Play Nice

Dear Leading Ladies,

We are all well aware of the mental health issues plaguing teens, especially youth in the LGBTQ+ community. Transgender youth particularly struggle as they are bullied and ostracized by peers, often rejected by their families, and desperate for a sense of belonging.

For transgender kids who love to play sports, there is another issue. Will they be allowed to play on the team that matches their gender identity?

Wrapped in all sorts of misinformation and false protestations of fairness are claims that allowing transgender girls to play on girls teams gives an unjust advantage to the player and her team. Reading the arguments seems to come close to suggesting that the trans girls choose to transition to boost their chances of winning. Now that makes a lot of sense. Yeah, bring on the hate, the social isolation, the emotional pain. I just want to win!

Reliable sources

We decided to look at what a few credible sources had to say, since some otherwise sensible people we know were buying some of the “don’t let them play” arguments. Before going on, we should note that the International Olympic Committee announced in November of 2021 that no athlete should be excluded from competition on the assumption of an advantage due to their gender. On the other hand, more than half of US states have had suits filed in the last few years attempting to ban trans athletes from playing on school teams consistent with their gender identity.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has been actively fighting these efforts by anti-LGBTQ+ groups and others. Though they are defending the rights of these clients every day in court, the ACLU believes that “upholding trans rights will take more than judicial and legislative action. It will require rooting out the inaccurate and harmful beliefs underlying these policies.” To that end, the organization published an essay online that debunked several inaccuracies.

The science is clear

Among those myths is the widely circulated belief that “Trans athletes’ physiological characteristics provide an unfair advantage over cis athletes.” In fact, “trans athletes vary in athletic ability just like cisgender athletes.” According to Dr. Joshua D. Safer, endocrinologist and executive director of the Mount Sinai Center for Transgender Medicine and Surgery in New York, “A person’s genetic make-up and internal and external reproductive anatomy are not useful indicators of athletic performance.”

Another myth, according to the ACLU article, is that “Sex is binary, apparent at birth, and identifiable through singular biological characteristics.” “A person’s sex is made up of multiple biological characteristics and they may not all align as typically male or female in a given person,” the article quotes Dr. Safer. “Many people who are not trans can have hormone levels outside of the range considered typical of a cis person of their assigned sex,” states the ACLU.

We looked to Scientific American for more of the, well, science of the matter. In an article entitled, “Trans Girls Belong on Girls’ Sports Teams,” and subtitled, “There is no scientific case for excluding them,” child and adolescent psychiatrist Jack Turban wrote, “It turns out that when transgender girls play on girls’ sports teams, cisgender girls can win. In fact, the vast majority of female athletes are cisgender, as are the vast majority of winners. There is no epidemic of transgender girls dominating female sports.” He was writing in response to a lawsuit in Connecticut brought by the families of three cisgender girls arguing that the trans girls on their track team had an unfair advantage. Two days after the suit was filed, one of the cis gender girls beat one of the trans girls. Hmmm.

Turban, who studies the mental health of transgender youth, explains that most of the argument about unfair advantage has to do with testosterone levels which affect muscle mass. He points out that this is faulty reasoning since, for one, there are other reasons for high testosterone levels, such as polycystic ovarian syndrome which affects ten percent of females. Secondly, those transitioning to females generally are taking hormones and puberty blockers that decrease testosterone levels significantly below those of most boys their age. Furthermore, Turban quotes Katrina Karkazis, an expert on testosterone and bioethics at Yale University: “Studies of testosterone levels in athletes do not show any clear, consistent relationship between testosterone and athletic performance. Sometimes testosterone is associated with better performance, but other studies show weak links or no links. And yet others show testosterone is associated with worse performance.”

More arguments in favor of trans participation come from the National Women’s Law Center (NWLC), admittedly not a medical source but widely respected. “Athletes come in all shapes and sizes,” says a statement from NWLC. “These differences may be advantageous or disadvantageous based on the scenario. For example, at 4 feet, 8 inches tall, professional gymnast Simone Biles is significantly smaller than the average American woman. Meanwhile, at 6 feet, 9 inches and 6 feet 10, inches, professional basketball players Brittney Griner and Han Xu tower over their opponents on the court. All three women’s statures are seen as positive and as a factor in their athletic success — which, for Biles and Griner, has included winning an Olympic Gold Medal.

