The new ‘gender inclusivity policy’ for transgender swimmers spark outrage at FINA

The new ‘gender inclusivity policy’ for transgender swimmers spark outrage at FINA

Web Desk
June 20, 2022

The new ‘gender inclusivity policy’ for transgender swimmers spark outrage at FINA

FINA comes under fire for approving a new “gender inclusivity policy.”
It sets the criteria for transgender athletes’ participation in the sport.
Only swimmers who transitioned before the age of 12 will be allowed to compete in women’s events.

Swimming’s international governing organization, FINA, has come under fire for approving a new “gender inclusivity policy” on Sunday that sets the criteria for transgender athletes’ participation in the sport.

Only swimmers who transitioned before the age of 12 will be allowed to compete in women’s events under the “gender inclusiveness policy.” The revised policies were approved by 71.5 percent of FINA members. A suggestion for a new “open competition policy” was also made. “A new working group will spend the next six months looking at the most effective ways to set up this new category,” the organization added.

FINA outlined out how transgender men and women will be permitted to compete under the new rules in a 24-page policy announced Sunday.

Transgender athletes, according to LGBTQ+ rights organizations and other swimmers, would be harmed by the policy.

“FINA’s new eligibility standards for transgender and intersex athletes are discriminatory, hurtful, unscientific, and in violation of the 2021 IOC principles. We must include all women if we truly want to safeguard women’s sports “In a tweet, Athlete Ally, an advocacy group for trans people’s participation in sports, said.

Interim President of the Human Rights Campaign, Joni Madison, also came out against FINA’s decision.

“This sudden and discriminatory decision is a blatant attack on transgender athletes who have worked to comply with longstanding policies that have allowed them to participate for years without issue. This policy is an example of swimming organizations caving to the avalanche of ill-informed, prejudiced attacks targeted at one particular transgender swimmer. We urge the FINA to rethink its policy and ensure inclusion for all athletes — including transgender women – and allow them to participate in sports free from discrimination, abuse and harassment,” Madison’s statement said.

“To the young athletes who may be disheartened by this policy, know that we know and believe that every young person deserves to be treated with dignity and respect and that transgender kids, like their friends, deserve the same chances to learn sportsmanship, self-discipline, and teamwork, and to build a sense of belonging with their peers.”

FINA stated that transgender men are eligible to compete in FINA events and set world records in the men’s category unless they meet the following criteria:

“For the disciplines of Water Polo and High Diving, the athlete must provide to FINA an assumption of risk form signed and dated by the athlete or if the athlete is a minor, by their legal proxy” or “All athletes who are undergoing treatment involving testosterone or other anabolic substances as part of female-to-male genderaffirming hormone treatment are required to obtain a Therapeutic Use Exemption (TUE) for that treatment in accordance with the FINA Doping Control Rules.”

Transgender women and athletes whose legal gender and/or gender identity is female can compete in FINA-sanctioned events if “they can establish to FINA’s comfortable satisfaction that they have not experienced any part of male puberty beyond Tanner Stage 2 or before age 12, whichever is later.”

The athlete must show they have “complete androgen insensitivity and thus could not experience male puberty” or “They are androgen sensitive but had male puberty suppressed beginning at Tanner Stage 2 or before age 12, whichever is later, and have since continuously maintained their testosterone levels in serum (or plasma) below 2.5 nmol/L” or “An unintentional deviation from the below 2.5 nmol/L requirement may result in retrospective disqualification” or “An unintentional deviation.

Transgender athletes who do not match the eligibility requirements will be allowed to compete in “any open events” that the organization may organize in the future.

FINA’s chief medical official, David Gerrard, said Monday that the new policy on transgender athletes adopted by the international governing body for competitive swimming was the “optimal conclusion” for the sport’s future.

“FINA’s response to this, in my opinion, was quite enlightened, very balanced, and educated,” Gerrard told Reuters. “It recognized the athlete’s voice, the scientific, objective evidence, and the little more subjective, human rights (and) legal issues that the lawyers present argued quite effectively.”