I’m a lifelong progressive Democrat and very much appreciate your attempt to find some compromise on this issue. But in my view what you lay out here falls well short of what is reasonable and common sense.
This issue is not complex and it is not nuanced. Males have substantial innate speed and strength advantage over females and this advantage _precedes puberty_ due to male hormone exposure in utero and during male mini puberty in the first months after birth. (Please Google male mini puberty.) We already know this both from scientific study and because we ran races against all our classmates at recess in 2nd, 3rd, and 4th grades and the boys (males) _always won_. By a lot.
Yes a blanket ban is appropriate, just as the age categories and weight categories in sport are blanket bans, e.g. there are no circumstances under which a 17 year old swimmer is allowed to move down to compete in the 13-14 age group or a 190 pound wrestler is allowed to move down to the 132 pound category. The sex categories are the same.
Raising this issue of pre-pubertal rec leagues is a smokescreen—of course a kids’ sex doesn’t matter if you have a designated mixed sex sports league for fun. If there is a girls’ category however it must be reserved for females—girls have a right to fairness at all ages, we don’t tell them that they only get fairness sometimes because in certain situations their feelings and rights come second—this is plain old sexism and an absolutely regressive and terrible thing to say to young girls who are competing in a girls’ race or sport.
Yes there are intact male athletes who identify as transgender using girls’ changing rooms in a number of high schools at present—and female athletes are bravely starting to show up at school board meetings to express their profound anger at this violation of their privacy and dignity.
You say we need policy based on science and common sense. The verdict from both is already in. Hormones barely dent male physical advantage, as demonstrated both in studies and in front of our faces—e.g. Lia Thomas was ranked 65th in the NCAA in the 500 freestyle, then suppressed testosterone and took estrogen for over a year, then went promptly won the women’s national championship in the 500 freestyle. And you say we still need to study this?
Lastly, you focus on fairness for elite female athletes—why are the other 98% of female athletes also not entitled to fair competition? A girl who wins first place (or second or third) in one of her races in a high school swim meet against a neighboring school is just as entitled to the opportunity and the feelings of accomplishment that come from her achievement as a WNBA player. Saying otherwise is profoundly
sexist.
We can and must welcome trans athletes in sport—in the category of their sex. A number of trans men (female) athletes are now happily competing in women’s sport on women’s teams. We can do the same for trans girls and women. And if you say, they won’t be able to compete—well most males are not able to make the cut for competitive sport, that’s life. There are plenty of other school activities to participate in.
Lia Thomas ranked higher on the men's team before starting HRT than she ever ranked on the women's team after HRT. You cite her performance on the men's team during the required time while on HRT.
Your other points are similar points of disinformation you have been provided with.
This is a manufactured issue that Dems have inflicted upon themselves and in the process have handed the rebubs yet another wedge issue. The logic is blindingly simple: The reason why girls and women's sports do not admit men is because if you were born XY, you have in general an unfair advantage over those who were born XX. This is simply a fairness issue, nothing more. Yes, trans females would then not have any organized opportunity to compete. But trans females are largely free to compete in male sports. But what's that you say, they would be at a disadvantage and might not even make the team? Yes in most cases, but what about the XX players on the female teams they would have displaced because of their XY advantage? True, they have taken hormones and now have lower testosterone levels, etc., but structurally many are still larger and stronger and thus have an unfair advantage. So welcome to the reality that life is not fair. The short slow and athletically ungifted must somehow come to terms with the fact that they will never play in the NBA (or WNBA). Trans females must make the same adjustment. Dems must acknowledge this illogical position.
Yes, this is a zero sum situation. You have to pick between letting these boys have what they want, or letting girls have fair sport. There is no compromise, only deciding whether you can stomach telling boys no. This issue has really been eye opening in the most depressing way. I didn’t know until now how low status girls are for most people.
