The United States Practical Shooting Association (USPSA) will discuss a motion at its February 24, 2025, board meeting to address gender equity in the sport by establishing an ad hoc advisory committee.
The motion, detailed in the meeting agenda [USPSA Board of Directors Meeting Agenda, February 24, 2025, p. 17] proposes a committee of 10 female and transgender shooters under 40 who have competed in at least one national event. The committee, chaired by Stephanie Thome (USPSA# L650), will prepare a confidential report—unless unanimously approved for public release—assessing the current environment for female and transgender competitors, evaluating policies, and recommending growth strategies and marketing campaigns according to the meeting agenda.
This initiative shows that the USPSA is putting in even more effort to broaden the appeal of practical shooting, a sport that has seen some pretty astronomical growth as has the rest of the competitive shooting world over the last decade.
The motion follows recent USPSA rule changes, such as the Limited Optics division introduced in 2023 and the Production Division capacity increases in 2024 which I think indicates that the board is more open to change than they have traditionally been in the past.
However, the age restriction to under 40 has sparked discussion, as it may exclude some very experienced female shooters, which could potentially limit the diverse perspectives the committee hopes to gain via the new committee. The confidentiality clause, requiring unanimous board consent for public release, could also raise transparency concerns among members, although the live meeting will be broadcast via uspsa.org/live.
The USPSA as an organization and particularly the board of directors have fallen under a lot of scrutiny in recent years which have admittedly been quite turbulent from a leadership perspective.
Whether these new initiatives will have the intended effect as stated by the Board remains to be seen. As with any change in policy or rules, the USPSA is no stranger to backlash from its roughly 37,000 active members.
Other topics that are going to be discussed in this meeting include some proposals for budget adjustments, and reiterating old business surrounding banned members reapplying for membership. The entirety of the Meeting agenda can be read at the link below.
Good! There needs to be more diversity, equality, and inclusivity in practical shooting, tbqh.
Maybe they could make a specific effort of /effecting/ that … maybe a “DEI Initiative”, if you will.
That would be a good thing (non-ironically).
DEI does not stand for “diversity, equality, and inclusivity”, DEI stands for diversity, equity, and inclusion.
First, DEI is actually a marxist socialist concept. Second, DEI is institutionalized racism and discrimination.
Diversity-Equity-Inclusion’ (AKA DEI) is just another name for a ‘Marxists socialism’ concept, or in other words a ‘communism’.
First, lets begin with ‘Equity’: Equity is the goal of all DEI programs, which is to say that DEI programs exist to force captive audiences of people to achieve “equitable” redistribution of resources, status, and wealth according to neo-Marxist Identity Theories like Critical Race Theory (or even now gender-identity).
Next, ‘Diversity’: Diversity initiatives are rooted in the goal of installing (placing, enacting) ideologically consistent political officers (or people) within organizations to effect and enforce policies directed toward achieving equity. These ‘political officers’, often called “Diversity Officers,” (but may be known included under other titles such as ‘human resources’ or simply a person or body overseeing the program) are in fact a rebranding of the older concept of commissars, who enforced socialism in the same way.
Finally, ‘Inclusion’: Inclusion is an overarching value structure for the “Diverse and Equitable” commissar system that’s being installed. In fact, it’s a justification not for inclusion as most people understand it, but for censorship and purges, just like in any Communist state. Inclusion, and its extension in “Belonging,” are a manipulative strategy akin to Mao Zedong’s “unity, criticism, unity” formula for taking over not just institutions but the value structure of populations and bending them toward socialism (e.g. communism or, in this case, called by the deceptive term ‘equity’).
Don’t tell Kamala. She thinks DEI means Drunk Every Interview.
😂😂😂
You misspelled Pege Hegseth.
Pete Hegseth is a DEI hire: Drunk, Entitled, Ignorant.
He’s also the ultimate DUI hire.
LOL, No. Marxist societies weren’t inclusive and were only diverse in that you were either a member of the Party or you were an enemy of the State.
