Princejohn – actually she has differences in sexual development .  Female presenting but genetically male in this case.

Actually, we have no idea about anything yet as the sole source of information is a Russian IBA official’s Telegram post.

Yes, it sounds like these athletes may have DSD/intersex characteristics (if we take what the IBA are saying at face value) but there’s a reason they stopped doing chromosome tests in 1999. In many cases having XY chromosomes has no effect on athletic performance and only serves to stigmatise women.

Which is basically what we are seeing here. Just a couple of unfortunate casualties in the culture wars.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode/sex-testing-in-the-olympics-and-other-elite-sports-is-based-on-flawed/

Sounds like you have a nephew.

No; I have a niece. She was born female, and will remain female. She wants to be a boy, and wants to be treated as a boy. She knows she is not a boy though. Myself and every single other family member will always know her as a girl. How we treat her is another matter. But facts cannot and will not be thought policed from our heads.

The way forward is to help her to welcome the body she has, to love who she really is, and not try to make her feel she is in the ‘wrong body’. Right now, I don’t know how to do that, and more importantly neither do her parents. Which is why they are having counselling and therapy.

Depressing that there’s a paucity of actual empathy and understanding coming from certain individuals on here. And unsurprising that some people seem intent on bending all of us to their will. What happened to mutual respect?

I feel very sorry for Khelif, she’s in an impossible situation. She is not a trans woman, she is a women blessed / cursed with male characteristics who loves sport, like Caster Semenya before her.

She was born female, and will remain female.

That is not your call to make it is for the individual to decide. They will make their own mind up in time, you and the rest of your family need to give them the space and no pressure to decide what is best for them.

That is not your call to make it is for the individual to decide

You cannot ‘decide’ to be something you are not. However, if someone wants to be treated as feminine or masculine I have no problem with that at all. Gender isn’t a binary thing; more a spectrum. As a human social construct, it is fairly arbitrary anyway. It is well past time we got over traditional gender boundaries. We need to move to a post gender state, where gender is no longer an issue. We are still some way off that of course, and maybe we’ll never get there. But Science and Medicine needs to have clear definitions for obvious reasons. My niece will never suffer from testicular cancer, for example. But ovarian cancer is a real risk, so she will need screening for that. That is where biology is vitally important. But how she presents in public is entirely up to her, and I 100% support her right in that regard. But she will always remain biologically female.

No-one can decide what sex they are.

I think what you might be better off saying is no-one can decide for another person what gender they are.

“I think what you might be better off saying is no-one can decide for another person what gender they are”

I’ll stick with what I said. ‘Gender’ seems to change its meaning every 10 minutes and depending on whom you are talking to, so I have no opinion on it.

Yes it does.

Incredible that people still keep assuming sex = gender. Just a quick google will clear it up but some people still refuse to see a difference.

Back to the original story, not sure what is going on these days, back in 2012 it was all about Semenya and forcing her to go through tests to prove she wasn’t male, the IOC did bring in a change that banned her from 2019 though, so unsure why this doesn’t capture other sports, as you’d think these boxers would be under the same type of biological issues against the tested levels to compete?

Anyway, i just see this as being mixed up with transgender athletes, i read the stories and see ‘him’ or ‘male’, but that’s not the case here, same with Semenya and others, it just seems to be the continuation of that Lia Thomas debacle, don’t think the IOC are helping themselves with so much change in isolation, rather than across the sports.

every 12 year old I’ve worked with has understood the sex/gender difference and been happy with that.

Good to hear and debates/misunderstandings/failure to acknowledge will eventually go away and just be for old people (just like so many other things that are not like they used to be)

Good to hear and debates/misunderstandings/failure to acknowledge will eventually go away and just be for old people (just like so many other things that are not like they used to be)

The way I’ve tried to explain things to the luddites at work is that homosexuality was the ‘issue’ for our parents and was something they had to come to terms with. For my generation homosexuality does not even register on my/our radar as it’s the norm.

Gender fluidity/ identity is now the new ‘homosexuality’ for me/my generation in that we have to understand and come to terms with. For people of a younger generation than me it’s the norm.

