Full Lawson on genders in chess

Recently, a 17-year-old player in Germany won the national girls’ under-18 tournament. The head of the German commission for women’s chess was less thrilled. The winner, you know, who identifies and officially categorizes as female, was born as a boy. Dominic Lawson, who writes for many major British newspapers, a strong chess player, in his words “managed to smuggle in chess as the subject” in his Sunday Times column. We brought you an abridged version, now we bring you this thought-provoking piece in full – with kind permission of the Sunday Times.