Transgenders in martial arts

[Druid11]

Well..... some women are uncomfortable doing grappling with men because of their life experiences, and some women belong to religious sects that aren't okay with mixed-gender touching. So for those two groups, a women's-only class would probably be appealing.

Without getting into too much about me, I will simply say that I am very personally familiar with what experiences a woman might have that make them uncomfortable with a man touching them, and leave it at that. But the way I see it, saying I feel uncomfortable training with the opposite sex and I'm not willing to work through that, but I want to train in a martial art (especially if it's a martial art with any kind of self defense benefits) kind of like saying, I'm uncomfortable with water, but I want to learn to swim, can I do it without getting wet?

I understand in countries with very strong social/cultural/religious mores about male/female contact that woman's only classes are really the only option and I would say that kind of training better than no training. But I also live in the USA, where those mores are not as prevalent. I don't even blame dojos/gyms for holding woman's only classes if it brings them money (they are businesses). I still find it to come off as condescending pat on the head, that basically says, "It's okay, weak woman I know you can't train with the guys, we have classes for you too though." Even if it's not really meant that way, that what it says to me. YMMV.

And for the record I found training with various polite, respectful guys, to actually be really empowering rather than triggering. Individual mileage may very.

I understand people having concerns about unfair advantage when it comes to people who are competing at a very elite level where small advantages can make a big difference. In that case, it makes sense to me that an organization might want to do some research to compare the athletic performance of transgender women who have transitioned (taking hormones, etc) with the athletic performance of highly athletic women in their weight class. If they find that there's a significant advantage, just because of them having had gone through male puberty, then maybe the organization will set a handicap or something.

But elite competition is a separate issue from just taking a class and practicing together. In the latter case, I really wouldn't see what the big deal is with that. They're just trying to learn, same as you.

I just mentioned the trans MMA fighter as side note. I don't see any issues with trans people taking any run of the mill martial arts class. Heck most female MMA fighters train with men anyway, so I'm not sure it would even be issue with training at a competitive level, just with the actual competition.

 

[Steve]

Quick story, not entirely relevant, but close enough. Back in the 90s, when I was a claims representative taking SSI and Social Security applications, I had a couple file a claim. Two gay men. Well, that's how they started. They weren't technically a "couple" at that time because gay marriage/civil unions etc were not yet recognized. However, they really were a long term, monogamous, gay couple. Well, that's not quite true, either. They were a monogamous, gay couple. That part was true, but as it turns out, they were really lesbians born in the wrong bodies. So, over the course of a few years, one of them got to the point in the transition process where he (now she) had the operation and legally changed his birth certificate. So, now, I don't have any gay people at all. I had to take a new claim from both of them, because now they're a long term, monogamous, hetero-sexual couple. That is, until the other guy completes the transition and gets his (now her) birth certificate legally changed. So, they started off two gay men, became a married couple (seriously, they got married and everything) and then became a lesbian couple. Those two are lucky they were funny and friendly, because they created a lot of work for me.

Please explain what you mean by "professional obligation". I am not an instructor, but if I was I would reserve the right to exclude anatomical males from an all female class as "trans" is not listed as a protected status.

I'm also curious about the "mostly". What is it that is excluded from personal beliefs I am entitled to?

I do realize there are genuine medical issues regarding gender. I also realize that political correctness has made it taboo to label these conditions as an "abnormality" which has driven society to glamorize and encourage acting on these DEFECTS rather than treating them. To the point now, we are expected to praise someone's bravery for embracing their condition rather than seeking to correct it. We are also expected to allow males into areas that are normally off limits to them simply because they either have, think they have, or claim to have one of these conditions. It baffles me that so many people do not understand the insanity here.

I use the words "abnormality" and "defect" because ANY behavior which is counter to the continuance of your species IS an abnormality/defect.

Nothing too crazy. Regarding professional obligation, when you represent a business, you have to comply with anti-discrimination laws. You also have an obligation to consider profit, or you won't be in business for too long, so things like optics, marketing and messaging matter. You may personally hate black people, but professionally, you need to get over it. You may personally feel that a member of a protected class is full of crap, but professionally, you have a professional obligation to comply with the law. That's all I mean by that.

