Just to be clear, I fully agree with you. Trans persons should be represented in all levels of sport. Banning these althetes is asinine and needlessly cruel. Including trans althetes endangers nothing, and would strengthen the sport and it’s community of fans in the long run.

But what bothers me, and what I mean by sports being taken too seriously, is how anti-trans crusaders will use people’s tendency to regard sports as something that’s almost sacred to further their agenda. I get this sense that there are people who don’t have a problem with the trans community outside of this issue, but who back anti-trans measures and politicans because they fear the fabric of our society will crumble if sports aren’t safeguarded somehow. They act almost as if a church is being defiled. They fetizie this idea of “fair play” and hero athletes to the point that people openly hate someone for using steroids but don’t seem care if their teammate commits domestic abuse. That phenomenon gets used as a wedge on election day.

But come on, unless you compete, it’s mostly entertainment. It’s just a show to watch. At the end of the day, the role sports play in most people’s lives is little different than anything else on TV. Some people go to cons and collect merch, other people go to ball games and collect memorabilia.

Right-wing outrage over representation in TV and movies has made the market shift, but I still feel like there’s a broad majority of voters from both sides that don’t seem to care and just watch whatever despite the noise they make on socials. Right-wing outrage over representation in sports has gotten actual legislation passed. The difference seems to say that sports play an outsized role in our collective gestalt or whatever. That we take, what is for most entertainment, a little too seriously.

Or it could just be that I’ve had too much caffeine today. I dunno. Like I said, it’s hard for me to put this in words.