People can be manipulated into supporting bad actors or destructive movements due to forced teaming or appeals to their kindness. That doesn’t mean that women’s rights or gay and lesbian rights caused this destructive cult. We have to try to see things clearly when so much is at stake.
I’ve done some polling on this in spring 2025, and voters are opposed to allowing trans women/girls to participate in women’s sports regardless of sage group. For professional supports, 66% of voters oppose letting trans women play in women’s sports; for college sports 65% oppose; for high school sports it’s 64%; and for youth sports it’s 60%. Notably the share opposing is higher for all levels tested than in a similar WaPo poll from 2022.
You have to choose: tell these boys no and make them sad, or destroy fair sports for girls. And you have to examine why you value girls so little compared to boys. It really is that simple.
No. Girls deserve fairness in sports no matter their age. Which means no boys allowed on their team, unless it is explicitly a co-ed team, which some do exist both for kids and adults. But other teams are sex segregated and that is because male and female people are physically different, even as children.
There DO need to be blanket bans on "trans women" competing in female sports. Why? Because sports associations, at all levels and sizes ( & you must know this), are not equipped to deal objectively with pressure from trans-rights activists: pressure that can be relentless, aggressive, time-consuming and personally threatening. We know that it is too easy to bully ordinary people into being ideologically captured.
I 100% agree that younger kids should be allowed to play in a safe and fair way. Having coached both girls and boys first grade soccer my direct observation is that this definitely involves separating the kids by biological sex. Thankfully little kid’s bodies are quite resilient because otherwise there would be no safe way for seven year old boys to play soccer! With the girls you generally have to coach the aggression, it’s like watching different sports.
Searchlight was supposed to be the Dem think tank that would say no to the most fringe, unpopular of causes of narrow identity groups within the Democratic social coalition. It’s too bad it promptly caved to the gender identity lobby.
The headline, and a later comment makes it look like it’s Sophie Cunningham who is missing some nuance. But it is an invented nuance, not a real one, so she’s not missing anything. Setting her up as the villain is an attempt to evade the logical and intellectual argument with some PR. Boys have a physical advantage at every age in every culture. The distributions overlap, but there is nothing which closes the gap. Not hormones, not attitudes, not training.
There are rules. The rules say if eligibility for participating in a sporting even is predicated on sex, that means actual sex, not any kind of feeling or desire. Anyone who is not eligible for a particular class cannot claim eligibility, regardless of threats, stamping their feet or downright intimidation.
I have no problem with anyone claiming to be transgender. I don't hate them or wish they didn't exist. But I won't give up my rights to make them feel better when they don't care how I, or any women, feel.
Aren't you leaving out the entire category of high school sports? This is where professional and elite athletes start. And boys have an advantage over girls starting around age 11 or 12. High schools are generally overseen by school districts which are governmental bodies. I'm not aware of "athletic associations" overseeing middle school and high school competitive sports.
Great to see common sense at last making a breakthrough on the pro Trans camp. It's been too slow coming but it seems now poised to be able to steer the discourse away from the hysterical extremist insanity, which we who actually have no skin in the game nevertheless have been subjected to for a decade, with accusations of bigotry Nazism transphobia and goodness knows what more together with real attempts to silence dissent through court actions, cancelling and the like, unless we blow to all the demands which just kept growing and expanding. Live and let live is a two way street the trans community are belatedly beginning to discover
There is also nowhere in the United States where young girls play sports against biological men, and there is not and should not be anywhere that adult men share locker rooms or take showers with young girl athletes. No one finds that acceptable.
No one finds it acceptable - that’s just not true. And if people didn’t push back it would have been normalized which was the goal.
Just going to point out that allowing a small group of people to follow a different set of rules is not a “right,” it is a privilege.
I’m a lifelong progressive Democrat and very much appreciate your attempt to find some compromise on this issue. But in my view what you lay out here falls well short of what is reasonable and common sense.
