Summary
The Trump administration has frozen $175 million in federal funding to the University of Pennsylvania over its policies allowing trans women to compete in women’s sports.
A senior official said this is “just a taste” of further action, with UPenn at risk of losing all federal funding due to a Title IX investigation.
Trump signed an executive order on February 5 banning trans women from women’s sports, citing fairness and safety concerns.
Advocacy groups are challenging the move, arguing it discriminates against trans athletes.
I wouldn’t really call it bending the knee. Schools offer services to students and while making the statement (that trans people are still people) is important denying services to hundreds if not thousands of students (due to lack of funding) who may or may not agree with that position just to make the statement isn’t responsible as an institution.
I absolutely agree with their attempt to stand up for students rights, and I also agree with their turnaround. There’s a significant and nonzero chance that they could have hurt students even inadvertently by losing that funding and it was responsible of them to think of the entire student body even though the message is very important.
“First they came for the socialists” yada yada.
It’s nice to be privileged so you can ignore the sufferings of others, but eventually it will reach everyone.
This is such a pathetic cop-out reply it’s not even funny. As if every single person with the opinion that Universities shouldn’t, to the detriment of the entire student body, unilaterally decide for everyone who attends where their political beliefs should be absolutely must be privileged.
You don’t have to believe that transgenderism is wrong to believe that students should be the ones to decide if they feel that it’s right for genetic men to participate in women’s sports. It needs to be up to the students, and not the institutions to make that a policy. The University itself has no right to make that policy without the consent of the students in the same way they shouldn’t and couldn’t be allowed to segregate students based on race.
I support trans rights, because I support human rights. It’s not privileged to believe that a public institution has no right to decide the social zeitgeist for the student body–they have no right deciding what is or isn’t acceptable.
Wait so it’s not okay for universities to segregate students based on race, but it is okay for universities to segregate women based on their sex assigned at birth?
Like I think you have some anti-trans brainworms that you haven’t really looked at. My identity isn’t a political issue. It shouldn’t be up to the rest of the student body if I can participate fully at a university any more than it should be up to the rest of the student body if a black person can participate at the University fully.
Nor should it be up to a tyrant like fucking Trump. Which is what is actually happening here. Is political oppression and targeting of folks like me by somebody that is just like Hitler. And you are telling the university that they should bend the knee.
So yes, first they came for the socialists. But that’s not actually true, in this case, first they came for the immigrants and trans folks.
Human rights are not up to discussion or vote. It’s not the university or any institution that decide on that, they just have to ensure they are respected.
That’s actually exactly how a democratic republic works… Why you think that’s not the case is a little concerning.
In a democracy you’re allowed to have dissenting opinions. There are people out there that don’t believe kids deserve school lunches. I personally think that’s fucked up, but for me to have my freedoms, ideals and opinions, I have to concede that private citizens also have the freedom to think kids don’t deserve school lunches.
That’s how it works.
Slavery was perfectly legal according to the votes at that time.
Do you know what “human right” means?
And you do know that countries come together to vote on what a “human right” is, right? Because it doesn’t seem like it. What a human right is, and what you seem to think it is, are two entirely different things.
Lol you really need these universities, maybe someday you’ll get to attend one of them
Lol no. That’s just majority rule.
Democracy has a list of necessary prerequisites in the form of rights and duties. How is it democratic for the majority to be able to vote to kill the rest?
I’m not discussing anymore with someone who doesn’t have a basic grasp of the concepts.
I understand your rationale. And in fact, in 99% of circumstances I begrudgingly agree with it. Sometimes, you have to do what’s right for the greater good even if you know it might hurt a few people in the process. But this is not one of those times. And it’s not even because of the specific issues being raised (Protests at Columbia, trans athletes at UPenn, etc.).
The reason I’m against it is because by so quickly bending the knee for Trump on these issues is that you’re telling your students, community, and alumni that the principles you claim to stand for are up for bid. You’re in favor of trans rights – until trans rights start actually costing you money. You’re in favor of the rights of students to protest – until it effects your funding. What happens when a school promotes support of LGBT issues and then comes in the crosshairs of the Trump Hate Machine? “Sorry guys, but we’ve gotta kick all the gays out. Trump threatened to pull $100 million in funding if we don’t.”? Where do you draw the line?
It’s one thing to expect that of a regular business. Neither your local mom & pop store nor Wal-Mart are expected to be champions of our freedoms and hold such an important place in our society. Even if I strongly disagree with their decisions, I can understand if they follow where the political and financial winds are blowing. But universities are a completely different beast and play a completely different role in our society.
I also agree, however, you can’t unilaterally hurt he student body regardless of their beliefs. They also have rights which need and deserve to be protected. Some students might not agree with the official stance of the University and that’s a problem. In the end you’re playing with their future too.
It would be different if the entirety of the student body stood up and said “We support this!” no one would have any ground to stand on. But this isn’t a “majority rules” type of situation. The school cannot unilaterally make a political stance at the detriment of all students regardless of the student bodies political beliefs. It’s just not appropriate for a public institution to do. They have every right and absolutely should support all of their students. And they should do that by making a non-gendered league for their trans students or any other students who want to participate, to participate in. Then no one would be able to bitch.
But you have transgender females who were born male, who had the benefit of a decade or more of testosterone to build lean muscle mass that other female athletes don’t have. It’s literally the same affect as doping and they don’t see it as fair–and if you take the argument at face value, it’s not so crack pot as to not merit discussion.
Everyone has the right to participate in sports. Male, female, lemur, panda, whatever. The question is, is do genetic men have the right to participate in female sports.
