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Section One: The Fundamentals
A) History and Context
Exercise 1: Notebook Prompt
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One of the most concerning facts from Tested Episode 3: Card-Carrying Females is how female athletes with naturally high testosterone levels are compelled to undergo surgical procedures or stop competing entirely. The fact that certain women are forced to take hormone-suppressing medicines, despite the lack of strong proof that their natural biology offers them an unfair edge, demonstrates how sports regulating bodies monitor women’s bodies in ways that do not apply to male competitors. The program also shows how these constraints disproportionately affect Black and Global South athletes, increasing racial and gender inequalities in sports.
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B) Timeline of History
Exercise 2: Notebook Prompt
What other significant case/milestone would you add to this timeline? Note it in your notebook along with a brief (one or two sentences) explanation of why you feel it is important.
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Caster Semenya Won Her Case against Switzerland due to DSD discrimination, however, she did not win the right to compete. |
| In July 2023, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) decided in Caster Semenya’s favour, ruling that Switzerland infringed her human rights by imposing testosterone constraints. While the decision has not instantly changed World Athletics’ regulations, it did, however, highlight issues about discrimination in sports governance.
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C) Gender coding in Sports
Exercise 3: Notebook Prompt
Has the gendering of sport ever been a constraint on your involvement? How?
Or, if not, why do you think this is?
| Gendered constraints have played a significant role in shaping my experience with sports. Growing up, I had a strong desire to play hockey, but there were no girls’ teams available in my city. The only option was the boys’ team, yet I was not allowed to join. My brother, on the other hand, was encouraged to participate, as my parents viewed hockey as an appropriate outlet for his testosterone-driven, aggressive behavior. In contrast, they considered the sport too dangerous for me simply because I was a girl. Beyond my parents’ concerns, structural barriers also reinforced this exclusion—the boys’ hockey team had a strict policy prohibiting co-ed participation, leaving me with no opportunity to pursue the sport I was passionate about. This experience highlighted the deeply ingrained gender biases in athletics, limiting access and reinforcing traditional notions of who belongs in certain sports.
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D) How is sport gendered in the popular imagination?
Exercise 4: Padlet/Notebook Prompt
While most sports are in fact unisex, gender coding remains pervasive, particularly at the professional level, although with a foundation established in youth competition. Participate in the poll below to share your views on how popular sports are gendered in the popular imagination. Also feel welcome to add or suggest sports that you feel strongly conform to the gender binary!
After you contribute to the padlet prompt, record your response in your notebook AND briefly discuss in two or three sentences how these responses and the polling figures in general confirm or contradict your assumptions about gender-coding and sports. Did anything surprise you?
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The polling results mostly confirm traditional gender stereotypes in sports, with cheerleading and gymnastics strongly associated with women, while football and powerlifting are perceived as male-dominated. Hockey is also heavily gendered as a masculine activity, reflecting long-held stereotypes of it as violent and muscular. However, the large number of neutral votes in sports such as soccer and tennis indicates a trend toward more inclusive perspectives, which is both shocking and encouraging in terms of overcoming traditional gender standards in athletics.
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Section Two: Breaking it down
A) Title IX
Exercise 5: Notebook Prompt
In a longer version of the interview excerpted in the video above, Leah Thomas states “Trans women competing in women’s sports does not threaten women’s sports as a whole because trans women are a very small minority of all athletes and the NCAA rules around trans women competing in women’s sports have been around for 10+ years and we haven’t seen any massive wave of trans women dominating”?
Do you agree with this statement? See also the image above suggesting that the issue may be overblown by politicians and influencers who don’t actually care that much about women’s sports.
Please share any thoughts you have in your Notebook by clicking on the audio button above or writing a few sentences.
| Given that trans women make up a very small percentage of athletes and that regulations governing their participation have been in place for more than ten years without overwhelming dominance, Leah Thomas persuasively argues that trans women’s participation in women’s sports does not represent an existential threat. This viewpoint contests the claim that trans inclusion is hurting women’s sports, arguing that the issue is being blown out of proportion for political reasons rather than out of a sincere desire to ensure equity in women’s sports.