This issue is not complex and it is not nuanced. Males have substantial innate speed and strength advantage over females and this advantage _precedes puberty_ due to male hormone exposure in utero and during male mini puberty in the first months after birth. (Please Google male mini puberty.) We already know this both from scientific study and because we ran races against all our classmates at recess in 2nd, 3rd, and 4th grades and the boys (males) _always won_. By a lot.
Yes a blanket ban is appropriate, just as the age categories and weight categories in sport are blanket bans, e.g. there are no circumstances under which a 17 year old swimmer is allowed to move down to compete in the 13-14 age group or a 190 pound wrestler is allowed to move down to the 132 pound category. The sex categories are the same.
Raising this issue of pre-pubertal rec leagues is a smokescreen—of course a kids’ sex doesn’t matter if you have a designated mixed sex sports league for fun. If there is a girls’ category however it must be reserved for females—girls have a right to fairness at all ages, we don’t tell them that they only get fairness sometimes because in certain situations their feelings and rights come second—this is plain old sexism and an absolutely regressive and terrible thing to say to young girls who are competing in a girls’ race or sport.
Yes there are intact male athletes who identify as transgender using girls’ changing rooms in a number of high schools at present—and female athletes are bravely starting to show up at school board meetings to express their profound anger at this violation of their privacy and dignity.
You say we need policy based on science and common sense. The verdict from both is already in. Hormones barely dent male physical advantage, as demonstrated both in studies and in front of our faces—e.g. Lia Thomas was ranked 65th in the NCAA in the 500 freestyle, then suppressed testosterone and took estrogen for over a year, then went promptly won the women’s national championship in the 500 freestyle. And you say we still need to study this?
Lastly, you focus on fairness for elite female athletes—why are the other 98% of female athletes also not entitled to fair competition? A girl who wins first place (or second or third) in one of her races in a high school swim meet against a neighboring school is just as entitled to the opportunity and the feelings of accomplishment that come from her achievement as a WNBA player. Saying otherwise is profoundly
sexist.
We can and must welcome trans athletes in sport—in the category of their sex. A number of trans men (female) athletes are now happily competing in women’s sport on women’s teams. We can do the same for trans girls and women. And if you say, they won’t be able to compete—well most males are not able to make the cut for competitive sport, that’s life. There are plenty of other school activities to participate in.
Lia Thomas ranked higher on the men's team before starting HRT than she ever ranked on the women's team after HRT. You cite her performance on the men's team during the required time while on HRT.
Your other points are similar points of disinformation you have been provided with.
This is a manufactured issue that Dems have inflicted upon themselves and in the process have handed the rebubs yet another wedge issue. The logic is blindingly simple: The reason why girls and women's sports do not admit men is because if you were born XY, you have in general an unfair advantage over those who were born XX. This is simply a fairness issue, nothing more. Yes, trans females would then not have any organized opportunity to compete. But trans females are largely free to compete in male sports. But what's that you say, they would be at a disadvantage and might not even make the team? Yes in most cases, but what about the XX players on the female teams they would have displaced because of their XY advantage? True, they have taken hormones and now have lower testosterone levels, etc., but structurally many are still larger and stronger and thus have an unfair advantage. So welcome to the reality that life is not fair. The short slow and athletically ungifted must somehow come to terms with the fact that they will never play in the NBA (or WNBA). Trans females must make the same adjustment. Dems must acknowledge this illogical position.
Yes, this is a zero sum situation. You have to pick between letting these boys have what they want, or letting girls have fair sport. There is no compromise, only deciding whether you can stomach telling boys no. This issue has really been eye opening in the most depressing way. I didn’t know until now how low status girls are for most people.
No. This is the propaganda spin take. This was never about saying no to boys or our inability to do so. This is about lgbtq and feminism run riot.
It is not feminism run riot, it is a demand that women and girlls should have fair competition in sports.
Trans is feminism run riot.
