Biden's middle ground Title IX rules on trans inclusion in sport
Biden's new education department policy would overturn the apparently 19 states that have complete bans on trans inclusion in sport. https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/06/politics/...
“The proposed rule would establish that policies violate Title IX when they categorically ban transgender students from participating on sports teams consistent with their gender identity just because of who they are,” according to a public notice from the US Department of Education.
“The proposed rule also recognizes that in some instances, particularly in competitive high school and college athletic environments, some schools may adopt policies that limit transgender students’ participation,” it continued.
It's actually a somewhat interesting middle ground in my view. Yes, it fights against the GOP's massive anti-lgbt push (over 400 bills introduced and counting: https://politicalwire.com/2023/04/06/rec...), particularly on the blanket bans on trans people in school sports. However, the bill crucially allows bans on trans people, they just can't be blanket bans. For example in competitive sports or college sports, schools could still adopt these bans. And this is rather a step back from what initial suggestion by Biden was initially suggesting, and really opens the door for these types of restrictions to be commonplace
Politically, I think it is somewhat smart. I think a centrist perspective that focuses - as I commonly have in the various trans threads - on thinking about most normal children playing sports with their friends in highschool as the priority and less so a sort of state level championship where the winners get scholarships or whatever is simply going to be thought of as more reasonable by more people than either extreme.
