The world’s top chess federation has ruled that transgender women cannot compete in its official events for females until an assessment of gender change is made by its officials.
Lol, literally the only game where physical size, bone density, lung capacity and muscle strength does not matter is keeping men and women separate! Haha… In chess there should be no separate category for women, unless… Unless… Unless we believe that women are less smarter than men.
The vast majority of times when men’s and women’s sports are separated it isn’t for the benefit of the men. It is because it would be a blow-out if the two sexes were together.
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I’ve got news for you…
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Women traditionally have been discouraged from competitions, including chess. To speak in broad strokes, even in progressive locations around the world, there are still those who believe that traditional gender roles mean women should but compete. Men have a generational head start. We are at the stage where, in order to be equitable and fair, we should be creating extra opportunities for women. If we didn’t, tradition and systemic practices would continue to discourage women.
Chess has no male category. There’s open, and female. This allows an extra space for women to compete against each other, feel safe, and make connections and friendships with other women in the minority. While still allowing them to compete in the coed category on a level playing field.
We will most likely continue to be at this stage for generations.
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You could just say “I’m a fucking moron” and save yourself some time
Why are men like this?
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This dude channeling his inner Radovid
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No, I’m saying chess has been biased from the start and the games greatest players have been neurodivergent for a long time. Gender injustice is happening here, but it also has complex layers worth investigating, too. Like, how much of Chess’ DNA and evolution has been balanced based almost exclusively to satisfy traditionally male interests (domination, competition). How did the pieces and board change to fit the boys’ game.
Is it helpful the WNBA ball is smaller? I’d say yes, but not just in the obvious ways, but also in service of the meta game and to put the best product forward. There are extenuating circumstances. I was trying to say: the exclusion is so deeply entrenched in the historical male worldview that it might just need to have these debates and growing pains to become what it should be: fair and fun.
Sorry to be contrarian here, but at the high competitive level chess is a cardiovascular challenge. If you listen to serious chess players talk about playing it’s not just a simple mental exercise.
High performing chess players have a higher HRV. Chess grandmasters might be sitting still but their body is undergoing a high degree of stress. https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2019-14359-001
Men statistically have higher HRV on average, and the outliers are even more extreme. https://www.whoop.com/ca/en/thelocker/normal-hrv-range-age-gender/
So when you enter into a competitive environment it’s just nicer to know you have a MORE level playing field.
I know chess specifically is controversial with regards to gender stuff and I’m not saying it’s perfect. I’m just saying that there are real reasons to support separate brackets.
Well… this is certainly enough bullshit to make the crops grow
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Pretty typical for here to see a post with actual sources and instead of people doing their own research they instead want to downvote and dog-pile. You can be upset with the outcome but there are reasons behind it (and it’s not just them jumping on the trans bashing bandwagon, they outlined exactly why it was done and how it works for male-female transitions and vice versa)
It’s not an “actual source”, it’s a shit source. N=16, really? Barely qualifies as a study.
Providing a source doesn’t make a statement unchallengeable, especially if the source is deeply flawed.
None of y’all are getting it. Trans women have an unfair advantage in chess because they can turn the king into another queen.
That would put the chess judges into a paradox and their mind would lock up, requiring a visit to the ICU. Because trans pepople can only do that, thay are “a danger to the whole chess community” /s
I’m still wondering why there is even gender based play in Chess.
Strangely, in chess, there is almost never a man category. There is everybody and there is women. wikipedia . See also motivations why and arguments against. It’s tricky.
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Arbitrarianism, “everythng else is gendered, so…”
Why are men and woman separated in chess??
Traditionally chess has been a men’s game, and female adoption is limited. The creation of an exclusive women’s division is to generate a pathway to success for women, even if it’s known to have a lower ceiling compared to men. Basically, it is to foster the game in females.
Why does men being around affect their liking of chess? Why does anyone care if they like chess or not? It’s a board game you sit at a table playing. If they want to play board games with other people, it really shouldn’t matter who those other people are.
That isn’t the problem. The problem is how it has been naturally male-dominant makes it naturally unfriendly to other groups in the first place.
