California Governor Gavin Newsom adjusts trans-athlete policy.
He is attempting to get right with public opinion.
No more "it is just a few people, ignore it, not a real problem."
Now Democrats are beginning to recognize that there is a principle at stake.
The Democratic position has been deflection and minimization. Democrats admitted that, yes, a few male-to-female trans athletes competed in high school and college sports, and a few of those excelled, but the very idea of creating public policy because of a few outliers seems wrong. It would be legitimizing a Trump point of attack. It would be giving in.
Gavin Newsom, like Massachusetts U.S. Rep. Seth Moulton in an interview in February, changed positions. Both openly said that male-to-female trans athletes competing as females is wrong. It is unfair. It can be dangerous to women. It can permanently damage women's athletics. They oppose it.
I think they are right. They are politically right, by putting themselves on the side of the vast majority of public opinion. They are morally right, too, by taking a step that not only protects women's spaces, including athletics, but it is a position that is in the best interests of trans people.
Democrats have analogized the trans-athlete issue to the same-sex marriage issue. Same-sex marriage faced some strong opposition for decades, but as people got accustomed to the idea, and as Massachusetts and other states implemented it, it became widely accepted. It just took some time. A key element of that acceptance was tolerance. Americans ended up taking a live and let live attitude. A same-sex marriage by people next door did not affect the marriage of opposite-sex couples. People could treat it as we would the choice of others to be anything that is statistically unusual, e.g. be a Mormon, run ultra-marathons, or believe crystals cure cancer. That neighbor does not claim some special privilege.
The same is true for the vast majority of people choosing to transition their gender, except in one dimension. A male-to-female athlete, in an athletic competition against biological females, may well have an edge, based on the changes that take place with male puberty. The trans athlete is asking to have that advantage ignored. The whole idea of a women's league is that everyone in it shares the same natural advantages and disadvantages. They are all women. We expect competition to be fair.
Humans have a notion of fairness. It is built into our laws and morality. A male-to-female athlete breaks that notion of fair play. A Democrat who defends participation of male-to-female athletes -- or who dismisses it as too-infrequent-to-matter -- is justifying unfairness. Any example of it is too many. It is the principle of the thing. Either you want fairness or you don't.
The orthodox Democratic position minimizing trans athletes competing as women comes at an especially bad moment in our country's political history. We see widespread backlash against identity-based preferences, whether it be for previous victims of prejudice -- Blacks, Hispanics, Asians, women -- or it be beneficiaries of preferences -- legacy admissions at elite universities.
Democrats need to read the room. Americans don't like identity preferences.
A Democrat need not voice support for discrimination against trans people or even trans athletes. Indeed, they can openly express support for helping everyone in America lead their best life. Live and let live. But they can identify male-to-female competitive athletics as a place where they insist on fair play, so -- no -- male-to-female athletes cannot compete in women's leagues.
Gavin Newsom is letting his hair go salt-and-pepper. He is trying to change his look from "Hollywood" into "statesman." With a change in look comes a change in message. I don't consider this a flip-flop. I consider it wising up to reality.
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15 comments:
Newsom courts MAGA in desperate bid for Presidency...will it work?
Newsom is a shallow flip-flopper who can read the tea leaves, and he's changing his public position just so that he can run for President. I'm almost 72 years old, and I'm certain that I could still play competitive soccer against the local girls' soccer teams. Just think if I was 17 years old. The girls would have no chance. Boys need to stay-out of girls' sports.
The male who became woman swimmer was selfish when she competed and won too much. A look at her shoulders did not look female. It will help transgender people to get them off the sports field. Trump was right on this issue just like a broken clock.
I predict it will take a long time to stop prejudice for transgender people along with prejudice against fat people.
Finally. Support women and girls! A male will always be a male and a female will always be a female. It is biological reality. We need to help these distressed people accept their natural sex, what they were born. (Please do not start with the intersex people, that is different.) Many folks think that we need to separate the T from "LGBT." "Transgender" and homosexuality are separate issues. A person can support the LGB community (in general) without supporting gender crazy (gender identity ideology and the radical rainbow mafia).
We need separate sports leagues for anyone who considers him or herself "transgender." Additionally, they can open up participation to anyone they choose. They can call it the Rainbow League. We already have separate sports for seniors, disabled people, veterans, etc.
Suggested reading (may be available from your local library):
"The Reckoning: How the Democrats and the Left Betrayed Women and Girls"
Americans have a notion of fairness, and also of privacy, and safety. It’s not just people with penises competing in women’s athletics, but inhabiting locker rooms, club/spa shower and changing rooms, and public restrooms. There have been sexual assaults and pregnancies in women’s prisons, here and in the U.K.
The analogy with homosexuality is understandable, though we’ve been lectured not to conflate sexual orientation and gender identity. Nor does “Born That Way” work as readily with e.g. Admiral Rachel Levine, who was Michael the father up to age forty or so. Are detransition announcements fully credited too?
I read that “immutable characteristics” was the original SCOTUS standard for civil rights protections against discrimination. Now it is arguably, “My Most Recent Self-Identification”. In fairness to the latter evolution, however, race itself is social/cultural construct. Maybe science here needs to signify social science. Law follows.
In 2004, the Defense of Marriage Coalition convinced Oregonians to pass a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage. At the time I wrote a letter to the Mail Tribune pointing out that people who considered same sex couples a threat to their marriage needed counseling, not a constitutional amendment.
If people want to change their sex, that’s also something they can do, but not until they’re grown. The human brain isn’t even fully developed until the mid to late twenties. Young children and teenagers don’t necessarily know what’s in their best interest, which is why most states consider 18 the legal age for signing contracts. Giving them sex-altering drugs before that age seems to me a form of child abuse. Banning that would at least eliminate the issue of gender and sports in high school.
On the other hand, as of January there were only five (count ‘em, 5) transgender athletes competing on girls’ teams in school sports for grades K through 12. According to NCAA President Charles Baker, there are currently about 10 transgender athletes competing in college sports.
Just weeks ago, athletic institutions in Newsom’s state of California defied the President Donald Trump’s executive order barring males from playing on female sports teams as a condition of federal funding. Newsom and state leadership have also pushed back against local school districts that want parents to be notified if children express a desire to change genders. Newsom even signed legislation banning such notifications last year.
Remember androgyny and the term "gender bender"? David Bowie and some other rock stars and cultural icons. They lived their lives without being militant,
delusional, cult extremists.
80% of Americans are not MAGA. Hello
The specific problem is biological boys and men invading private female spaces and stealing sex-based opportunities from females.
Sex is not a feeling, a name or a wardrobe. It is a biological reality.
Governor Newsom made his comments during the first week of Women's History Month. We still have a long way to go to protect the privacy, safety, rights and dignity of women and girls, but this is certainly a step in the right direction. Thank you Governor.
If anyone is interested, Caitlyn Jenner, 1976 Olympic champion extraordinaire and "transgender person" agrees with Governor Newsom on this issue. And yes, from what I have read, Jenner is now using the term "transgender person."
One is too many.
That >75% of the comments today are anonymous tells you something about this topic.
Maybe so, but it certainly isn’t an existential threat like climate change, which Republicans won’t even talk about, or Trumps coup attempt and sabotage which they totally support.
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