> This is news to me - which males are you talking about here?

This poor bloke who found out he was infertile during a premarital medical exam, for instance: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7760426/

> It's really not, though. They found a marker they can test for, and have clearly defined exceptions.

Have you heard of the politician's fallacy, "something needs to be done, this is something, so this needs to be done"...

Your argument here is that... needing a test, and having a test, doesn't mean it's the right test.

You're also assuming that we even need a test... evidence (no transfemale olympians ever coming not dead last) suggests we don't.

> This poor bloke who found out he was infertile during a premarital medical exam, for instance: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7760426/

Interesting. Perhaps a better test is needed.

> You're also assuming that we even need a test... evidence (no transfemale olympians ever coming not dead last) suggests we don't.

This isn't just about trans women, but also about DSD cases like Imane Khelif and Caster Semenya.

SRY testing was done at the 1996 games and for a while before that. 8 cisgender women tested positive at that games. Far more than the number of transgender athletes who have ever participated. This resulted in genetic testing being changed from all women to on-suspicion.

The bottom line is these tests will catch dozens of people who are phenotypically women, who can even give birth. Why should men be allowed to compete as genetic freaks but not women?

From what I've read, these women all had CAIS or similar, and testosterone had no effect on their bodies. Thankfully the new IOC guidelines have an exception for that and would let them compete with women.

But I want to point out that XY+CAIS individuals cannot conceive or carry a child. They have no ovaries and no uterus.

> Why should men be allowed to compete as genetic freaks but not women?

They are, if they are female or have CAIS. Caster Semenya, for example, does not meet that standard. Caster was assigned female at birth and raised as a girl, but is not biologically female, rather a male with a DSD (5-ARD) who has testes and fully male levels of testosterone and musculature.

there are many types of DSD (aka intersex)

one type most definitely would "fail" SRY test

yet they can give birth using donated egg, IVF, etc.

nature makes many variations, it's not exact, it's not binary

there is common and less common and that's why it's messy

A different approach would have been to accommodate the less common

But they purposely decided not to do that because that's the opposite of their goals

it's because Y chromosome is transient and "males" can lose it with age or illness

it doesn't really do anything after puberty

it's about gene expression and it can be discarded genetically

so yes there are "men" walking around who would show negative on a SRY test and qualify

again, they tried this exact thing in 1996

and it went over so badly they ended it by 2000

this is 100% politics and conservative people with power trying to manipulate things

biology is not binary, it's messy and not exact

there are "common" things and less common

Another approach would have been to accommodate the less common

But you'll notice they didn't even try to do that