Rex Kerr
1 min readOct 11, 2022

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Except this "fact" is totally untrue stated in this form.

Places that allow trans women to compete almost universally require at least a year of HRT precisely because attaching a verbal label does not overcome the sizable strength disparity between long-term hormonally male and long-term hormonally female bodies.

But beyond this, (1) hormonal replacement doesn't fully negate strength differences after only a year; (2) it doesn't alter developmental differences e.g. in height and mass, which matter for some (but only some) sports; and (3) only for a few sports has there even been a cursory examination of how performance changes as HRT takes hold.

The problem isn't only that people don't pay attention to facts and are mislead by right-wing propaganda, though that is also the case. The problem is also that the supposed advocates too often can't be bothered to give factual facts either. This gives the entire thing a kind of opiniony post-truth feel, where you may as well just go off your gut feeling instead of listening.

There are some okayish ways to summarize the state of affairs briefly ("the fact that after hormone therapy, strength diminishes substantially, has led many sports governing bodies to allow trans women on HRT to compete"), but this really isn't it.

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Rex Kerr
Rex Kerr

Written by Rex Kerr

One who rejoices when everything is made as simple as possible, but no simpler. Sayer of things that may be wrong, but not so bad that they're not even wrong.

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