7 ms·

Why not Human Olympics?

cm2187 6mo ago
Already exists, it's what people refer to as "male olympics". As far as I know, females aren't banned from competing. It is just that they don't stand a chance in most disciplines. The whole point of female olympics is to keep males out.
- xeonmc 6mo ago
  Can trans male who transitioned before puberty compete in male olympics while being pumped full of steroids legally?
  - mikkupikku 6mo ago
    Maybe they should accept that they simply aren't competitive if they can't compete against their own sex. There's no shame in it, most people aren't competitive, certainly so at this level.
- UncleMeat 6mo ago
  That’s not true. Men’s gymnastics and women’s gymnastics are totally different sets of events and men would get trounced in a women’s event.
  - deleted 6mo ago
    [deleted]
  - zahlman 6mo ago
    Putting aside that you argue entirely by assertion, that is one discipline, which therefore does not contradict the claim about "most disciplines". Meanwhile the gap is well known to be massive in typical events, e.g.: * Compare https://worldpowerlifting.com/records/womens-world-records/ https://worldpowerlifting.com/records/womens-world-records/ vs https://worldpowerlifting.com/records/mens-world-records/ https://worldpowerlifting.com/records/mens-world-records/ (or for that matter, browse through https://exrx.net/Testing/WeightLifting/StrengthStandards https://exrx.net/Testing/WeightLifting/StrengthStandards) * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women's_100_metres_world_record_progression https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women's_100_metres_world_recor... plateaued at numbers seen in men's competition over a century ago; a "sub-elite" female competitor sprints barely ahead of "intermediate recreational" men per https://marathonhandbook.com/average-100-meter-time/ https://marathonhandbook.com/average-100-meter-time/ . Griffith-Joyner's record-setting time would not have even qualified her to run with men since at least 2000: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/100_metres_at_the_Olympics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/100_metres_at_the_Olympics * I often hear it suggested that women show an advantage in longer races, but even at standard marathon length this is not borne out in results: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025_Boston_Marathon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025_Boston_Marathon * National and international level competitive women's sports teams regularly get trounced by teenaged boys in exhibition e.g. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDH_r7-GN4o https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDH_r7-GN4o widely reported on last year and https://www.cbssports.com/soccer/news/a-dallas-fc-under-15-boys-squad-beat-the-u-s-womens-national-team-in-a-scrimmage/ https://www.cbssports.com/soccer/news/a-dallas-fc-under-15-b... from 2017 * The entire history of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Sexes_(tennis) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Sexes_(tennis) requires quite a bit of creative interpretation to put women's tennis anywhere near the level of men's That's just off the top of my head of anecdotes and examples I can recall being casually thrown around in these sorts of discussions.
  - fourseventy 6mo ago
    Only because they don't practice those events... If men practices those events they would be better at them
    - UncleMeat 6mo ago
      I'm not sure that is true. Beam targets flexibility in ways that no men's event does.
  - Yizahi 6mo ago
    Confidently incorrect. As an example - a banned Thomas salto had been developed and performed by a male gymnast first, and afterwards women starting trying to do it too. This is an anecdote example, but it shows that gymnastics is not some women dominated sport. As another example - four out of four named jumps in the figure skating are all named by male athletes who performed them first.
krunck 6mo ago
Why not ignore gender labels and go by chromosomal configuration? There could be XY and XX [1] olympics. And then there should be X, XYY, XXX, XXXY, XXYY, and all the other possibilities [2]. There is more complexity than the binary in the expression of sex in humans. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_differentiation_in_humans https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_differentiation_in_huma... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersex https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersex
- badc0ffee 6mo ago
  I agree with you in general, but I think it would be fair to let XY individuals with CAIS compete on the female side - their bodies do not respond to testosterone.
- appreciatorBus 6mo ago
  All biological categories are fuzzy around the edges. Those fuzzy edges do not invalidate the category. The existence of small #'s of people with actual physical intersex conditions (not "I feel like <x>") in no way conflicts with humans being sexually dimorphic.
- RansomStark 6mo ago
  That is what they do. Male, female, man, woman, boy, girl are sex categories, not gender categories, that is they predate the very idea of gender as distinct from sex. Sports categories never had anything to do with gender. The other difference of sexual development are different sexes
- madaxe_again 6mo ago
  Really, there should be separate categories for people with more than the regular amount of arm hair. Also separate categories for short people, tall people, lazy people, people who wear glasses, people with blue trousers, and of course, for sketch artists and quantitative traders.
- space_fountain 6mo ago
  Because then trans men will dominate the "women"'s category. What's frustrating about this entire subject is that many of these things were tried. After finding that too many cis athletes were being disqualified they switched to the current rules that in most cases split things based on testerone levels. You can choose to do it some other way, but all of them come with some problems that people won't like