For that younger generation their ‘thing’ that they will have to come to terms with will be digital implantation/modifications (or somesuch societal future change)

Its the sign of a progressive society. People who resist can moan about it in the Daily Mail comments section or move to Saudi.

Or some people claim there is a difference, some disagree.  There is no consensus on the use of the words

Case in point, just the point blank refusal to accept that there is a consensus.

A 2 second google, wikipedia states:

Sex generally refers to an organism’s biological sex, while gender usually refers to either social roles typically associated with the sex of a person (gender role) or personal identification of one’s own gender based on their own personal sense of it (gender identity). Most contemporary social scientists, behavioral scientists and biologists, many legal systems and government bodies, and intergovernmental agencies such as the WHO make a distinction between gender and sex.

I’d say that’s a pretty strong consensus.

That really does not show consensus at all.  ~far too many qualifiers.  My point made.

also note I made no judgement about the validity of either point of view at all but was attacked as if I did.

Just to go at this at a slightly different angle, Carini abandoned after less than a minute because she said “I had to preserve my life.” Regardless of the specifics of the authenticy of her opponent, a boxer surely goes into the ring comfortable with the fact that they might make an error or the opponent might be that much better than them and they might get a perfectly timed full force blow to the face/head that gets through and catches you completely unawares. You my be dropped straight away or you might by vulnerable and effectively  defenceless to follow up  blows until you do drop or the fight gets waved off. That is the ultimate worse case scenario as a boxer and you surely have to accept it might happen every time you fight.

My question is – does a 66kg woman risk any greater level of injury if a 66kg man punched her in the face than a 66kg man would in the same situation? In other words her “I had to preserve my life” claim – if you assume her opponent was able to punch like a man, was her life in any greater risk than every competitor in the men’s competition faces every day?

By the sounds of it, this particular situation might be a non issue in a year two as there is a very real chance boxing might find itself no longer an Olympic sport. Not because of this but other issues means the IOC might be at the end of their tether with the sport; exacerbated by the fact that skateboarding, surfing and break dancing is more the look they are after than people getting punched in the face.

It’s weird that as ideas of gender become more transient the labelling paradoxically becomes more rigid. ‘Boy who likes wearing girls’ clothes’ => ‘girl in the wrong body!’, as opposed to “fair enough, boys can wear whatever they want”. And ‘tomboy’ is taken to be something “more significant” rather than just “cool, you can be a tomboy”

That really is not the direction the trans debate is moving, and I’m astonished anyone would think that.

The more I see clips of the fight, the less I see in terms of physical differences, beyond height difference. I reckon the Italian was mentally expecting a beating and lost it mentally rather than physically.

If Khelif was THAT much more powerful, you wouldn’t expect her to have lost almost 20% of her fights, or only have six KOs from 51 fights.

Maybe she’s just a really shit boxer….

Or turn it around… She’s won 80% of her fights. Would say that’s a pretty good record.

Or turn it around… She’s won 80% of her fights. Would say that’s a pretty good record.

For what’s falsely claimed to be a man in a women’s class? She’s a tidy enough boxer – what’s she’s not is a man.

This is a very useful quick read on the history of women being excluded from sport based on spurious claims about the primacy of chromosomes above all else:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2500237/

The story of Ewa Kłobukowska is particularly sad, a top athlete declared not a woman… she clearly in every meaningful way was. After being forced out of athletics, she went on to give birth to a child… even that wasn’t enough to have her status as a female athlete and one of the world’s best ever runners restored:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ewa_Kłobukowska

Interesting articles Kelvin, thank you. I’d read about Klobukowska before, a horrible story.

So what is the solution?

– take the athletes word for it, they are the sex they declare they are?

– get rid of sex categories and just have open events?

– use modern sex determining methods, which are far quicker, more accurate, and less intrusive than those of the past?

To me the last of these seems to be the best out of poor options. It’s not good, but better than either of the other options.

Or is there something I have not thought of that would satisfy everyone?