Intersex Gender and the evolution of sport

[MetaSexual2]

All the recent news coverage of South African sprinter Caster Semenya being examined to determine her sex is making me think a lot about gender issues and sports. Brief recap for those who haven't followed the story - Semenya, who is 18, has a breakout win a few weeks ago and becomes world women's 800m champion. Other sprinters question her masculine appearance and the IAAF has her undergo gender testing. Information about the testing has leaked to the press, who are reporting she has some form of intersex condition.

BTW - her recent identification as a hermaphrodite by the mainstream press is almost certainly incorrect. A hermaphrodite would have fully formed sex organs of both male and female.

So in general I'd be curious to hear the take from bisexuals, and particularly trans- or inter-gender bisexuals, on what is happening to Semenya.

In the past, I've done some writing about how technology will force us to use more and more rigid competition categories (i.e. weight, height, gender, bio or cybernetic technological enhancements, etc.) to create a "fair" playing field for competitors. I don't think there is a clear answer here, just interesting to think about.

[Long Duck Dong]

she was born, therefore she is......

I have heard reports that its being regarded as a race driven issue..... that other countries with the same issue with athletes, often gets swept under the table

the athlete in question, was not enhanced / doped / medically made superior.... but simply born a lady that was more * evolved * in some areas...... and it makes you wonder how many world records were broken by people that could indeed be intersex or have other natural aspects that could be used to rob them of a achievement.....

what I want to know is why so many athletes form other countries that has been deemed to be * unusual * have not been pulled aside ( china and russia ) and yet SA and bulgaria were hammered.... could it be a case of *lets not push against those that can push back

my other issue is that the athlete won the gold legally and legitly..but there is talk of giving a gold medal to the second runner up..... nice way to say * well done you won the race but now we are gonna slap you in the face by making somebody else the recognized winner of the race, cos you were born a certain way so it makes your achievement void*

[stormalong]

Gender and sexuality are 2 different things. It isn't fair to the other women to have to compete against a man (which she basicly is, judging from having no female internal organs, but having internal testicles). That's why they have women's categories in the first place. Let her/him run with the men and compete with them. Just my :2cents:worth

[MetaSexual2]

Yes, if the leaked report is correct, she is more towards being a male than a female in terms of internal structure, but her testosterone levels are not what a normal male's would be. She falls into a third class, which makes it very hard to come up with a decision that is equitable for everyone. This is what I meant above by having to have more categories to cover instances like this if you really want to do things fairly. This gets very tricky though - you could wind up with several different classes for every given sport depending on what kind of "physical machinery" the athletes have. Auto racing is good metaphor for what it might look like. Weight classes (boxing, etc.), gender, and sometimes age are the only real divisions that are typically used in athletics now (based on physical characteristics). The other direction you could go would be to just lump everyone, men and women, in together. This doesn't seem very fair though, and in the same sense "let her go run with the men" isn't either. If they want to keep the existing M/F competition structure, I suppose they will have to have to draw a line based a few different physiological variables to determine where borderline cases fit.

I have great sympathy for Caster. She has probably been raised as female and clearly identifies as one. This is why I think the IAAF needs to come up with an absolutely clear set of guidelines on this so people don't screwed by the system in the future. They haven't up till this point and that has caused the types of problems you point out. How do they do this so that intersex people aren't being excluded is an ethical minefield though.

[MelissaMaven]

I would have to agree with stormalong, to some degree. When being intersex or transgender comes into play, there will often be physical characteristics which go along with those which do not meet the average for one particular gender or another. This can obviously lead to issues of fairness to compete.

However, these characteristics can vary widely from case to case.

Unfortunately, simply being someone of this nature automatically gives you a disadvantage once the public knows. Even if there were a process to categorize someone as being closer to one gender or another in order to compete, in the end who decides what gender you're more comparable to? And once a decision were made, how many people would still question your legitimacy to compete? And if you were classified to compete as being the opposite gender to what you live as, then who in that position would still honestly want to participate?

Most people just don't understand how this stuff works, and would never accept it, regardless of any official decisions made about the individual. People have a need to classify things, even though sometimes it's just not that simple.

