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Fear, Loathing, and Empty Gestures: UK Legislation on Sport and the Transgender Participant

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Transgender and Intersex: Theoretical, Practical, and Artistic Perspectives

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Abstract

The Gender Recognition Act 2004, s.19—which sought to restrict transgendered persons’ opportunities to participate in sports—was never argued before the courts of the UK before being repealed by the Equality Act 2010. The 2004 Act had sought to ban participation of transgendered persons in sports if their involvement was not conducive to either ‘competitive fairness’ or ‘safety’. This chapter explores the legal difficulties that were always bound to exist in enforcing a prohibition on either ground. It considers the relevant medical literature and fundamental legal principles that are common to most European jurisdictions in order to illustrate the difficulty of introducing lawful, effective constraints on transgender participation, and argues in favor of inclusivity for all sports participants.

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For an earlier version of this chapter, see McArdle (works cited list). Material from that paper is reproduced with the kind permission of Sage. This chapter was initially intended as joint paper with my colleague Alexandra Veuthey, but as the project developed it became apparent that we had radical differences of opinion over transgender participation and the adequacy of the sporting and juridical field’s responses to it. For her well-argued views on this challenging area of law, see Veuthey (works cited list).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Law, Stirling University, Scotland, UK

    David McArdle

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  1. David McArdle
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  1. Dresden University of Technology, Dresden, Germany

    Stefan Horlacher

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McArdle, D. (2016). Fear, Loathing, and Empty Gestures: UK Legislation on Sport and the Transgender Participant. In: Horlacher, S. (eds) Transgender and Intersex: Theoretical, Practical, and Artistic Perspectives. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-71325-7_3

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