Outsports Radio

With the Tokyo Olympics coming in July, some are looking at August 2 with a weather eye. That will be the day of the women's 87+ kg weightlifting competition. It will also be the day that New Zealand's Laurel Hubbard will step into Olympic history as possibly the first transgender athlete to participate in an individual event at the games. It is a moment she has been working for since 2015. It is also a moment that some don't want to see happen. Amid the growing "debate" over transgender rights is the often forgotten human variable. Transgender athletes are often casted in a light that dehumanizing. Dr. Jaimie Veale, a senior lecturer in psychology at Waikato University has studied such issues at length as a board member of the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH), and a founding president of the Professional Association for Transgender Health  Aotearoa (PATHA). Most recently Veale has organized an effort to quantify the state of transgender New Zealand toward building better human ri