Cultural evolution. Anyway, I don't mean to suggest a solution "for all times and for all places", I'm old enough now I've seen how complicated life can be. But I do believe that gender is a poor, outdated, even lazy way of staging fair competitions, and that we can improve.
Well, you want biological females to be able to compete evenly with biological males. It’s just not possible. A high school varsity team is able to beat a pro female team in any sport, soccer, basketball, tennis whatever. Because males are naturally stronger and more athletic. It’s just a fact. And also none of this would be being discussed right now if everyone could just play in their divisions (male vs male, female vs female). Problems only arise when females not only try to interject themselves into men’s games, but when they demand that they get equal competition as well. It’s just not possible due to biological differences
I can imagine certain females, say the iconic "Russian tractor-driver women", who could crush many males, crush 'em like a bug.
But we’re talking about the above average athletic woman vs the above average athletic man. We’re not talking about the top 0.0001% females vs the top 30% males
I think there's a lot more overlap in capabilities between the genders that we're simply not looking for because of the "boys" and "girls" shorthand. Complete overlap? No. But weight classes would capture much of what remains.
I think you’re missing the part that boys are just naturally stronger than girls. a 125 pound high school freshman boy will likely be stronger than a 150 pound high school senior girl. Weight classes don’t really solve anything
And it's not entirely about weight or strength, either. A senior "girl" in sport X will have had three more years practice than a freshman "boy" in sport X.
yeah but seniors never compete against freshman unless a freshman makes varsity which is really rare and only because they are strong enough and good enough to compete
Sorry but WNBA champs would destroy a high school basketball team...you have no idea how physical and fast professional female athletes in teh WNBA are compared to fucking 17 year olds. You think Naomi Osaka would lose to a high school tennis player? what are you smoking...