Tuesday, April 5, 2011
Transgender issues
Recently in the news, they reported a story of a division 1 basketball player at George Washington University who was born female and doing her best to make the transition to becoming a man. She has not had surgery to scientifically become a man, but she does want to be referred to as a man. She has changed her name from Kiara to Kye. Through her teen years, she made the transition to dressing more masculine, admitting she was lesbian, and then decided to go through with surgery once her career as a basketball player for the women's team at her college was over. Is she contradicting herself by wanting to be considered a man and playing on the women's basketball team?
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I think this goes back to the conversation we had when the "Women in Sports" speakers came to class. The reason many women want to keep sports separated rather than co-ed is because of physical advantage. Men tend to be taller, and due to their testosterone, bigger/ stronger. Kye hasn't made a full transition yet, which means she/he might still be shorter than the guys on the basketball team, not as big, and not as strong. I may be wrong with the above statement, but if Kye is still going through a transition with her/his body, than he/she might not be physically ready to play with the boys yet. Again, not sure if this is true, but it could be an explanation for why she hasn't joined the men's team.
ReplyDeleteSarah brings up a good point about the actual physical side of this in sport...but the philosophical discussion can go off in a different direction. Michigan's Women's Music Festival has been hosting disagreements about gender identity for years now...trans man who want to go to the fest are allowed because they're still technically female-bodied, but some people feel like they shouldn't be because they've given up identifying as a woman and taken on male privilege. At the same time, transwomen are NOT allowed because they're male-bodied, even though they live as women and have given up male privilege. Camp Trans now exists basically across the street during the festival.
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