On Thursday, Italian boxer Angela Carini withdrew from her boxing match in the women’s under-66 kg category against Algeria’s Imane Khalif on Thursday, giving the latter, who was banned from competing in world championships following failed fitness tests, testosterone and gender eligibility, an opening round win. Algeria’s Khelif won the fight just 46 seconds after his opponent withdrew. Few punches were thrown before Carini abandoned the fight, which is a rare occurrence in Olympic boxing.
The victory drew adverse comments from many prominent people like JK Rowling and Elon Musk, who took to social media questioning Khelif’s gender.
“Could any image better summarize our new men’s rights movement? The mischievous smile of a man who knows he is protected by a misogynistic sporting establishment, enjoying the anguish of a woman he has just punched in the head and whose life’s ambition he has just destroyed,” JK Rowling wrote in X.
Could any image better summarize our new men’s rights movement? The mischievous smile of a man who knows he’s protected by a misogynistic sporting establishment, capitalizing on the anguish of a woman he’s just punched in the head and whose life’s ambition he’s just destroyed. #Paris2024 pic.twitter.com/Q5SbKiksXQ
-JK Rowling (@jk_rowling) August 1, 2024
Elon Musk responded to a post from celebrity sports host Riley Gaines who said: “Men don’t belong in women’s sports #IStandWithAngelaCarini Let’s make it trendy”
Musk replied “Absolutely”
Absolutely https://t.co/twccUEOW9e
-Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 1, 2024
Many of these comments on social media forced the IOC to speak out and support Imane Khelif. In its response, the IOC said: “All athletes participating in the Paris 2024 Olympic Games boxing tournament comply with the competition eligibility and entry regulations, as well as all applicable medical regulations established by the Paris 2024 Boxing Unit. (PBU). As with previous Olympic boxing competitions, athletes’ gender and age are based on their passports.”
“These rules also apply during the qualification period, including the boxing tournaments of the 2023 European Games, Asian Games, Pan American Games and Pacific Games, the 2023 ad hoc African qualification tournament in Dakar (SEN) and two world qualifying tournaments held in Busto (ITA) and Bangkok (THA) in 2024, which involved a total of 1,471 different boxers from 172 National Olympic Committees (NOCs), the Boxing Refugee Team and Individual Neutral Athletes, and featured more than 2,000 qualifying fights,” the IOC statement said. .
The IOC said the athletes in question had already been the target of an arbitrary decision by the International Boxing Association.
“We have seen misleading information in reports about two female athletes competing at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. The two athletes have competed for many years in international boxing competitions in the women’s category, including the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, International Boxing Association (IBA) Championships Worlds and IBA-sanctioned tournaments These two athletes were victims of a sudden and arbitrary decision by the IBA. Towards the end of the 2023 IBA World Championships, they were suddenly disqualified without any due process.
Paris 2024 Boxing Unit/IOC Joint Statement pic.twitter.com/fZvgsW8OOi
– COI MEDIA (@iocmedia) August 1, 2024
“According to the IBA minutes available on its website, this decision was initially taken exclusively by the General Secretary and CEO of the IBA. The IBA Council only ratified it later and only later requested that a procedure be established to follow in similar cases in the future and reflected in the IBA Regulations also says that the IBA must “establish a clear procedure on gender testing. The current attack on these two athletes is entirely based on this arbitrary decision, which was taken without any proper procedure – especially considering that these athletes had been competing in high-level competitions for many years.
Such an approach is contrary to good governance,” the IOC added. The IOC said it is committed to protecting the human rights of all athletes participating in the Olympic Games in accordance with the Olympic Charter, the IOC Code of Ethics and the Strategic Framework IOC on Human Rights The IOC further said it was saddened by the abuse the two athletes are currently receiving, the statement added.
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