People can be manipulated into supporting bad actors or destructive movements due to forced teaming or appeals to their kindness. That doesn’t mean that women’s rights or gay and lesbian rights caused this destructive cult. We have to try to see things clearly when so much is at stake.
I’ve done some polling on this in spring 2025, and voters are opposed to allowing trans women/girls to participate in women’s sports regardless of sage group. For professional supports, 66% of voters oppose letting trans women play in women’s sports; for college sports 65% oppose; for high school sports it’s 64%; and for youth sports it’s 60%. Notably the share opposing is higher for all levels tested than in a similar WaPo poll from 2022.
youthpoll.yale.edu/spring-2025-results
You have to choose: tell these boys no and make them sad, or destroy fair sports for girls. And you have to examine why you value girls so little compared to boys. It really is that simple.
No. Girls deserve fairness in sports no matter their age. Which means no boys allowed on their team, unless it is explicitly a co-ed team, which some do exist both for kids and adults. But other teams are sex segregated and that is because male and female people are physically different, even as children.
There DO need to be blanket bans on "trans women" competing in female sports. Why? Because sports associations, at all levels and sizes ( & you must know this), are not equipped to deal objectively with pressure from trans-rights activists: pressure that can be relentless, aggressive, time-consuming and personally threatening. We know that it is too easy to bully ordinary people into being ideologically captured.
I 100% agree that younger kids should be allowed to play in a safe and fair way. Having coached both girls and boys first grade soccer my direct observation is that this definitely involves separating the kids by biological sex. Thankfully little kid’s bodies are quite resilient because otherwise there would be no safe way for seven year old boys to play soccer! With the girls you generally have to coach the aggression, it’s like watching different sports.
Thank you for sharing your actual experience
"Trans children" are protected by having them compete in the category appropriate to their sex, period.
Searchlight was supposed to be the Dem think tank that would say no to the most fringe, unpopular of causes of narrow identity groups within the Democratic social coalition. It’s too bad it promptly caved to the gender identity lobby.
The headline, and a later comment makes it look like it’s Sophie Cunningham who is missing some nuance. But it is an invented nuance, not a real one, so she’s not missing anything. Setting her up as the villain is an attempt to evade the logical and intellectual argument with some PR. Boys have a physical advantage at every age in every culture. The distributions overlap, but there is nothing which closes the gap. Not hormones, not attitudes, not training.
"I hope she [Sophie Cunningham] sees that protecting the young girls means letting them play sports with their friends."
Remarkably, she does.
There are rules. The rules say if eligibility for participating in a sporting even is predicated on sex, that means actual sex, not any kind of feeling or desire. Anyone who is not eligible for a particular class cannot claim eligibility, regardless of threats, stamping their feet or downright intimidation.
I have no problem with anyone claiming to be transgender. I don't hate them or wish they didn't exist. But I won't give up my rights to make them feel better when they don't care how I, or any women, feel.
Aren't you leaving out the entire category of high school sports? This is where professional and elite athletes start. And boys have an advantage over girls starting around age 11 or 12. High schools are generally overseen by school districts which are governmental bodies. I'm not aware of "athletic associations" overseeing middle school and high school competitive sports.
Great to see common sense at last making a breakthrough on the pro Trans camp. It's been too slow coming but it seems now poised to be able to steer the discourse away from the hysterical extremist insanity, which we who actually have no skin in the game nevertheless have been subjected to for a decade, with accusations of bigotry Nazism transphobia and goodness knows what more together with real attempts to silence dissent through court actions, cancelling and the like, unless we blow to all the demands which just kept growing and expanding. Live and let live is a two way street the trans community are belatedly beginning to discover
There is also nowhere in the United States where young girls play sports against biological men, and there is not and should not be anywhere that adult men share locker rooms or take showers with young girl athletes. No one finds that acceptable.
No one finds it acceptable - that’s just not true. And if people didn’t push back it would have been normalized which was the goal.
Why lie about this?