Earlier this year, Chloie Jonsson was banned from competing in CrossFit competitions as a female due to the fact that she is a transgender person. She was told by the fitness organization that she would have to compete with males if she wished to compete in CrossFit sponsored strength contests. Rather than accepting the discrimination that she was being faced with, she instead chose to sue CrossFit, charging the organization with discrimination, unfair competition, and intentional infliction of emotional distress.
CrossFit asserted that the organization was choosing to disallow transgender athletes from competing as anything other than their birth sex as a means of preserving the fairness of competition; however, what CrossFit fails to recognize is the fact that the hormone therapies that are undergone by many transgender people, Chloie included, effectively nullifies any perceived "advantage" that she would have from being born as a male. The policy that CrossFit enforces essentially forces transgender athletes to out themselves in order to comply with the guidelines of competing only within their birth sex.
In Chloie's case, she underwent sex reassignment surgery in 2006, and has identified herself as female since she was a teenager. She is legally recognized as female, and all legal documents, including her birth certificate, recognize her as a female. Additionally, she did not identify herself as transgender, and stated that "If I am going to be forced to out myself, I want it to be for the good for all transgendered people and athletes -- not because of a company's discriminatory policies."
For additional information about Chloie Jonsson and her case, check out the following links:
--Melissa Condon
Hi Melissa! I found this article to be really interesting. It is hard for me to make a definitive judgement in this case, because I can see where both sides are coming from. I wonder if a transgender man whose birth sex was female were to want to compete in a similar athletic competition, would there be this much controversy? It seems in that case peoples' attitudes toward a transgender man would be that he would "stand no chance" in an athletic competition with people physiologically born male, and therefore it would not be seen as big of an issue. Thoughts to ponder. Thanks for sharing!
ReplyDelete-Bridget Thomas
Hello Melissa, I found this post really engaging. I personally think that this is very unfair. Chloe is a woman, and the fact that she's transgender or not shouldn't matter. She is biologically a female now, so her body is functioning like any other female. I think that CrossFit is being rather transphobic not including her with the other women. And the fact that she was outed because of this just highlights the injustice. If I were in her shoes I'd be quite offended as well. It should be a person's own choice to come out when they want to and the fact that CrossFit didn't respect this is appalling to me. Thank you!
ReplyDelete-Casey Coulter
Hey Melissa! This article is really thought provoking! In all honesty, I can kind of see where the people who choose the regulations for cross fit are coming from. I think that this judgement would be really difficult to make in a broad, general way. I think there are probably some transgender woman who may have more of an advantage because of their previous sex. It would be especially controversial if the transgender athlete won an event over women who had not been altered. I can see both sides because Chloie Jonsson deserves to have an opportunity to compete in something that she is clearly passionate about no matter what sex she previously was. Thanks for sharing!
ReplyDelete-Sarah Jump
Honestly, when I started to read it I thought that Chloie was not going through surgeries or hormone treatment. Thinking this, I was going to write about how the company was trying to keep the competition fair, considering the differences in strength between sexes.
ReplyDeleteI did change my mind of course because the company merely did not want a transsexual to be comfortable. (Correct me if I'm wrong but when they go through surgery they are no longer just changing their gender.) I can only hope CrossFit changes their policy soon!
-Erin Lucas
I think that it is already shaky ground to deny someone something based solely on how they were born, but the fact that she has had surgeries and treatments to completely change her body should be enough reason to allow her to compete. At that point it seems less about "fairness" and more like blatant discrimination.
ReplyDeletePerhaps if they are so concerned with a potential physical advantage, they should see whether her scores typically average closer to male or female scores and use that information as a basis of which group she should compete with.
~Alex Duncan
I feel it was very important to bring in that she has been legally recognized as a woman and she didn't out herself. In other places like the Olympics, there is similar controversy about transgender people participating in their sport with their assigned sex at birth. I feel it is wrong to force an individual into a group with people they do not identify with, like what CrossFit was trying to force her into.
ReplyDelete-Elijah Zagorski