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Martina Navratilova is a Hateful Bigot


Kyle

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So you are saying there needs to be a purity  testosterone test? Hypothetically, if there were a benchmark that said "X level of testosterone disqualifies from competing in women's leagues irrespective of identified gender, but if said person could get to Y level (an acceptable amount) that is okay for a reasonable expectation of fairness in competition" that would be the logical solution here using your logic?

So basically a transperson who identifies as a woman would have to deplete their body and system of as much testosterone as they can (whether through estrogen or other means) in order to qualify the same as in a weight class wherein a heavier person would have to shed weight to qualify for a lower weight competition?

That makes sense. I think we solved the problem. Next?

It sure would be nice if the article explained this part of the story. Oh wait, it does, lol. But keep on keepin on. OUTRAGE!!!! SJW!!! AAAAAARG!!!

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14 hours ago, Knoxtnhorn said:

Cool.  One team for every sport.  No women's sports, no Title IX, no separate Olympic sports, no gender differentiation.  

I'm in.

This is really the only answer.  If we're saying gender is a social construct, then it should have no place in sports.  One gender for everyone.  Football, basketball, soccer, et al.  

If we're all truly equal, let's quit dividing up the field. 

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9 minutes ago, OatmealRaisinCookie said:

But then only trans women would see the field. A cisgendered woman, rarely to never, which doesn’t seem fair.

Just going to have to suck it up and have a no doping division as well as an “open” divisions to allow for whatever. 

But chemical and hormone treatments should still be excluded as they are now for professional sports. 

Fairness should not be replaced by feelings. Common sense needs to start being exercised by the athletes and the sports leaders. 

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15 hours ago, RomaVicta said:

I think the stand that most tolerant people take regarding transgenderism is that the evidence shows that the sexual spectrum is not a neat and tidy division between between black and white. This untidiness is what, in my opinion, mysteriously alarms most intolerant people.

aren't you automatically secretly gay too, if you end up on the wrong side of these questions?

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15 hours ago, Neonmoon said:

There’s a reason the IOC has no restrictions on trans men (former women) competing and have testosterone level restrictions for trans women (former men)

It’s the same reason they don’t let men fight women in MMA. Testosterone matters 

She is right. The people arguing against her are idiots 

Did you ever see the East German swim and track teams?  LOL.....

 

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16 hours ago, RomaVicta said:

I think you're just hoping to stir up trouble by ironically supporting the criticism of Navratilova. 

I think the stand that most tolerant people take regarding transgenderism is that the evidence shows that the sexual spectrum is not a neat and tidy division between between black and white. This untidiness is what, in my opinion, mysteriously alarms most intolerant people.

The issue of competition in gender separated sports illuminates a place where the emergent realization of sexual complexity disrupts the belief/desire for a clear line. 

Navratilova raises a valid issue that sprang up with Rene Richards decades ago. I don't know what the answer is. Trans persons who started with a female frame wouldn't have an advantage among elite female athletes. A trans person who started as formidable male athlete would seem to be unfair on the playing field. On the other hand, you don't want to stigmatize someone who was born in the untidy part of the sexual spectrum.

I can only guess that if I, a man who when younger was a powerful football lineman with speed, were to align my identity to become a female, I would feel like I had an unfair advantage over other women in many physical contests. I wouldn't feel that way if I were 5'10 and 160 pounds.

How do you work the rules and laws to accommodate that? I have no idea.

Finally, I want to be clear that my use of untidy in no way implies dirty or wrong.

 

14 hours ago, Dahobbs said:

Your logic is flawed. Ultimately, gender is a set of behaviors. And there is  evidence that gender itself (like many behaviors) has a biological/developmental link (for instance exposure to certain hormones at critical times in development) and is established early in life. While the vast majority of males (sex) are born as men (gender) and thus have the behavioral attributes of men, some do not. The a similar pattern is true of females (sex). There is no harm in recognizing that same males are born as women and that some females are born as men, nor in using that taxonomy in social settings.

Sports are a different matter due to the importance of testosterone. While gender is a social classification, sex is indisputably grounded in biology, in particular the presence and level of the sex hormones. And the male sex is equipped with an abundance of testosterone, resulting in greater physical strength.  Using sex as the primary classification for sports makes sense given that distinction. That doesn't obliterate the usefulness or necessity of using gender (as opposed to sex) in other social settings.  

 

 

1 hour ago, DigglerontheHoof said:

This is really the only answer.  If we're saying gender is a social construct, then it should have no place in sports.  One gender for everyone.  Football, basketball, soccer, et al.  

