Forums >General Running>Caster Semenya
I read an article this morning that the IAAF claims Semenya has XY (male) chromosomes.
https://dailycaller.com/2019/06/19/caster-semenya-biologically-male-iaaf/
I don't know if this is correct, it was just what the article said. Assuming it is, for all athletic purposes she is male. In my personal opinion, genetic gender should be the determinant for athletics. Gender identity, gender reassignment surgery, and other factors should not determine what category a person can be eligible to compete as a woman for championships, awards, and records. Hyperandrogenic or not, the presence of a Y chromosome should indicate that individual as a male for competition.
I have nothing against Semenya, I support and encourage everyone in our track and field family (except cheaters). I think it's great that she loves this sport and is a source of inspiration for many. I also have nothing against LGBTQ and intersex people (this is where I say "some of my friends are blah blah blah").
Semenya's individual story is such a gray area, as she was raised female and identifies wholey as female, but the genetic designation is not a gray area. There are a very small number of people who have genetic syndromes that exhibit multiple X or Y chromosomes, including those with multiple X chromosomes but also a Y (Klinefelter Syndrome), or even 3 or 4 X and a single Y. These individuals may exhibit traits of both genetic genders, and even hermaphroditism. I have teenagers, so I am fully aware of the new concepts of gender, including non-gender and gender fluid. But social gender identity should not determine gender for competition, genetic gender should. In my opinion.
Can open, worms everywhere. Please discuss.
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I think I agree with you. Semenya is in an unfair position but I do not think it is right to put all of her female competitors in a different unfair position. A friend brought up an interesting point when we discussed this once. What if there was a male athlete with testosterone levels well above the allowable limits that were proven to have been achieved naturally due to his genetics? How would we treat this athlete?
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If Caster in fact has a Y chromosome, then I don't think she should be competing with the women. Biological sex is different from gender.
Side note: the Olympics started testing all athletes for sex verificaion during the 1968 Olympic games. It has been done at both the summer and winter games ever since. The only Olympic competitor ever exempted from this test was Princess Anne who competed with the British equestrian team. The Olympics did not make an issue of it with Semenya obviously.
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First - I don't have the answers, but there are some things that come to mind.
Ms. Semenya was identified as female at birth, and has retained that identity all her life. I struggle with the idea that a genetic test should change that.
It bother's me when the IAAF talks about her "unfair" advantages. What about the people who are genetically disposed to be great distance runners? Or great sprinters? Or great putters of the shot? By the IAAF's argument they, too, have an unfair advantage and should be penalized in some way. Am I completely serious? No. But my point is most, if not all, champions owe some of their greatness to genetics that allow them to beat all other competitors (along with hard training, etc.). Singling out Ms. Semenya for an unfair genetic advantage seems hypocritical to me.
As the OP said - can open, worms everywhere.
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The fact that the Olympic Committee does a sex test made me surprised at the IAAF saying that Semenya is a biological male (XY chromosomes). If she was discovered to be XY buy the OC, they would not have let her compete as a woman (I think).
Physical attributes that deviate from the norm should not eliminate a person from competition; should people taller than 6'6" be banned from competing in basketball? They are obviously an aberration if they are close to or over 7' tall, and that is an "unfair advantage" when they play against shorter players. For that reason, hyperandrogenic women should not be banned from competition. However, people with biological sex of "male" (XY) should not count if they choose to compete as women.
In the 800m and 1500m there have been several successful runners in the women's field who are hyperandrogenic or are of suspect biological sex; Semenya and Wambui currently, and Mutola several years ago. There SHOULD be a way for intersex or hermaphrodite people to compete if they want to, we just need to find a way to classify them for the purpose of awards, records, and prize money (if any) so they are not posing an unfair competition for biological females (XX).
We can all agree that Semenya's times are HORRIBLE for a male, 1:54.25, 3:59.92 and 49.96 400m. I ran about those same times in high school. Maybe she really is just a hyperandrogenic biological female. And if that's the case, why should she be required to negate her natural gift?
Women’s sport ends up having to figure it out. They decide. All else is noise.
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The whole “XY” = male thing doesn’t work unfortunately. Many types of intersex individuals can be XY and not responsive or “insensitive “ to testosterone and to varying degrees.
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The counter argument is that we choose to segregate sports into categories - martial arts are segregated by weight, for example. And in running, we segregate by three criteria - age, sex, and occasionally weight (the Athena/Clydesdale categories).
Two of those categories are easy to define - black and white - age and weight. But sex, which we always thought was similarly easy to define, is much much grey than we first realized. And that's the crux of the issue - do we continue to have a women's category in running, and if so, how do we define it.
The so called "Michael Phelps" argument doesn't work here. If we chose to segregate swimming by wingspan, then, with his 80 inch wingspan, he would not be eligible to compete in the 70 inch and under wingspan category, even if he had been told all his life that his wingspan was 65 inches. But we don't segregate swimming by wingspan, and thus he competed against those with much less reach.
