'Females shouldn’t sacrifice their hard-won gains.' Ohio House Bill 68 justice.
Originally published in the Columbus Dispatch, this is a slightly expanded version that goes into more detail. I truly appreciate the Dispatch for their willingness to include contrarian voices and headlines that help to sell newspapers.
Reality wins in Ohio. After more than a year of legislative action, overriding Governor DeWine’s ill-founded veto, and a court review, both parts of HB 68 are now law.
The SAFE Act (Saving Adolescents from Experimentation) restricts the provision of permanent, life-altering, and unproven medical and surgical interventions for minors with gender dysphoria. The Saving Women’s Sports Act requires school and university sports teams that aren’t specifically co-ed to be single-sex. That means men’s and boy’s teams are only for males and women’s and girl’s teams are only for females.
Franklin County Judge Michael Holbrook’s recent decision that upheld the law is an excellent example of a thorough description of the facts, the relevant law, and, just as important, the proper roles of the legislature and the judiciary in deciding such matters.
The American Academy of Pediatrics, Endocrine Society, and World Professional Association for Transgender health would have us believe there is unanimity with regard to the evidence for “gender affirming care” but the truth is far different. UK’s Cass Review found much of the evidence to be of “low quality” and now the American Society of Plastic Surgeons has come out to challenge the apparent consensus.
European nations including UK, Sweden, Denmark, and Finland that have conducted thorough evidence reviews relating to medical and surgical interventions for gender dysphoric youth have found little evidence supporting them and have tightened eligibility requirements and clinical guidelines accordingly.
Young people experiencing gender dysphoria should be treated with kindness, dignity, and respect. With proper support, the evidence shows the overwhelming majority of them will grow to accept the reality of their biological sex, sexual orientation, and ultimately who they are.
As adults, they should be free to live their lives as they see fit and should be free from discrimination or government intervention. They are our neighbors, family, and friends and we should treat them as such.
The reality of biological sex is also essential to the Saving Women’s Sports Act section of HB 68. Regardless of how anyone feels, presents, or even how they were raised or what’s on their birth certificate or passport, humans cannot change their sex.
While it isn’t as simple as XX chromosomes make females and XY make males, sex in humans is binary. There is no third, fourth, or infinite spectrum of sex. The existence of disorders or differences of sexual development (DSDs) that complicate the simple XX/XY dichotomy doesn’t change that fact any more than the existence of one-legged humans changes the fact that we are a bipedal species.
As it relates to sports, the differences between the sexes are clear. On average — and that’s key here — males are stronger and faster, with larger bones, muscles, lungs, and heart than females. The existence of exceptions or some overlap with some females stronger and faster than some males doesn’t change the fact of the rule.
Male physical advantage is real.
For millennia, males have used their physical advantage to dominate females. Only in the past few generations have females taken back some of that power, with the help of the law.
In the Olympics that just ended, two competitors in women’s boxing, Imane Khelif and Lin Yu Ting, won Gold in their weight classes despite controversy about whether they are, in fact, males with DSDs.
The controversy arose from the disqualification of both boxers in March 2023 by the International Boxing Authority and reported to the International Olympic Committee prior to the start of the Paris Games.
According to the IBA report, the boxers were disqualified following two separate blood tests showing both athletes failed to meet the female qualifications. While the test results have not been released for privacy reasons— though the athletes could authorize it — IBA rules require female competitors to have XX chromosomes. The athletes were accorded the opportunity to appeal the decision to the International Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS). Khelif filed but failed to complete their appeal. Lin did not appeal.
Adding to the drama, in June 2023, the IOC itself withdrew its recognition of the IBA, for financial and ethical concerns that preceded the case of these two athletes.
It’s important to note there is no evidence prior to these tests that either athlete have identified as transgender or been known since birth or competed as anything but female. While this is possible with some DSDs, it does not preclude the possibility they are in fact male with male physical advantage.
A potentially similar case involved South African middle distance runner Caster Semenya who won numerous Olympic and World Championships in the women’s category. Subsequent sex testing revealed Semenya to be XY male with the specific DSD of 5 alpha Reductase Deficiency (5-aRD).
This particular disorder can result in underdeveloped external male genitalia — and potentially erroneous identification as female at birth. Such people experience male puberty and the male physical advantage it conveys. Semenya was barred from women’s competition in 2019 after World Athletics revised — and CAS upheld — its rules to protect women’s sport by acknowledging the objective reality of male physical advantage.
Semenya recently said in an interview that “those [internal testicles] don’t make me less a woman.” Let that claim sink in.
Were it not for World Athletics disqualification, the IOC would have no problem continuing to allow Semenya — an unequivocal male — to compete in the women’s category.
If these people were just living their lives, their sex would be no one’s concern but their own. But it matters here because they are athletes competing in sex-specific categories, categories that exist for good reason.
The Paralympics also seemed not to care about its female athletes when they authorized a male runner with 11 national titles in the male category from 2015-2018 to compete in the women’s category this year.
Andrew Parsons, President of the International Paralympic Committee said: “I think it is just fair that we treat [transgender athletes] respectfully. But I do think science should give us the answer, because we also want to be fair with the other athletes in the field of play. It is a very difficult question. And science hopefully will be able to give us the answer."
I agree we should treat transgender and all athletes respectfully but it’s not a difficult question at all. Science has long given the answer to these questions; those responsible for setting policy consistent with the answers are simply too cowardly or politically captured to do so.
Such disputes are easily resolvable with sex testing via cheek swab or blood tests that are no more invasive than the drug testing Olympians already accept. The International Olympic Committee has chosen not to, relying instead on passports.
When discussing this topic with people the past few years, I’ve often been told that females should refuse to participate in the charade of competing with males in the women’s and girls’ categories. They could, and I would applaud their principled courage for doing so. But they shouldn’t have to.
If girls’ and women’s sports are to remain viable, they must be reserved only for females. Males simply have no place there.
Females shouldn’t sacrifice their hard won gains nor be expected to stand down from competition to prove their point. Legislation is needed because medical associations and too many sports’ governing bodies have failed to do the right thing.
While there are only two sexes, humans have an infinite variety of abilities and personalities. We can appreciate and support the beauty of that variety without denying the objective reality of sex.