By mostly, I mean that, while you can hold whatever opinion you want, people sometimes forget that they are not immune to repercussion for your opinions. If you are an overt racist or bigot, and choose the wrong times or places to share your opinions, you may lose your job or your friends. You may find it difficult to get a job. You may find that people don't think you're a very nice person and avoid you. Shoot, it may simply be that people don't invite you to their parties or want to sit with you at lunch. Point is simply that, sure you can hold your opinions, and that's your right. You probably won't be arrested for your opinion. But you CAN find yourself regretting when and how you choose to share your opinions with others.

 

[Steve]

Separating males and females in social settings is actually a behavior that's far more detrimental to the continuance of the species than letting a minority choose their sexual identity. As is ignorance.

Look at what happened to the Amazons in Wonder Woman comics!

 

[Tez3]

I don't believe you can choose choose which gender you are, you can't just decide to be one or the other because there is more to gender from a biological stand point. It isn't something I would argue with them about though, there isn't any harm to me or others if they wish to be addressed as whatever they wish.

I do wish that more gay and lesbian people took up martial arts, my cousin and some other people I know get messed with all the time because of they sexual orientation and I would be more comfortable knowing they could defend themselves better.

I don't think it's about 'choice' more how you feel. I doubt anyone wakes up and thinks 'oh I'll be female today'. It's about a deep seated genuine feeling that they are in the wrong body which I think must be an awful feeling.

How do you know that lots of gay people aren't doing martial arts?

'pet'...I don't remember you calling anyone here pet. I may want to be called pet. Reminds me of my mom calling me pet...when I wasn't being called other choice derogative names.

Luckily for me everyone's names are next to their posts so I can remember who they are, pet!

Mine is that allowing everybody to make up an imaginary identity is ignorant

'Allowing'? who are we to decide what identity people can or cannot have?

 

[Gerry Seymour]

'buddy'
'my friend'

"My friend" works well enough, but sounds odd (at least in the South). "Buddy" works with men (again, in the South), though in the South we actually have guys with the name "Buddy", so that complicates it.

 

[Danny T]

"My friend" works well enough, but sounds odd (at least in the South). "Buddy" works with men (again, in the South), though in the South we actually have guys with the name "Buddy", so that complicates it.

I am in the South my friend.
In my area of the South you will hear:
"y'all"
"guy"
"buddy"
"my friend"
"mon amie"
"T"
All will be considered non gender specific.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

I am in the South my friend.
In my area of the South you will hear:
"y'all"
"guy"
"buddy"
"my friend"
"mon amie"
"T"
All will be considered non gender specific.

Louisiana is a bit of a culture unto itself (as the "mon ami" indicates). In what I refer to as the "gereric South (NC, SC, GA, most of TN, and maybe AL), y'all is probably the only universal, and it's used as a pronoun, rather than a form of direct address.

 

[Buka]

Everyone carries at least one X chromosome, the "chick" chromosome. Does that mean you're half a chick? What about it someone who is born with the chromosomes XXY or XXYY (both real conditions BTW)? Should those people be considered some third sex just because they don't conform to what you think it means to be a man or woman? Gender is much more than just what your chromosomes are. I see no reason not to respect someone else and how they feel about themselves by referring to them by their preferred pronoun.

I agree wholeheartedly. Just wanted to add - there's a lot of people who look at their X and wonder Y?
(sorry, couldn't resist)

 

[Midnight-shadow]

I don't think it's about 'choice' more how you feel. I doubt anyone wakes up and thinks 'oh I'll be female today'. It's about a deep seated genuine feeling that they are in the wrong body which I think must be an awful feeling.

I would just like to point out here that a lot of non-cis individuals get very upset when people talk about "choosing a gender" because to them they never got the choice from birth and it's not so much they are choosing to change genders but more that they feel they need to change in order to fit inside the body they were born in. As to why trans persons feel like this, this is something neuroscience and psychology have yet to uncover. Sometimes it can come down to hormone imbalances but this doesn't account for all cases of gender-fluidity.

 

[Tez3]

I would just like to point out here that a lot of non-cis individuals get very upset when people talk about "choosing a gender" because to them they never got the choice from birth and it's not so much they are choosing to change genders but more that they feel they need to change in order to fit inside the body they were born in. As to why trans persons feel like this, this is something neuroscience and psychology have yet to uncover. Sometimes it can come down to hormone imbalances but this doesn't account for all cases of gender-fluidity.

