Olympian Sharron Davies labeled 'transphobic, homophobic' for saying only male and female sexes matter
Former Olympic swimmer Sharron Davis has stirred another gender-based controversy, leading social media users to accuse her of transphobia online. Davis took to Twitter on Monday, July 1, to sketch out an end-of-the-world scenario, explaining why she believes "binary sexes matter".
Davis, in her tweet, claimed that if the world was reduced to just two humans, the only way for humanity to survive on a deserted island would be for a man and a woman to procreate. The controversy comes months after she argued that female athletes needed to be protected from transgender competitors "with a male sex advantage".
"If you put 2 biological females on an island, humanity dies out (but they’d talk loads). If you put a biological male & a trans woman on an island, humanity dies out," Davis wrote. "But if u put a male & a female there we might stand a chance! Providing they can fish of course. Binary Sex matters."
Although some of the Olympian's followers agreed with her analogy, many others tore it apart, claiming that she had manufactured a scenario in an attempt to prove her point.
One Twitter user responded with: "And? I don't know if you've noticed but we're not exactly running short of homosapiens on this planet. This is also one of the standard arguments made by homophobes."
Another user also hit back at Davis, saying her argument meant that post-menopausal woman would not count as a female in her hypothetical situation: "Sharron, you've 56. You're not going to be having kids on a desert island either. And yet you're still a woman. Gosh, it's almost as if identity isn't defined by fertility or something."
One user, however, defended her position saying he "couldn't believe you are having to teach basic biology to so many. It's also amazing the fact that they don't accept it. On behalf of humanity, I salute your time, patience and resilience."
One of her followers, meanwhile, accused her of being a TERF (Trans-Exclusionary Radical Feminist) and Davis at that point attempted to explain that the idea of two people being stuck on an island was just an analogy for her point.
"Some of you are making me laugh... the island's an analogy and wasn't literal!!! Didn't think we were going to deliberately maroon chosen specimens at the end of the world after Armageddon as an experiment?" Davis further tweeted.
