Kamala Harris Says She Has “Concerns” About Trans Student Athletes

Why should I give a shit what a politician says about fucking sports, period?

Ooo yeah let's be concerned over the, what .002% of our population doing things they wanna do and being who they wanna be. Yeah that's a big talking point when 80% of the rest of the country can't afford rent.

Fuck. Just leave trans people alone already Jesus Christ...

Out of all the trans issues you care about trans sports? It's almost like you want people to hate us. Who am I kidding that's exactly why. Fucking right wing shills in the DNC. Out of every issue with trans people, Americas by majority are supportive except for mf trans sports, because of course it's extremely stupid, especially if you aren't going to let kids have some hrt when they want to transition. No coincidence there. Of course that's what they will pick to run on because the DNC is controlled by the same fucking hateful dipshits that control the rest of the state. The DNC will do everything in its power to make sure the Republicans win because they know their voters are stupid enough to help them implement a police state and mass surveillance and turn America into an autocracy. Fuck the DNC.

Don't forget in the last election you didn't hear a peep out of the fucking DNC only for their candidate to pull out right at the end to guarantee trump a win. That should tell you how Americans really feel. The only people who vote Republicans at this point are a few mentally retarded people and some boomers with dementia. They lie about everything.

Who cares what kamala thinks or says?

She lost, quite predictably, after being annointed by establishment tools that brought us hillary and joe, and will fail us with newsom if they can.

Do not follow their lead. They are doomed to fail in unseating r's let alone restoring society.

Pretty much. It's another "Hey let's demonize those nasty Democrats!" because those get clicks. Because those conservative stories about raping kids and shooting up a place doesn't get any traction anymore.

Everything that comes put of Kamala's mouth concerns culture war crap. I'm convinced she's just a MAGA sock puppet, because not only does she have no chance of winning over republican voters, but also now alienated democrat voters with this crap. Unbelievable!

Ignore her, and newsom. Jon stewart 2028.
- Liberals are toast bro 🤣

This comment section could be a case study about how China and Russia have used wedge issues to divide America. This kneejerk bullshit is why we have an orange goomba in the white house.

It's not China and Russia, it's both Republicans and Democrats being fascist Nazis, only one is slightly nicer and more convincing that they give a shit about human rights.
This is a tactic used by far right parties for much longer than China and Russia have had the chance to interfere with US and Europe politics.
Republicans picked these wedge issues all by themselves, following the manual of fascism to the T.
Ding ding ding
Also, trump has been an enormous wedge in US and world society, arguably his worst crime of all

This ends up being very effective as a wedge issue for Republicans, because they can make shit up about the other side, and run against the lies they tell themselves, because the truthful situation is complicated and the lie is simpler to understand.

Some sports are strictly separated by gender, and some are not. Generally speaking, it's people who administer the leagues that make that decision. Everything from pro leagues down to rec leagues will have rules based on gender, and they are created by whoever administers the leagues to foster competition.

I don't feel qualified to know which sports confer a distinct advantage to people who go through male puberty. It certainly isn't all of them, but there must be some where it makes sense to exclude humans who have gone through male puberty from women's leagues. But, I don't feel most politicians are qualified to know that, either. People who know each sport best should make that decision, based on science and the knowledge of their sport, and politicians should just butt out. But you get better soundbites by lying about it and airing grievances about it than by being rational.

My first reaction especially given other things I've heard about this book was Wtf is wrong with this lady?

The full quote is not quite as bad as I assumed:

“I agree with the concerns expressed by parents and players that we have to take into account biological factors such as muscle mass and unfair student athletic advantage when we determine who plays on which teams, especially in contact sports,” Harris reportedly wrote. “With goodwill and common sense, I believe we can come up with ways to do this, without vilifying and demonizing children.”

Every time somebody brings up concerns over trans athletes I always think about these images of Katherine Switzer running the Boston Marathon:

I question why we have gender divisions in the first place, bc it's definitely not that society was ever concerned about fairness. The reason gender divisions were created in the first place, is the same reason we originally had racial based divisions until one day we didn't.

That guy wasn't physically assaulting Switzer and trying to stop her from becoming the first woman to run the Boston Marathon bc he was concerned she may be at an unfair disadvantage. He was trying to stop her bc back when the marathon first started somebody made "No girls allowed!" one of the rules, and this guy was uncomfortable with change. It seems pretty obvious now, that was just a dumb and unnecessary rule to begin with.

If this is all really about fairness like people claim, then maybe we should consider just nixing gender divisions entirely and moving to something like weight class or skill level divisions for competitive sports.