Basically, professional sports is just not the best of fields to be in for such an individual.

[Cherokee_Mountaincat]

Ya know the funny thing is, no one bothered to lift her skirt and Look either until someone bitched and complained. She physically looks male and has the strength of a male but May have the female genitalia outwardly, but the Doctors have only derived their discisions from blood tests and such. No one has bothered to do a physical exam to see if all of the working parts are female! *Rolling eyes* The trouble is, she was good at it, and some busy body had to pull the race and gender card on her.
I say do a thorough exam and determine the Person she is, then let her compete again. Place her in the men's competition and let her run there and see if she has a shot, but dont take it away from her entirely. Its wrong to strip her of something that she's worked her whole young life for.
Just my humble:2cents:
Cat

[Realist]

"HE/IT"?

I can understand maybe a he/she designation, as there is some confusion, but I would never consider a human being an IT!

[bygyuk]

Well said Realist.

Whatever organs she has (or has not), Caster Semenya is as human as any of us. Use he/she if you REALLY must, but to refer to a fellow human as "it" is deplorable.

IMO, whatever the rights and wrongs of the sporting issue, if she regards herself as female, she has the right to be referred to as "she".

I am old enough to remember a time when some people thought it funny to refer to gays as "he she or it".

[Hephaestion]

Situation is possibly that which occurs every so often. There will almost certainly be a high number of females in the family (including aunts and cousins) betraying a genetic condition in which the body does not respond properly to testosterone. In other words the body will be masculine in genetic composition and some parts will be influenced towards masculinity but the overall efffect is that of remaining a female in appearance (the base plan).

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[coyotedude]

I feel compassion for her and for others in her position.

The fact is there is a wide array of conditions and situations that qualify under "intersex" or gender ambiguity, and not all of them are immediately obvious from birth - particularly if you don't have access to sophisticated medical care and diagnostics. It's not just genetics or physical characteristics, either; the psychological effect of these conditions can be devastating if not handled correctly.

In the 1990s, there was a concerted effort by the IAAF to limit or ban gender testing for athletes internationally because of the thorny issues involved with intersex conditions and gender ambiguity.

What's worse is that in this case we are making lots of assumptions from leaks to the press that may or may not be accurate. But think how devastating it could be for this particular athlete - this human being - to have news of her condition being broadcast worldwide to cultures that have real and significant biases about gender and sexuality. Or how devastating it could be to learn that no, you can't have children because you have no ovaries or a uterus but you do have testes growing somewhere inside of you.

In theory, she should be accorded the respect that is due every human being, no more and no less. But that will never happen now, and I think that's just tragic.

Peace

[diB4u]

Actuarly to be honest and frank, the way she was treated was disgusting.

She is a she, thats her name, intersexed is a genetic condition.

Please spare a thought for how she feels, that her name and picture has been on most newspapers in her own country and outside of south africa. What is her crime? To be born different.

Dear me, please no talk of her being an "it". She lives, she breathes, she farts and she has sexual thoughts.

The international atherletic federation should hung their heads in shame.

Then if people must consider other options then change the gender definition then to have 3 genders on offical documents etc, but, in my view, theres enough hatred and bigotory in the world, and now it seems that even in racing theres once again controversy.

[coyotedude]

Please spare a thought for how she feels, that her name and picture has been on most newspapers in her own country and outside of south africa. What is her crime? To be born different.

Yes! You said it so much better than me. Thank you!

[the sacred night]

There is a good discussion of the intersex and sports issue in the book "Sexing the Body" by Anne Fausto-Sterling. It actually recounts a similar story and points out that gender/sex testing was started to keep men from masquerading as women to gain an unfair advantage, and these intersexed individuals are clearly not in that boat. The one discussed in the book appears not to have even been aware that she was intersexed until the scandal happened. Interestingly enough, the book also mentions a documented case where a man really did masquerade as a woman, and he came in fourth behind three women, so maybe the line between male athletes' and female athletes' capabilities isn't so clear.


Well said Realist.

Whatever organs she has (or has not), Caster Semenya is as human as any of us. Use he/she if you REALLY must, but to refer to a fellow human as "it" is deplorable.