Not everyone is comfortable with this. By a large margin. The dedication of an event for women only creates that comfort zone.
This situation, and I humbly state I mean no fallacy, is strikingly similar to STEM education. Nobody is preventing them from joining, nobody cares if anyone likes it or not, but the fact that it is dominated by a specific group in the “open” field makes it less appealing to the other groups.
Alright, so woman want to have a woman’s only chess club to dominate their club with a gender because they feel the regular club is dominated by another gender. Id assume though, woman could play in the normal club dominated by men if they choose to? All seems silly. Part of the appeal of board games or videos games is that it’s a battle of the minds. A 10 year old kid can win against 300 lb MMA fighter. We can’t really help that naturally less men want to learn to bake, while less woman want to learn to hunt, can we? It should be open though to whoever. I think excluding a transgender woman on this is wrong, she has no advantage. It seems plain hurtful, and id think the woman who say they feel excluded from the main league should be able to empathize. I can understand physical competition, but that’s just my opinion.
Come to think about it, maybe it’s probably similar to how weight classes work in martial arts, except that the point of this is to guarantee that women can progress somewhat within their careers.
Of course I do not agree that we need to elevate or celebrate them to the level of grandmasters.
In a specific case of transgenders, I understand that transgender women are excluded until an official statement of medical or psychological evaluation has been made, to prevent cases where men illicitly transition just to play in these, and pardon my sexism, weaker leagues.
How can it be like weight classes? What are you measuring? In a tournament people play, the winners move forward. Doesn’t matter what’s in the pants. If ya lose, you’re welcome to keep playing with whoever else you want. Is the woman’s chess league saying men have an advantage in chess? Chess is about memorizing a bunch of different outcomes. I dunno, don’t have much interest in it myself, but if I was a woman and wanted to be the best in the world, I’d want to play against the best. There’s plenty of dudes that get their ass kicked in the men’s league. Should they make a separate league so they can win it? Are men just better at everything? Even board games? Or do men just care more? I’ve seen the graph that says men are more likely to have geniuses, but also more likely to be retards. Is that where it comes from? Does everyone have to be good enough to be a grandmaster to play? Cause I’d have to guess there’s a handful of superstars and the rest just play. But I don’t follow it.
Again, you are missing the point. It’s that the point of a protected space for women is to promote women’s participation in chess, not to overly tout their position over others.
And no, this does not have to do with the intelligence curve. It’s entirely about careers and participation.
There’s a very simple explanation to this, sexism.
And that answer is wrong
Men and women aren’t separated, at least not usually. Its a woman’s category and an open (everyone) category. Is almost completely opposite of sexist, gives women more opportunities to succeed.
Edit: link to a larger discussion on this topic
Women experience a fair amount of harassment in the open league. They aren’t forbidden from participating, but the environment discourages it, so they set up a women’s league too.
If there wasn’t widespread cognitive damage amongst a fair bunch of male players and organizers, they could implement a far more sensible solution: punishing harassment.
And the real reason is because women don’t do well against men. They get dominated except for a very small minority. So I orde for women to have more parity, they have women’s chess A biological man competing with them is, statistically, a huge advantage.
I hope this is a joke. if it is, add “/s”
Tradition would be my first guess.
Clarifications and comments (some pre emptive)
Chess has a women’s category to boost participation and spotlight female players.
Women can and do compete in the open category, which allows men and women. However, currently the highest rated women perform under the super closed “Super GM” level, so they participate in the tournaments that are less prestigious but fitting their rating. Male players like IM Eric Rosen also participate in such tournaments.
The best female player in history , Judit Polgar was 8th best in the world when taking both genders into account. There’s nothing stopping women from reaching the elite level in open chess. She even participated in the candidates tournament which decides who gets to play against the world champion for the world champion title. Unfortunately she didn’t perform too well, but it’s not because of her gender, she was basically beaten 2-1 (plus draws) by a male competitor, just like the other contestants in the round she was eliminated.
At her peak she had 2735 Elo points, making her 55th highest rated person in the history of organized chess. This is higher than one of the actual challengers to the crown, Nigel short.