If we're all truly equal, let's quit dividing up the field. 

This is the entire problem right here, and I'm pretty sure it's the entire problem with all transgendered discussions these days. That's the inability to differentiate between sex and gender. As Dahobbs alluded to, sports are not divided by gender for social reasons, they are divided by sex for competitive reasons.

The inability to understand that gender and sex are different things creates conflict where there should be none. Transgender rights supporters cause more long-term problems than they do good because they are just as bad about conflating the two.

There should not be men's and women's sports, or boys' and girls' sports in high school and below. There are male and female divisions. There can be women in the male division and men in the female division. Testosterone level is a reasonable measure at this point but it's my personal opinion that if you developed into and or through adolescence with testes and the associated levels of testosterone then you should be ineligible for the female division in sports. Your physical development was significantly aided by testosterone and there's not really a good denial for that that I've seen. If there is scientific evidence or literature indicating that being below a certain threshold of testosterone for 12 months reverses all previous musculoskeletal benefits I'm certainly willing to read it. They certainly regress in their performance but I'm not sure I believe that their performance regresses to where it would have been without the testosterone boost.

But now it is a political minefield specifically because everyone always has and even more importantly still refers to them as men's and women's sports. The IAAF has made efforts to change that and now refer to the testing as "female classification" instead of gender verification.

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1 hour ago, DigglerontheHoof said:

This is really the only answer.  If we're saying gender is a social construct, then it should have no place in sports.  One gender for everyone.  Football, basketball, soccer, et al.  

If we're all truly equal, let's quit dividing up the field. 

But then the feminists will cry foul when women don’t get team spots due to the “sexism” in sports. 

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8 minutes ago, Huckleberry said:

 

 

This is the entire problem right here, and I'm pretty sure it's the entire problem with all transgendered discussions these days. That's the inability to differentiate between sex and gender. As Dahobbs alluded to, sports are not divided by gender for social reasons, they are divided by sex for competitive reasons.

The inability to understand that gender and sex are different things creates conflict where there should be none. Transgender rights supporters cause more long-term problems than they do good because they are just as bad about conflating the two.

There should not be men's and women's sports, or boys' and girls' sports in high school and below. There are male and female divisions. There can be women in the male division and men in the female division. Testosterone level is a reasonable measure at this point but it's my personal opinion that if you developed into and or through adolescence with testes and the associated levels of testosterone then you should be ineligible for the female division in sports. Your physical development was significantly aided by testosterone and there's not really a good denial for that that I've seen. If there is scientific evidence or literature indicating that being below a certain threshold of testosterone for 12 months reverses all previous musculoskeletal benefits I'm certainly willing to read it. They certainly regress in their performance but I'm not sure I believe that their performance regresses to where it would have been without the testosterone boost.

But now it is a political minefield specifically because everyone always has and even more importantly still refers to them as men's and women's sports. The IAAF has made efforts to change that and now refer to the testing as "female classification" instead of gender verification.

Should there be weight classes in boxing and wrestling? What about age limits for professional football? They are there for a specific reason. I know you may not be arguing the pro on this, but it becomes a safety issue before we enter into the politics. Women don’t play in the NFL because they would get killed. I remember a story about 10 years ago when Serena Williams lost to the (Don’t quote me) #400 ranked men’s tennis player in the world. The reason the WNBA struggles isn’t due to sexism, it’s the quality of play. The Sparks vs. The Mavericks wouldn’t be much of a contest.

Further, how do you deal with anti-doping? If shooting up testosterone is forbidden, it should be forbidden across the board.

Edited by Spankytoes
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7 minutes ago, Spankytoes said:

Should there be weight classes in boxing and wrestling? What about age limits for professional football? They are there for a specific reason. I know you may not be arguing the pro on this, but it becomes a safety issue before we enter into the politics. Women don’t play in the NFL because they would get killed. I remember a story about 10 years ago when Serena Williams lost to the (Don’t quote me) #400 ranked men’s tennis player in the world. The reason the WNBA struggles isn’t due to sexism, it’s the quality of play. The Sparks vs. The Mavericks wouldn’t be much of a contest.

Further, how do you deal with anti-doping? If shooting up testosterone is forbidden, it should be forbidden across the board.

Serena and Venus were beat by a 200 ranked smoker who only lost one game between the two.  I believe there is no rule in tennis that says a woman can't compete against the men, same as golf.