“Transgender and intersex athletes are no exception. The assumption that transgender girls and women have categorical, overwhelming physical advantages compared to other girls and women is overly broad and not supported by evidence. This overbroad assumption fosters discrimination against these already marginalized students, particularly transgender and intersex girls [girls born with a combination of male and female biological traits] and women of color, who already face some of the highest rates of discrimination and violence.”

Cisgender girls don’t have to worry

The NWLC, notwithstanding dozens of lawsuits to the contrary, contends that Title IX, enacted to ensure equal access to all educational opportunities regardless of gender – including athletics – legally protects transgender students. NWLC believes any ban goes against this law and is wrong and unfounded. The Center also discounts the claims that transgender girls will dominate their sports. “Like their peers, transgender and intersex girls and women sometimes lose at sports, and sometimes they win. The small number of transgender and intersex girls and women athletes have not demonstrated any categorical ‘dominance’ or overwhelming advantage.” Swimmer Lia Thomas at Penn is a clear example of a trans woman athlete who does not always win, as referenced by the Law Center and others.

Turban joins the ACLU at scoffing at the notion of trans youth having an unfair advantage. The likelihood of them even becoming star athletes is rare, he notes, given the depression, anxiety, homelessness and poverty so many live with. “This is likely a major driver of why we see so few transgender athletes in collegiate sports and none in the Olympics,” he writes.

This is about common decency too

“On top of the notion of transgender athletic advantage being dubious, enforcing these bills would be bizarre and cruel,” he concludes, referring not only to the calls for separate teams but also to invasive and intrusive medical exams to assess and pronounce a child’s sex.

Turning to another medical source, National Public Radio (NPR) spoke with Dr. Eric Vilain, a pediatrician and geneticist, who studies sex differences in athletes. He concurs that there are no good reasons to limit transgender women's participation in sports, especially at the high school level. Questioned about the difference between male and female athletes, Villain said, “We know that men have, on average, an advantage in performance in athletics of about 10% to 12% over women, which the sports authorities have attributed to differences in levels of a male hormone called testosterone. But the question is whether there is in real life, during actual competitions, an advantage of performance linked to this male hormone and whether trans athletes are systematically winning all competitions. The answer to this latter question, are trans athletes winning everything, is simple — that's not the case. And higher levels of the male hormone testosterone are associated with better performance only in a very small number of athletic disciplines: 400 meters, 800 meters, hammer throw, pole vault — and it certainly does not explain the whole 10% difference.”

Banning trans girls is blatant discrimination

Like the other experts, Villain is concerned about women facing yet another form of discrimination in the sports world. In school, particularly, he sees sports as an arena for inclusivity, a place to offer acceptance and a place of belonging where young people can set individual and collective goals.

On that theme, Alex Azzi at NBC Sports, wrote, “Firstly, trans women are women. Furthermore, arguing that trans women are a threat to “fairness” or “equality” in women’s sports isn’t just transphobic. The argument is also built upon a fallacy. Because women’s sports aren’t fair.” There is unfairness, in comparison to men, in access to competitive opportunities; compensation; the way sexual abuse is dealt with; access to coaching and administrative opportunities; and more.

The Women’s Sports Foundation has condemned the recent rash of bills aimed to limit transgender people from playing sports, imploring the legislators, “to stop using girls’ and women’s sports as a vehicle to discriminate,” according to Azzi.

“Transgender exclusion pits women athletes against one another, reinforces the harmful notion that there is only one right way to be a woman and distracts us from the real threats to women’s sports,” according to Cheryl Reeve, Minnesota Lynx coach, as quoted by Azzi.

For Azzi, Reeve, and so many others, barring trans women from playing is scientifically and morally wrong, but also only part of the problem. In claiming to be on the side of fairness, those calling for banning trans women from the field and court are perpetuating discrimination and hate. It’s a shell game we shouldn’t fall for.

And you know what? If some trans women athletes win, that’s more than okay. They could use some wins for all the challenges they face in life.

Please talk to others about this issue and share this letter. We all have much to learn and understand. And catch the documentary on Hulu, “Changing the Game,” about three transgender high school athletes.

Rooting for all girls and women,

Therese (she/her/hers)
Judy (she/her/hers)
Didi (he/her/hers)
Mackenzie (he/her/hers)
Leading Ladies Executive Team
ladies@leadingladiesvote.org
leadingladiesvote.org