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Notable that this is a transmasc person, which have often been thought to be safe from these changing rules.
How are the other bodybuilders supposed to compete with supplemental steroids prescribed by a doctor to mimic a natural balance???
Have they tried repeatedly lifting heavier things and then putting them back down again?
Apparently not if they’re scared of someone with, by their logic, an innate disadvantage.
The amount of testosterone someone has naturally can vary wildly and has a huge impact on ability to build and maintain muscle. I naturally am on the low end for males and have lifted weights for 20 years. About 10 years ago I got a prescription for TRT and am now measuring on the high end of the natural scale. Immediately after getting the prescription my ability to lift and put on muscle was night and day. The difference in the amount of effort I need to put in to maintain muscle is unbelievable.
Point being, it’s disingenuous to say that any natural male bodybuilder just needs to lift more, because the playing field isn’t particularly even to begin with, even for naturally born males. Someone who was born a female and has transitioned will be supplementing testosterone, and likely that results in their levels being on the high end of natural as my story is not abnormal.
Just to gonna sail right on by the point about skeleton structure huh.
That’s fine, let’s get all the other body builders on estrogen then to balance out their fucking TREN because clearly dudes in competitions low on natural T aren’t supplementing elsewhere lmao
Or maybe we can shove some paralytics into their diet, Harrison Bergeron style, so low T males don’t have an unfair disadvantage.
Ron Hache, a spokesperson for the Canadian Physique Alliance, says the decision is not directed at transgender people.
Sure bud. You’re not a bigot, working for a bigoted organization. Sure, we all believe you. Definitely. [Eat shit and die.]
Fuck American rules. Who decided that American rules were the ones to follow anyway???
I don’t see an issue with this, personally. I’d also broadly agree with the idea of banning all beauty contest competitors who’ve had plastic surgery, under a similar principle. An organized competition around physical traits should not be significantly influenced/determined by a doctors risk tolerance / skill pre-competition.
Doesn’t stop people from doing the activity either way, if they enjoy it. Structured competitions require some rules and restrictions though, to keep things fair, beyond just being ‘equitable’ to minorities.
Whether he’s winning these things or not is kinda moot, too. Like the article notes that he’s met ‘soft guys’ at competitions that are more passive/seem less toxic. Men, as a gender, have all kinds of different testosterone levels – some are below average, but still strive to compete / participate in these events. A trans guy being “set” at a doctor prescribed “medium” level, would seem like he’s being given an advantage over all those “soft” guys. I can’t imagine many of those ‘soft guys’ would be thrilled to hear they lost to an x-woman on drugs in a competition often related to masculinity. I mean, why shouldn’t they also get that edge? Why should Canadian healthcare policy’s lopsided treatment of testosterone supplements between trans people and straight people impact the outcome? Doesn’t seem ‘fair’ for the soft cis guys.
If they wanted to be fair and inclusive of everyone, they can set a maximum T level, or do brackets for T levels like they do weight brackets in boxing.
Unlike sports, there isn’t anywhere for skill to come into determining who wins here. It’s genetics, money, and time.
Except genetics is taking a backseat to science in some cases. Cases that are normally considered cheating. Except for a small minority where they’re allowed to do it. Like if you were to show up to a gaming LAN party with a ton of hacks/mods, because you were bad at the games being played, you’d be a cheater. Even if you try justifying it saying you’re bad at those games, and that you need computer science bots to help make you better at it, you’re still entering in to the competition with an unfair advantage and not competing with the other players in a fair way. And even if other players beat you, you still cheated and made it a lot less fun for anyone who lost to you in the process. And to demand that the competition completely change how players are sorted / paired, so that bot players/cheaters get representation and can participate too, totally undermines the whole point of the event.
Idk. I agree that it’s theoretically possible to implement some sort of max T level via medical sources or whatever, but that’s totally impractical for most levels of the sport, I would imagine. It’s a huge hurdle to put for event organizers to meet, in order to include a very small sub set of the population. There need to be some limits on that, otherwise the cost / effort to put on events for anyone becomes intolerable for organizers/administrators.
Also, given how rampant weight manipulation is for fights, I would hate to see the harms if athletes starting trying to game the testosterone tests like they do for weight classes now.
Structured competitions require some rules and restrictions though, to keep things fair, beyond just being ‘equitable’ to minorities.
The question then becomes whether this ruling is fair. No one’s questioning the need for rules.
I can only speak for myself on this matter, but as someone who competes (albeit at an amateur level), this would not detract from the fun of the sport. Even if they end up at the top of the podium, that’s no different from running into a genetic freak. If you have five of them taking up the top five spots in the rankings? Then we’ll talk.