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8 minutes ago, Spankytoes said:

Should there be weight classes in boxing and wrestling? What about age limits for professional football? They are there for a specific reason. I know you may not be arguing the pro on this, but it becomes a safety issue before we enter into the politics. Women don’t play in the NFL because they would get killed. I remember a story about 10 years ago when Serena Williams lost to the (Don’t quote me) #400 ranked men’s tennis player in the world. The reason the WNBA struggles isn’t due to sexism, it’s the quality of play. The Sparks vs. The Mavericks wouldn’t be much of a contest.

Further, how do you deal with anti-doping? If shooting up testosterone is forbidden, it should be forbidden across the board.

Yes, they are there for competitive reasons. All you're doing is reinforcing my point.

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46 minutes ago, Onboard 2.0 said:

If you were born with a dick you shouldn't compete against women. If as a woman you wanna go head to head against men... have at it.  How difficult a concept is this to grasp ?

There's a joke in there somewhere about grasping a dick.

The discussion is interesting. The testosterone perspective makes sense, but it also illustrates the untidy aspect of the issue.

Where will the line be drawn on where that test determines male or female relative to sports competition? For persons right on the line, you would have controversy and dispute similar to who ends up being #5 in the college football playoff rankings.

If you were to apply the standard of testosterone, how would we feel if Martina or Selena or Evert came out on the male side? 

Testing for testosterone levels may make sense, but whether you're talking about gender or sex, it's still complicated.

This thread is about sports, but I can't help thinking eligibility to compete in professional sports is among the least of problems for the vast majority of transsexuals. Our society makes it physically dangerous for them to reveal themselves as transsexual particularly while in public school. The new right has used them to scare the morons. I don't envy their path.

 

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12 hours ago, Kyle said:

I would much rather challenge party lines than parrot them daily.

I see the new magic cloaking device for right wing partisans has metastasized from the Politics board. As usual, it's projection.

I have a (partisan) opinion. If you don't like it, you're the one who is part of a herd of parrots serving as an echo chamber. I scorn all parties.

At least mix up the language from time to time. I'm sorry you have to find ways to try to hide party loyalty. I guess that means you're not absolutely shameless.

Edited by RomaVicta
Benny Hill wasn't funny
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Just now, RomaVicta said:

There's a joke in there somewhere about grasping a dick.

The discussion is interesting. The testosterone perspective makes sense, but it also illustrates the untidy aspect of the issue.

Where will the line be drawn on where that test determines male or female relative to sports competition? For persons right on the line, you would have controversy and dispute similar to who ends up being #5 in the college football playoff rankings.

If you were to apply the standard of testosterone, how would we feel if Martina or Selena or Evert came out on the male side? 

Testing for testosterone levels may make sense, but whether you're talking about gender or sex, it's still complicated.

This thread is about sports, but I can't help thinking eligibility to compete in professional sports is among the least of problems for the vast majority of transsexuals. Our society makes it physically dangerous for them to reveal themselves as transsexual particularly while in public school. The new right has used them to scare the morons. I don't envy their path.

 

It is all about  1. testosterone, and 2.  a typical body type/size/ muscular structure for men and women.  You're getting off track with the other issues. The OP was directly about sports and that's where I'm keeping my comments.

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5 minutes ago, Onboard 2.0 said:

It is all about  1. testosterone, and 2.  a typical body type/size/ muscular structure for men and women.  You're getting off track with the other issues. The OP was directly about sports and that's where I'm keeping my comments.

My comment was about a comment made by the person who started this thread. Although much of the conversation has been rational, the original post and the title of this thread indicate Kyle doesn't really care about that. He's throwing a bomb.

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11 minutes ago, RomaVicta said:

There's a joke in there somewhere about grasping a dick.

The discussion is interesting. The testosterone perspective makes sense, but it also illustrates the untidy aspect of the issue.

Where will the line be drawn on where that test determines male or female relative to sports competition? For persons right on the line, you would have controversy and dispute similar to who ends up being #5 in the college football playoff rankings.

If you were to apply the standard of testosterone, how would we feel if Martina or Selena or Evert came out on the male side? 

Testing for testosterone levels may make sense, but whether you're talking about gender or sex, it's still complicated.

This thread is about sports, but I can't help thinking eligibility to compete in professional sports is among the least of problems for the vast majority of transsexuals. Our society makes it physically dangerous for them to reveal themselves as transsexual particularly while in public school. The new right has used them to scare the morons. I don't envy their path.

 

I don't think you should have males (sex) in the female (sex) division, primarily for the developmental reasons listed by Huck. But you may certainly have men (gender), primarily females identifying as men without testosterone supplements, competing in a female division. I also don't have any issue with females competing in male divisions, but I don't think a natural female without hormone treatment should ever have to compete against men. I'd be curious what data exists on females with high enough testosterone to be at all comparable to men.The natural testosterone levels of females are so low comparatively that even a multiple fold increase doesn't approach normal levels in males.  

