Politics drive many of us to eliminating consideration of critical factors over a contentious societal issue.

Societal issues such as trans athletes in women's sports are complex and are due in-depth open discourse.

What is considered fair and unfair in societal achievement is complex and open to critical analysis.

In the many overpoliticized discussions that rage across our media, it seems that an awful lot of cognitive dissonance must be processed, as all sides are forced to ignore the multifaceted complexities of a controversial societal/cultural issue to stay affixed to a set of selected supporting considerations (confirmation bias). Take, for instance, the discourse over trans athletes in women’s sports. Let’s dissect one of the key points made in the related discourse—that is, that trans athletes enjoy an unfair advantage if they are allowed to compete in women’s sports.

Athletics Select for Top Performers

The crux of athletics is a competition to see who is best at some specified physical task(s)—be it on the individual or team level. It is argued that the physical build of a biological male athlete—no matter downstream hormonal or surgical interventions—may push the athlete past the top-performing biological women, thus giving the biological male an “unfair” advantage.

But isn’t some form of advantage precisely what athletic competition selects for and rewards? What therefore denotes "fair" versus "unfair"? Sure, hard work, positive attitude, and effort can take an athlete a certain distance, but the more “competitive” the contests, the more various forms of innate (unfair?) advantages come to light.

It was said that Michael Phelps had the perfect body for competitive swimming. This advantage was bestowed upon him by his genes, as would greater percentages of fast-twitch muscle fiber in a sprinter, or better VO2 Max in an endurance athlete. Reaction time, kinesthetics, hormonal levels, strength, height, mass, eye-hand coordination, balance, flexibility, vision, foot speed, and other principally genetically determined factors will confer........

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