I know it is difficult to ask of female athletes that they refuse to race, as some are advising. But, at a minimum, I think they should refuse the podium shot.
Swim Englandannounced an updated transgender and non-binary policy on April 3, 2023. The policy will come into effect in September 2023 and will apply to its swimming, artistic swimming, diving and water polo competitions. The policy restricts the ‘female’ category to athletes with a declared birth sex of female and creates a new ‘open’ category for everyone else. The ‘open’ category will be for those with a birth sex of male, trans or non-binary competitors.
Swim England believes that the creation of open and female categories is the best way to achieve fairness of competition.
Obviously, there was no need to create a male birth sex category because there aren’t any “Trans-men” (i.e. those with female birth sex) who want to go up against men in competitive swimming.
The policies of different sports organizations vary. For example,FINA, the international federation for swimming and other water sports, released a policy that bans transgender girls and women from competing in the women’s category unless they have transitioned before age 12 and maintained their testosterone levels under 2.5 nanomoles/liter.
World Athletics announced new rules impacting transgender women athletes, banning some from competing in female track and field events. The regulations prohibit athletes who have gone through what WA called “male puberty” from participating in female world rankings competitions.