life can be a matter of actual life or death.

Fair enough. Prisons then. Domestic abuse shelters. Lockerrooms.
Women don't want the "two to put you down" crew in there.
Life and death indeed.

It's just interesting to me that in one thread people are "Men and women are basically the same or at least interchangeable in any and all environments, and if you say they're different, I'll fight you."

And in here "There are manifest and massive differences between men and women and if you say different, I will fight you"


I get what you're saying on the drugs, but they're not really trying to become men, just stronger women. All women already have testosterone.

And I know you didn't bring it up. This is Ann Post's fault.

 

[Cornu Ammonis]

Fair enough. Prisons then. Domestic abuse shelters. Lockerrooms.
Women don't want the "two to put you down" crew in there.
Life and death indeed.

It's just interesting to me that in one thread people are "Men and women are basically the same or at least interchangeable in any and all environments, and if you say they're different, I'll fight you."

And in here "There are manifest and massive differences between men and women and if you say different, I will fight you"


I get what you're saying on the drugs, but they're not really trying to become men, just stronger women. All women already have testosterone.

And I know you didn't bring it up. This is Ann Post's fault.

I think this is a really disingenuous approach to take. For the most part, women and men *are* interchangeable in most environments. Sports, reproductive medicine, and physical violence are the big areas where it does make a difference and sports is a hobby that got too big for its boots. The other two are actually life and death.

(Sports, at the end of the day, is such an incredibly niche area of life (especially at the competitive/professional level) that has way more oxygen and money given to it than it deserves. And honestly, it’s the one battlefield that the anti-trans movement feels it has any traction so it keeps getting these arguments made about it to keep the “trans question” alive.)

 

[YoungHearts]

Have been away from Thumped for a bit - and it's comforting to see that the flames are still burning , although perhaps not so comforting to note that the world remains on fire. I haven't changed my position at all on anything (see previous posts on various related and unrelated forums) - but at least I am consistent , and it's always interesting to read what you are all thinking - Thumped itself remains a bastion of edifying debate .

 

[Deadmanposting]

For the most part, women and men *are* interchangeable in most environments.

Yeah of course.

Most reasonable people don't care who wears a dress or calls themselves whatever or sleeps with whom. Go for it. Live your truth.
True in almost anywhere you want to do it - in a shop or cinema or you name it. Fly your flag.
No one cares what sports trans women play. Have at it.
Sport is not the problem, the problem is men.

It's these distinct areas like prison and sports and shelters and so on, where we have pre-existing protections for women - for good reason - and their erasure that are the issue.
And it's not disingenuous at all.
These are the places where sex is real. And where the problem remains to be men.

Most reasonable people agree on 95% of it.
It is not "anti-trans" to argue for safe spaces for women.
But that's what you will be called if you make the case for such.
Any 'traction' is because the case against trans women are women is manifestly clear in these areas.
It's either true or it isn't. And it clearly isn't.

 

[nuke terrorist]

Prisons should not exist other than to keep public safe from very dangerous people in extreme circumstances and should never be used as 'punishment'.
So the overwhelming majority of prisoners should not be locked up and even the worst of humanity deserve to be treated far better than prisoners.

Toilets should always be safe cubicles and don't need to be gendered.

Yeah - sport ultimately isn't important and maybe we should be more concerned with things like kids being forced to participate in sport at school.

Men are a lot more dangerous than women but a lot of the stuff mentioned on this debate is about what to do when it's too late.

 

[Deadmanposting]

I don't mean to disrupt anything by going on about this, but - TO ME - the inconsistency is glaring.

Clearly not for anyone else.

 

[rettucs]

Women don't want the "two to put you down" crew in there.

to clarify, are you referring to trans women as the '"two to put you down" crew' ?

 

[egg_]

Ah come on man, that's just being provocative. Clearly he means men

... not that I think that's great either in fairness. I'm not part of that crew

 

[YoungHearts]

I don't want to step across anyone here - but I took from this an acknowledgement that male and female bodies are quite different - which is an objective truth, and it really matters in various circumstances - and yes, it can be life or death, sometimes even in sport (see boxing, which is why there is such a debate among sports bodies about preserving women's sports - fairness and safety are clearly abiding principles, and should be, even if many of you don't care about sports, many do - including those playing them).

There are many times when there is an interchangeable aspect between men and women...male and female bodies, but honestly there are so many times where there is not - and then you come up against an immoveable reality. I suppose the awful case of Crotty clarifies elements of this - I was following the thread where many of you were talking about male on male violence and male on female violence and the difference there, often in terms of impact. All of it is awful - but yes, it distills yet again, the difference in power, physical power.

On the first day that I started college, many years ago now, the women on the course were offered free self-defence classes - I wish I was making this up (we were also furnished with rape whistles). I was completely shocked at the time and naively questioned why, but now I realise it was only meant to be helpful, and rooted in a horrible reality (I was studying law, so they really were rooted in a horrible reality).

Anyway, sorry to be depressing - but male violence is a problem for everyone, isn't it? And women can be violent too, of course, but it's not the overwhelming majority. I constantly wonder what can be done about it. I have to believe that things can change and improve - as a teenager I remember reading this from Marx, "social progress can be measured by the social position of the female sex" - it is as apposite now as then - but I don't meant to take us far away from the crux of the thread - it just goes back to the objective truth that there are material differences between the sexes - certainly physically, and it can have material consequences. It does seem that now Crotty will be expelled from the Defence Forces, and if nothing else, it has at least brought this age-old conversation and reality into public consciousness again.

 

[nuke terrorist]

There are lessons to learn from how Irish (men especially) were raised only a few decades ago.
- gender segregated schools.
- corporal punishment which could be brutal. I know a man born in 1950's who had his nose broken twice at primary school by the same teacher. The teacher, now dead, was infamous in the local area and little or nothing was done to stop him - even in the 1990's.
When corporal punishment was made illegal in 1982 it did not stop.
Nobody told you your rights your innocence and ignorance was easily used against you by adult bullies. Little or no right of response to adults who rarely apologised for anything.
- lads, in my experience generally experienced much more minor level violence than girls.
- feck all women's voices in history or English studies. Same with ethnic minorities or working class.
- crucial things like consent classes only became the norm after Me Too. Why???
- women often enforced all these things.
And that is assuming you lived in a safe household.

Now that's a failed way to raise kids and I've left out religion and some other things.
But at least once I got to be an adult this ended.

Girls mistreatment gets worse as teenagers and is lifelong.

As a teen listening to songs about harassment of women and starting to read columns and interviews with women talking about how often this happened was a major education for me.

Response to Young Hearts:
Yeah. Self defense classes in 1990's were huge in women's activist circles.

 

[rettucs]

Ah come on man, that's just being provocative. Clearly he means men

... not that I think that's great either in fairness. I'm not part of that crew

I thought it a fair question as sport was brought into it, and he mentioned 'Locker room'. I don't think thats what he meant either but would appreciate the clarification.