BBC Sport: our submission to the Thematic Review

This was submitted to the BBC last year as part of the Review of Portrayal and Representation.

We deliberately limited our examples. There are too many to cite, and almost all BBC Sports coverage has made the same repeated mistakes.

The issues with Sport are very specific and frankly enormous.

– male people entering female sports categories (rather than vice versa)

– at elite level and grassroots level

– the males (men and boys) may be transgender or have a difference of sexual development (DSD)

– journalists need to understand and track complex sets of regulations and biological detail

– and stay across developments and competitions both globally and domestically, including international laws on transgender recognition

There is a need for proactive impartial management. It’s a huge job.

Where is the current bias?

• Refusal and reluctance to use the word ‘male’ for males, linked with the refusal to ‘neutralise’ copy by using alternative terms to ‘female’ such as ‘the athlete’, ‘the runner’, ‘the player’ and so on

• Bias by omission, including failure to cover the personal journeys/lived experiences of sportswomen who have lost out on team places, medals, sponsorships, prizes and other opportunities due to trans-identified males, and failure to cover the issue as it affects grassroots sport,

• Language and principle of affirmation across all coverage.

• Failure to supply accurate fact checks on male/female advantage, race data, DSDs and male/female biology in order to support producers and presenters

• Wilful inaccuracy on the sex of athletes

We believe there’s evidence of weak editorial management.

There’s a lack of clear internal guidance within Sport on impartiality and accuracy. It may be that they don’t understand what impartiality is.

No specific language guide for Sport to deal with its particular difficulties

Internal gender identity activism embedded in the department

The absence of fact checks means that problems with outward-facing content will keep repeating themselves. This can only be managed proactively.

Examples

Refusal to say male

‘World Athletics bans transgender women from competing in female world ranking events’

‘UK Athletics bans transgender women from competing in female category’

We’ve picked out these two because they not only showcase a number of the problems outlined, they purport to act as fact checks. BBC colleagues will use these as a resource.

At no point does the BBC make clear that the athletes being referred to are men. This is the reason for the story and the controversy, but we know that hundreds of thousands of people, if not millions do not understand ‘transgender women’ to mean males. The BBC should be clear.

The athletes are described as ‘transgender women’ and ‘‘transgender athletes’ - from inaccurate to misleading. There are also references to ‘trans inclusion’ and ‘trans eligibility’ which could apply to females as well as males. The references to ‘male puberty’ and the female category (in quotes only) are insufficient and serve only to confuse.

Why does it matter?

A story about males in female categories needs to explain that the issue is - males in female categories. Whatever sophistry is deployed to try to justify leaving out this crucial information, it does not spring from the principles of journalism. The BBC’s job is to inform, not to behave as an activist. The reason male trans people adopt female pronouns is to tell people that they’re female. This is what it does for the BBC audience, and it's inaccurate/misleading.

Their maleness is of paramount importance: because there is no problem with the inclusion of trans female (XX) athletes in female categories.

The refusal to say male is a perennial failure for the BBC. The Review team could ask Sport why they do this - it’s not required by UK law or by Ofcom.

If the BBC persists in wishing to avoid male pronouns, the solution is obvious. After clearly explaining that the athlete is male, use neutral descriptors (footballer/ runner/ sprinter/ the name).

It’s not preferable to using male pronouns, but even this seems to be an option that Sport is reluctant to take.

Recommendation: It’s essential for audience understanding that the BBC learns to say ‘male’, and, where possible, use male pronouns. Female descriptors and pronouns should be avoided.

Another common language bias is the trope that sports governing bodies are ‘choosing between inclusion and fairness’. This is misleading. Male ‘inclusion’ always means that a female is ‘excluded’. Either from a team place, a podium, a sponsorship, a title, a prize. It shouldn’t be uncritically described as inclusion.

An easy solution is available: say ‘maintaining fairness’ instead. Stop using inclusion as an all-encompassing term for males entering female categories. ‘Maintaining fairness’ is shorter, it’s more accurate, and it’s not misleading.

