O Sport desempenha um papel importante em nossa vida americana. Embora o dinheiro seja um fator nos esportes universitários, é consideravelmente menor do que em esportes pró e, talvez, faça disso a coisa mais próxima do
The Superbowl, Daytona500, Kentucky Derby, World Series, Stanley Cup, Augusta Masters, US Tennis Open are the events which we calibrate our calendars around.
And, if like me, you live in the South or the Mid-West, college sport has an even greater significance than professional sport. While money is a factor in college sports, it is considerably less than in pro-sports and, perhaps, makes this the closest thing to the Coríntia Espírito America pode reunir. Fortunas de dunkers e jogadores livres estão sendo aplaudidos em bares em toda a terra, as águas normalmente mais calmas da natação competitiva estão atraindo mais atenção.
March is perhaps the time that college sports blooms across the nation with the NCAA March Madness Basketball tournament headlining a range of college sports championships.
But while the fortunes of dunkers and free-throwers are being cheered in bars across the land, the normally calmer waters of competitive swimming are attracting most attention.
A questão da identidade de gênero está no coração da tempestade. Campeonato Nacional. Nenhum registro foi quebrado, mas essa conquista foi manchetes em todo o país, por um simples fato: Lia Thomas nasceu um homem. Suas conquistas na piscina a empurraram, talvez despreparadas, para os holofotes e uma série de questões muito além de sua capacidade de nadar rapidamente. Os críticos mais altos de Thomas foram aqueles que precisam competir com ela na piscina. Como William Thomas, ele correu para a equipe de natação masculina da Universidade da Pensilvânia. Ele registrou as dez melhores vezes em eventos de 1000 e 500 metros e correu e venceu nas competições da Ivy League, mas foi apenas um nadador médio no cenário nacional masculino. Ele então saiu como trans-gênero um ano depois e começou a terapia hormonal para fazer a transição. Natal Quando um grupo de pais anônimos de nadadoras escreveu para a Fox News-esse bastião de tolerância-reclamando que suas filhas deveriam ter a chance de competir pelo status de todos os americanos e a oportunidade de julgamento pelas Olimpíadas por causa de Thomas. Campanha com Thomas com o slogan “
A swimmer by the name of Lia Thomas handsomely won the 500-metre Freestyle national championship. No records were broken but this achievement made headlines across the country for one simple fact: Lia Thomas was born a man.
Lia Thomas has become the face of the transgender debate in America. Her achievements in the pool have thrust her, perhaps unpreparedly, into the limelight and a series of issues way beyond her ability to swim fast.
The first voices of dissent against her achievement did not come from the usual political, conservative or religious groups who normally come out in force and a flush of moral indignation when such topics are broached. Thomas’s loudest critics have been those who have to compete with her in the pool.
Her fellow competitors seem most agitated by her inclusion in women’s sports because it deprives one of them a spot on the roster.
Thomas’s story is an intriguing one. As William Thomas he raced for University of Pennsylvania Men’s Swim Team. He recorded top ten times in 1000 and 500 metre events and raced and won in Ivy League competitions but was only an average swimmer on the Men’s national stage. He then came out as trans-gender a year later and began hormone therapy to transition.
By all accounts, even from those who are most agitated by her recent achievements, Thomas has meticulously followed all the rules, protocols and policies stipulated by Swimming and College Sport authorities to allow her to compete at this month’s Women’s Swimming Championships.
The maelstrom started around Christmas when a group of anonymous parents of female swimmers wrote to Fox News – that bastion of tolerance – complaining that their daughters were to be denied the chance to compete for All-American status and the opportunity to trial for the Olympics because of Thomas.
Fox quickly found a rent-a-quote Republican in Vicky Hartsler, a congresswoman from Missouri, who upped the ante by running a campaign featuring Thomas with the slogan “ O esporte feminino é para mulheres, não homens que fingem ser mulheres“.
This served as the desired dog-whistle for other groups to form and under the banner of ‘Save Women’s Sports’ protesters disrupted swimming events Thomas was scheduled to compete in.