DEI is entirely a post-modern liberal invention to ensure employment of people within academia that are not qualified to be a grocery bagger let alone a PhD level instructor.
You missed the pint of what ‘inclusive’ is as in marxist socialist DEI.
“DEI is entirely a post-modern liberal invention”
Nah. Its been around for a longggg time, all the way back to ancient Rome, it just wasn’t called ‘DEI’. Its been a part of every tyrant regime, Biden-Harris basically ‘screamed it’ with many of their actions. It was even in the many word salad campaign speeches she gave, shes a huge supporter of DEI—especially its most troubling part, equity. She has made it very clear that she thinks that equity is the functional equivalent of equality (that’s the deception DEI people want to fool you with, that equity = equality, they are not the same thing, and the tipoff Jsled made in his post). Under equity, Harris has said, the government and the private sector should treat people differently solely because of their race, which is something Biden promoted also. Like I said, first, DEI is actually a marxist socialist concept and is institutionalized racism and discrimination.
Dei really = Descrimination Intimidation and Exclusion in practice
I think you’re on the wrong website. LMAO!
He’s probably been moderating a ‘rainbow’ group over at reddit too long.
😆
So when the attention whores fail to outperform actual women do they 40% faster?
jsled,
GAWD, what a lying, useless tw*t you are!! Just like your buddy, MajorLiar. IF there is convincing evidence that men and women are equal in precision shooting, I’m all in for opening the categories. Having some personal experience, I can say that, at lower levels, women equal or exceed men in equestrian sports (not so much, at the higher levels).man
Here’s an idea – get rid of gender/sex distinctions altogether. Let women who think they are men, and men who think they are women (and ACTUAL biological men and women) just compete together. And we’ll wait and see the next time a woman sets a world or Olympic record.
Or, here’s a radical thought – just let mentally-deranged “transgenders” compete against their BIOLOGICAL sexes, or even give them a category of their own. Take your pick, but don’t be a lying, Leftist/fascist propagandist in support of your deranged ‘agenda’, ‘kay??
(Like MajorLiar, you are simply too stupid to insult.)
Well now, I just received my notification from USPSA that my membership expires in 45 days. I guess it might be time.
I have a problem with DEI. It does more to create division than inclusion.
Men and Women competition should be determined by biology at birth as who competes in their group. Then do an overall score.
This is absolutely ridiculous. This shouldn’t even be a discussion. If this happens I hope the majority of people in the USPSA cancel their membership and move to IDPA.
There are only two genders, male and female, I know of no others.
Then you know eff-all about biology.
Cool story.
Well, look at you paying attention and all. There are only two sexes, male and female I know of no others. Fixed it for you.
Well, look at you paying attention.
There are only two sexes, male and female. I know of no others..
Fixed it for you.
Swarf,
My immediate reaction to your ‘comment’ was “Are you completely stupid???”. Then I thought about it a bit, and it was obvious that your are either completely stupid, or a propagandist liar (but embrace the healing power of “and”!!).
Yes, the are a FEW “intersex” people (approx. 0.0018%, by the most GENEROUS estimates – and anyone who ever passed high school biology knows that ALL of them display characteristics of one sex, and that there are literally NO examples of true ‘hermaphrodites’ (possessing full sexual characteristics of both sexes).
Y U B so stupid????? Oh, you’re a Leftist/fascist, propagandist idiot, like your buddies jsled and MajorLiar.
Technically speaking, there are two sexes and only two sexes.
“Gender” isn’t a biology term, it’s a linguistics term that has also been applied to social ideas. As such, it has a lot of squish to it and while it started as “gendered language” in terms of masculine and feminine words in Romance languages, the usage has moved past that. Mostly thanks to Focault, IIRC.
Yep
So like equity made up bullshit with the force of consequences to normal people?
Equity, in that case means something like “freedom from disparities” but it’s being operationally defined in such a way as to differ from “equality”.
Equality would be equal opportunity, “equity” means equal outcome regardless of what’s required to achieve that, including inequitable treatment of others.