The use of the word ‘inclusion’ is a giveaway that BBC Sport defaults to the side of the transgender athlete. Another is the framing of stories as ‘trans rights’ and ‘the future of sport for trans people’.

This is a story about women’s sport and female athletes, and what kind of future they have when males can self-identify into it.

Women’s sport has always been treated as second class. But just as we see sponsorships, success and prizes rising, we see more and more male athletes ‘retiring’ into female sport or switching ‘between sexes’ to their own advantage.

BBC Sport seems blind to the wider impact on female elite and grassroots sport. Portraying the issue only with a ‘trans’ framing reveals a significant bias.

Bias by omission - data

‘Under previous rules, World Athletics required transgender women to reduce their amount of blood testosterone to a maximum of 5nmol/L, and stay under this threshold continuously for a period of 12 months before competing in the female category’

The reason for this rule (much higher natural male testosterone) is not given, nor the relevant detail: ’This is about twice as high as the uppermost normal testosterone level for a female, which is 0.5 to 2.4 n/Mol. Normal male testosterone levels are 10 to 35 n/mol.’

In fact it also misses the opportunity to say it later in this sentence: ‘It had proposed that transgender women would have to reduce their blood testosterone level to below 2.5nmol/L for two years, bringing it in line with amendments made last year by the UCI, cycling's world governing body.’ Here was the opportunity to say that 2.5n/mol is the highest normal female level. This omission looks deliberate throughout.

The BBC seems unable or unwilling to link to data, and particularly data on how male bodies are changed by testosterone whether or not hormone levels are later reduced. Transgender advocates are very clear that ‘puberty cannot be reversed’ (it’s the argument for allowing children to be prescribed puberty blockers) - so it’s important to inform the reader that certain male advantages are locked in. The Sports Editor will be able to explain this to the gender identity affirmative members of his team.

We recommend that the BBC for the first time publishes a fact check on the biological differences between males and females, with specific reference to Sport: including testosterone levels, skeletal differences, musculature: what male puberty actually does to the male body, and how it is not possible to reverse most of those impacts.

In order to produce it they must broaden their range of sources. We have recommended Dr Emma Hilton before but there is also Colin Wright, (US based) and of course Robert Winston and Richard Dawkins are two very high profile and reliable scientists. The BBC still repeatedly uses Joanna Harper without interrogating the flaws in his own study, which was not peer-reviewed.

‘An independent chair will lead the group which will also include ..a transgender athlete’

The BBC omits to explain if this will be a male athlete helping to determine whether males should compete in female sports, nor whether a female advocate will attend. It’s relevant.

The BBC omits any reference to the fact that the ‘ban’ in the headline does not apply to transgender females. This is because if they were to use testosterone or steroids in order to enter the male category, they would be disqualified. This only refers to males, but it’s not made clear, and most people will not understand that.

The Review team hopefully will not assume that its own knowledge and beliefs are matched by those of the BBC audience.

Language guidance

‘In February, UK Athletics said it wanted a change in legislation to ensure the women's category is lawfully reserved for competitors who are recorded female at birth.’

‘Many argue that transgender women should not compete in elite women's sport because of any advantages they may retain - but others argue that sport should be more inclusive. The debate centres on the balance of inclusion, sporting fairness and safety in women's sport - essentially, whether transgender women can compete in female categories without an unfair advantage.’

‘Fina, now known as World Aquatics, also aimed to establish an 'open' category at competitions, for swimmers whose gender identity is different than their sex observed at birth’

Both articles frame the entry of male athletes in female sports as inclusion/inclusive and decline all opportunities to describe the athletes as male. We’ve explained why the BBC should not use ‘inclusion’ as a framing for males entering female sports categories, especially not as a contrast to ‘not competing because of retained advantages’. It portrays women who don’t want to compete against those with an unfair advantage as ‘the excluders’.