Already exists, it's what people refer to as "male olympics". As far as I know, females aren't banned from competing. It is just that they don't stand a chance in most disciplines. The whole point of female olympics is to keep males out.

xeonmc 6mo ago
Can trans male who transitioned before puberty compete in male olympics while being pumped full of steroids legally?
- mikkupikku 6mo ago
  Maybe they should accept that they simply aren't competitive if they can't compete against their own sex. There's no shame in it, most people aren't competitive, certainly so at this level.
UncleMeat 6mo ago
That’s not true. Men’s gymnastics and women’s gymnastics are totally different sets of events and men would get trounced in a women’s event.
- deleted 6mo ago
  [deleted]
- zahlman 6mo ago
  Putting aside that you argue entirely by assertion, that is one discipline, which therefore does not contradict the claim about "most disciplines". Meanwhile the gap is well known to be massive in typical events, e.g.: * Compare https://worldpowerlifting.com/records/womens-world-records/ https://worldpowerlifting.com/records/womens-world-records/ vs https://worldpowerlifting.com/records/mens-world-records/ https://worldpowerlifting.com/records/mens-world-records/ (or for that matter, browse through https://exrx.net/Testing/WeightLifting/StrengthStandards https://exrx.net/Testing/WeightLifting/StrengthStandards) * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women's_100_metres_world_record_progression https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women's_100_metres_world_recor... plateaued at numbers seen in men's competition over a century ago; a "sub-elite" female competitor sprints barely ahead of "intermediate recreational" men per https://marathonhandbook.com/average-100-meter-time/ https://marathonhandbook.com/average-100-meter-time/ . Griffith-Joyner's record-setting time would not have even qualified her to run with men since at least 2000: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/100_metres_at_the_Olympics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/100_metres_at_the_Olympics * I often hear it suggested that women show an advantage in longer races, but even at standard marathon length this is not borne out in results: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025_Boston_Marathon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025_Boston_Marathon * National and international level competitive women's sports teams regularly get trounced by teenaged boys in exhibition e.g. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDH_r7-GN4o https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDH_r7-GN4o widely reported on last year and https://www.cbssports.com/soccer/news/a-dallas-fc-under-15-boys-squad-beat-the-u-s-womens-national-team-in-a-scrimmage/ https://www.cbssports.com/soccer/news/a-dallas-fc-under-15-b... from 2017 * The entire history of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Sexes_(tennis) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Sexes_(tennis) requires quite a bit of creative interpretation to put women's tennis anywhere near the level of men's That's just off the top of my head of anecdotes and examples I can recall being casually thrown around in these sorts of discussions.
- fourseventy 6mo ago
  Only because they don't practice those events... If men practices those events they would be better at them
  - UncleMeat 6mo ago
    I'm not sure that is true. Beam targets flexibility in ways that no men's event does.
- Yizahi 6mo ago
  Confidently incorrect. As an example - a banned Thomas salto had been developed and performed by a male gymnast first, and afterwards women starting trying to do it too. This is an anecdote example, but it shows that gymnastics is not some women dominated sport. As another example - four out of four named jumps in the figure skating are all named by male athletes who performed them first.

krunck 6mo ago

Why not ignore gender labels and go by chromosomal configuration? There could be XY and XX [1] olympics. And then there should be X, XYY, XXX, XXXY, XXYY, and all the other possibilities [2]. There is more complexity than the binary in the expression of sex in humans. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_differentiation_in_humans https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_differentiation_in_huma... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersex https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersex

badc0ffee 6mo ago
I agree with you in general, but I think it would be fair to let XY individuals with CAIS compete on the female side - their bodies do not respond to testosterone.
appreciatorBus 6mo ago
All biological categories are fuzzy around the edges. Those fuzzy edges do not invalidate the category. The existence of small #'s of people with actual physical intersex conditions (not "I feel like <x>") in no way conflicts with humans being sexually dimorphic.
RansomStark 6mo ago
That is what they do. Male, female, man, woman, boy, girl are sex categories, not gender categories, that is they predate the very idea of gender as distinct from sex. Sports categories never had anything to do with gender. The other difference of sexual development are different sexes
madaxe_again 6mo ago
Really, there should be separate categories for people with more than the regular amount of arm hair. Also separate categories for short people, tall people, lazy people, people who wear glasses, people with blue trousers, and of course, for sketch artists and quantitative traders.
space_fountain 6mo ago
Because then trans men will dominate the "women"'s category. What's frustrating about this entire subject is that many of these things were tried. After finding that too many cis athletes were being disqualified they switched to the current rules that in most cases split things based on testerone levels. You can choose to do it some other way, but all of them come with some problems that people won't like