With regards to gender, I’ve deconstructed the language aspects of that here before, it’s several pages long and I’m not going to do that again.
Suffice to say, I’m *confused* by the people who list their pronouns as “they/them” and then get mad when you refer to them as an “it”. They literally asked you to do this.
Sorry, brah, that’s how it works. “They” is the plural nominative of “it” while “they” is the objective.
We use these terms when we don’t know the identity (and therefore sex) of the person being discussed, when an animal or object is being discussed, when we discuss groups previously identified or several other cases that have nothing of import to do with identity.
Given that the person requesting these pronouns is a single person, and not claiming to be a group either, there’s no point in hashing out the plurals. That leaves us with the singular.
1. I heard the doorbell, who was IT?
2. IT was John.
1. Oh, HE’S a cool guy.
2. No, HE’S a Troll. You just don’t know HIM that well.
1. Oh, I didn’t know. Trolls are annoying. THEY’re all dbags and dumb as a box of rocks.
2. I don’t like boxes of rocks, THEY are heavy.
1 . That’s not the box’s fault. IT is an inanimate object.
2. Who cares? It’s not like IT has feelings.
HFS, it’s like English construction actually makes some sense and some people are openly asking you to… objectify them. Which, by the by, is EXACTLY what they want, for attention’s sake.
*”Them” is the objective.
I kinda see why people want that edit button back.
This is pure stupidity. Transgenderism is a mental disorder. We should not be encouraging the mentally ill to acquire firearms, since their suicide rate is already around 50%.
Despite what the media, the far left or even the right might say, the truth about transgender identity is that it is a result of a mental illness. Mentally ill people should not have fire arms. I would even extend this to the entire LGBQT… community. I will now await your hate replies.
What happened to the tens or hundreds of other comments TTAG?
Did these people not get the memo?! DEI is DEAD! WTF?!
They’re late to the game and haven’t realized it is already the last quarter and the fans have lost interest.
DEI, especially “equity” leads to cultural degradation. You spend so much effort attracting people that look different that you end up with a bunch of people that aren’t nearly as interested as the people that are naturally drawn to the activity. It dilutes the group, which eventually dissolves it as the disinterested people age in to management roles.
Just look at franchises in comics, movies, games, and other modern media. Many have been gutted and turned to “run by committee” garbage after implementing DEI initiatives. They attracted people that didn’t care about the topic and that pushed away the people that do care about it.
Do lesbians go out with transformers? If they do I’m going to dress up like a gurl and go shooting with a couple of them. The nice looking lesbians, not the ones with cigars and USMC tattoos and cut off plaid work shirts”giter done” *fART* Old Milwaukee’s Best beer drinking lesbians. No a lesbian you’d be proud to find your wife with lesbian.
With a gun even.
“Do lesbians go out with transformers? If they do I’m going to dress up like a gurl and go shooting with a couple of them.”
It might increase your chances of actually having a date on Saturday night.
No, not really. There’s actually quite the tiff going on when it comes to online dating apps meant for lesbians being overrun by the trans people.
The same sort of thing has happened in some areas with bars.
So, no, lesbians are not that accepting of men with severe mental illness who try to pretend to be women to hook up with women who prefer women.
Damn the luck.
It’s way too early for April 1st.
Why does every comment go to moderation?
We’re working the issue. They should not be going directly to moderation.
Scott,
Oh, you have allegedly disabled your ‘algorithms’???? You let us know how that goes for you; we’ll actually evaluate your performance based on the ACTUAL results we see.
Nice chat! Do better.
Cool! Thanks Scott.
Comment awaiting moderation LOL.
I don’t think sex/gender matters much in competitive shooting. Male, female, or whatever you choose, all are capable of shooting pretty much equally. Practice makes perfect.
It should be more by age group. Us old fogies have bad eyesight, hearing, arthritis, etc. We certainly can’t beat the youngins if it requires athletics/acrobatics.
