Should a Male to Female transgender be able to fight women in MMA, etc...

[Metaphor]

There's no reason for male teams to reject the transgendered. They're going to be inferior, not superior.

Your comment underscores your lack of knowledge of the sport. (Why would you want inferior players on your team?) The men who founded the league chose to make the question a non-issue by ignoring gender as a criteria for participation/membership. Also women have the equalizing advantage of a lower center of gravity applying more force with their hips and arse and not accepting shoulder hits which men instinctively block with.

If women have a biological advantage in roller derby, then it's 'unfair' for an all-male team to play against a mixed-gender team, and it's the women's teams who should accept any male that can prove himself to be at least as good as their least good player.

I suspect, though, that, like almost all sports, men do have the biological advantage. Look at the speed skating records for men and women.

If it were not ubiquitously acknowledged that men were better, they wouldn't gender segregate sports in the first place.

 

[doubtingt]

What is allowed for a transgender former male should be the same as for a non-transgender male. If a sport wants to have men and women fight and the fighters agree, then have at it. If they don't want this, then they should be allowed to keep them separate and use a "born as" rule.

This is not about gender roles. Both genders and the transgenders are engaged in the same type of activity. It is a matter of creating the kind of competitive product that they want to sell and consumers want to buy. In every objective way that is relevant to the relevant athletic skills most transgenders are far more like the sex they were born as than the sex they either feel like and/or changed themselves to. So, whatever the rule is for men vs. women, should be applied to transgenders as though they are their born sex.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

There's no reason for male teams to reject the transgendered. They're going to be inferior, not superior.

Your comment underscores your lack of knowledge of the sport. (Why would you want inferior players on your team?) The men who founded the league chose to make the question a non-issue by ignoring gender as a criteria for participation/membership. Also women have the equalizing advantage of a lower center of gravity applying more force with their hips and arse and not accepting shoulder hits which men instinctively block with.

Sorry, poor wording. I'm saying that there's no reason for a league to say that male teams can't accept FtMs because biology will make them inferior, not superior. They gain no extra advantage that way.

 

[Jayjay]

It's a sport, basically entertainment. I think the sports league should be able to make the decision whichever way they want regardless of biology. In my mind the issue is about whether that makes the sport interesting, and how it might be perceived.

 

[doubtingt]

It's a sport, basically entertainment. I think the sports league should be able to make the decision whichever way they want regardless of biology. In my mind the issue is about whether that makes the sport interesting, and how it might be perceived.

I agree. My argument above is not that the sport should be forced into anything, but just that whatever they decide should be based upon recognizing the objective fact that whether a man feels like a woman or dresses like a women is not relevant to the competitive aspects of the decision, only to the superficial marketing aspects. In terms of the competition aspects of the issue, allowing a transgender former male to fight women is the same as allowing a non-transgender male to do so.
But hey, if its good enough for Andy Kaufman.....