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21 minutes ago, Dahobbs said:

but I don't think a natural female without hormone treatment should ever have to compete against men. 

why not?  there’s no difference between the two; gender is a social construct.  having separate competitions for men and women is sexist.  “women’s” sports is sexist.  why can’t we just compete without labeling people by their sex organs?

 

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13 minutes ago, futureman said:

why not?  there’s no difference between the two; gender is a social construct.  having separate competitions for men and women is sexist.  “women’s” sports is sexist.  why can’t we just compete without labeling people by their sex organs?

 

Look, we all know pussy is undefeated, no sense adding insult to injury...

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31 minutes ago, Dahobbs said:

I don't think you should have males (sex) in the female (sex) division, primarily for the developmental reasons listed by Huck. But you may certainly have men (gender), primarily females identifying as men without testosterone supplements, competing in a female division. I also don't have any issue with females competing in male divisions, but I don't think a natural female without hormone treatment should ever have to compete against men. I'd be curious what data exists on females with high enough testosterone to be at all comparable to men.The natural testosterone levels of females are so low comparatively that even a multiple fold increase doesn't approach normal levels in males.  

Curious as well.  I think the natural differences are stark and it's not exactly a fine line in between the two.  I don't think there would be any natural blending where low T males test as female and high T females test as males.

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15 minutes ago, Gene Parmesan said:

Curious as well.  I think the natural differences are stark and it's not exactly a fine line in between the two.  I don't think there would be any natural blending where low T males test as female and high T females test as males.

Caster Semenya is a very difficult case (similar to Dutee Chand). Her situation was handled terribly with leaked information and an invasion into her privacy. That being said, I'm not sure what the situation should be for competitors like her. The natural testosterone level for females is 0.5 and 2.5 while for men it is between 10.5 and 34.5 or so. Based on results they had from testing it seems there is overlap among Olympic athletes, though, much more than those normal ranges would seem to indicate. That is apparently based on this article:

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/cen.12445

although unfortunately the bias of the authors is readily apparent from the introduction, although to they're credit they are open about that bias. Either way I don't have access to the full text so their statement that there is "complete overlap between the sexes" when it comes to testosterone levels could mean lots of different things.

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Dumb question amnesty:

 

How do older males T levels compare to fit female at 25? I’ve never had my levels checked and don’t care to, but as that’s become popular for middle aged men there has to be a solid sample size. If T level is the only thing used to separate the sexes for sports would there ever be a case where an aging champion in golf or tennis switched to the female division at the end of his career?

 

Are we talking order of magnitude base 10? Base 2? Or overlapping ranges?

 

Edit: nevermind. should have finished the thread before posting. Huck posted they may overlap in Olympic athletes.

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Navratilova's comments weren't about the nuances of IOC standards and how to deal with the issue. She alleged cheating by way of men "declaring" themselves to be women, winning a bunch of stuff, then "declaring" themselves to be men again. Anyone have a citation of this supposedly rampant phenomenon?  I like how she also acts as though testosterone suppressants are just some minor thing that a man would choose to do temporarily just to win some medals. I take it that the controversy is the idea that this is happening, but from a broader perspective it treats the subject of gender identity as some passing fancy. I can't imagine the mental turmoil involved with gender identity issues and to describe it in this way is stupid. As for all the hand wringing in this thread about it being unfair, why are so many naturally born women still winning medals if there was a problem of men doing what Navratilova is alleging? 

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8 minutes ago, Llano Estacado said:

Dumb question amnesty:

 

How do older males T levels compare to fit female at 25? I’ve never had my levels checked and don’t care to, but as that’s become popular for middle aged men there has to be a solid sample size. If T level is the only thing used to separate the sexes for sports would there ever be a case where an aging champion in golf or tennis switched to the female division at the end of his career?

 

Are we talking order of magnitude base 10? Base 2? Or overlapping ranges?

 

Edit: nevermind. should have finished the thread before posting. Huck posted they may overlap in Olympic athletes.

Normal range is a order of magnitude different.

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Normal range is a order of magnitude different.


Not in Olympic level athletes in the study Huck posted...unless they’re all already doping at the same level. Heheh

“16·5% of men had low testosterone levels, whereas 13·7% of women had high levels with complete overlap between the sexes. Women had a lean body mass 85% that of men – sufficient to account for sex differences in performance. There were highly significant correlations between many of the measured hormones.”