To be honest even if it were a 'choice' ( which I don't believe it is) I don't see why people should care, too many people poke their noses into things that are really absolutely none of their business. If you harm no one, then it's no one else's business what you do, are or want to be.

I rather hate these hardline people who say 'a real man is...' and 'a real woman is...' and give a whole list of things they should be. I think there is actually a lot of fluidity about all of us that shouldn't be kept hidden or worse forbidden. A real person is whatever they want to be!

 

[JP3]

Smarter people than me are stumped by the "why" question regarding the existence of people who are now tagged with transgenderism, or it could be labelled as self-misidentification of gender (meaning they don't identify with the gender their body has expressed as, not that they don't feel an identity). Hard to even explain my thought, as you can tell. Personally, I have no dog in the hunt, so if it is not pressed on me (e.g. guys insisting they get to go into the ladies room, which was actually on the ballot here in Houston election before last) which is the same room my daughter goes into and it makes HER uncomfortable.... if that doesn't happen, I don't care. I'm not evolved enough I suppose to say it's OK to cross certain cultural lines yet, I guess.

Back to the subject of the O/P, I would offer that TG folks in a MA class is an interesting question. Should TG people get to participate? Of course. Should they have to go to their own classes? Of course not. Should they participate in women's only classes.... I've no idea. I'd think that, because they are trans-ed or trans-ing, they probably don't have the "bad thing" which standard-issue guys do (apologies for low-brow description, just trying to get this thought out) which certin cool ladies on here have had to deal with (WaterGal comes to mind).

If TG practitioners simply aren't interested in girls (if they are switching in that direction), I'd ... think.. there'd be no issue, save only for the physical strength/speed/coordination/recovery advantage developed by all the testosterone through puberty and after. It would be a training advantage to need to deal with larger, stronger, faster opponents while in training, so as to develop the skills needed if such were ever needed in the outside world. Otherwise, I would think that the training would have a false element of efficacy to it.

I'm not saying that a woman in MA can't be a bad-***, surely she could. But, I am saying that a bad-*** woman to other women n class who has never trained against a male who wasn't just giving away the advantage would be, in my mind, an illusory, untested confidence. Perhaps not in a purely "art form" sort of practice, where the art is practices for the sake of the art itself. But, for any sort of self-defensive sort of skillset, you've got to test it against bigger/smaller, slower/faster, taller/shorter, heavier/lighter and all combinations thereof in order to Know.

 

[WaterGal]

Yeah that's all well and good for their personal life and yes that I agree on but when it comes to doing women only classes then it becomes an issue. So if a man says right I'm a woman now and isn't physically a woman yet you believe he should be let into women's only martial art classes?

If a person consistently identifies themselves as a female, goes by a female name, wears women's clothes, and has female hormones (whether they're naturally occurring or come from the pharmacy), then yes, I believe they should be allowed in a women's martial arts class, regardless of what parts they may have in their underwear.

Also vice versa, though people are usually much less up-in-arms about female-to-male transition than the other way around. Which I think has a lot to do with how we as a society view women and their worth relative to men.

 

[Tez3]

(e.g. guys insisting they get to go into the ladies room,

'Ladies room', 'bathroom' lol it's the lavatory/toilet! In Europe they have been unisex for ever, no one cares. In many pubs in Europe there's one toilet with a door and by it is a urinal, quite often you walk past a chap using it to get to the cubicle. No one cares. In the UK we have a lot of public toilets that are unisex, again no one cares, it's just a place to relieve yourself, there's cubicles with locking doors. People go in, relieve themselves, flush, wash their hands and walk out. That's it. On some French streets they have a pissoir, Pissoir - Wikipedia What is regarded in Europe as a perfectly normal thing seems to have become something else in the US?

I'm not saying that a woman in MA can't be a bad-***, surely she could. But, I am saying that a bad-*** woman to other women n class who has never trained against a male who wasn't just giving away the advantage would be, in my mind, an illusory, untested confidence.

So, you are assuming a lot here. Firstly that women who are train are small and light while the blokes are big and butch, reality shows that isn't true. Secondly that women who only train against women ( of whom I know absolutely none btw) will never be able to take down a chap, my, that made me laugh. Thirdly, many men also have an 'illusory, untested confidence' because they use strength against smaller opponents but when they meet someone of similar strength AND skill then they are knackered. Too many rely on strength not technique.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

then they are knackered

Entirely off-topic, here. I thought "knackered" meant tired, worn out, exhausted. Is my British idiom sadly off?

