Caster Semenya could be forced to undertake hormone therapy for future Olympics

Female boxers do wear groin protection but it differs to what males wear, I've no idea if the boxer in question is wearing female or male protection though.
 
It does raise interesting questions about sport categorization. We split male/female in the interest of "fairness" due to different physical performance limitations between them, but we don't categorize by race, even though it is known that
blacks of West African ancestry (which would include most African-Americans) have a higher ratio of ''fast-twitch'' muscle fiber than whites do, which gives them an edge at leaping and sprinting.
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We also categorize some sports like Boxing/MMA by weight category to account for different body types and sizes, yet in grass roots football, we categorize only by age. In the later, this can present massive differentials week in week out in football matches across the country where in some age groups around age 14/15, you can have 6ft+ heavy players, going in for headers/tackles against 5ft light players that haven't gone through puberty and are not developed yet. Girls can also play in I believe up to under 14 level among boys. This is obviously different to elite level world sport and I don't think we can realistically do anything other than basic age groups in most amateur level sports. Just saying.
 
Fubsy said:
@dowie get him.
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Get what? Those were his very sentiments I was merely echoing...

BowdonUK said:
Can someone with XY chromosomes have only female organs?
I'm saying only because intersex people tend to have both, even if some aren't fully developed.
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As I understand it, Intersex covers a range of different conditions, each with its own scale of how male or female the individual is. There is no mid-point on any scale, so the individual will always lean one way or the other, to a measured extent.
There are some Intersex conditions where the individual is XY chromo but has fully functional female parts, can (and did) carry a child to term, etc.
 
ttaskmaster said:
Get what? Those were his very sentiments I was merely echoing...
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Was a play on your evergreen defence of a certain breed of dog and now transferring that into the thread about categories in sport.

Where would you draw the line? Your post above implies you don't think there is one when it comes to DSD in female sports.
 
Fubsy said:
Was a play on your evergreen defence of a certain breed of dog and now transferring that into the thread about categories in sport.
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Actually it was a similar argument in this thread, which I believe predates the disagreements from the dog one.
Incidentally, it's not the dog being defended, but the people affecting it that I'm 'prosecuting'. But I'm sure you knew that, given how often I've pointed it out.

Fubsy said:
Where would you draw the line? Your post above implies you don't think there is one when it comes to DSD in female sports.
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I try not to 'imply' anything with my posts, as people tend to read into that whatever they want to hear.
Right now it's a messy bulk-buy Costco-special multipack of canned worms, with the various disagreements over the scientific evidence for any of the different perspectives, with the way the CAS/IOC have handled the matter, with the levels of publicity and privacy violations, with the legal procedures and interpretations underpinning the different hearings and rulings, and all manner of holes being picked in everything.

From a scientific perspective, you show me absolute peer-agreed proof that an individual has a definite and unfair advantage, not commensurate with their designated* sex, as a result of their specific biology, then that is the line.
Again, show me the same level of proof that it is specifically natural excess testosterone that has resulted in this particular advantage, in their particular discipline/event, that's where the line begins.
But as of the last time I bothered reading up on the subject, these factors and those in the above paragraph are all still being highly and hotly debated by various experts, so until those are globally settled you can't reliably start filling up your line-painting machine.

From a moral perspective, we have a wealth of both Trans-people and athletes being caught doping, both of which I consider artificial advantages. Someone who has been designated all their lives as female, by both the doctors of their own 'uneducated, backward, under-resourced' nation and previously by those of the official ruling bodies, and is competing in their 'natural state' without any kind of elective enhancement - I see no problem with them competing, unless you have the above-specified proof that the advantage they have is unfair. The argument is that most elite level athletes have some sort of advantage, which is precisely what got them to elite level in the first place. Whether those are unfair is again still debatable, but it seems even there the rules are still chopping and changing...

Either way, the details and reasoning behind any such ruling should not be made public, given how badly these athletes' privacy and personal lives have been put through the ringer.




*Designated by social and physical standards, completely ignoring any legal or self-certifying assertions.
 
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As always @ttaskmaster comes in to tell us we are all incorrect.

Provides zero suggestions or solutions to improve situation, does not catch up on the thread and previous evidence contrary to his reply. Decides to just state it's a can of worms, agrees that information to clear up the situation should not be released because it hurts someone that can potentially cause harm to others.

All those paragraphs for nothing meaningful.
 
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jaybee said:
It does raise interesting questions about sport categorization. We split male/female in the interest of "fairness" due to different physical performance limitations between them, but we don't categorize by race, even though it is known that


We also categorize some sports like Boxing/MMA by weight category to account for different body types and sizes, yet in grass roots football, we categorize only by age. In the later, this can present massive differentials week in week out in football matches across the country where in some age groups around age 14/15, you can have 6ft+ heavy players, going in for headers/tackles against 5ft light players that haven't gone through puberty and are not developed yet.
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And those are fair points to raise, I don't think categorising by race is going to be palatable though and that's a bit of a minefield both socially and in terms of even how to categorise objectively as you're going to have people with mixed heritage etc..

But sure people with West African DNA will dominate sprinting, East Africans will dominate long distance and neither group will typically be very competitive at swimming.

But in this case, we do have a category/requirement and it's being breached rather unfairly. We test for doping/drugs, we check the weight of athletes where weight limits are in place, we check the age of athletes where age limits are in place. Paralympics have criteria for types of disability.

None of those things are conflated by modern gender discourse and people's choice to identify or continue identifying (after someone has made that choice for them at birth) as a particular gender when biologically they're the opposite sex.

We'd have no tolerance for someone saying they identify as someone older or younger or heavier or lighter or with a disability they don't have etc..
 
jaybee said:
It does raise interesting questions about sport categorization. We split male/female in the interest of "fairness" due to different physical performance limitations between them, but we don't categorize by race, even though it is known that


We also categorize some sports like Boxing/MMA by weight category to account for different body types and sizes, yet in grass roots football, we categorize only by age. In the later, this can present massive differentials week in week out in football matches across the country where in some age groups around age 14/15, you can have 6ft+ heavy players, going in for headers/tackles against 5ft light players that haven't gone through puberty and are not developed yet. Girls can also play in I believe up to under 14 level among boys. This is obviously different to elite level world sport and I don't think we can realistically do anything other than basic age groups in most amateur level sports. Just saying.
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Well how do you divide it up? The traditional races have subgroups some of which have advantages.

Then what do you do with mixed race people? Both in the traditional sense and amongst the sub groups.

Sex is binary, race isn’t.
 
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