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1 minute ago, Llano Estacado said:

 


Not in Olympic level athletes in the study Huck posted...unless they’re all already doping at the same level. Heheh

“16·5% of men had low testosterone levels, whereas 13·7% of women had high levels with complete overlap between the sexes. Women had a lean body mass 85% that of men – sufficient to account for sex differences in performance. There were highly significant correlations between many of the measured hormones.”


 

 

We can't tell much from those statements. It does seem to indicate there is more overlap than I would expect based on the normal range in the population. But, the statements are vague and mixing relative and absolute measures. I think the implication is supposed to be that the males with low testosterone had levels comparable to the females with high testosterone. But I'd like to see the data from the study to better understand what the authors are saying. They also mentioned there was measurable variation between sports, so it could be something like males with low testosterone in a low testosterone sport (curling?) had levels comparable to females with high testosterone in a high testosterone sport (weight lifting?). That result would be less surprising than female weight lifters having comparable testosterone to male weight lifters.  I also wouldn't be surprised at all if doping affected those results. It is after all a population that we know has an issue with doping comparative to the overall population. 

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I can't access the article posted.  Were the overlaps within the same sport?  I think that's key.  Do female sprinter testosterone levels compare to male sprinters or is the overlap a female powerlifter versus a male archer?  If you were to draw a testosterone line each sport would need it's own limit, correct?

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At the risk of sounding like Dan Patrick, why shouldn't men play men and women play women? That's fine if you believe that gender doesn't matter and that we're all equal in every shape and form. But when I think of men's and women's tennis being pushed together in one category all I can think of is James Brown singing "this is a maaan's world". I've never understood why some find it offensive for someone to say that men and women are different. 

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15 minutes ago, Gene Parmesan said:

I can't access the article posted.  Were the overlaps within the same sport?  I think that's key.  Do female sprinter testosterone levels compare to male sprinters or is the overlap a female powerlifter versus a male archer?  If you were to draw a testosterone line each sport would need it's own limit, correct?

We don't know, but that is what I was surmising. As for testing, I think the test is simple: are you taking testosterone? If yes, male sports. If no, are you genetically male? If Y, male sports. I think testosterone is too big of a developmental advantage even if one suppresses it later on. I'd be open to data to seeing showing I'm wrong on that. 

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24 minutes ago, Macanudo said:

Ok....   Then gender and sex are related?

Male, as in sex. Not man as in gender. As I covered before, gender and sex are distinct concepts. They are highly correlated in that the vast majority of males are men and the vast majority of females are women. In that sense they are related. But sex is not dispositive of gender, nor gender dispositive of sex. 

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23 hours ago, Coors yellow belly said:

she’s not wrong

100%.

A TG friend of mine played defensive end and was a state champ wrestler in California before she transitioned. Later, she was in a Pride parade, and a local women's football team saw her 6'4" frame and tried to recruit her.

She refused. Not because she didn't want to play, but for the very things Navratilova is talking about here: She felt that having gone through puberty as a male gave her an unfair advantage that would be tantamount to cheating.

So, anyway. There's an anecdote fer ya.

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On 2/19/2019 at 10:14 AM, RomaVicta said:

My comment was about a comment made by the person who started this thread. Although much of the conversation has been rational, the original post and the title of this thread indicate Kyle doesn't really care about that. He's throwing a bomb.

I feel like I should send you a rent check for all the space I'm occupying in your head. You're certainly welcome to keep creating all the strawmen about me you want. If there was a bomb thrown, it was the emotional reaction to Navratilova's comments by immediately labeling her "transphobic." Maybe she does walk around with a MAGA hat, rope, and bleach, but I would be surprised.

The issue is complicated, and I certainly do not have an easy answer. If believing that reactionary, hyperbolic name calling might not be productive makes me some sort of secret party hack or whatever your earlier strawman was, so be it. News to me.

Edited by Kyle
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47 minutes ago, Kyle said:

I feel like I should send you a rent check for all the space I'm occupying in your head. You're certainly welcome to keep creating all the strawmen about me you want. If there was a bomb thrown, it was the emotional reaction to Navratilova's comments by immediately labeling her "transphobic." Maybe she does walk around with a MAGA hat, rope, and bleach, but I would be surprised.

The issue is complicated, and I certainly do not have an easy answer. If believing that reactionary, hyperbolic name calling might not be productive makes me some sort of secret party hack or whatever your earlier strawman was, so be it. News to me.

I dont think you are a secret hack if it makes you feel better. 

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