The debate over transgender athletes in women's sports has come to the forefront of the culture wars in the United States, sitting at a peculiar intersection of fairness, biology, identity, and law. Supporters of allowing male-to-female (MTF) transgender athletes to compete in women's sports frame the issue as one of inclusion and fairness to transgender people. For supporters, exclusion is seen as unfair, stigmatizing, and for some, a form of bigotry. Opponents argue that women's sports exist to offset the biological differences between the two sexes, and that inclusion of MTF athletes in women's sports undermines the fairness and purpose of sex-segregated competition. A recent Gallup poll shows that 69 percent of Americans believe that transgender athletes should only play on sports teams that match their biological sex.
The question of which version of fairness should prevail is no longer an abstraction or one confined to an isolated incident here or there. Last week, the Supreme Court heard two cases on the matter: Little v. Hecox and West Virginia v. B.P.J. These cases are important because they touch upon how competing priorities are balanced in public institutions. While women's sports began in the late 19th century, they were enshrined in law with Title IX, which is a U.S. law that prohibits sex-based discrimination in any education program or activity receiving federal funding, including athletics.
Since these cases involve public schools, any eligibility rules are going to be framed in terms of government power, as well as taking a side on a culture war issue. The laws prohibiting MTF transgender athletes from participating in public school athletics are the legal question at hand for the Supreme Court. I want to look at this issue more generally of whether MTF transgender athletes should be allowed to participate in women's sports from a lens of freedom and fairness.
Why This Is Not a Ban
First, I want to point out that excluding MTF transgender athletes from playing in women's sports is not a ban. From a public policy standpoint, a ban prohibits someone from participating in an activity altogether. An eligibility rule, by contrast, defines who qualifies for a particular category while leaving open other avenues for participation. As we will see later, there is a reason why women's sports impose eligibility criteria.
MTF transgender athletes are not prohibited from competing or participating in sports altogether. There are alternatives available. They are still free to participate in men's sports, co-ed leagues, or recreational leagues, as well as in private clubs or leagues that allow them access. This policy is context-specific, proportional, and based on relevant characteristics, making it a case of principled exclusion rather than oppression.
Importantly, this discussion is about structures and rules, not the worth of any individual. Transgender people should be treated with dignity, just like everyone else. At the same time, biological women should also be treated with dignity, which is why they should be allowed to compete on a fair and level playing field, even if that means excluding MTF transgender athletes.
Freedom of Association, Positive Discrimination, and Why Exclusion Happens Daily without Malice
When we hear words like "discrimination" and "exclusion," they are framed in a negative context and are often seen as something that we should not do. Freedom of association is an individual's right to join or leave groups voluntarily, and also determines who we spend our time with. For freedom of association to work, you need positive discrimination.
The fact of the matter is that we accept positive discrimination as a normal and daily part of life, even without realizing it or viewing it as malicious. We naturally prioritize our loved ones, whether it is family or friends, over strangers when it comes to our time, resources, and attention. We choose whom to befriend, whom to date, whom to hire (if you run a business or are a hiring manager), and whom to help, all at the exclusion of others. Here are a few examples of when that discrimination comes into play in real life:
- Religious institutions typically define participation or membership based on religious identity. It is not a denial of religious freedom of non-practitioners of a given religion, but protecting the associational and spiritual integrity of the community.
- Ethnic clubs, heritage societies, and cultural centers often limit membership to members of the in-group. Since the goals of such organizations are cultural preservation, support networks, and shared experience, inclusion of outsiders can undermine the purpose that the group is meant to provide.
- Professional associations and fraternities/sororities define membership based on criteria, whether it is profession, skill, or gender. The exclusion protects the purpose and experience for intended members.
- With charitable giving, you give to a cause that means something to you. By extension, you choose to not give to other causes, i.e., you exclude other charities from your giving. Being forced to give to all causes equally would violate your freedom to direct your resources as you wish.
- LGBT centers exist to provide community and safety for a marginalized group. Allowing people outside of that demographic dilutes the space's purpose and its sense of security.
- Employers select employees based on skills, experience, and cultural fit. An employer is not obligated to hire anyone who submits a job application.
- In romantic relations, you choose someone you're attracted to and whose values, interests, and/or personality align with yours. You cannot coerce romance without destroying the meaning of romance and what makes it so special. This is why I took such an issue with the argument of "not dating a trans person is transphobic." A similar argument can also be made with friendship and why you cannot be forced to be friends with just anybody.
