I believe they are referring to racial segregation in the US which adopted a ‘separate but equal’ mantra [in theory]. In practice, it was EXTREMELY unequal and clearly racist, with a white majority being first class citizens and a black minority as second class (or worse) citizens. Separation between mens and womens sports is separate and also unequal, the reasoning for which could be debated, but population wise thats a 50/50 split so in practice it ends up being ‘less unequal’ than would a segregation between a majority and minority. The trans population is less than 1% of the total pop, so ‘separate but equal’ would most definitely become highly unequal in practice. Is it compassionate, then, to have the handful of trans kids play sports against themselves in what would most definitely be ‘second-class’ conditions? How many ways must our society tell these kids that they are ‘others’?
I believe they are referring to racial segregation in the US which adopted a ‘separate but equal’ mantra [in theory]. In practice, it was EXTREMELY unequal and clearly racist, with a white majority being first class citizens and a black minority as second class (or worse) citizens. Separation between mens and womens sports is separate and also unequal, the reasoning for which could be debated, but population wise thats a 50/50 split so in practice it ends up being ‘less unequal’ than would a segregation between a majority and minority. The trans population is less than 1% of the total pop, so ‘separate but equal’ would most definitely become highly unequal in practice. Is it compassionate, then, to have the handful of trans kids play sports against themselves in what would most definitely be ‘second-class’ conditions? How many ways must our society tell these kids that they are ‘others’?