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comment by usualgerman
usualgerman  ·  535 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: USA Powerlifting to allow trans athletes to compete with women after losing suit

I think I’m a bit more conservative on this as an American woman. The big issue even on non-contact sports is scholarships. College sports in America are a critical way that kids who otherwise could not afford a good college get in, especially for minorities. But, women cannot possibly compete for those spots even in the situation where a man, even one on hormone replacement is available. And with the prospect of free tuition on the side of a male student, this might be something they’d be willing to do simply to escape poverty. On the coaches side (again in the USA) there’s huge pressure to build a winning team. Coaches of Division I sports are often the highest paid people in that college. It’s a huge business, and if you can get just under the NCAA hormone levels with a couple of B p-team men, you can wipe the floor with a woman’s team. And thus, now you’ll essentially shut a lot of women out of those scholarships and those teams because they’re unable to keep pace with the men playing.