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It's a hard issue. Personally, I believe that a) it's important to have women's sport, and we should (I have some personal bias here ) and b) if we're going to have women's sport, then testosterone is the best dividing line we have. It's not perfect - those born with XY chromosones who transition to female still have some innate benefits of being born male - better bone density, early muscle development, narrow hips. But testosterone catches the bulk of the differences, and I also fervently believe that those who are transitioning from one sex to the other should be able to compete as athletes in their new gender, if they are willing to meet certain criteria.
I've found the writing of Dr. Joanna Harper to be particularly compelling on the subject of sports, gender, and intersex/transgender. She is a competitive runner, a exercise physiologist, and MtF transgender, so she is uniquely qualified to comment on this subject.
https://sportsscientists.com/2016/05/hyperandrogenism-women-vs-women-vs-men-sport-qa-joanna-harper/
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Dark wave, thanks for insight. I will check that link. Agree w most of what u said. Unfortunately we are left with an arbitrary cutoff and a big grey area.
One comment though, you mention transgender but the intersex (Castors) situation is different because instead of an athlete taking hormones willfully (not under duress or obligation by qualifying body. (don’t take this to mean they choose their gender, that is not the argument I’m making).
With an intersex athlete this “testosterone equalization” is thrust upon them by an outside entity. If you want to compete you are going to have to take this testosterone lowering pill. Oh by the way, the media and world may know your most personal health information even before you do as in Castors case when it was leaked to the press.
I realize it’s not immediately relevant to the discussion, but with men similar indeterminate situations exist. The men are separate case, but if we make the argument testosterone level=fair race, should an XXY male (Klinefelters) or other guy with hypogonadism (low testosterone) which is NOT uncommon, be allowed to supplement? The flip side, I’m not aware of a large number of male athletes with natural excess testosterone, thankfully, but their will always be outliers.
THIS is why I started the thread; it's such a puzzling problem with no binary solution. The more we learn about the condition and the athlete, the more we can respect the difficulty of the task before the IAAF and other rule-setting committees.
And the issue of the two biological male HS athletes competing as Girls in New England is making the news rounds. And so is CeCe Telfer, who is a biological male that won the national championship in the NCAA Div-II Women's 400m IH. I don't think any of these athletes transitioned or claimed gender identity just to get better paces at track meets, that would be incredibly shallow and greedy. But they DID transition or identify, and they DO like to run track. Now we need to find a way to be inclusive to athletes like this without penalizing cisgender female athletes. It's a difficult proposition.
One comment though, you mention transgender but the intersex (Castors) situation is different because instead of an athlete taking hormones willfully (not under duress or obligation by qualifying body. (don’t take this to mean they choose their gender, that is not the argument I’m making). With an intersex athlete this “testosterone equalization” is thrust upon them by an outside entity. If you want to compete you are going to have to take this testosterone lowering pill. Oh by the way, the media and world may know your most personal health information even before you do as in Castors case when it was leaked to the press.
I actually don't see the two situations (intersex and transitioning MtF) as different.
In both situations, you have someone born as something other than XX female with testosterone levels in the female range, but whom identifies as female and wants to compete in that division. In both cases, in order to compete in the female division, they should bring their testosterone levels in line. The only difference is that the FtM is transitioning from one pole to the other, while Semenya is naturally between the two poles.
Caster Semenya is not prohibited from competing in the men's division in the Diamond league because of her hormonal status; she's unable to compete in the men's division because she's not good enough to. In the same way that many of my male 2:2x marathoner friends would likely make the Olympics if they were allowed in the women's divison, but don't hit the Olympic standard as men.
She's not barred from competing unless she takes the meds; she's barred from competing in the division she wants to compete in unless she takes the meds.
A TUE is granted for Testosterone use for males in certain, very race circumstances. I believe Klinefelters is one of them.
Here, for your reading pleasure, is the TUE worksheet for testosterone supplementation for men, outlining the criteria considered. Basically, you can't get a TUE just because you are old, train too hard, or have "low T" per the late night commericals. But you can get a TUE as part of the medical response to certain conditions.
The black and white answer seems to be if you aren't XX, you can't compete in the women's division without hormone therapy/treatment. Basically, everything darkwave said, I agree with. In reality, I don't know how you get there. I did some Googling and the IOC stopped gender confirmation after 1996. If track requires a license of some sort for international competition, do you require gender confirmation and/or hormone testing on the front end? So in order to get a credential as a female athlete, you must submit proof of XX chromosomes or proof that you have been on hormone therapy for the required length of time & are within the female levels for testosterone? Seems easy enough. But is that the line? What about at the national level? NCAA? High school?
It might just be the conspiracy theorist side of me, but does anyone wonder if there is influence by a certain shoe company in all of this?
And then there's this at the high school level. Connecticut high school athletes file complaint over transgender policy (Hartford Courant)
And so is CeCe Telfer, who is a biological male that won the national championship in the NCAA Div-II Women's 400m IH.
Is CeCe the one who last year competed as a male indoors and as a female outdoors?
Are we there, yet?
She competed as a male in 2017, had to take a year off per NCAA rules before competing as a female in 2019.
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