The 2024 Olympics has seen plenty of spor5ing highs as well as heartbreak for competitors around the world, but no competition has sparked more debate and controversy this year than the women’s boxing.
Algeria’s Imane Khelif is guaranteed either a gold or silver medal in the welterweight event, after securing her place in the final on Wednesday morning NZ Time.
While Khelif will make it to the podium her experience at the Olympics has been soured by public backlash against her and Taiwan’s Lin Yu-Ting in the featherweight division. Both boxers were banned from International Boxing Association matches last year after tests on their sex ruled they were ineligible to compete.
[...] University of Waikato Professor in Sociology of Sport and Gender Holly Thorpe told The Front Page that the IBA has largely been discredited.
“They lost their permission to be the world governing body of boxing. My understanding was that was for issues relating to transparency, the culture of that organisation, a number of kind of ethical concerns.”
Corruption! Russians! Disinformation!
[...] Thorpe said that hormones fluctuate for us at different stages of life, and that testing women for testosterone is problematic.
Whereas if you’re born with XY chromosomes, you stay born with XY chromosomes and having XY chromosomes means you’re a dude.
Oh, wait. It’s the IBA who says both boxers have XY chromosomes and the IBA has been “discredited” because, you know, corruption and Russian disinformation.
“The important thing is that the International Olympic Committee, for women to participate in the boxing at the Olympics, all they need to prove is their gender identity and their passport. They don’t need to do a blood test. They don’t need to prove their hormones or chromosomes. It is their gender identities and their passports, and that is all the IOC requires.
In other words so long as you say you’re a woman and have it on your passport you’re good to go. It doesn’t matter if you’re not actually a woman.
[...] “If we look at Michael Phelps, for example – huge feet, tall, big hands. These are biological advantages in swimming, but we’re not accusing him of any unfair advantage, right?
This is what I call the ‘superman’ argument. According to this argument, Khelif, for example, didn’t win because he’s actually a guy (I won’t get into arguments about him being intersex, etc), but because ‘she’ was born with certain genetic advances. The strange thing is that these advantages are precisely the same as those any guy would have over a woman when it comes to boxing. Wow, what a coincidence!
But there you have it. If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck and looks like a duck, then it is a duck. Unless you’re the IOC and the duck has declared itself to be a swan. In which case, it’s a swan.
Kevin is a Libertarian and pragmatic anarchist. His favourite saying: “There but for the grace of God go I.” This article was first published HERE
8 comments:
Well said, but lets extend that thought. The IOCs argument is that having XXY chromosomes makes you female (even though he went through puberty with internal testes ?), so if a man was born XYY & had advantages in strength, speed & agility over "normal" men, would he be allowed to compete, even with elevated hormone levels ? I think not...
Also, the IBA cant be cancelled by the IOC so far as Boxing is concerned, but the IOC has now become a discredited laughing stock that have bought not only the Olympics, but amateur sport as a whole into disrepute. In my opinion France just murdered the Olympic games...
No, we don't already know that they are men.
There is no such thing as 'an XY chromosome'. Most people have two sex chromosomes in their karyotype (chromosomal line-up), either XX or XY, The former are women and the latter are men. However, some people have 3 sex chromosomes. Some are XYY, being lanky chaps with long legs. There is also the combination of XXY. Most of these are apparently male but some appear as females (female phenotype), although of a somewhat masculine appearance including greater musculature development than most women. These women are still women, NOT MEN (do for heavens' sake look up a standard text on human genetics!) but should not be allowed to compete in the Games (and until recently could not).
They are genuinely intersex, they are NOT MEN.
Barend Vlaardingerbroek
Semantics
If you are born with a Y chromosome...you are a man.
More importantly, if you look like a man & fight with the power & speed of a man, you have no business fighting woman & should be barred from combat sports as the IBA correctly adjudicated...
Hazel, if you are born with a Y c'some ON TOP of two Xs you MAY be genuinely intersex if you present a female phenotype but with masculine features.
"If you look like a man" isn't based on scientific criteria. Neither is "fight with the power of a man" - awfully subjective.
Back to Genetics 101..........
If you do not understand the science, ranting on about your beliefs is just inciting people and is dangerous. Please stop doing this - they are women - the spectrum is large and covers quite a lot of women - many variations. Maybe they should stop these competitions because thye are so divisive.
........ or maybe they should go back to karyotyping competitors who appear to be female but may be harbouring a rogue Y chromosome that gives them an advantage over XX women.
Given the fact that the IOC have publicly stated that they rely on the claimed gender in athletes passports to determine eligibility, I think the IBA, which has determined through testing these athletes are not only XY, but displayed elevated levels of testosterone & androgen to be far more reliable. In addition, any 2 year old could notice the square jaw, broad shoulders, angular frames & lean musculature of these athletes indicates they are male. You can put lipstick on a pig, but it does not make it a supermodel...
They are NOT XY karyotypes but XXY.
Readers interested in this issue are encouraged to look it up using standard academic sources on human genetics. Over and out.
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