TThe controversy surrounding Olympic boxers Imane Khelif of Algeria and Lin Yu-Ting of Chinese Taipei does not appear to be going away anytime soon.
On August 6, Khelif defeated Janjaem Suwannapheng of Thailand and advanced to the gold medal in the women’s welterweight (66kg), where she will face Yang Liu, of China. Lin is guaranteed at least a bronze medal after advancing to the featherweight semifinals; she will face Esra Yildiz Kahraman of Türkiye on Wednesday. Both competed in the women’s category, despite recent claims by the International Boxing Association (IBA) that they are not women. Regardless of which color medal each boxer wins in Paris, views on gender determination will likely continue to be one of the legacies of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. “I had heard the news about it, but I wasn’t following it closely. She is a woman, but she is very strong,” Suwannapheng said of Khelif after the fight.
At the famous Roland-Garros tennis stadium, where one of the courts was renovated with a boxing ring, fans turned out in droves to support Khelif. Shouts of “Imane, Imane, Imane” drowned out the bell at the end of three rounds, and when the final unanimous decision was announced, Khelif jumped up and down in the ring and raised his fists.
“What she went through was on a totally different scale,” says Imane Megharbi, an influencer from Algeria. “She was being harassed by international celebrities, which was very sad and unfortunate, because she was focused on a goal and has been working for years to be in the Olympics. And finally, when she is here, she was unfairly attacked.”
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Both Khelif and Lin have competed in women’s divisions for years, including at the Tokyo Olympics three years ago, where neither won a medal. (Khelif finished fifth in his weight class.) But doubts about their sex were catalyzed by the IBA last year when the group, which is boxing’s international governing body, disqualified Khelif and Lin from their world championships, claiming that both women had failed. eligibility tests that establish your gender. Khelif has refused to answer questions about any tests the IBA claims to have administered. The IBA held a press conference in Paris in which it did not provide any additional documentation about this test nor did it clarify the reasons for the disqualifications. IBA officials only stated that the two boxers were “destroying the sport, especially women’s sport.” They continued their claims that Khelif and Lin may be transgender, despite statements from each of the athletes’ representatives stating that they were born and raised as women.
The IBA’s allegations fueled a firestorm of unfounded opinions online, including from conservative politicians, claiming that the women are transgender and Harry Potter author JK Rowling, whose past statements on transgender issues have displeased many fans. The question is whether there are biological criteria for determining sex, since chromosomes, genitals and hormones can vary widely within gender.
Eric Vilain, director of the Institute for Clinical and Translational Science at the University of California, Irvine, who has conducted extensive research on disorders of sexual development, says there is no single test, or even a series of tests, to definitively determine sex. Chromosomes, hormones, receptors for these hormones, and genitalia all play an important role, and within each of these parameters there is great variation. “For example, there are not only XX and XY chromosomes, but in several individuals there is a mosaic of XXY or XYY; some individuals have testicles and ovaries in the same body; and hormones vary greatly depending on individuals,” he says. “Therefore, the idea that a parameter like sex chromosomes determines an individual’s sex and can form the basis for making them ineligible is simply wrong.”
Vilain served as a medical expert on an IOC committee that in 2015 established a framework for considering sex assignment and hyperandrogenism (high testosterone levels). He says that based on the variability and range of biological factors involved in sex determination, the IOC in 1999 abandoned sex testing, which was mainly based on chromosomes. In 2021, the 2015 framework was updated with the Fairness, Inclusion and Non-Discrimination Based on Sexual Identity and Sexual Variations guidelines. In it, however, the IOC leaves primary responsibility for sex determination to individual sports federations, which in turn have interpreted the IOC framework in a variety of ways. World Aquatics, which oversees water sports like swimming, for example, foci on puberty as a central criterion, while World Athletics, which is responsible for athletics, focuses on testosterone levels in combination with a list of XY-based disorders of sexual development.
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Vilain applauds the IOC’s support for Khelif and Lin, but hopes the organization will provide more details on the criteria used to allow Khelif and Lin to compete. This way, it could serve as a model for future determinations and not open athletes up to the questions and “bullying,” as Khelif called it, that she and Lin experienced. “My hope is that once we have this explanation, they will apply it at least during the Olympics to all athletes [including those] with differences in sexual development that could have been excluded based on decisions that varied from one federation to another and had no scientific basis,” he says.
Khelif’s first fight in Paris, against Italian Angela Carini, lasted just 46 seconds – Carini withdrew from the fight after receiving a few punches from Khelif. “I couldn’t breathe anymore. I thought about my family, looked at my brother in the stands and went to my corner to retire…I have never been hit by such a powerful punch,” she said, according to the Italian sports newspaper. Sports Gazette.
Carini, who learned boxing from his father and brother, stated that his decision to abandon the fight and not shake Khelif’s hand as he left the ring was not related to doubts about Khelif’s gender, saying: “It wasn’t something I intended. to do. I have nothing against [Khelif]. In fact, if I met her again, I would hug her.”
Khelif praised the IOC for its support. The IOC withdrew the IBA from the Olympics as amateur boxing’s international governing body in 2019 due to concerns about corruption and questions about its impartiality. And at a press conference in Paris, IOC President Thomas Bach called the group’s allegations “hate speech” and denounced them as “totally unacceptable.” passport as a woman and competed for many years as women,” he said.
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Avoiding most of the media hubbub in Paris to focus on his fights, Khelif implored in an interview broadcast after his quarter-final fight “to all the people of the world to defend the Olympic principles and the Olympic Charter, to abstain to intimidate all athletes.” , because this has effects, massive effects. It can destroy people, it can kill people’s thoughts, spirit and mind.”
In 2023, Khelif was appointed as a UNICEF ambassador and hopes to continue promoting sport for girls, after the experience of initially being discouraged by her father from pursuing boxing. Growing up in a rural village in western Algeria, Khelif began playing football, but was bullied by boys when her natural athletic abilities began to overshadow them. She shared with UNICEF that when those boys started fighting with her, she managed to dodge their attacks, which led her to boxing. Her father did not approve of her playing the sport, and she and her mother took on odd jobs, including selling scrap metal and couscous, to raise enough money for the bus fare Khelif needed to train in a nearby village.
Now, both parents support his Olympic dream. “Imane is an example of an Algerian woman. She is one of Algeria’s heroes,” said her father, Omar. told RFI after Khelif’s quarter-final victory over Anna Luca Hamori of Hungary secured her an Olympic medal. At the club where Khelif first honed his boxing skills, a trainer played down the gender uproar. “Their goal is clear: it is designed to confuse her and make her forget why she came to the Olympics.”
Many of the fans present at Roland-Garros waving Algerian flags were women, who now see Khelif as a symbol of female empowerment. “You can’t imagine the scale of people [in Algeria who are supporting Khelif]”, says Megarbi. “Not only because she is Algerian, but because she is a woman. Even if the whole world, the whole world is against you, your country is behind you. Algerian women are after you. She has been a beautiful representation for women for her strength and perseverance.”
This story originally appeared on Time.com read the full story