However, the topic is complex since others argue that biological differences in strength, endurance, and muscle development may have an impact even if just a few trans women compete at the highest levels. Opponents of transgender involvement in women’s sports argue that biological benefits of male puberty, including as cardiovascular capabilities, muscular growth, and bone density, may provide transgender women an edge over cisgender female athletes, particularly in endurance or strength sports. Although existing laws, such as those mandating hormone therapy, are intended to reduce these disparities, many athletes and experts doubt that they will totally eliminate competitive inequity. The image above demonstrates the difference between the number of NCAA athletes (510,000) and the number of known transgender athletes in the system (“less than 10”), according to NCAA President Charlie Baker. The data reveals that the presence of trans athletes in NCAA sports is statistically insignificant, which supports Leah Thomas’ claim that their involvement has no major influence on women’s sports generally. The image also supports the notion that political and media attention to trans athletes may be disproportionate to their actual presence in competitive sports, implying that the issue is being exacerbated for ideological or political reasons rather than widespread competitive concerns. |
B) Unfair Advantage?
Exercise 6: Notebook Prompt
What does the host and writer, Rose Eveleth, have to say on the issue of unfair advantage?
Can you think of other examples of unique biological or circumstantial advantages from which athletes have benefitted enormously that have nothing to do with gender?
| In “Unfair Advantage?” Episode Five of Tested, host and writer Rose Eveleth delves into the concept of unfair advantages in top athletics, specifically in terms of gender and genetics. She questions the concept of fairness in sports, pointing out that many exceptional athletes have unique genetic features that give them a natural advantage, yet these advantages are not often investigated in the same way that gender inequalities are. Eveleth wonders where the line should be set between natural skill and an unjust advantage, noting that sports generally reward people with exceptional physical abilities. While the majority of the argument revolves around gender, there are several instances of athletes who gain from biological or contextual advantages unrelated to gender. For example, Eero Mäntyranta, a Finnish cross-country skier, had a genetic mutation that raised his red blood cell count by 50%, increasing his endurance. In a comparable manner swimmer Michael Phelp’s extremely large wingspan, hyper mobile joints, and capacity to create less lactic acid provided him with a huge competitive advantage. Runner Usain Bolt’s height and fast-twitch muscle fibers contribute to his record-breaking pace, and some Kenyan and Ethiopian long-distance runners advantage over high-altitude modifications that increase endurance. André the Giant’s acromegaly provided him with tremendous stature and power in wrestling as well. These instances demonstrate how advantages in sports are frequently a combination of genetics, training, and environment, posing difficult considerations regarding what constitutes fair competition.
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Again, let’s turn to Katie Barnes who points out that we tend to forget amidst all the debate that “sports, by design, are not fair” (235), that “the reality of sports is that we accept unfairness all the time” (235).
Do you agree? Why? In your experience, how fair are sports? Feel welcome to add a video response in the padlet and provide an example if you’re willing. Make sure you include a screenshot of your response in your notebook.
| I agree with Katie Barnes assessment that sports are fundamentally unfair, and that we frequently accept these inequalities without question. Many exceptional athletes benefit from inherent genetic features, environmental variables, or financial advantages that have a substantial influence on performance. For example, Eero Mäntyranta, a Finnish cross-country skier, has a genetic mutation that raised his red blood cell count by 50%, providing him a significant endurance edge over his opponents. Similarly, basketball players of great height, such as Shaquille O’Neal, profit from their size in ways that shorter athletes cannot, yet height has never been regarded as an unfair advantage that demands regulation. Even in motorsports, drivers with access to better-funded teams have an advantage owing to greater technology and equipment, resulting in inequalities in competitiveness that are unrelated to individual performance. These instances show that, while fairness is desirable in sports, advantages based on genetics, resources, and circumstances are universally acknowledged as part of the game.
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B) The Paris Olympics
Optional Response:
What does Robins mean when she argues that:
“The aims of transvestigating an Olympic athlete are not, in any meaningful sense, anything to do with sports, or fairness, or even with women (cis women, at least) as a social category. Rather, they have everything to do with transness, and the public expression of transfemininity.
For my money this has never been about sport.
What it has always been is an excuse to publicly relitigate the existence of trans women.”
Make a note in your Notebook.
| Evan Robins states that scrutinizing and “transvestigating” Olympic athletes such as Imane Khelif is not really about sporting justice or even about preserving cisgender women as a social category. Instead, she believes that these occurrences are essentially about reinforcing societal concerns about trans identities, especially transfemininity. These allegations, which frame specific female athletes as questionable or not “woman enough,” aim to doubt and delegitimize the presence of trans women as opposed to engaging in a genuine conversation about equity in sports. According to Robins, these disputes are less about guaranteeing fair competition and more about exploiting sports to promote transphobia, encouraging inflexible gender standards and placing doubt on any woman who does not adhere to conventional feminine ideals. Ultimately, she views these attacks as a way to constantly question and discuss the legitimacy of trans identities under the pretext of preserving women’s sports.
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