Professor: ‘Trans Athletes Causing Life-Altering Injuries’
John F. Banzhaf III, B.S.E.E., J.D., Sc.D., Professor of Public Interest Law Emeritus at George Washington University, remains as committed as ever to his position on the transgender athlete issue. His latest post (reprinted below) from this morning illustrates that:
“Britain’s Supreme Court has just ruled that the legal definition of a woman is someone born biologically female; a decision which will help protect female athletes from serious injuries.
This follows an earlier ruling by The Court for Arbitration in Switzerland which rejected a complaint by a M2F transgender swimmer that rules that stop her from competing in elite women’s races are invalid, unlawful and discriminatory. Also, Maine is also being sued for forcing girls to compete against M2F transgender opponents.
While these actions are being taken in part because of public outrage that young girls are being forced to undress and shower with males whose sex organs are fully exposed, most of the emphasis has been on the inherent physical unfairness of requiring females to compete against males, and on the many documented cases where girls and women have been very seriously injured.
Public interest law professor John Banzhaf – who was one of the first not only to document but also to explain why serious physical injuries occur even in non-contact sport such as volleyball – has also compiled one of the most comprehensive lists of how females have suffered life-altering injuries in many different sports.
The activist law professor, who both played with and coached volleyball at George Washington University [GWU], has documented and explained just how much of a physical disadvantage women and girls face when forced to play volleyball and many other sports against a male opponent, and how those overwhelming physical differences have led to serious injuries, as well as to forfeitures required to avoid the real threat of injuries such a mismatch creates
And the danger, now clearly documented in many different contact sports – including MMA, boxing, hockey, rugby, field hockey, and soccer [SEE BELOW] – also occurs in other non-contact sports such as basketball.
Here are some of the reasons why the huge disparities in physical abilities between male and female athletes create so much risk of physical injury to girls and women, even in a non-violent non-contact sport such as volleyball.
The official height of the net in female volleyball competition is a full 7 and 1/2 inches lower (and therefore much easier to spike over) than it is for males. Also, male volleyball players are, on average, about 8 inches (11%) taller than female players, and can jump over 6 inches higher.
Thus they can spike the ball from over a foot higher than can the average female, and do so on a net which provides the girls and women on the other side with much less protection.
In addition, male volleyball players can spike the ball much harder and faster. The record for male volleyball players is 82 mph, whereas the corresponding record for females is only 64 mph; thus males can hit the volleyball at the opponent almost 30% faster.
But since the amount of kinetic energy possessed by a moving ball is proportional to the square of its velocity, a ball hit by a top male player can have more than 60% more knock-down and injury-inflicting energy than one hit by a top female player.
Putting all these factors together – taller players who jump higher, much stronger hitters, etc. – allowing men to play on a net which is so low that it provides little protection for females is obviously very dangerous, as well as grossly unfair, argues the law professor. That’s why there have been so many injuries with M2F players even in a non-contact sport such as volleyball.
As another example of the unfairness if not absurdity of allowing men to compete against women, simply by claiming to be transgender, Banzhaf suggests doubters consider the following.
To dramatize the problems – if not what many call the “foolishness” or “ridiculousness” – of permitting biological males who claim to be female to compete in sports competitions reserved from girls and women, a male powerlifter, claiming to identify as a woman despite his beard and penis, won a women’s competition by easily breaking the female record by nearly 100 pounds; lifting an unheard of 35% more weight than the woman’s record.
Weightlifter Avi Silverberg said he did this in protest against the competition’s “discriminatory” transgender policies of permitting males who simply claim to identify as females to compete in female athletic events against biological females, notes Banzhaf.
Perhaps female teams forced to play against one or more M2F transgender athletes should borrow a page from Silverberg’s ploy; form a team of male volleyball players who were almost able to make the men’s team and have them claim – even those with beards, see: 6 ft Bearded Basketball Player Injures 3 Girl Athletes – to feel female so they can beat teams with one or more M2F transgender players at their own game.
After all, there’s already been at least one women’s volleyball team with no fewer than five penises, so adding one more might not seem as unreasonable as it might otherwise sound, suggests Banzhaf.
And to those who claim it is unfair and/or discriminatory to prevent students born male from playing on a women’s volleyball team if they wish, Banzhaf explains why many more male players who don’t claim to be female are currently, under existing law, denied exactly this opportunity simply because they have a penis.
Professor Banzhaf has also documented how M2F transgender athletes have seriously injured girls and women in many sports.
BOXING
USA Boxing, the governing body of the sport in the U.S., has adopted a new rule which would permit males (M2F trans athletes) to compete against women in a sport which requires competitors to inflict as much harm as possible upon their opponent by punching them in the head and body. As one report put it: “Men can now legally beat up women!”
But even years ago a similar situation resulted in very serious injuries to a female in another battering sport, and disabling injuries to girls and women athletes caused by male competitors have occurred in many sports, even in non-contact ones such as volleyball, notes Banzhaf, the author of:
MIXED MARTIAL ARTS, PUNCHING
Even years ago this problem was dramatically illustrated in another very dangerous confrontation in a similar sport when a male who “transitioned” to female at 30 years of age (well past puberty when most size and strength development occurs), was permitted to fight as a female in women’s mixed martial arts [MMA] competition in which punches were central.
