Transgender chess players

[NickFaulks]

But that's referring to a qualification to a zonal tournament, not to an interzonal tournament.

I tripped up over that too, but it really doesn't alter the point Djuna is making.

Wikipedia say she "narrowly missed qualifying for the Zonal". Well, yes.

[NickFaulks]

Quite right. Not all female players are in favour of the female playing titles though.

Some of those against have already got their own IM title, so are established on the Open ladder. Perhaps their opinions should not be given full weight either.

[Matt Bridgeman]

Quite right. Not all female players are in favour of the female playing titles though.

Some of those against have already got their own IM title, so are established on the Open ladder. Perhaps their opinions should not be given full weight either.

I think it’s definitely quite a tricky subject. I know a few English girl players coming up to the point of being able to claim WCM titles and there are mixed feeling. They don’t love the gender discrimination aspect and don’t necessarily want woman’s only titles, but on the other hand it does lead to increased status in the chess community and does have a nice goal structure for progression to 2100, 2200 etc. And the other hand we don’t really have any players on the female only European professional circuit full-time, and perhaps players on the continent have less mixed feelings. It’s unclear.

[Chris Goodall]

You can't legislate for every scenario that might occur - all you can do is use a common sense approach when it does.

Challenge accepted!

So would we allow into a women's chess tournament:

• Abigail, a post-transition trans woman (yes)
• Bella, a pre-transition trans woman awaiting an appointment with the gender identity clinic (yes)
• Charley, a pre-transition trans woman presenting as a man and refusing to answer your polite enquiries about where she sees her transition journey taking her (yes?)
• Davide, a post-transition trans man (no)
• Erling, a pre-transition trans man awaiting an appointment with the gender identity clinic (yes?)
• Freddy, a pre-transition trans man presenting as a woman and refusing to answer your polite enquiries about where he sees his transition journey taking him (yes)
• Grover, a person presenting as male but labelled F in the grading list (yes)
• Harrie, a person presenting as female but labelled M in the grading list (yes)
• Indigo, a person of entirely ambiguous gender who isn't supplying any more information (yes?)
• Jaylen, a person who identifies publicly as non-binary (yes)
• Ky'ren, a person who identifies publicly as genderfluid, as in, sometimes they feel male and sometimes female (no?)
• Louie, a male-to-female-to-male detransitioner (no)
• Maya, a female-to-male-to-female detransitioner (yes)
• Northwind, a Native American two-spirit individual (yes)
• Olivier, a male cross-dresser (no)
• Pearl, a natal man who has gone through facial feminisation surgery and presents female, but refers to themself as a biological male and Pearl as simply a "persona" that makes them comfortable, since they don't actually believe people can change sex (yes?)
• Quinn, a person with Dissociative Identity Disorder whose alters include people of multiple genders including female, and who has entered the tournament under "Rose", a female alter, but can't promise to remain Rose for any part of the tournament (no?)
• Sabrina, a trans woman who will enter the tournament only on condition that you don't harm her by pairing her against anyone she deems transphobic (no?)
• Toby, a bearded gravel-voiced man who is openly attempting to troll the tournament organisers by identifying as a woman for the duration of the tournament, and recording the resulting awkwardness for his YouTube show (no)
• Ursula, a trans woman who was previously on the grading list as Brian with a grade of 2000, but now wants to enter the Minor, claiming Brian doesn't exist any more and accusing you of deadnaming her by associating her with Brian (no)

[Djuna Tree]

You can't legislate for every scenario that might occur - all you can do is use a common sense approach when it does.

So would we allow into a women's chess tournament:

(list)

A tournament organiser is not entitled to this level of information about players. You admit people who have F on the grading list. If they have M, they are statistically far more likely to have had this entered incorrectly by an organiser (putting male as default) than they are to be transgender. The ECF manages this via self-identification (same as for players who aren't trans) and you can offer your help with correcting inaccurate data as for any other player.

What you don't do is make your best guess based on their appearance. You are more likely to discriminate against a masculine-looking woman who isn't trans this way. We know that baseless rumours have followed numerous athletes far in excess of the tiny proportion of the population who are trans -- because the misogynistic scrutiny of women's bodies affects all women, and is not specific to trans women.

[Ian Thompson]

So would we allow into a women's chess tournament:

• Jaylen, a person who identifies publicly as non-binary (yes)

That one's not a hypothetical question.

Someone meeting that description played in this year's British Championship and would have been equal first if deemed eligible for the British Women’s Championship.

