ACLU can not undo 160 million years of evolution

Apparently the American Civil Liberties Union doesn’t know the difference between sex and gender, but then what can you expect from a bunch of liberal lawyers who are more interested in making a headline than they are in knowing anything about biology or understanding the law?

In March 2020, the Idaho Legislature passed and Gov. Brad Little signed into law House Bill 500, the Fairness in Women’s Sports Act, which prohibits biological males from competing against biological females in public school and collegiate sports within the state.

They were correct in passing this law because when it comes to sports competitions of this nature, sex matters.

But the ACLU would have it otherwise. In the 19th edition of Taber’s Cyclopedic Medical Dictionary, the section on chromosomes informs the reader that at the moment of fertilization in a human, the biological sex of the embryo is determined in a random manner when the sex chromosomes from the sperm unite with the sex chromosomes from the ovum.

The female sex chromosome from the ovum always contributes an X to the embryo while the male sex chromosome can be either an X or a Y. If the combination is XX, then you have a female embryo. And if it’s an XY combination, than you have a male embryo.

Those are the only two combinations and this is a hard scientific fact.

There’s no LBX or YQ squared combinations.

You’re an XX female or an XY male and you will be one of those from the time you’re conceived to when you die.

When it comes to sports, XX does not equal XY because Y doesn’t equal X. The scientific literature from institutions such as the University of California-Berkeley will tell you that 160 million to 180 million years ago, give or take a couple of weeks, the male determining gene began to originate on the future Y chromosome and that the Y chromosome started to become specialized for male genes.

Skipping forward to present day, the Y chromosome only has about 3 percent of the functioning genes that it once did. So it’s no longer equal to an X chromosome. It does, however, determine a male sex human, which has physiological differences resulting in a being that among other traits has denser, stronger bones, larger hearts and a greater development of type 2 muscle fibers than a female human.

Those differences allow a male to produce higher amounts of speed and power during physical activity, which is a competitive advantage in almost every sport — shooting, sailing and equestrian events being the exceptions.

A transgender individual is a person of one biological sex who desires to be identified and function as a person of the other biological sex.

America, being a free country, allows individuals the freedom to do so within the limits that all other citizens face, such as representing oneself as someone else for criminal or fraudulent purposes. A transgender person can sculpt their body and undergo hormonal therapy if they so desire to achieve their goal.

What they can’t do, however, is change their genetic makeup from a XX to XY or vice versa. They will remain the biological sex that they were at conception.

The Fairness in Women’s Sports Act, which I dare say most of the opposition to it hasn’t read, does not prohibit transgender individuals from competing in sports activities at primary or secondary schools or at institutions of higher education. What it does define is that sports teams at public schools based on biological sex will be either male — men or boys; female — women or girls; or coed or mixed and that athletic teams or sports designated for females, women or girls shall not be open to students of the male sex.

A biological male who wishes to be identified as a female can still compete against males in his chosen identity. What he can’t do is to pass himself off as a biological female in the arenas of sports competition.

The ACLU and others say that this law is addressing a problem that doesn’t exist. My reply is that it is a problem that should never be allowed to exist.

I’ve had the privilege to watch several daughters of friends of mine as they trained for high school track and cross-country competitions. During their tenure, they trained year-round to be successful at the highest levels of competition.

Any young women who desires to put in that amount of time and dedication in hopes of a scholarship at a higher level of education or competition deserves a fair chance against others of her same biological sex rather than someone whose genetic makeup gives them a distinct advantage.

The ACLU says that this legislation is unconstitutional. The U.S. Department of Justice disagrees.

On June 19, 2020, the DOJ filed a statement of interest defending the constitutionality of Idaho’s Fairness in Women’s Sports Act. The DOJ stated that the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution does not require states to abandon their efforts to provide biological women with equal opportunity to compete for, and enjoy, the lifelong benefits that flow from participation in school athletics in order to accommodate the team preferences of transgender athletes.

HB 500 opponents want gender identity to equal a person’s sex. It’s not. No matter how you change your body’s appearance, 160 million years of sex gene evolution is going to trump it.

So identify yourself and live as you wish. But you’re always going to be the XX or XY that you were conceived as.

Hassoldt is a field forester who lives in Kendrick.