Inclusive and exclusive are loaded terms. Inclusive is a positive portrayal, exclusive is a negative portrayal. Women who want to retain single sex sport should not be portrayed negatively.

The phrase 'competitors who are recorded female at birth’ implies that sex can change and that males can become female. There’s no need to add the qualifier recorded / observed at birth. The word ‘female’ can simply be used. In contrast, men are not described as ‘recorded male at birth’ - they are given the word 'women'.

The BBC has chosen the most convoluted language throughout both articles to obfuscate the fact that males are entering female categories, and this rule applies only to them, that there are only males and females, and that males have on average natural physical advantages.

Suggestions:

• Recognise that the word ‘inclusion’ is misleading and one-sided, advise against using it to refer to male athletes in female sport

• Accurately describe males and females as men/males and women/females.

• Recommend against the phrase ‘sex recorded/assigned/observed at birth’ (except when referring to athletes with DSDs) - it implies there is another kind of sex.

• Do not use the phrase ‘gender identity’ unless attributed: it is not scientifically substantiated that everyone has a gender identity.

We won’t analyse any more articles because these are the same fundamental problems which are repeated over and over through BBC Sport output. It is not for lack of evidence that we limit the links. Here are three more, but the Review team may check any BBC article on transgender males in female categories during the relevant period and will be able to identify similar issues.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/cycling/65718748

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/cycling/66203709

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/67482965

Bias by omission - ‘lived experience’

There has been a real shortage of voices of the women who have lost out on medals, sponsorship, prizes, team places, podium places and so on, including the voices of grassroots players and even young sportswomen or their parents.

This is in contrast to the voices of male transgender athletes who have been profiled or given sympathetic interviews and airtime by BBC Sport. Rachel McKinnon, Valentina Petrillo, Emily Bridges, Philippa York, Charlie Martin, Harriet Haynes, Blair Hamilton, Sammy Walker, to name a few.

A specific example from the required time frame would be this article on Harriet Haynes. Haynes became Women’s Pool Champion of Champions after his opponent Lynne Pinches conceded, on the grounds it was unfair to ask her to play against a male opponent (men have longer reach, are taller etc).

So here were three possible stories for the BBC: a straight report of what happened, linked to fact checks of male/female differences: a sympathetic profile of Harriet Haynes: or a sympathetic profile of Lynne Pinches.

It declined to publish the straight report, and it decided not to interview Lynne Pinches. Instead it published a highly sympathetic piece on the transgender player (linked). Note that male advantage is merely ‘claimed’: that implicit blame is ascribed to Pinches for the ‘abuse’: that female pronouns were used even when they could be avoided.

The comments from Fair Play Women and Lynne Pinches had to be added after publication due to multiple complaints that could really be described as outrage. The initial piece was simply a one-sided point of view. The Sports team didn’t even approach Pinches.

Due to internal and external pressure, Lynne Pinches was eventually interviewed, but the piece was repeatedly delayed, and not published for about another month.

What does this tell us?

There’s no instinct or desire towards telling the female story. It’s a knee jerk default to male. And it’s an example of BBC Sport dealing with the issue by firefighting rather than behaving proactively.

Sex and gender in sport is so controversial that editorial management should have been across the story when it first happened. The Sport Online Editor should have been alerted to look out for pieces from Nations and Regions (this was a Wales piece) which would need extra attention to ensure impartiality. It could have ensured that Salford itself wrote the story, and that both players were approached and given the same treatment.

Instead it allowed the BBC to drift into the worst possible outcome. Bias to the point of activism, a huge groundswell of complaints, trust lost - and not fully restored despite the corrections ultimately made a month later.

We suggest that there is a shift in editorial management towards a more decisive and forward thinking approach. Ensure that everyone involved in covering this story is able to acknowledge the facts around biological sex, whatever their beliefs on whether males should be included in female categories. Reassure teams that there will be no repercussions for accurate reporting or for pitching stories that don’t fit a gender activist approach.