There are plenty of sports where gender divisions basically dont exist until you hit the college level. Hockey is a prime example. There are all-girls select youth teams, but all teams that arent exclusively for girls are open to anyone that can hang. There are plenty of girls that play competitively with boys through highschool hockey. There are plenty of women who play with men at the adult level in beer leagues and the like. But at the juniors, college, pro, and olympic levels they are gender divided.
Realistically at the highest levels of play some division does make sense, as that is where the highest level of physicality is allowed, and generally that is the reason why it can be less safe for women to be playing alongside men. As well as the fact that few women would be playing college or pro hockey if there were not gender divisions.
That said however, I see no reason why the odd woman that can hang in upper levels hockey shouldnt be allowed to play, nor would they be barred from doing so if they could. Likewise I can see how forcing womens upper leagues of the sport to accept cis men who cant hang in the upper levels of mens hockey would push women out of the sport. So it makes sense that they have exclusivity there.
Its one of those issues where I have no issue with gender divisions at the highest levels, in the interest of allowing a professional level of womens sport to exist, but at the same time trying to apply that same logic to youth sports completely falls apart. All youth sports should be just be open gendered competitions. If you see open-gendered hockey at the 12-14 year old level the girls are often 1-2ft taller than any of the boys and physically the more dominant group, and yet no one says the boys’ safety is at risk over it.
Not to mention that lost in all of the trans fear-mongering is the fact that when people take hormones their bodies significantly change. If someone born male starts hormone therapy to transition, their feet will shrink, they will lose muscle mass, so on and so forth. So at the end of the day they truly have zero physical advantages over cis women they would compete with in sport. Women’s leagues in the upper levels of a sport make sense, but it also makes perfect sense to allow transwomen to play with them. People dont seem to understand that male physicality is the result of a continual supply of hormones making you look as you are, not solely the result of past hormonally influenced growth. If you cut off the hormones making you a big strong man, you will no longer be big nor strong
- I think divisions at the highest level are understandable, but does it absolutely have to be gender based division?
  For contact sports like hockey, it would be interesting to see if you really went with a strict division by something like weight class how much would gender really change competitiveness?
  Even in gender based divisions for noncontact sports like basketball, individual skill level can be more important than mass. Mugsy Bogues was a pretty rare case, but he was 5'3" and holding his own with guys that were well over 6' tall.
  Maybe divisions with some combination of weight and skill level? Or some other factor? Idk I feel like we'll never really know until somebody is willing to try.

I’m also concerned for their safety and wellbeing. That’s why you’re concerned, right Mrs. Harris?

…That’s why you’re concerned, right?

Concerned about, not for.

Fucking spineless weathervane. No wonder she lost. Focus group driven decision making.

Oh look it’s not just Newsom and that rep from Georgia anymore. The spineless democrats are testing the waters now to see how throwing trans people under the bus will go.

It is not throwing trans people under the bus to keep trans women out of competitive female sports.
This needs to stop being a hill that people want to die on. It's fucking rediculous to argue they should be allowed to participate in a discriminatory category we created intentionally to allow non-competitive persons to have their own competition.
Sorry trans women, theres literally one extremely specific thing you aren't allowed to do. I support you in literally any other life endeavor, or in playing that sport recreationally or competitively in an open gender category.
- Separate but equal, total neolib move that’s super classy. “Your discomfort is tolerable because I don’t have to deal with it”
  Also this is not the only example of dems throwing trans under the bus. The far more egregious example is newsom going on right winger podcasts and giving validity to the utter bullshit of the cass review and the idea that you shouldn’t be allowed to transition until your mid 20s (plus all the sports bullshit). Backing legislature that is anti trans too. not just sports stuff, though there is a lot of that. The NDAA banning trans care for any military children was voted in by several democrats and some states did the same for Medicaid with dem support. Texas’s bathroom bill had some dem support. Memorializing Charlie Kirk, a total shithead who was openly and vehemently anti trans. Etc
  No spine, no moral code. End result is a minority class that has constant existential anxiety because one side actively wants to destroy them and the other is like “supporting you is like a whole thing, I’m just in this for the donor money”

Did no one actually read the article past the vaguely misleading headline?

“I agree with the concerns expressed by parents and players that we have to take into account biological factors such as muscle mass and unfair student athletic advantage when we determine who plays on which teams, especially in contact sports,” Harris reportedly wrote. “With goodwill and common sense, I believe we can come up with ways to do this, without vilifying and demonizing children.”

