u/AbsoluteNarwhal

I hope this doesn't violate rule 2, although I will argue that this shouldn't be a political issue even though it has in some ways become one. Also, I'm not going to specifically talk about the stuff currently happening with the WNBA. I know a lot of the current controversy is about that, but I'm not super familiar with it because I don't live in the US.

I have often heard people say that it's "obvious" and "just basic science" that trans women have an advantage over cis women in sport, but it's not actually very clear cut. For example, a meta analysis of 50 studies concluded the following:

>While transgender women exhibited higher lean mass than cisgender women, their physical fitness was comparable. Current evidence is mostly low certainty and has heterogenous quality but does not support theories of inherent athletic advantages for transgender women over cisgender.

It found that trans women who have been on HRT had similar relative fat mass, relative lean mass, upper-body strength, lower-body strength and maximal oxygen consumption compared to cis women. This study also found that trans women's athletic performance decreases significantly after HRT.

Obviously the key here is being on HRT for at least a couple years. I am not arguing that a trans woman who hasn't medically transitioned should be allowed to compete. Whenever possible, professional women's sports leagues should do blood tests and ensure competitors' testosterone levels are in the expected range, in order to enforce the HRT requirements and keep the competition fair.

Until recently, this was exactly how it was done in the Olympics: generally female trans athletes had to prove they had been on hormones for at least 2 years, and blood tests were done to make sure the athletes' testosterone levels were within the expected range for cis women. And in the multiple decades that trans athletes could compete, zero won medals. You would think that, if trans women had such a massive advantage, they would have dominated these Olympic games, or at least had some winners, but no. Only one openly trans athlete has ever even competed, and she did not win a medal.

In the 2028 Olympics, all female athletes will now be required to prove that they have XX chromosomes. Despite being invasive and unnecessary, it completely ignores intersex women who, while still being assigned female at birth, could have XY, X, XXY and many other configurations. These people might not even have any advantage whatsoever and are also definitely women and should be allowed to compete too.

Although there isn't a complete academic consensus on whether trans women who started HRT after puberty have an advantage (more research needs to be done), trans women who started HRT before puberty or used puberty blockers couldn't possibly have any of the advantages that come with male puberty because they never went through it. Even if you disagree with all of my other points so far, I can't see why anyone arguing in good faith could be against these trans women competing. They don't have an advantage.

Fundamentally, sport isn't fair. The average person could train extremely hard and still fail to beat someone who was gifted with a natural advantage. Michael Phelps has an enormous wingspan, incredible lung capacity and many other natural gifts that set him apart from most humans. Of course, genetics aren't everything, the best athletes are the ones who are both the most gifted and train the hardest. But is it really reasonable to say that Michael Phelps should be disqualified from the Olympics because he has an unfair biological advantage over everyone else? Joanna Harper, from this article, said this:

>So, sports are inherently unfair. But when we subdivide sports into categories, we do so with the purpose that biological differences don't overwhelm what we seek in sports. So, for instance, big boxers have such a huge advantage over small boxers that we segregate that sport by weight categories so that small boxers can win something,

Just like the reason we have weight classes in boxing, the reason we segregate men and women in sports is so that women still get the chance to play. And trans and intersex women are too few in number and don't have advantages significant enough to hurt the original mission of women's sports, which was always fundamentally about inclusion.

One final thing, in the last few years this debate has been used as a political wedge issue. I believe that trans women's inclusion in sports should be something that is decided by sports associations and committees, not governments or political parties. When people think about trans women in sports, the media has given many people this vision of "men in dresses" stealing all the medals from women, but this just isn't representative of reality, no matter what your opinions on trans people are. I hope this post has at least been interesting to read, I tried to be as objective as possible.

I apologise if this kind of question gets asked a lot here.

I achieved 999888766 in my GCSEs, and an A in add maths. The 6s were in English lit and lang. I went to a high achieving school where these grades are only a bit above average. I'm also predicted A*A*A*A*.

A bit of context: I am now entitled to extra time but I didn't have it during GCSEs, and I'm going to see if I can get extenuating circumstances for this because I think it put me at a disadvantage (e.g. I didn't finish either English exam on time which definitely contributed to my low grade).

I know that Oxford cares more about GCSEs than Cambridge, and these are below average for Oxford. I still want to apply to Oxford because Cambridge does not offer joint honours in Maths and CS, and I prefer Oxford's Maths + CS course to both Cambridge's CS and Maths courses.

Will I be at a massive disadvantage at Oxford, or do I still have a good chance if I also get a high score on the TMUA?