NC joins parade of legislatures with bills to ban men from competing with women in sports | Eastern North Carolina Now

The North Carolina General Assembly introduced a bill earlier this week that would ban biological males from participating in women’s sports at schools.

The Save Women’s Sports Act, or House Bill 358, which was filed by North Carolina state Reps. Mark Brody, Pat McElraft, Diane Wheatley, and Jimmy Dixon on Monday, endeavors “to ensure that women are not forced to compete against men playing on women’s sports teams.”

Whereas, the benefits that natural testosterone provides to male athletes are not diminished through the use of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones. A recent study on the impact of such treatments found that policies like those of the International Olympic Committee that require biological males to undergo at least one year of testosterone suppression before competing in women’s sports do not create a level playing field. “[T]he reduction in testosterone levels required by many sports federation transgender policies is insufficient to remove or reduce the male advantage by any meaningful degree.”

For example, “the muscle mass advantage males possess over females, and potentially the performance implications thereof, are not removed by 12 months of testosterone suppression.” Instead, the study concluded that “The data presented here demonstrates that the male physical performance advantage over females, attributed to superior anthropometric and muscle mass/strength parameters achieved at puberty, is not removed by the current regimen of testosterone suppression permitting participation of transgender women in female sports categories. Rather, it appears that the male performance advantage is largely retained by transgender women and thus remains substantial.”

Twenty-six state legislatures have introduced 41 bills in the first two months of 2021 that would prohibit transgender students from participating on teams that do not correspond with their biological sex, according to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).