My problem with the article is how much air Americans give to the topic of trans athletes in sports when Americans have more pressing problems. Healthcare, affordability of life, violence are real issues affecting Americans much more than sports games. I don't think giving air to this conversation is helping Americans.
- That's the entire point of all these "culture war" issues. They're used as distractions for more pressing matters, that the ruling class really doesn't want to address, because they know conservatives will be outraged by them, and progressives won't be able to just let people be victimized, for no reason. If the public tires itself out, fighting over topics like these, there's a better chance we won't have the energy to demand real action on more expensive things.
Oh, so they are going to mandate weight and height classes across the board for all sports and stop separating sport by gender?
- Prior to Republicans passing laws to outright ban transgender athletes from participating altogether, they actually had standards in place for how long athletes had to be on HRT, before they were allowed to compete. By all physical accounts, this meant that those athletes had comparable muscle mass and bone densities to the gender they identified as.
  What else would you expect? Even between biological girls of the same age, there are significant differences between individual athletes. Once you include training, diet and other normal genetic factors...the differences between a trans athlete on HRT and a cis athlete is actually well within those standard margins. Any advantage they might have, comes from skill and training alone.
"with goodwill and common sense, I believe we can..."
When the folks across the aisle you're champing at the bit to reach demonstrate goodwill and common sense, maybe you might have a ghost of a chance. Until such time, you're validating the position that trans women have no place in established sports.
- So...until then, goodwill and common sense shouldn't apply to your approach? What policy should you adopt, until the other side decides to get their shit together?
  Should we advocate for exactly the kind of hyperbolic position that Republicans use as a strawman, to argue against inclusion?

Jesus fucking Christ, sports shouldn't be a political issue at all. It's literally a fucking game, the government and politicians shouldn't be involved in this shit at all in the first place. We should care about as much about Kamala's opinion on the WNBA as we do about her opinion on Minecraft. The leagues are privately-owned companies, let them run their fucking company how they want (which up to this point, has been trans-inclusive).

Agreed, but people are sooooo into sports and their teams. Sometimes I think we've turned politics into sports teams, making bipartisan politics harder to achieve.
Generally yes. But the government also enforces civil rights, including against sex and gender discrimination, especially at public (i.e. government-funded) universities.

Neoliberal garbage. This is why she lost to literal fascists.

There is no goddamn problem! Fuck sake I should not have to choose fascist asshole or shifty semi fascist.

People are already getting ready to make you fall in line.
The left is full of cowards.
- This post has nothing whatsoever to do with the left. Why are you lying?

And behold the thing that I said was going to happen, has happened. More democrats engaging in transphobia to try to pry votes away from the fascist party by being fascist-lite.

Can we stop pretending the democrats can be reformed now? Their leadership has time and time again proven they do not give one fuck about progressive politics.

Scratch a liberal and a fascist bleeds. There is no such thing as values on the liberal wing of politics, just as there are no values on the MAGA wing. As soon as capital is involved, they will drop anything they stood for.

Ah yes. BoTh sIdEs

America has real problems! Healthcare, food, jobs, affordability. Talking about trans athlete's possible competitive advantages is such a misalignment of our priorities.

Yeah, but shitlibs won't talk about those things because they want to keep the corporate bribe money flowing.

Absolutely painful to watch progressives here already trying to lose 2026.

A post about Kamala Harris has fuck-all to do with progressives. Why are you scapegoating?
- Ohh good, please more purity tests!

I'd be more concerned about the group responsible for more than 50% of violent crimes, but I guess we're allowed to be scared of people playing sports too.

This shouldn’t be an issue. Both sides should stop trying to mandate this. There should be men’s sports, women’s sports and co-ed sports, even at the pro level. Give athletes the freedom of choice and let them sort themselves.

Having 3 buckets, one third of which any one person is banned from participating in over arbitrary generic markers, doesn't really sound like "freedom of choice".

ITT: "I haven't read the article but I'm going to sit on a high horse and claim I'm the enlightened one anyway!!!!1"

Just get rid of all sports in educational institutions and make them all private clubs. Problem solved

Can somebody explain to me why we shouldn’t have a trans league or allow them to play with the opposite gender? There’s a reason we have men’s and women’s leagues. Trans women can have a big advantage over many cis women. What am I missing here?