Here’s an example of what the BBC should do more often. BBC Sport deserves praise for it.

‘Transgender athletes: 'Protect women's sport,' say two British elite athletes’

It’s the ‘personal journey’ of two female athletes who feel excluded and mistreated - the only piece the BBC has ever published like this, in more than ten years of controversy. Note that the athletes had to remain anonymous. A need for anonymity is sometimes used to justify not doing a story. But that level of fear and potential repercussion which female athletes endure is a story in itself, not a reason for ignoring it. BBC Sport should be willing to publish more similar.

Activism within BBC Sport

In every department at the BBC, there are people who believe that sex is determined by the brain, by identity. People are of course entitled to hold that belief, and it only becomes a problem for the output when they allow it to interfere with accuracy or impartiality.

It’s undeniable that there are gender identity advocates in BBC Sport, and it could colour their work. It needs careful management. Editors need to lose their fear of being described as transphobic merely for focusing on facts and untold stories of women.

Here are two articles that give off a strong sense of advocacy.

Transgender chess decision: New Fide rules criticised by players but welcomed by committee chair

The article is built on the very idea that this is a mystifying decision.

Ban on trans-women in female category 'fails cycling community'

There is no reason to interview this man: he’s not female, he’s not transgender, he’s not affected, he’s absolutely irrelevant - he just has an opinion that suits gender advocates. These are the choices that BBC Sport is making in its representation of sex and gender in sport.

Differences of sexual development

We have chosen this article which acts as a fact check both internally and externally.

Caster Semenya Q&A: Who is she and why is her case important?

‘For the first time in several years, Caster Semenya has spoken publicly about her experiences as a world famous elite athlete born with differences of sexual development (DSD).’

If you are not already aware that Caster Semenya is male, you will not become aware of it through reading this article, unless you reach the 23rd paragraph and are able to understand:

‘Semenya's specific DSD was confirmed as 46 XY 5-ARD (5-alpha-reductase deficiency)’

and in addition are able to understand that ‘people with this particular DSD have the male XY chromosomes’ means that he is, in fact, a male: therefore this is a story about a male in a female category, not a different kind of woman.

Given that every other reference in the article is to Semenya as female, the reader will assume that Semenya is an unusual type of female with XY chromosomes.

Note: BBC Sport originally excluded this detail about the specific DSD that Semenya has. Despite the fact that this is billed as a Q and A, the most important information was omitted. At the bottom is a note that explains the article had to be updated to include the detail that identifies Semenya as male. This happened only after an outpouring of complaints.

BBC Sport should not be outsourcing its fact-checking to people who can navigate the BBC complaints system or share their expertise on social media. Again, this was fire-fighting, and it was made necessary by an initial reluctance to explain that Semenya has a male DSD.

These phrases in the 2nd and 7th paragraph install the false idea that Semenya is an unusual female:

‘the rules that prevent her and other DSD athletes with elevated testosterone levels from competing in women's elite races’

‘she has an elevated level of testosterone - a hormone that can increase muscle mass and strength’

Semenya is not a female with high levels of testosterone. He is a male with normal levels of testosterone for a male, and a female birth certificate. We know his DSD, so we know that these levels of testosterone would have kicked in at puberty and affected his development irreversibly.

Other bias is more subtle.

‘Athletes with 5-ARD have "circulating testosterone at the level of the male 46 XY population and not at the level of the female 46 XX population", which gives them "a significant sporting advantage over 46 XX female athletes"’ is in quotes attributed to CAS.

In fact they are verifiable and science-based statements which (as this is a fact check) the BBC could confirm. Putting them in quotes leaves them open to doubt. In fact the Review team themselves will assume there is a reason for the quotes, and that they are in doubt

They are not in doubt, and the BBC should not suggest they are. A sports scientist (Ross Tucker) or a biologist (we have already linked some) could help with backgrounders on this.

The glossary is also deeply captured.

