Why gender matters in sports
I recently violated my own rule about engaging in Facebook debates.
This never turns out well. However, I jumped into the comments when I saw this post from a Facebook friend who I consider quite intelligent, even if I don’t agree with his politics.
Maybe the take home message should be “if you don’t want to get hit really hard, don’t box or don’t box against the best in the world.” Perhaps that should be the message.
This post was in response to the result of an Olympic female boxing match between Imane Khelif of Algeria and Angela Carini of Italy. Carini bowed out after 46 seconds.
I knew at the time the International Boxing Association banned Khelif from the world championships in 2023 because the IBA said Khelif did not meet the eligibility requirements to be considered female. The IBA head said Khelif had XY chromosomes. Females have XX chromosomes and males have XY.
My comment was this:
Last year khelif did not meet the criteria to be considered a female at the world championships. I know testing varies but the concern is not unwarranted.
The concern is not unwarranted. This can be a murky situation with various boxing associations. My point was that there is at least a valid concern about whether Khelif is male or female.
It’s funny how the left always accuses the right of resorting to name-calling and being unable to defend a position. The left loves to prop itself up as intellectually elite, especially when compared to the barbarians on the right.
Someone decided to jump into my instant messages to respond with this comment helpful to the conversation:
You might want to check your bigotry at the door.
I checked the person’s profile. She claims to be Yale educated.
Pretty highbrow engagement, huh?
I responded to her:
amazed at how quickly it escalates to that. There are obvious reasons governing bodies are trying to figure this out and some have already concluded xy should not be fighting against xx. That doesn’t seem unreasonable to me but apparently opinions vary.
Then her again:
Do yourself a favor and learn a few FACTS about biology.
The all-caps definitely added to the chat.
It didn’t take me long to realize the futility of continuing.
There are two separate issues as it relates to women’s sports. One issue is the participation of transgender athletes competing in women’s sports. These are people born male who decide to change sexes later in life.
According to a 2022 study published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, “male physiology cannot be reformatted by estrogen therapy in transwoman athletes because testosterone has driven permanent effects through early life exposure.”
This issue appears to be settled as far as the science is concerned, but the politics of the issue has allowed transgenders to compete in some women’s sports.
But that is a separate issue.
We do not know whether Khelif is biologically or genetically male or female.
Here’s why:
The integrity of the International Boxing Association (IBA) isn’t great. It’s Russian-controlled and the IBA head declined to release the testing data related to Khelif so we don’t have the evidence to back up the claim.
Khelif supporters accused the IBA of concocting the results because Khelif beat a Russian fighter. There were 12 Russian fighters in the 2023 World Championships and only one captured a gold medal, so 11 Russian fighters lost. Two boxers were banned after eligibility tests so that argument doesn’t hold weight.
Still, it is fair to be skeptical of the IBA since it did not release testing data.
Wouldn’t this be easily solved by simply revealing the testing data from this Olympics?
No. And here’s why. This is it:
The International Olympic Committee and the Paris 2024 Boxing Unit issued a statement in response to the controversy generated by Carini’s quick exit from the Khelif match.
“As with previous Olympic boxing competitions, the gender and age of the athletes are based on their passport.”
Khelif was assigned female at birth and was, of course, raised female. However, the public nature of Khelif’s story has led some to speculate that Khelif may have a disorder that affects around one in 15,000 called 46,XY.
A person with this disorder appears to be female at birth, but goes on to develop many male characteristics.
As you can imagine, one of the characteristics of this disorder is possessing extremely high levels of testosterone and other male sex hormones.
If this is accurate, there would probably be an astounding difference in the amount of testosterone between the two athletes.
Although testosterone levels vary in men and women, there is a general baseline:
Normal Results
Normal measurements for (testosterone) tests:
Male: 300 to 1,000 nanograms per deciliter (ng/dL) or 10 to 35 nanomoles per liter (nmol/L)
Female: 15 to 70 ng/dL or 0.5 to 2.4 nmol/L
The above data comes from the Mount Sinai Health Library.
But we don’t know if Khelif has this disorder. The Olympics seem to believe a passport is all the data needed.
You can understand, based on the data, how much of an advantage occurs when a person with a testosterone level of 300-1,000 ng/dl engages in a combat sport against a person with a level of 15-70 ng/dl.
Let’s look at a few non-combat sports for a moment.
100 meter dash world record
Men: 9.58 seconds
Women: 10.49 seconds
400 meter dash world record
Men: 43.03 seconds
Women: 47.6 seconds
Long Jump world record
Men: 29 feet, 4.5 inches
Women: 24 feet, 8 inches
Back to my original Facebook comment: The concern is not unwarranted. Not only is biological/genetic females competing against biological/genetic males an issue of plain, fundamental fairness, it is a matter of safety inside a boxing ring.
As a general rule, the pounds per square inch of force generated in the punch of a standard male is significantly greater than that generated by a female.
Critics charge those concerned about this issue with being bigots. Maybe some are.
I can only speak for myself. I have absolutely no ill will against Khelif or any other person similarly situated. If Khelif is XX, the playing field is level and everyone can move on.
It is ridiculous, however, that some form of testing is not required in the Olympics and they should be ashamed to allow a combat sport to take place without it.
I also have no ill will against any transgender. It just simply comes down to what is fair and safe for competition in sports and the built-in advantages make it patently unfair.
It needs to stop. Posts such as these will make no difference on this issue. Change will occur when enough females sacrifice competing in the short-term for long-term fairness.