 

[DanT]

We have a trans person at my club (girl to guy):

-He walks in the door
-He goes to the change room
-He trains
-He goes to the change room
-He leaves the studio
-He goes home

There really isn't much time for discussion of what peoples personal beliefs are. I think for the most part people don't even notice that he's trans. I should add that we're in Canada, so we're pretty accepting.

 

[drop bear]

Entirely off-topic, here. I thought "knackered" meant tired, worn out, exhausted. Is my British idiom sadly off?

It can also mean castrated.

A knackery is where you cut up horses for their bits.

 

[Tez3]

Entirely off-topic, here. I thought "knackered" meant tired, worn out, exhausted. Is my British idiom sadly off?

It does but also means ruined, broken or beaten, depends on context. 'My husband came in and said the car is knackered', 'fight him and you're knackered'. Comes from 'knackers' who slaughter old and worn out horses in the knackers yard

 

[Gerry Seymour]

We have a trans person at my club (girl to guy):

-He walks in the door
-He goes to the change room
-He trains
-He goes to the change room
-He leaves the studio
-He goes home

There really isn't much time for discussion of what peoples personal beliefs are. I think for the most part people don't even notice that he's trans. I should add that we're in Canada, so we're pretty accepting.

That's getting more the norm in the US. Less so in the state I live in (NC), but more so in the area I live in than in the rest of the state.

 

[Tez3]

It can also mean castrated.

A knackery is where you cut up horses for their bits.

Not heard that one, an Aussie version? We have the 'knackers yard' rather than 'knackery', the knackers man usually comes and takes away dead horses but can also slaughter them as well if necessary.

 

[JP3]

'Ladies room', 'bathroom' lol it's the lavatory/toilet! In Europe they have been unisex for ever, no one cares. In many pubs in Europe there's one toilet with a door and by it is a urinal, quite often you walk past a chap using it to get to the cubicle. No one cares. In the UK we have a lot of public toilets that are unisex, again no one cares, it's just a place to relieve yourself, there's cubicles with locking doors. People go in, relieve themselves, flush, wash their hands and walk out. That's it. On some French streets they have a pissoir, Pissoir - Wikipedia What is regarded in Europe as a perfectly normal thing seems to have become something else in the US?

* Becoming isn't accurate at all. Remember who it was that primarily left the U.K. to go to the Colonies in the beginning.... Puritans. If it had been up to me, I'd have asked that it was a different portion of the populace that decided to up and out from England, but it wasn't, and the belief structure is still laced throughout American sociology/society. When the rest of the Colonies began to fill up with immigrants from other areas, the underlying social strata was already well entrenched. Repressed sexual adolescents, that's us. We're getting better, though. Glad to know the English still know everything. That's cool.


So, you are assuming a lot here. Firstly that women who are train are small and light while the blokes are big and butch, reality shows that isn't true.

** Whose reality? I've been training quite a while and I have literally never been in a MA class where the average female was even close to the average male size. I understand the U.K. is slightly different on hight-weight norms than the States, but still. To see if my earthly experience was somehow slanted, I just googled averages for U.S. and England, and you can do so as well, but here's the results:

Women:

5'4" and 166 in the U.S. (fast food diets are literally killers)
5'3" and 154 lbs

Men:

5'9" and 195.5 lbs (fast food, I'm telling ya...)
5'9" and 184.3 lbs in England

... so... If you are saying to me that your reality bucks the above national averages that much, I'm thinking you have a very odd dojo. Also, just size does not take into account the effect on muscular development by simply having the male level of testosterone flowing. It changes things.

Secondly that women who only train against women ( of whom I know absolutely none btw) will never be able to take down a chap, my, that made me laugh. Thirdly,

** See the above statement as regards Women's Only (note the word "Only" in the O/P). I've never known any women martial artists who practice against women only, either. But, the O/P postulates they exist. If so, I have those concerns and I stand by them.

many men also have an 'illusory, untested confidence' because they use strength against smaller opponents but when they meet someone of similar strength AND skill then they are knackered. Too many rely on strength not technique.

I have absolutely NO problem with that statement at all. It is dead-on correct. There are millions of people with a very secure,a nd false, sense of personal competence and self-confidence because they go to a 1 hour taekwondo class once a week an think they are really doing something. There are tons of variations on this theme.