‘Differences of sexual development: DSD is a group of rare conditions whereby a person's hormones, genes and/or reproductive organs may be a mix of male and female characteristics. Some of those affected prefer the term "intersex". 46 XY 5-ARD is a specific type of DSD’

Crucial omission: every person on the planet is male or female. No one is in between the sexes, and any particular DSD is diagnosed according to the sex of the person. It’s not hard to make this clear but the BBC chooses not to.

‘Intersex: An umbrella term used to describe people who are born with biological variations in their sex characteristics that don't fit typical male or female categories’

See above. This adds nothing, it’s padding, and confirms the impression that people can be neither male nor female, or can be both, none of which is true.

‘Hyperandrogenism: A medical condition characterised by higher than usual levels of androgens, or male sex hormones, the most common of which is testosterone.’

This is very misleading indeed: and it does look either deliberate or ignorant. Including this in the Semenya glossary is designed to give the impression that this is the condition that Semenya has. In fact hyperandrogenism is a condition mainly seen in females (in males it generally has a negligible effect, as T levels are already high). In females the effect is virilisation, but Semenya, we know, is not female, and his virilisation is from naturally circulating testosterone.

Notice that this condition (hyperandrogenism, a mainly female condition) is given a separate section, but 46 XY ARD is not, even though that is the actual condition (a male condition) that Semenya does have. There is a great deal more to say about 46 XY ARD: including that the chief impact of this DSD is on the external genitalia, which is why they can look like girls when they’re born and are ‘assigned’ female at birth. Testicles are usually present internally, and - at puberty - testosterone acts in the normal way, as on all boys. This may be news to the Review team but it shouldn’t be - the article should explain it. It’s billed as a fact check but it leaves the reader thinking Semenya is female.

Detailing the DSD would draw attention to the fact that Semenya is male, and not female. Is this why it was omitted, even though it’s 100 per cent more relevant than hyperandrogenism?

There is no way the BBC should assume its readers will head off to research complex DSD biology after reading this article, in order to understand that Caster Semenya is a male, and that this issue is about male people in female sports categories. It is not a reasonable assumption.

The one useful sentence is this:

‘Some are assigned female or male at birth depending on their external genitalia’

This is the only appropriate use of assigned or recorded at birth. This use of assigned implies ‘incorrectly’ - and in Semenya’s case it was indeed incorrect.

There is selective bias here in a separate but linked story here which the BBC shows no interest in. The BBC has tended to conflate 'DSDs' with ‘trans’, and to take the same ‘advocacy’ stance that it takes with gender identity. (For example in the recent Imane Khelif controversy, it repeatedly used gender identity advocates as contributors, rather than scientists or sports women. However that is outside the time parameters of the Review).

The separate but linked story is the scouting of male DSD athletes to compete in female categories, and the danger they pose to the integrity of women’s sport. Inevitably, the males dominate, but the problem arises with their legal sex marker of ‘female’.

Even without this detail, the BBC fails to make clear in this very long fact check that the subject of it is male. It’s misleading and counter-factual.

We will add one more link to demonstrate that the problem has not gone away.

Christine Mboma: Olympic 200m silver medallist to make competitive return after 20 months out

‘Tokyo 2020 runner-up Mboma is a female athlete classed as having differences in sexual development (DSD)’

This article is just outside the parameters of the Review and will not be critiqued. But you can see that it is equally misleading. The highlighted (second) sentence is a complete untruth, Mboma is also male 46 XY ARD, and was unable to compete because of World Athletics rules which only apply to the 46 XY karyotype.

More information on the rules about DSDs in sport

*****

Thank you for your attention. The solutions we suggest for improving portrayal and representation of sex and gender in BBC Sport focus on improving accuracy, resources and the range of voices. We hope you are able to find sources and resources to support and confirm the information we have supplied, but if you would like more detail and links, we are happy to supply them.

This is the end of our final submission on Sex and Gender to the BBC Thematic Review of Portray and Representation