Olympics 2024

They’ll probably introduce a mixed boxing tag team relay in a few years for gender equality anyway

I think a sport where the object is to punch each other repeatedly in the head is madness. Quibbling over whether the brain damage is slightly more acceptable if it's caused by someone with the same chromosomes seems to miss the point. Implying some false equivalence with general violence against women is I think verging on bad faith (hence the slightly snarky comment). Of course in general men have physical advantages over women, but we're not talking about in general. We're talking about an incredibly small category of professional athletes who are further categorised into weight bands as a proxy for strength, and in this case, less than half a dozen individual athletes. At that point, population level patterns are pretty meaningless.

By the way, it was a genuine question as to which definition of sex you were using. I assume you hold that chromosomes are definitive. In which case at what age do you think we should screen for this given that many sporting careers start with an interest at junior school?

As I commented in my earlier contribution to this debate, boxing is a strange (*) hill on which the IOC have chosen to die / not die re males in women's sport. It's not a boxing issue per se; the contact element of boxing just makes the issues more obvious. It's a males in women's sport issue.

As as I also commented earlier, the underlying problem is actually governing bodies - in this case the IOC - actively wanting males to compete in women's sport. Hence the removal of chromosome-based sex testing in the late 1990s, without any consultation of female sportspeople and against the preferences of circa 80% of female sportspeople per numerous subsequent survey. And hence the repeated messaging that Caster Semenya (and the other Rio 800m medallists) was a female with abnormally high testosterone levels when they knew she (no need to misgender Caster) was a DSD male with normal male testosterone levels due to having internal but fully functional testicles.

If the governing bodies commit to protecting female sports then the issues really go away. At grass roots level, peer pressure keeps males in the men's categories. And at elite level, chromosome testing does the job.

The Lia Thomas saga in the US is a good example. Everyone knew Lia was a fully intact male, but for whatever reason, the Powers That Be wanted Lia to be able to access the female changing rooms and beat as many females as possible in the women's categories. Anyone who attempted to speak out was threatened with loss of job or loss of scholarship.

Similarly, the USA Cycling rules re eligibility, which allow self-ID of gender up to Cat 2, actively promote males competing in the women's category. This Twitter account is worth a follow in this respect: 🚲 (@i_heart__bikes) / X

Conversely, in the UK, the Powers That Be in swimming don't want males in women's categories and have introduced female and open categories (ID as female taken on trust, subject to investigation by the the relevant national governing body if considered necessary) other than for entry-level galas where organisers can offer genuine "self ID" categories.

The governing bodies for the other main Olympic sports in the UK have taken a similar approach, at least at elite level.

(*) Whilst at any given point on the ability distribution, males are circa 10% faster than females, when adjusting for weight, males apparently punch with circa 2.5x the force of females.

Without getting into the specific case at this Olympics which is not related to any of the trans panic/nonsense (choose your team) in any way, I'm calling bullshit on the "males punch 2.5x the force of females" when applied to top level boxers at a given weight. Maybe it's true on average across populations and then used out of context.

Big scandal this morning! Did you not see it!

According to Hollywood, it’s actually females punching 2.5 times harder than males.

I think that's quite a big "if", but this is the key thing from that article that seems to get forgotten by governing bodies too often : "the female category in elite sport has no raison d’être apart from the biological sex differences that lead to sex differences in performance and the gap between the top male and female athletes."

Just reading back on this. You say she has 'fathered two children'. I was intrigued so looked it up. She is in a same sex relationship and her partner has undergone artificial insemination.

Or is there another story?

It's a rumour because a donor is never discussed. Although I'm not sure Tom Daley discusses it much either.

I did wonder if that was the assumption. Slender chance I'd have thought, but a possibility.

Not to mention the idea that the same punch is dangerous when connecting with the female skull but not the male skull. 🤪

You think they should pull their punches and be more neutral in their tone?

I think they shouldn't imply that their problem with USADA is anything other than what they have done in this scandal.

Not really arguing or wanting to get involved in the "debate" as such but I thought there were maybe a couple of other circumstances where an XY person could present as a woman beyond 5-ARD? Although of course 5-ARD has more sporting relevance due to the testosterone.

Plus other disorders where XX women have abnormally high testosterone, but then it's just a genetic advantage like any other I guess - except in some cases where governing bodies have tried to use testosterone as the determining factor.

That's a valid argument, and it would likely curry a fair amount of sympathy if that's the argument that the IOC was making to justify DSD males in their female categories. But it's not an argument they have ever used.

But ultimately, I think one has to take the route that is fairest to the 50% (the female population) rather than the 1/15000 where there are mutually exclusive "rights". (Not that sport, or even fair sport is a right, as understood by human rights legislation.)