IOC OKs transsexuals to compete in Olympics- Is this fair to non-TG female athletes?

Non-transgendered female athletes that is?

IOC gives go-ahead for transsexuals to compete in Olympics

For a person who has transgendered from man to woman, are female hormones going to really going to adequately compensate for the inherently more powerful musculature of a man that the transgendered person will still have?

  1. The East German girls are all very happy about this decision.

  2. Brazil will be untouchable in Women’s Soccer.


Overheard in the public restroom: “That’ll leave a skidmark all the way to the treatment plant!”

Please read this thread or [url=“http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=223434”]this thread (preferably both) before posting in this one. I’m getting tired of repeating myself.

Your question, astro, is invalid because it begs the question. Long-term post-op male-to-female transsexuals simply do not have an “inherently more powerful musculature”. Since your question assumes a contrafactual, it cannot be answered.

The only way in which it might be unfair is in sports where height is a significant serious factor, but even then I don’t think it would make that much of a difference.

What about the larger heart and lung capacity?

What about the larger heart and lung capacity of someone born and raised in a village at 10,000 feet rather than sea level?

People are not laboratory mice - their genetics, environment as a child, and all sorts of things will affect them.

And cardiovascular health isn’t the sole determining factor. Flo-Jo was an asthmatic, but still a champion athlete. And wasn’t there recently an Olympic swimmer with severe asthma? Both those folks had less than average respiratory systems yet still were world-class athletes. It’s not JUST the physical here - if it was, we could just skip the track meet and award medals based on a physical exam.

I was more or less coming in to say this, but I’m glad you were the one to do it - being an expert on the subject, as it were.

I think the perception that some people have of TG persons is that they’re just a man in a dress with some surgical changes. We know that isn’t true at all.

Fascinating article I found on the subject here -Sports: Transgender Issues