Regarding the rulings:
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No one is going to pretend to be a woman, in order to convert the person’s identity with fide, they are required to have government issued paperwork saying they have transitioned. It’s not worth it.
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it’s funny that male to female transgender people are not regarded as women by this ruling, hence cannot participate in women’s events, but female to male transgender people also forfeit their women’s titles as they are not seen as women either. (To be fair, they can convert them to open titles, and get them back if they detransition officially)
So according to FIDE, transitioning from a man to a woman doesn’t make you a woman, you are considered a man, but also, transitioning from a woman to a man makes you a man, so you are also not considered a woman.
Seems paradoxical. You’d think they’d pick one and stick to it.
Also: chess does have physical advantages, but they seem to be reletive and not competitive. Most high level players have some sports regimen as it helps increase cardiovascular efficiency, but size of competitor doesn’t seem to matter as seen by David Bronstein and Mikhail Tal. Ian Nepomniatchschi intentionally lost weight for the world championship, and his ratings grew as a result.
Remember that whales are not necessarily more clever than humans even though their brains are huge in comparison.
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This is such a stupid argument, while you might be able to make the argument about sexual dimorphism in physical sports there’s literally no good reason why a woman shouldn’t be allowed to play chess against a man, or play chess against another woman if they are trans.
Chess is a game based on intelligence and strategy, it’s not based on strength. It seems that this decision was made primarily on the basis of sexism, either because they think that chess is ““manly”” or because they think that men are smarter than women or that women are stupid. Either way not logical, purely sexist.
Women have been allowed in the open division and Trans females will also continued to be allowed in that division just not in the women’s division.
So you’re saying there’s a case for discrepancy in other sports?
They said that while you might be able to make it for sports, you certainly can’t make it for chess. That doesn’t mean they personally think there’s a case for sports too.
Exactly, I’m saying that in chess there is no advantage or disadvantage between sex (or gender for that matter) because it is not a physical game.
No I was saying that for chess you can’t since there’s no unfairness or difference in advantage to playing chess as a man or as a woman.
To be clear, the head of FIDE is this guy with close ties to the Russian fascist state.
No wonder the “gender change” wording of their new rules is so similar to the new Russian law that essentially bans transitioning.
One can imagine that every oligarch who wants to suck the milk of Mr. Putin is required to demonstrate loyalty periodically by pissing in the eyes of one of Mr. Putin’s designated targets. LGBTQ+ is just one of those.
well this just doesn’t even make any fucking sense at all
I don’t think it’s a issue in chess. Unless they have to run 100m while holding the chess board.
Why is chess even seperated by gender? Its a completely non physical.
The environment around men favors them to be stronger than women. If there were no women’s category, there would only be men playing chess and very very few women and that would sucks.
I think it’s to give the top women a platform, for young girls to see people like them on the TV and make them believe they can do it too. If enough young girls start playing and keep playing, there should be plenty of female players that can compete with the best men in short order. There are also women’s titles that have lower requirements than men’s. It’s a pretty controversial thing; some women refuse to take the “lesser” WGM title over the open IM title.
I’m not saying this works or I agree with it, but that’s the thinking.
To be honest, the girl’s category may not be as useful as it used to be but in certain country, it definitely is still very useful.
If transwomen wants to compete, compete in open. In my opinion, this has nothing to do whether or not a transwomen is a women but with the environment a person is growing in.
There is usually an open section (what I guess you think is the men’s division), that is dominated by the top players who are almost if not all men. Why the top players are all men is not an easy answer.
Here is a post discussing it some. https://www.chess.com/forum/view/general/why-are-there-only-few-female-chess-players-at-the-top-level
Some men are smarter than others, if men can see that. Then why can you see that in average, specially in this high level competition, men are just smarter than women? Top 5 women dont even rank in the top 100 men’s category.
Bait
This isn’t like running or something where men have a significant advantage physically over women just make it mixed gender and be done with it people can claim whatever gender they want and chess can avoid getting into a politically charged firestorm
Except because of some factors, that’s exactly the case. There have been around 2000 grandmasters ever. Only around 40 are women. Don’t ask me why, I’m not touching the topic with a 10 meter pole.
There is already an open division there is just also a womens division to provide additional support and opportunities for women in chess.
