The International Olympic Committee (IOC), perhaps feeling pressure from biological female athletes, has revamped its transgender restrictions for 2024. The new guidelines are that any transgender athlete will be required to have taken on their new gender identity before the age of 12. The old rules required any transgender athlete who competed as a woman to have testosterone levels below ten nanomoles per litre for at least 12 months before their first competition. The new requirements appear to be an effort to address the obvious disadvantages that biological women have when competing with transgender women.

The IOC may be a bit behind several other governing sports bodies. In March, the World Athletics Council restricted anyone who had transitioned beyond the age of puberty from competing in any upper-level women's competition. In 2022, the International Swimming Federation also stated that only transgender athletes who transitioned before age 12 would be allowed to compete, and in July of 2023, the International Cycling Union (UCI) banned transwomen who had gone through male puberty from competing. The new rules will disqualify some athletes like Laurel Hubbard from New Zealand, who competed in women's weightlifting in Tokyo in 2021. Hubbard was the first openly transgender woman to compete. 

2024 will be the year of reality.https://t.co/AhLG7MNqSA

— April Hutchinson (@Lea_Christina4) December 31, 2023

The spotlight on the huge disadvantage biological women have against their transgender counterparts was brought front and center by former University of Kentucky swimmer Riley Gaines. Gaines was forced to compete against William — now Lia —Thomas in the 200 freestyle final at the NCAA Women's Championships in 2022 and actually tied for fifth place. Gaines was forced to hand over the trophy to Thomas for a photo op. But while Gaines was able to keep up and compete with Thomas, others were not so lucky. In another race, Thomas blew away the second-place finisher by 38 seconds, a perfect example of the huge advantage transgender women athletes have over their biological female competition.

Thankfully, the IOC and other organizations have addressed the physical unfairness of the competition, but virtually no one has addressed the danger of men competing against women. In May of 2023 in North Carolina, a high school volleyball player suffered a concussion when a transgender player on the other team spiked the ball and hit her in the face. The incident has caused long-term physical and mental injuries. But perhaps the most dangerous development in men competing in women's sports happened just recently when USA Boxing changed their policy and will allow transgender women to compete against biological women "under certain circumstances." The "certain circumstances" include gender reassignment surgery and multiple rounds of testing of hormonal levels. 

This is all well and good, but when will the transgender crowd get the fact that no amount (or lack) of hormones makes up for the fact that these individuals, having been born male, have more muscle mass, stronger bones, and larger lung capacity? Swimming and cycling are one thing, but when it comes to a violent contact sport like boxing, this is a preventable tragedy waiting to happen. Is someone being killed during competition what it is going to take for the transgender community to come to grips with the fact that they simply cannot compete with biological females? When your agenda is at stake, it is all just collateral damage.

Will there be pushback from transgender athletes in Paris this summer? Maybe. But for women who have worked their whole lives to compete in the Olympics only to have those precious few minutes stolen from them, their own pushback seems like a no-brainer.

Notice how you never see transgender men wanting to compete against biological male athletes. Now why is that? 🤔

— Thomas Matthew 🇺🇸 (@latayprime) December 30, 2023