Gender identity and sports
lundi 13 mai 2019 à 02:00We should be open to the idea that a person's gender identity is significant for certain purposes, while per genetic and developmental background could be significant for certain purposes. One area where this may be useful is dividing sports competitors into classes.
Dividing sporting competitions into classes is a way of compensating for systematic differences in bodily strength or size. In many sports competitors are classed based on sex, but not always only that: boxing has classes based on weight, because otherwise the heavier boxers would have an inherent advantage.
Perhaps we could handicap each sport based on certain pertinent body measurements -- for instance, for running, leg length and/or lung capacity. This could potentially do a better job than sex-based classes, or gender-based classes, or prior-sex-based classes, and do it without reference to sex or gender.
There would be no reason to fuss if you took drugs that gave you longer legs, or bigger muscles, if your handicap took account of the effect.