Please use some punctuation, your comment was really hard to read.
Having said that, I agree
Sorry dude adhd man
Plenty of enlightened gents hitting the thread here to rubbish the need for a women’s category whilst simultaneously demonstrating the need for a women’s category
This place feels more like Reddit every day. Incidentally I notice also that Lemmy has inherited Reddit’s rule that every commenter is assumed male until proven otherwise. For a few days this place seemed like it might turn out different. Oh well.
can you explain this a bit more? I’m not seeing it
Double_A Nerdy men playing a board game are intidimating? How do women even get anything in life done of they are this fragile? WTF? Do you also want separate women-only schools, and women-only companies?
Rbmellor Tf are they in separate groups for? Don’t girls know how sexy they look playing cheers?
System_glitch And the real reason is because women don’t do well against men. They get dominated except for a very small minority. So I orde for women to have more parity, they have women’s chess A biological man competing with them is, statistically, a huge advantage.
Two others I recall have been since been removed
Etc
Being a minority in any social setting brings difficulties that others just don’t otherwise face.
Having a women’s category for chess is a way of creating a safe environment for everyone to thrive.
Nah, wait, why the hell is there a separate women’s category in fucking chess in the first place? Those in charge of this decision are 100% misogynists AND transphobes. There isn’t a single good reason for this.
I’m going to assume you aren’t trolling.
Women traditionally have been discouraged from competitions, including chess. We are at the stage where we should be creating extra opportunities for women to be involved in these competitions. If we didn’t, tradition and systemic practices would continue to discourage women.
Chess has no male category. There’s co-ed, and female. This allows an extra space for women to compete against each other, feel safe, and make connections and friendships with other women in the minority. While still allowing them to compete in the coed category on a level playing field.
We will most likely continue to be at this stage for generations.
I recently heard the argument that no men would mentally survive loosing to a women in chess, especially grandmasters.
ngl I wonder if this contains more then a kernel of truth
That’s not the issue.
There are events for women, and there are events for everyone.
Women are underrepresented in chess, hence they have their own exclusive events.
Reading between the lines, I can kind of see this one. The point appears to be to correct for societal inequities in the space of chess. If you learned chess and came up as a masculine presenting individual, they believe that the environment was more advantageous to you, so transitioning later in life doesn’t change that advantage.
As people have already pointed out, this is clearly not an issue of the effects of testosterone on the body. So you are right in the sense that this policy can only be defensible on equity grounds.The overlooked issue with the argument that the organization is providing an equitable space for feminine presenting individuals coming up through a system that is overwhelmingly make dominated is that under the current policy, transmen are having their women’s titles stripped from them unless they officially change their designations back to women. Only then, their awards would be restored. Suddenly presenting as male due to testosterone does not immediately negate the past experiences. If this policy is really about recognizing the challenges of climbing the ladder in chess as a feminine presenting individual, then these transmen who are also transitioning later in life should be allowed to keep their hard earned titles. Unfortunately, this policy is not actually about acknowledging the challenges of being a feminine presenting chess player. It smells like the organization wants to be able to claim they are acting equitably without thoroughly thinking about the logic of the policy. Whether people like the policy or not, or whether it is morally right or wrong is irrelevant. Well-crafted, consistent policy is much easier to defend. This policy is neither well thought out or consistent.
I did notice the invalidation of women’s titles if you transitioned to male, but not if you transitioned to male. It seems like the general view is because the women’s league is the easier league to achieve titles in, if you go to the “more competitive” league you then could game the system to “farm titles” or something if you transition and detransition.
The whole thing does seem a bit ridiculous as you mentioned based on my understanding of the system. The titles are clearly qualified as for a specific league, you don’t lose junior league titles because you get older. Maybe this factors into elo calculations?
Either way, I appreciate the well written response. In my personal experience, the onus of trying to understand seemingly transphobic positions to potentially change them seems to fall on trans people, while allies seem more than happy to stick to the shouting and protesting. I had mentioned a point from a trans women who felt the discourse around pronouns was counter productive in her view, and someone immediately jumped to the defense of his partner who wasn’t there before I could finish the sentence.