A few years ago, I played roller derby. It's one of the most trans inclusive sports on the planet. Trans women are explicitly welcome to play in the womens leagues.
I live in Australia, in a city of a couple of million people. We had 4 or so different derby "clubs", and each one of those could field anywhere between 1 and 3 derby teams of various levels. Once you looked outside of the city to include towns and smaller cities within a couple of hours drive, there were around 10 or so "teams". I was one of 2 trans folk active in my city at the time (3 if you count someone who was playing on the mens team)
Now, every capitol city in Australia has a similar situation, though the bigger cities can field a few more teams than my city could.
At one tournament weekend, with a whole year of planning, folk decided to put together a trans team for a demonstration game. It took the whole country to fill that team, and they played the game, without having had any chance to practice together.
There wasn't enough trans folk to make two teams, let alone a meaningful season, with playoffs and multiple rounds against different teams.
"Just make a trans league" has the same meaning as "trans people aren't allowed to participate".
Guess who else has an advantage over many other cis women? Cis women with "superior" genetics. We don't bar them. In fact, finding them seems to be one of the main drives of sports.
Usain Bolt has such a massive genetic advantage over everyone else and no one is calling for him to be banned from running, or to be forced in to his own league. Same with Michael Phelps. Let's not even get started on tall people in basket ball.
A person's sex is just more genetics.
- Well, there is Imane Khelif. There was a push to bar her from boxing. But that kind of thing happens very rarely.
- The difference is HRT could be considered as gaming the system whilst being born that way is luck of the draw.
  Michael Phelps has gentics made for swimming that allow him to perform multiple strokes to perfection. He's considered a lucky man. If there was a pill one could take to attain such superhuman abilities. It would be considered doping, and rightfully so.
I'd assume there aren't actually enough trans women trying to play sports to form a league. NCAA President Charlie Baker testified in December 2024 that he knows of fewer than ten transgender college student-athletes among 510,000 athletes total.
When trans women go on GAHT/HRT, our bodies change a lot. I've lost considerable muscle mass and strength versus just over a year ago (it was very noticeable in the garden this year, oof). The lack of testosterone also changes your mental state and tones down the stereotypical male competitive nature. You literally become softer.
My personal opinion is that if you're on hormones for at least a few years, you've shown that you clearly want to play and shouldn't be disqualified, and at the very least be given a chance to participate. As far as I'm concerned, this entire thing is politically-charged and is about as interesting as acetaminophen and vaccines causing autism.
What you don't hear is trans men wanting to compete in men's sports. They need to have a voice too, as rare as it might be.
The first is that trans women do not have a big advantage over cis women. They have, at best, a very slight advantage, depending on their time on HRT and age.
The second is that there isn't a lot of trans people. Trans people make up around 2-3% of the population, so they would have around 1/30th of the number of teammates in their school. That would be difficult to make a full team around. And because they're segregated out, they would need to find other teams to play against, as well.
The third thing you're missing is that you really only care about trans women in this debate. Do you care if trans men compete against cis men? They compete at very similar levels, too, and if you think being born as a woman is a disadvantage, then why do they do just as well after transitioning?
And the last thing is that we have gendered leagues due to a sexist history behind sports. Women weren't allowed to compete in a variety of sports for a long time. Women's leagues were initially created for the same reason black leagues were created. We have kept them because they are a really lazy way to determine what category of play you are in, as though they act similar to weight classes in wrestling. But athletes within the same sex can compete at completely different abilities for different reasons. Taller players can have a much bigger advantage against shorter players in a ton of sports, so why don't we use height as a determiner of which league you play in instead?
- Taller players can have a much bigger advantage against shorter players in a ton of sports
  Can you give some examples of these sports?
- only considered trans women because generally in sports you’re trying to be stronger and larger. Trans men can do that and have the disadvantage.
  I get what you’re saying about separate leagues but the strongest and tallest men would have an advantage over the strongest and tallest women, skill aside.
  Maybe just make a mixed league that everybody is cool with playing in and keep separate leagues too.
Not enough trans anthletes to warrant their own league. Who would even watch it?

You know, they used to not separate sports by gender, until the ladies started beating the men. Then all of a sudden, nah we gotta split em up. So, even if their argument had any kind of validity, it still doesn't.

According to whom? The Heraean Games were held in conjunction with the ancient Greek Olympics. Are you saying that they were designed to spare men's feelings, or are you saying that the tradition of sparing men's feelings was already in place in the ancient world?
Right now, women are allowed to compete with men in the NBA, NFL, and MLB.
We never see them participating because they physically cannot compete with the males.

Sure she supports genocide, but she'll protect those trans people you progressives care about for some stupid reason. Fuck, most of them aren't even billionaires.

Later: on this subject she also agrees with charlie kirk, a good christian and family man who never said anything unpleasant don't fire me.