Equity is the equality of outcomes (a.k.a. – communism). There’s no place for Marxism/Communism in the United States. It’s the antithesis of our constitution which stands for liberty and equality of opportunity. Marxism/Communism killed substantially more people in the 20th Century than any other ideology and we should pass a constitutional amendment with an outright ban of Marxism/Communism.
Shooting competitions based on movement and speed are going to favor men over women, statistically.
Yes, there will be women who can beat 99% of men, but those are phenoms, like the women at the higher levels of the UFC who will beat the tar out of 99% of men. They have a rare aptitude and they’ve honed the skill(s) to the point that they’re in the top 1% of the world.
But placing men of such caliber against women of such caliber will favor the men heavily, and that’s what’s going to happen at higher levels of competition.
Find me a woman at the top of her sport that can beat an average man, and I’ll find a man at the top of that sport that will make that pro woman look like a below average junior varsity dude.
P.S. Hey management! The new commenting system here blows.
Well at least it posted this time. What happened to the edit function?
That’s what I just said. If you take the top 1% as a co-ed thing, the 0.5% that’s men are going to destroy the 0.5% that are women.
As I said below, thinking about this for a few minutes, the goal probably isn’t the competitors, at least not directly. It’s the organizational structure of the USPSA.
I guess I’ll have to finish reading the entire comment before I reply now that there isn’t an edit or delete function. Boo
What have I been saying?
This stuff’s not going to just go away because you want it to or because Trump won.
I doubt most of the gun community has an issue with women shooters in competition but I do suspect that most of the gun community has an issue with pretending to be one sex when you’re the other so as to gain an unfair advantage in competitions.
While that advantage probably isn’t as large in shooting as in contact sports or other “classic” sports, it’s still there. Ergo, this is like PEDs. It’s cheating.
There’s also the question about mental illness and the appropriate way to deal with that. While I’m sure that some of the trans community are perfectly safe with firearms, preexisting and openly admitted mental illness probably makes other people a bit wary to be around you in the context of firearms. Dunno if that’s strictly speaking a fair thing for them to think but it’s certainly a reality.
I fail to see the point. Sign up, shoot, go home. There is nothing stopping anyone. I’ve competed in USPSA and read the rules. What am I missing?
The fact that USPSA doesn’t have separate divisions for sex/gender or race or anything thing else pertaining to the people competing but this is an issue means someone intends to make it an issue.
We’ve only seen this play 10,000 times at this point, I’m not sure how it’s not crystal clear.
The only real question is why they’d do this. It’s bound to go over like a lead balloon, but perhaps that’s part of the point.
I suspect, but cannot prove, that this is intended as a jumping off point for something else. Laying the precedent, as it were.
Re-reading the article while I dick around with this Unity mount, I’m not sure how I missed this:
Very likely, the target here isn’t the competitions or competitors themselves, but the actual corporate structure of the USPSA. That is, the part of the organization that has directors, assistant directors, managers etc. The messaging here about the competitors is intentionally, or unintentionally, a smoke screen.
This is a common vector to introduce fuckery into a business or organization. “The rank and file are fine, but our leadership lacks diversity which is causing problems for [subset of rank and file]”.
This allows professional agitators to be considered for positions of power within the organization that were previously closed off to them due to a lack of merit. If they can pull that off then Entryism has been accomplished.
The real issue with DEI isn’t just what it optimizes for, that would be survivable in most cases. It’s the fact that when it’s introduced the people doing it usually already have people selected for the positions they want to create/add/takeover and those people were selected for being activists first and [position] second. This is how DEI acts as cancer over time.
DEI and whatever other names or forms it may take should be regarded for what they are: methods of attack with the goal of introducing caustic political ideology into an organization. They have not, are not and will never be anything else.
The real question remains the sub-goals of this behavior. Degradation of the overall organization is always the overarching goal, how to get there varies enormously.
Likely it’s designed to turn uspsa into a training organization for the John Brown Gun Club / far left / queertifa for Hamas groups.
Trans are not healthy in the head and they want to promote their gun use?