Reportedly, within the first minutes of the match, he had fractured the skull of an experienced female MMA competitor, and continued his brutal assault until the fight had to be stopped after lasting less than 2 minutes.
The uneven fight lasted just over 2 minutes, before the referee was forced to stop the carnage to prevent even further damage and suffering to a then-helpless female being repeatedly punched about the face and head by the much more powerful male.
WATCH THE ENTIRE MATCH – Fallon Fox VS Tamikka Brents
The badly battered women explained that “I have struggled with many women and I have never felt the strength I felt in a fight like that night . . . I have never felt so dominated in my life and . . . I am an abnormally strong woman in my own right.”
HOCKEY
Another M2F transgender athlete has caused serious and possibly permanent injuries to a biological female opponent, this time in a hockey tournament where a much larger and more heavily muscled player crashed into a much smaller rival, says Banzhaf, who says this creates another powerful argument against permitting M2F athletes to compete against girls and women.
Here’s how it was described by one reporter: “the size imbalance between the two skaters was so great that the [female] Team player ended up being propelled head first into the boards with enough force to deliver a concussion” which left her unconscious.
Not surprisingly, the resulting article was entitled Ignoring Biological Reality Puts Female Hockey Players at Risk, and concluded that “a frightening injury at an NHL-sponsored transgender tournament in Wisconsin reminds us why women’s leagues should remain sex-protected spaces.”
As the article noted regarding that argument said: “Should naturally bigger, stronger, faster biological males who self-identify as girls or women be permitted to compete in leagues and tournaments with (on average) smaller, weaker, slower biological females? The reason why the gender slogans tweeted by the NHL attracted so much controversy is that the league now seems to be answering that last question in the affirmative.”
RUGBY
As another example of how letting men compete against women created a massive risk, three biological girls were reportedly seriously injured playing in a high school rugby league by a M2F transgender player.
According to the girls’ coach, the transgender athlete’s “body size, body strength . . . completely dominate any girl that I have on my team . . . The aggressive nature that was witnessed clearly showed that it’s a definite issue that we have to deal with . . . I have three players that were injured in that first game against Guam High directly by that particular player.”
FIELD HOCKEY
The title of this article seemingly says it all:
Shocking Field Hockey Injury Sparks Fight Over Transgender Athletes
Reporting on the same injury
Swampscott field hockey injury has readers questioning mixed-gender youth sports:
“A crowd of onlookers at a high school field hockey game in Swampscott was shocked last week after an incident involving a male and female player left the girl with serious facial and dental injuries.”
SOCCER
As reported by WATCH: Transgender Soccer Player Injures Female Opponent
which actually shows the devastating action:
“A male soccer player who identifies as transgender injured a female player during a semi-professional women’s league game” recently.
“The transgender player’s aggressive shoulder check sent the female player to the ground where she lay unmoving. She was ‘unable to train until later in the week,’ sources told Reduxx, and ‘when she did, it was only very lightly.'”
VOLLEYBALL
A final actual example illustrates how serious risks occur when M2F athletes are permitted to compete against girls and women, even in non-contact sports.
It involved play between two high school girls volleyball teams during which a M2F player was able to spike the ball so forcefully (reportedly at 70 mph) that it caused “severe” and possibly permanent injuries to his biological female opponent, who was knocked to the ground and suffered a concussion.
As a result of this hard-hit spike, the injured girl experienced long-term concussion symptoms such as vision problems, says Banzhaf. Indeed, the girl’s injuries are so severe that for a long period of time she was not medically cleared to return to play, and her school had been forced to forfeit all its volleyball games against the school with the biological male volleyball player in order to protect its own girls against similar serious injuries.
Prof Banzhaf, who has studied and written extensively on problems created when M2F athletes are permitted to compete against girls and women, says there are at least four reasons why such contests should not be permitted:
■ In most sports and situations, M2F transgender athletes have a very significant size and strength advantage over their female competitors which can rob girls and women of opportunities to compete fairly and to win to obtain scholarships and other advantages, as well as seriously damaging their morale and discouraging their very participation in sports.
■ In many sports – even non-contact sports such as volleyball – there is a very real and clearly established danger of serious and possibly permanent physical injuries to girls and women from M2F opponents.
■ Forcing girls and women to shower and change clothing with a M2F biological man with male genitalia on their team violates their right and very reasonable expectation to sexual and bodily privacy.
■ Girls are actually being punished for refusing to play against M2F opponents, and even for simply speaking out against males on female teams.
Banzhaf notes that in other sports where biological considerations (such as strength) require separate competitions, those in the protected category are not required to run the risk and unfairness of having to compete against someone with a clear biological advantage.
For example, in boxing, wrestling, judo, karate, and other similar sports, a 140 pound athlete is never forced to defend themselves against an opponent weighting 240 pounds, even if the potential intruder honestly believes themselves to be much lighter in weight (the reverse of anorexia and bulimia, which are other examples of body dysmorphia), and even if the 140 pound athlete can in fact beat many much heavier opponents.
Similarly, where there are competition categories based upon age, someone in their 20s would never be permitted to compete in categories reserved for those over 50, much less those who are over 70, no matter how old the challenger claims or believes himself to be or feel, and even if a 55-year-old man can in some cases be more athletic than most males in their 20s.”