Lia Thomas became the first transgender woman to win an NCAA swimming championship with her victory in the 500 metre freestyle race earlier this year but obviously this achievement was mired in controversy due to the fact that she was born a man and thus had genetic advantages over the other women competing in her field.

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A multitude of people spoke out about the issue and there were calls for rulings allowing transgender people to compete at this level in the sport and it seems like FINA (the international sports federation for swimming) have actually decided to listen for once after they made the following announcement yesterday. Transgender athletes will now be banned from competing in women’s events if they went through male puberty and need to have completed their transition by the age of 12. They’re also hoping to establish an ‘open’ category for transgender athletes as well to still allow them to compete at an elite level.

Here’s what FINA President Husain Al-Musallam said about the new ruling:

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We have to protect the rights of our athletes to compete, but we also have to protect competitive fairness at our events, especially the women’s category at FINA competitions.

FINA will always welcome every athlete. The creation of an open category will mean that everybody has the opportunity to compete at an elite level.

This has not been done before, so FINA will need to lead the way. I want all athletes to feel included in being able to develop ideas during this process.

I suppose this probably does make the most sense doesn’t it? Transgender athletes might feel attacked and that this amplifies the idea that transgender women aren’t actually women, but I don’t really know what else can be done because the fact is that their bodies may well have advantages after puberty that genetically born women don’t. I think that is just a fact and you can’t really argue about it, even though Lia Thomas only won one of the races that she competed in and got battered in a bunch of others by real females.

It’s obviously a loaded issue though and as I’ve said before I’m not going to solve this debate in a couple of sentences at the end of a Sick Chirpse article. Let’s see how this new ruling plays out and if it represents a satisfying resolution for everyone involved. I hope it does, but I’m betting that it probably doesn’t.

For more of the same, check out South Park’s take on the transgender athlete question. You know that’s going to be good.