Define genetic male and I swear to God I will find some holes in your argument because you have not examined this issue.
This is a human rights violation, trans women are women. Segregating people for political gain is fucking evil.
And your argument is that the university should do some evil so the bully doesn’t hit them harder with the stick?
You don’t stop bullies by giving them what they want. That just encourages them.
Anyway, your comments in this thread seriously did not land well.
You’re either somebody that thinks they’re an ally when they’re not, or your entire argument is disingenuous and you really don’t care about trans people at all.
My suspicion is that it’s the later
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Replace “trans students” with “black students” in your justification and ask yourself if you still believe doing what is good for the majority (not “the entirety”) is the most important directive.
This is exactly how fascism works. “First they came for…” and all.
Firstly, they’re not the same. Pretending that they are is beyond disingenuous. Secondly, segregation affected all institutions in a state. University, primary, public, private. Everything. This doesn’t. It affects a single University and not even the direct student body–only those who participate in sports. It’s also not segregate in nature–no one is saying “trans students can’t attend school here” they’re saying “only genetic females should count as female athletes.”
You’re right, there are like a dozen trans college athletes in the entire US. Good point.
You don’t need to layer more shit on the question until you can justify yourself, just answer the question. If UPenn was told to stop black people from playing sports, would you think it was correct and good for UPenn to conform because most of their students are not black athletes?
Since you won’t acknowledge your red herring even after it being specifically pointed out I just have to operate under the assumption that you’re being disingenuous purposefully. Since no discourse can even be had here because that’s not your intention to begin with, why would I continue this?
It’s pretty obvious that you disagree, and that’s fine. I’ll flip the script and shoot you a non-red herring in return but I’m really not going to bother responding, because I don’t feel like you’re here for any reason other than to wag your finger on your high horse at others perfectly reasonable opinions;
Do you believe that UPenn has the right to expel students who protest the war in Gaza? Can they unilaterally stand up and say “any student who protests genocide is expelled.”
I think that would be pretty fucked up. Hopefully you would, too. Which is why I think it’s best that Universities should be protecting the rights of all their students and not get involved directly in politics. They need to stand up for their trans students, but they also need to be there for their student athletes who have no personal objections to trans students, but don’t think its fair they get to compete in sports which are not for their birth gender. Which is a perfectly reasonable objection. Some of these women athletes work their entire lives to be seen by professional recruiters and if they’re outshined by controversy from trans athletes and the debate of whether or not they should even be there in the first place they could be passed up for entire careers. All things considered, they’re not crazy to give pause…and why Universities should have non-gendered leagues for sports where anyone can play regardless of gender. Why we reduce sports to male and female is so fucking stupid to begin with and such a stupid thing to fight over.
It’s a complicated issue with no black or white line. And you pretending like there is either wholeheartedly proves your mental immaturity to not be able to see other’s point of views at best, and at worse confirms your ignorance beyond any reasonable doubt.
That’s literally not standing up for rights. Their rights don’t extend to dictating who else can play sports because they think they’d be too good. Hey, you know another group that some people would claim, for some pretty suspect prejudices, they are too good at sports? Black people. There’s certainly a much more disproportionate number of top black athletes than there are top trans athletes.
Fucking lol, wall-of-text-man who still couldn’t explain precisely why he won’t answer the parallel question and has been universally downvoted since he explained his position enough to make the transphobia evident. Hopefully someday you’ll be embarrassed of your present self.
Yes it is. You can’t “stand up for rights” by infringing on another’s rights.
They’re not dictating who can play sports any more than they always have. There’s already a female league, which inherently means men can’t participate. Are you going to argue that having a women’s league is against the law or discriminatory in the first place? If that’s your stance, then you’re essentially agreeing with me that universities should transition from a gender-based system to an open, non-gendered system to be inclusive for all students–not just those who fit into clear, traditional gender roles. By doing that, literally no one would have any room to complain about transgender inclusion. It’s the obvious solution to everyone’s issues, but as a society, we’re so fixated on who has a penis and who has a vagina that we’re completely overlooking the simplicity and fairness of this approach. The best part is that it doesn’t infringe on anyone’s rights in the process…everyone is equal, everyone can participate and play, no one is excluded.
It’s almost as if people are free to have their own opinions about things, even when those opinions don’t align with the majority. Strange, right? Populism doesn’t bother me—it’s just the system functioning as it should. Frankly, I’m not impressed when someone holds the exact same opinion as a dozen or so random people on the internet. The fact that you think that’s how it should be is… odd to me. The way you feel things ought to be and the way they actually are will almost always differ. The reality is that even students who hold racist, sexist, xenophobic, or transphobic views also have rights, and you can’t trample on theirs without opening the door for everyone’s rights to be trampled on.
You can’t protect rights by taking them away from others. That’s not protecting rights–it’s just making yourself feel morally superior. It would be fantastic if trans individuals could compete without anyone having an issue with it. I’d fully support that. But that’s not the reality we live in, and denying that reality doesn’t help anyone, least of all trans students. Sitting behind your keyboard and declaring, “Things should be this way!”–even when that approach grants rights to one group by stripping them from another–helps absolutely no one. Using the justification of “haha, he’s getting downvoted, so that means I’m right!” is just plain silly. Sure, it might be an unpopular opinion, but that doesn’t determine whether it’s objectively true or not. Truth isn’t decided by popularity.
EDIT:
It’s almost like this is a serious issue and deserves more than 140 characters. Why you think that’s a bad thing is pretty fucked up. You’re not the advocate you think that you are here.
“now look what you made me do!”