(Is that a pistol in your pocket, missy, or are you angry I don’t want you in the ladies room with my wife or daughter. )
Remember:
“Everything woke turns to sht”
– DJT
This. A 1000 times, this. The sport is already extremely flexible and integrated, it is the organization that is a target.
One does have to wonder about secondary targets (the competitors in this instance).
If they can successfully recruit a bunch of people widely seen as mentally ill, will that drive off the current competitors out of concerns over safety?
Maybe, maybe not. The type to do this wouldn’t mind that happening though, they’d see it as a bonus.
Socialist
Casino
Demoralization
Little
Vaccination
Drinking
(these are some words that would send your comment to moderation)
No moderation. I assume the other previous triggers are gone too. Thank you!!
Now how about a comment edit function like we had before?
Does this mean that we can now have little conversations about how socialists love demoralization and vaccination while we’re drinking?
…in that little casino. Yes. We can also post links.
Moderation, after the fact, still occurs. They didn’t like my Gaza joke, apparently.
Just checking
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5XVGnDu87uc
The fact anyone within USPSA thought this proposal was a good idea tells me loud and clear they don’t need my membership any longer. And I suspect I am one of hundreds, likely more.
Too many other venues / sanctioning bodies to shoot.
Man, they’re four years too late on this and must have slept through the last election.
That’s a nice shooting sport you have there. It would be a shame if something happened to it.
-DEI
This is the beginning of the end. It will be completely ruined by these politics within a few of years. Just like Marvel and Star Wars.
BREAKING NEWS: Huge 2A Win By SAF & FPC!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ODObn-3rNU8
BREAKING NEWS: Huge 2A Win By SAF & FPC!!
h ttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ODObn-3rNU8
Everyone else is condemning and abandoning DEI, now USPSA is about to adopt it? This seems backwards to me.
Yes – many DEI programs have gone to far and it’s not a bad thing the administration is rolling some of that back. But some of the commenters here need to stop watching FOX or Newsmax so much. Holy crap you’re as brainwashed as people on the left are about guns. It’s absolutely a good thing that a major shooting sports group is trying to bring in more women. Women are 1. Great 2. Nice to have around 3. Help break the stereotype of fat white guys as shooters 4. Vote and 5. Make most of the cosumer decisions in a typical family.
“It’s absolutely a good thing that a major shooting sports group is trying to bring in more women.”
Except that isn’t what they said they were doing. You just made that up. You are either a very devious person or you’re a useful idiot. If they wanted to do what you’re saying, then all they had to do was say that. Here’s what they actually said:
establish an ad hoc advisory committee to prepare a report and recommendations on how the organization can address concerns related to gender and insure a safe community for all competitors. Ideally, this committee will consist of 10 female and trans shooters under the age of 40
The report should address the current environment faced by female and trans shooters, recommended rules and policies to foster the growth and development of the sport and recommended marketing campaigns and initiatives to help grow the sport.
https://s3.uspsa.io/agenda/USPSA%20Board%20of%20Directors%20Meeting%20Agenda%20%E2%80%93%20February%2024%202025.pdf?ref=uspsa
“It’s absolutely a good thing that a major shooting sports group is trying to bring in more women.”
Trans’ed men are not women.
Trans’ed women are not men.
What’s being pointed out is the inequality and degradation this agenda would bring to the sport. The inequality that Trans’ed men are treated as women they are not and Trans’ed women would be treted as men they are not.
We’ve seen already how this plays out to degrade a sport into inequality, with other sports. We’ve seen the whole spectrum in society as a whole how such DEI plays out. It never ends well, actual biological women, even lesbians, always suffer when this DEI ideology is introduced into sports or any sector of society, heck even Trans suffer as a society sector from their own trans cohorts.
You don’t know how much of anything works, do you? Fucking Peter Pan fantasy land you live in.
If an individual is willing to mutilate their body to satisfy the voices in their head, then I would argue that that individual is desperately mentally ill, and I would also question the wisdom of having them around Firearms.