Garota dourada de natação da Grã-Bretanha, Sharon Davies, tem sido um dos críticos mais barulhentos, escrevendo um artigo no Daily Mail, declarando que o esporte deve ser governado pela fisiologia. Pipped para o ouro por um nadador da Alemanha Oriental, Petra Schneider, que anos depois revelou que ela e seus colegas de equipe foram impiedosamente cheios de esteróides através da puberdade por seus treinadores para dar uma vantagem. Ela adverte sobre a hostilidade e senso de medo que ela e outros recebem do que chama de "trans-ativistas", mas ela escreve: "Eu me recuso a recuar porque é uma questão importante para a próxima geração de mulheres jovens". A solução do senador republicano do Alabama, Tommy Tuberville, parece um pouco mal recomendado. Tuberville era treinador de esportes na Universidade de Auburn antes de optar por entrar na política. Ele foi listado como um dos piores violadores da Lei das Ações, as regras que proibiram os políticos negociando ações com base nas informações que estão a par, acumulando 132 violações de transações totalizando quase US $ 900.000. Ele disse ao Eric Michael Garcia, do Independent. "Você não pode fazer nada."
Davies of course has been smarting about this since the 1980’s when she was pipped for gold by an East German swimmer, Petra Schneider, who years later revealed she and her fellow team-mates had been ruthlessly pumped full of steroids through puberty by their coaches to give them an advantage.
Her Daily Mail article touches on her sense of wrong-doing, cheating and the lack of courage the sports administrators are showing. She warns of the hostility and sense of fear she and others receive from what she calls ‘Trans-activists’ but, she writes: “I refuse to back down because it’s an important issue for the next generation of young women.”
Davies is clearly well informed about the workings of NIFA, the body which oversees Swimming and Diving events, and wants to see a workable solution.
But her support for Alabama Republican Senator Tommy Tuberville’s solution seems a little ill-advised. Tuberville was a sports coach at Auburn University before opting to enter politics.
He is fiercely anti-abortion, pro-building a wall on the border, and an outspoken climate change denier, claiming we have nothing to worry about ‘for the next 400 years’.
His sense of fair play is unusual too. He was listed as one of the worst violators of the STOCK Act, the rules which forbid politicians trading stocks on the basis of information they are privy to, racking up 132 violations from transactions totalling nearly $900,000.
His defence was unorthodox too.
Tuberville responded to being named as one of the worst offenders by saying “They might as well start sending robots up here (Washington),” he told The Independent’s Eric Michael Garcia. “You can’t do anything.”
“I think it would really cut back on the amount of people that would want to come up here and serve, I really do”.
Perhaps that would be a good thing?
So, what Tuberville appears to be promoting, and Davies backing, is the creation of a third gender class.
graciosamente, Davies diz que não tem animosidade pessoal para Lia Thomas e quer que ela 'viva sua vida autêntica', mas o nadador escreve: 'A única solução verdadeiramente justa é criar uma categoria biológica protegida e uma categoria aberta, acolhedora e inclusiva, onde as mulheres trans e transilantes podem competir'. Homens biológicos, mulheres biológicas e algum grupo para "outros". Acho que essas designações trágicas "separadas", que permitiram que a segregação racial continuasse nos EUA por tanto tempo. Manhã todos os dias, parecem estar focados apenas no gênero em natação e esportes. Para quem são, certamente deve ser conduzido por algo mais do que apenas querer ganhar uma corrida.
Are they proposing three racing categories? Biological males, Biological females and some group for ‘others’. I find this scary and starkly reminiscent of the tragic ‘Separate but Equal’ designations which allowed racial segregation to continue in the U.S. for so long.
It perhaps would be leveraged too into non-sporting life too – Bathrooms, Changing Rooms, School Admissions and so on.
Davies and her supporters, perhaps because of a life dedicated to trudging up and down a pool from early in the morning every day, seem to be solely focused on gender in swimming and sports.
They seem to mistakenly believe Lia Thomas and other transgender athletes only motivation to transition is to to win races and medals.
Thomas’ decision to identify as a woman, take the hormone therapy, the surgical and physical changes which follow, and emerge as someone they feel is genuinely true to who they are, must surely be driven by something more than just wanting to win a race.
Lia Thomas tem uma vantagem. Ela tem 6'4, tem um físico imponente, mãos e pés, o que a impulsiona mais e mais rápido. Ela tinha essas vantagens antes de decidir fazer a transição. Mas o tempo de Thomas em vencer o estilo livre de 500 metros ainda era 10 segundos mais lento que o recorde estabelecido por 10 vezes medalhista olímpico Katie Ledecky, uma fêmea biológica. Os clientes do Reino Unido, EUA e Globais para tentar e "fazer boas idéias acontecerem".
So are transgender athletes welcome to compete, just not to win?
