Observations on the human condition

Anecdote is not data, I understand. 

The oldest granddaughter (8) participates in a summer swim league. The suburban neighborhood pools compete against each other. Yes, it is a thing. The teams around here are from 4-14 years old. Boys compete against boys, girls against girls in each age class (7/8, 9/10, etc.). The season consists of dual meets, pool team vs. pool team. 

Thursday was the big final meet, all of the teams competed in a big invitational-type tournament. There were hundreds of kids competing in the high school pool. Here is the thing, in every single age class, in every different stroke, the boys’ average times, and especially winning times, was faster than the girls’. I will leave it to you to draw your own conclusions about trans athletes and sports. *

One final observation. The teams are coached by high school kids for the most part. At the end of the tournament there was a coaches’ race. In this one, the race was not segmented by gender nor age. The male coaches won every single race. a couple of the female coaches from granddaughter’s team are varsity swimmers on the Carmel High School girl’s swim team. They lost to the boys as well. 

So what, you say? The Carmel girls swim team is No ordinary program. You read that right, if you clicked the link, thirty-seven straight years. Reagan was President the last time someone else won. Ponder that. They still lost to the teenaged boys. 

Tell me again that gender is a construct. 

*yes, some of the girls beat some of the boys’ times that is not what I wrote.