3 ms·

The solution is to develop relative skill rating systems like Elo.

dpd_dpd 7mo ago
No, the solution is to exclude male advantage from the female competition via evidence-based analysis, as the IOC's new policy does.
- txrx0000 7mo ago
  Grouping based on skill would achieve what you describe and then some. It would eliminate every kind of advantage, not just sex-based advantage.
  - bluescrn 7mo ago
    Sport does that already. The Olympics is the very top skill tier. So you're just suggesting making everything mixed-sex, and having very few women at the Olympics?
    - txrx0000 7mo ago
      > So you're just suggesting making everything mixed-sex, and having very few women at the Olympics? Yeah. It would work like video game rankings. Top-ranked players are top-ranked because of skill, and if they happen to be mostly men for most games, so be it. But I get your point. The crux of the problem is most people don't want to see skill-based matchmaking. They want to see the best man, the best woman, or the best disabled person, etc. The categories are already defined in people's minds as cultural constants. The trans people don't like this because they feel excluded by both male and female categories, so they argue in bad faith that there's no physical difference between females and trans-females or males and trans-males. Our long-term options as a society are to either 1) change culture so that people get used to skill-based matchmaking like in video games, or 2) ignore trans people and wait for this issue to disappear when future tech allows a man to transfer his consciousness into a female body and vice versa. Since 2) is quite far out technologically, I propose 1).
      - bombcar 7mo ago
        If we can admit of best male, best female, best disabled, best under the age of 18, etc, we can certainly admit of best trans-male; best trans-female.
        txrx0000 7mo ago
        That's a possible compromise, but a high maintenance one. It would set a precedent for other groups, and then we'd have to add a new category every time people complain. I think we should just make the Olympics universal and let anyone compete for the title of absolute best in the world, no qualifiers. Detach the existing categories too, like men-only or women-only. Make all category-gated games a separate deal, like Paralympics. Each group can organize their own variant if they want.
  - s1artibartfast 7mo ago
    However, the point is not to group by advantage. It is to create a separate category for women to compete in where women can win. Any grouping that failed at this purpose misses the mark
- space_fountain 7mo ago
  It’s interesting how the evidence based analysis switched as soon as the republicans came into power. Maybe this is less about evidence and more about opinion actually?
ordersofmag 7mo ago
Not sure how this helps. Olympic events already have relative rating systems that ranks all the participant: pretty complicated and sport dependent systems that determine qualification for the games and competition amongst all the competitors at the games. The problem how to have separate competitions for different groups of participants when there isn't a universally shared agreement on who should be in which group.
- txrx0000 7mo ago
  If you have a relative skill rating system, then there's no need to split competitors into groups. But if you insist, then you can split them based on skill ratings (define a rating range for beginner, intermediate, advanced, etc). And for games with one-on-one matchups, sampling from a gaussian centered on each player's skill rating is good enough.
  - kelipso 7mo ago
    It will end up being all men at all the skill rating levels.
    - txrx0000 7mo ago
      No it would not. Look at chess ratings.
      - kelipso 7mo ago
        Basically proving my point. Very few women in top chess. Currently there are 0 women in top 100 chess players. Only 3 women were ever in the top 100 chess players. And chess is not even a game where men have a natural advantage like in almost all of the physical sports.
        txrx0000 7mo ago
        I don't deny that there are very few women in top chess, but that wasn't your point. You said it would end up being all men at all the skill rating levels, which is not true. Take chess as an example: there are a lot more women at around 1500 elo than at 2500 elo. So if you host an intermediate-level tournament just for players around 1500 elo, plenty of women will participate.

No, the solution is to exclude male advantage from the female competition via evidence-based analysis, as the IOC's new policy does.

txrx0000 7mo ago
Grouping based on skill would achieve what you describe and then some. It would eliminate every kind of advantage, not just sex-based advantage.
- bluescrn 7mo ago
  Sport does that already. The Olympics is the very top skill tier. So you're just suggesting making everything mixed-sex, and having very few women at the Olympics?
  - txrx0000 7mo ago
    > So you're just suggesting making everything mixed-sex, and having very few women at the Olympics? Yeah. It would work like video game rankings. Top-ranked players are top-ranked because of skill, and if they happen to be mostly men for most games, so be it. But I get your point. The crux of the problem is most people don't want to see skill-based matchmaking. They want to see the best man, the best woman, or the best disabled person, etc. The categories are already defined in people's minds as cultural constants. The trans people don't like this because they feel excluded by both male and female categories, so they argue in bad faith that there's no physical difference between females and trans-females or males and trans-males. Our long-term options as a society are to either 1) change culture so that people get used to skill-based matchmaking like in video games, or 2) ignore trans people and wait for this issue to disappear when future tech allows a man to transfer his consciousness into a female body and vice versa. Since 2) is quite far out technologically, I propose 1).
    - bombcar 7mo ago
      If we can admit of best male, best female, best disabled, best under the age of 18, etc, we can certainly admit of best trans-male; best trans-female.
      - txrx0000 7mo ago
        That's a possible compromise, but a high maintenance one. It would set a precedent for other groups, and then we'd have to add a new category every time people complain. I think we should just make the Olympics universal and let anyone compete for the title of absolute best in the world, no qualifiers. Detach the existing categories too, like men-only or women-only. Make all category-gated games a separate deal, like Paralympics. Each group can organize their own variant if they want.
- s1artibartfast 7mo ago
  However, the point is not to group by advantage. It is to create a separate category for women to compete in where women can win. Any grouping that failed at this purpose misses the mark
space_fountain 7mo ago
It’s interesting how the evidence based analysis switched as soon as the republicans came into power. Maybe this is less about evidence and more about opinion actually?

ordersofmag 7mo ago

Not sure how this helps. Olympic events already have relative rating systems that ranks all the participant: pretty complicated and sport dependent systems that determine qualification for the games and competition amongst all the competitors at the games. The problem how to have separate competitions for different groups of participants when there isn't a universally shared agreement on who should be in which group.

txrx0000 7mo ago
If you have a relative skill rating system, then there's no need to split competitors into groups. But if you insist, then you can split them based on skill ratings (define a rating range for beginner, intermediate, advanced, etc). And for games with one-on-one matchups, sampling from a gaussian centered on each player's skill rating is good enough.
- kelipso 7mo ago
  It will end up being all men at all the skill rating levels.
  - txrx0000 7mo ago
    No it would not. Look at chess ratings.
    - kelipso 7mo ago
      Basically proving my point. Very few women in top chess. Currently there are 0 women in top 100 chess players. Only 3 women were ever in the top 100 chess players. And chess is not even a game where men have a natural advantage like in almost all of the physical sports.
      - txrx0000 7mo ago
        I don't deny that there are very few women in top chess, but that wasn't your point. You said it would end up being all men at all the skill rating levels, which is not true. Take chess as an example: there are a lot more women at around 1500 elo than at 2500 elo. So if you host an intermediate-level tournament just for players around 1500 elo, plenty of women will participate.