Ohio is coming up
with a law that will ban transgender girls from participating in sporting
events meant exclusively for girls. A doctor will be required to verify if a
student’s sex is called into question.
The bill, which
will now go to the state senate from the House of Representatives, was a
last-minute addition to an unrelated bull that passed in a marathon session
Wednesday, the first day of Pride month.
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The law coming up
in Ohio will need students whose sex is “disputed” to provide a physician’s
statement verifying “internal and external reproductive anatomy” and other
criteria. Schools in Ohio who violate the proposal are likely to face lawsuits.
Republican
proponents of the legislation say the move will give girls a level-playing field
in sports. In Ohio, less than 20 transgender girls have been approved to play
high school sports in the state in the last 10 years, according to Equality
Ohio.
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Democrats and
other opponents of the law say that it is harmful, unnecessary target an
already marginalised and vulnerable group.
The bill states
that if an athlete’s “sex is disputed,” they are required to show a doctor’s
statement “indicating the participant’s sex” based on their “internal and
external reproductive anatomy, normal endogenously produced levels of testosterone
and an analysis of the participant’s genetic makeup.”
The updated bill
now includes text from the separate Save Women’s Sports Act and requires
schools, private colleges and state universities to set up separate single-sex
teams for the male sex and the female sex.
Seventeen states
in the US are said to have implemented laws outlawing transgender students
participating in sports teams consistent with their gender identity.
While the law
requires a physician’s intervention when a student’s gender is disputed, it
does not detail what would constitute a student’s gender being “in dispute.”