Why Women's Sports Exist and Why Biology Isn't Optional
Women's sports are not an exception to this rule when it comes to freedom of association or positive discrimination. They operate on the same principle. I brought this up in my 2019 analysis of MTF transgender athletes in women's sports, but it merits repeating. Women's sports exist because in most sports, biological differences matter.
It does not matter what type of cosmetic surgery one undergoes, how many hormones are taken, what government paperwork is altered, or how one decides to live their life. Biological reality does not disappear through identification or medical intervention. Gender identity is a societal construct, but biological sex (or simply sex) is not. Male-to-female transgender individuals remain biologically male, even after transition, and no amount of identifying otherwise changes that reality. Another way to frame this is that MTF transgender individuals are a subset of men, in spite of their best efforts.
This should be an obvious observation of reality because MTF transgender individuals transitioning does not erase the biological advantages they incurred. The physical differences between men and women were apparent in the caveman days, but now we have the ability to measure them more precisely. As I brought up in 2019, men have greater lean body mass, larger hearts, higher cardiac outputs, larger hemoglobin mass, larger VO2 max, greater glycogen utilization, and higher anaerobic capacity. The Journal of Applied Physiology acknowledged biological realities in a study last year (Joyner et al., 2025; see infographic below). Another study, this one from Sports Medicine, shows how testosterone suppression for MTF transgender athletes has minimal effect and how the other advantages are still maintained (Hilton and Lundberg, 2021).
I am not here to rattle off the entire evidence base on the topic, but I do want to make an observation. If there were no biological difference, there would be a more symmetrical effect observed in men's sports and women's sports. The truth is that an FTM transgender individual, which de facto is a subset of women, entering men's sports is not controversial because odds are that said athlete will not have a distinct biological advantage over men.
Why Women's Sports Are a Protected Space
Women's sports exist precisely because biological and physiological differences between men and women matter. Without a protected space, women would be crowded out of meaningful sports participation, not by malice, but by reality. Open competition would systematically favor male physiology, leaving women with fewer opportunities to compete, succeed, and develop as athletes.
Women's sports exist to prevent that outcome. Women's sports are not some arbitrary carve-out, but a deliberate response to biological inequality. Excluding MTF transgender athletes is not a moral condemnation of transgender individuals or an act of cruelty for its own sake. It is an acknowledgment that not every space can serve every individual. When women's sports are no longer permitted to draw sex-based boundaries, it ends up undermining and eroding the very purpose that such a space was created for women in the first place.
When Ideology Collides with Biological Reality
Women's sports is arguably the clearest example of where gender identity theory collides with biological reality. In many policy debates, whether trans women are women or not comes off as abstract. With athletics, it is observable and immediately apparent that they are not truly women. That clarity creates discomfort and cognitive dissonance for those who falsely believe that trans women are women, making it difficult to rationalize it away. For those who treat gender identity as fully substitutable for biological sex, this fight is more than being about athletic competitions or whether transgender people deserve dignity. Conceding limits in athletics and acknowledging biological reality would mean acknowledging the absurdity of the entire gender identity framework, particularly that gender identity overrides biological sex. Rather than lose face, activists and politicians continue to double down, even at the expense of their own credibility since it is the path of least resistance.
The Stakes for Sex-Based Rights
Letting gender ideology win this battle is more than about women's sports. Last August, I brought up how kowtowing to gender identity creates conceptual and legal incoherence. If sex is no longer an objective category, then any institution or rights organized around biological sex becomes indefensible. When sex is treated as a feeling rather than a fact, many aspects of women's rights and gay rights become negotiable, whether that is women's sports or same-sex marriage. Women's sports are a clear casualty of such an approach, as is illustrated by the 2024 United Nations report that estimated that female athletes have lost over 890 medals to transgender athletes.
The moment that biological sex is replaced by the subjective self-identity that is gender identity is the moment that sex-based protections and spaces collapse. The question before the Supreme Court is not whether transgender people should be treated with dignity (to reiterate, they should), but whether sex-based rights are allowed to remain real. If biological sex is optional, women's sports and any other sex-based space or rights are also optional. As such, I hope that the Supreme Court rules in favor of women's sports over gender ideology.
No comments:
Post a Comment