[Roger de Coverly]

As I understand it the floor for female players was 2000 (rather than 1900), and the argument was that this hurt women playing in all-female events as it brought average female ratings down. Susan Polgar (aka Polgár Zsuzsanna) was excluded from the 100-point bonus on the ground that she played in exclusively open tournaments and so had not been disadvantaged.

My recollection was that it was 1900 which became 2000 when they added the 100. That was followed shortly afterwards by the extension down to 2000 for male players.

The argument about playing only in open tournaments appled just as much to British players and probably Western European as well. It's quite possible that there was enough BCF influence in FIDE if not to talk them out of the addition, but not to discriminate against British players whilst doing so.

[Roger de Coverly]

So would we allow into a women's chess tournament:

Interesting list!

If it's an Open tournament, they can all play, but there's still the problem of special and reserved prizes.

Leagues that have gender based rules would have a similar problem.

[Gerard Killoran]

I think you misunderstand 'non-binary', i.e. someone who doesn't identify as a man or a woman, and as such would enter the Open section.

To enter the Women's section would be to choose the very binary option of identifying as a woman.

[Matt Bridgeman]

Also on ‘the list’ of hypotheticals might be a reasonable sized group of young females who went through gender reassignment to male, and have regretted it as it did not cure their body dysmorphia. And now want to/are transitioning back. They culturally have a lot to deal with, and I would think they should be a ‘yes’ if wanting to enter female only chess competitions during that process.

[Djuna Tree]

Also on ‘the list’ of hypotheticals might be a reasonable sized group of young females who went through gender reassignment to male, and have regretted it as it did not cure their body dysmorphia. And now want to/are transitioning back. They culturally have a lot to deal with, and I would think they should be a ‘yes’ if wanting to enter female only chess competitions during that process.

Again, I cannot imagine why a tournament organiser would have or need this amount of information about a player.

[Geoff Chandler]

Adding to the hypothetical in the extreme cases.

Some FIDE member countries may not allow their players to play v a transgender person because going transgender is illegal in their own country. Or due to that law or a religious reason the player themselves might refuse to play v a transgender person. You could get a situation where an Israeli transgender person turns up and half the tournament will not play against them.

[Chris Goodall]

Also on ‘the list’ of hypotheticals might be a reasonable sized group of young females who went through gender reassignment to male, and have regretted it as it did not cure their body dysmorphia. And now want to/are transitioning back. They culturally have a lot to deal with, and I would think they should be a ‘yes’ if wanting to enter female only chess competitions during that process.

Absolutely - there's a podcast I listen to hosted by two journalists who were fired from their publications for profiling detransitioners in a very neutral and caveated way, because trans rights advocates have historically staked rather too much on the idea that detransitioners don't exist.

I mentioned Maya the female-to-male-to-female detransitioner as a Yes. If Maya hasn't started transitioning back, she is in the same position as a pre-transition natal male (Bella), who is also a Yes.

What you don't do is make your best guess based on their appearance. You are more likely to discriminate against a masculine-looking woman who isn't trans this way. We know that baseless rumours have followed numerous athletes far in excess of the tiny proportion of the population who are trans -- because the misogynistic scrutiny of women's bodies affects all women, and is not specific to trans women.

I have never proposed either guessing or misogynistically scrutinising, in fact it seems your answers line up perfectly with mine.

[Djuna Tree]

Adding to the hypothetical in the extreme cases.

Some FIDE member countries may not allow their players to play v a transgender person because going transgender is illegal in their own country. Or due to that law or a religious reason the player themselves might refuse to play v a transgender person. You could get a situation where an Israeli transgender person turns up and half the tournament will not play against them.

The offensive practice of refusing to play Israelis is not a protected right. If I refused to play someone I would expect to forfeit at best and be disqualified at worst.

I am also unaware of a religion that prohibits playing board games with transgender people, or a jurisdiction which forbids doing so overseas, but I am open to correction.

[NickFaulks]

There would be enough press interest to expose a fraud.

But under current rules it wouldn't be a fraud. That is the entire point.

FIDE accepts the information provided by the federation and they accept the information provided by the player, as supported by national legislation. Canada provides for 100% self-certification, no questions asked. This means that under current rules a player may be eligible to play in FIDE Women's events if they live in Canada, maybe not in England and if they are in Iran.... I wish someone would explain to me how that can possibly be right.

You hear the argument that FIDE could simply say to an obvious impostor "that's not right, you're out". Believe me, they couldn't. I can almost guarantee that CAS would say, if you didn't want this to happen then you shouldn't have drafted your regulations to allow it. It would be expensive.