The world’s top chess federation has ruled that transgender women cannot compete in its official events for females until an assessment of gender change is made by its officials.
The world’s top chess federation has ruled that transgender women cannot compete in its official events for females until an assessment of gender change is made by its officials.
Wow. The argument against trans women in sports is already unscientific enough. Why is chess even split into gendered categories? This just makes zero sense.
It is generally not, most tournaments anyone can enter. However, there are women-only tournaments because for a lot of social and historical reasons, men dominate the open tournaments.
Interesting side-note fact on the power of social norms: if a woman and man play without knowing each other’s gender the woman will be more likely to win than she would if either party is made aware.
All the more reason to include trans and nonbinary people then. Blur the lines. Drag should also be encouraged.
Fuck it we should do the masked singer thing for chess. Masked grandmaster!
Seriously, a lot of people would play better chess if they weren’t intimidated by their opponent. Unless you consider headology part of the game, the way it is in poker and Cripple-Mister-Onion.
There most certainly is evidence that going through male puberty can confer an advantage in some sports. Not all sports. If there are going to be restrictions placed, I would prefer they be placed by the sports’ governing body, who presumably understands how competition works in their sport, based on science.
In this case, though, it seems to be based on social issues, as some others in this thread have pointed out. There are reasons why the womens-only tournaments were formed in the first place, and some feel that letting trans women in would undermine those reasons. We can’t just pretend those reasons don’t exist.
Socially, I have no problem addressing trans women however they want to be addressed, or letting them use whatever bathroom they want. I would prefer to let the governing bodies of individual sports and activities decide what is most fair for all involved, using science. I think politicians should generally get their noses out of all of it, and leave people alone to discover who they are.