New Zealand women’s sports gets a timely Christmas present.
I’m sure it wasn’t meant to be in the nature of a gift, but when New Zealand’s mainstream media reported on our new coalition government’s policy to restrict public funding to sporting bodies who can’t – or rather, pretend they can’t – tell the difference between females and males, it came right in time for some Christmas cheer. True to form, of course, instead of our MSM celebrating the protection of female sports, they made it all about being a tragedy for “transgender athletes”.
Try as they might, though, the good news can’t be disguised.
Naturally, there was a dearth of female athletes interviewed in any MSM articles or opinions about the government’s policy to protect women’s sports. Even the trans-tamed ones, who declare they’re fine with men in women’s sports, seemed to be absent. However, Anton Weatherly, a mediocre male downhill mountain bike competitor, who now goes by the name of ‘Kate’ and competes in women’s competitions where he dominates, got airtime, as he usually does. He trotted out the well-worn tropes of ‘there’s only a small number of men competing in women’s sports’ and ‘there’s more important things to deal with’.
First – a small number does not automatically equate to a small impact. Just one person can have an enormous impact on many people.
Second – the ‘more important things to deal with’ has been used for centuries to shut down and belittle concerns which are inconvenient to address. It’s a classic tactic.
Yawn.
Even as clinging on to their ‘progressively correct’ credentials begins to look more and more like a death grip, the MSM refuses to get with the programme. Most New Zealanders don’t agree with men who say they’re women being allowed to compete in women’s sports, as per the Talbot Mills poll below in Nov 2023. However, our MSM continues to stick the woke part of their heads - which is a sizeable portion of it - in the sand about the public’s increasing opposition to men in women’s sports. It’s not a strategy with a terribly good success rate in making something go away, but so far, it seems they’re not to be deterred from trying.
When New Zealand’s new coalition government formed, one of the policies in the final agreement between the three political parties of National, ACT, and NZ First, was to restrict public funding to sporting bodies who disadvantage women athletes with ‘inclusive’ policies around gender¹. In other words, those sporting bodies who think it’s fine to allow men who say they’re women to compete in women’s sports won’t get any public money.
It was NZ First who specifically campaigned on this, and they delivered. Not everything a party campaigns on survives a coalition agreement, but they successfully managed to put a bomb under the last government’s policy of prioritising men who say they’re women over actual women in women’s sports.
(Picture of ACT leader David Seymour, Prime Minister Chris Luxon, and NZ First leader Winston Peters walking away from the explosion courtesy of Spider Cat’s tee-shirt in store.)
Then, almost like it was timed to coincide, a study was published which showed that non-binary males outperformed non-binary females in sports – and it wasn’t satire or a parody!
What was once centuries-old knowledge that needed no proof beyond what we observed with our own eyes now needs a study done on it, because a tiny number of people have managed to push a narrative which defies reality. I can tell you categorically that I wish my inferior strength and speed compared to men (generally speaking) was just all in my head. I’d have sorted out that thinking quick-smart.
Most of us believe that sports should be available for anyone, as the physical and psychological benefits are without question. But men who say they’re women are not women – that’s just a fact – and they shouldn’t be inserted into women’s sports for no other reason apart from wanting to be there, or because it’s the simplest solution about what to do with them. Sporting bodies are going to have to grow a spine, and do the hard work of actually thinking about how they can make participation work in reality for those who identify as the opposite sex, rather than just how they can make it work in their policies for an easy life.
I predict that, alternative solutions will not be taken up by men who want to play in Women's sports because alternatives will mean a bigger chance of losing. Thus proving that men want to be in Women's sports because they are aware of the advantage they have over women and they don't care about hurting women physically or otherwise.
Only someone mentally ill claims to need to adopt womanhood for themselves and at the same time destroy womanhood on the sports field.
Thanks Katrina, a small step to revert the damage done over the last few years. Another important step would be to sack Sport New Zealand CEO, Raelene Castle.
She willing put her name to the sickening Transgender Policy last year. As a sports professional she knew beyond a shadow of doubt that it was always ridiculous and unfair.