IMO, whatever the rights and wrongs of the sporting issue, if she regards herself as female, she has the right to be referred to as "she".

I am old enough to remember a time when some people thought it funny to refer to gays as "he she or it".

Some people actually prefer to be called "it." I'm not arguing that the athlete in question is one, and she probably isn't, so I agree it was inappropriate, but "deplorable" is a bit harsh. I have considered changing my pronoun to "it" because I like the lack of gender distinction and I think, in the proper context, "it" can sound more ethereal or otherworldly than disparaging. Just indulging a tangent :)

[MelissaMaven]

I was just reading this (http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2009/sep/13/caster-semenya-gender-test-results), and unfortunately it seems that she's not handling it all so well. It also goes on to explain a bit more details of her condition.

Either way, due to her testosterone levels and all, she clearly had an unfair advantage, and shouldn't be allowed to continue competing in the womens' events as far as I'm concerned. Now whether she should be allowed to keep the medals she already won, though, I'm of mixed opinion about that.

Personally I feel that any doubts of her eligibility should have been conducted and decided on before she ever raced anyone at this professional level. And yet I also feel that she is equally to blame for not being more forthcoming from the start, if she was indeed fully aware of her physical state.

If she was aware, then she willingly "cheated" pretty much.

[TwylaTwobits]

I would wonder why she had to hear this news from the media and not the doctors who did the lab work. Really in this day and age, do personal and private matters not count for anything? South Africa was threatening a third world war over the way it was handled, they seem to target as race. Personally I think nothing should take away her achievement. She did not falsely race, she did not take steroids, she did not deliberately do a thing. She was born the way she was born and should not be penalized or have a footnote added to her place in sports history because of something she could not have stopped anymore than you can hold back the tide when the moon rises.

There could have been numerous athletes throughout the history of track and field that were intersex, the problem was that Caster was so dominating that the jealous competitors were anxious to discredit her in any way shape or form they could.

Yes I used "her" repeatedly in this post. Caster is a female, for all purposes, she has no external male organs per the report the doctors leaked to the media. Therefore she is female and should be allowed to compete as one.

My two cents.

[MetaSexual2]

SacredNight - thanks for the book reccy :) If you are into this kind of identity stuff, one book you might be interested in is "the Shattered Self" by Pierre Baldi. Its about how the world is changing because we are breaking down the physical barriers that define ourselves and our relationships with the world. I'm very interested to see how people react when faced with something that doesn't fit their normal categorisation of the world, and so this case is a very interesting one.

Twyla - The position you are taking is that only external physical appearance matters. I don't think that is a fair basis for defining a competition category. I agree we should use her in referring to Caster, because that is her chosen gender identity and we should respect that. If the report is correct though, she clearly falls outside the boundaries of what we would normally consider "physiologically female".

MM - I think the tricky bit for the IAAF is that they would have require across the board gender testing for female athletes prior to competition, but what you are suggesting is probably the way things will go eventually. I still think there is a problem of fairness for athletes who fall in this middle ground though. She is clearly a world class athlete, but her times are not on par with men running the 800.

CD & DiB4U - No question the IAAF ballsed this up big time. Its really a tragedy for the individual that any of this was leaked to the press. I think Caster's own coaching staff should bear some of the responsibility if they had questions about her condition, but I think the athlete may have a pretty good case for suing the IAAF on privacy grounds if there is a legal mechanism for doing so.

WoN - hello little trolly person

[diB4u]

Yes! You said it so much better than me. Thank you!

I just get really reallly angy, when anyone is called an "it" regardless who said it. Thats why there should be at least 3 recognisable genders, male, female, trans or maybe four?

Sometimes i loose count lol.

On a seperate but equal footing, I do not know anyone who likes to be refered to as "it". I've been called an "it" before, why cause I dont conform to expectation.... so what lol.

Regarding the IAAF- one test was done that proved she is a woman, but they did another test that provided information that she has male gonads?

I quickly turned off after hearing the first "trail by tv".

[MetaSexual2]

Dib4U - Take this with a grain of salt, because these are all press leaks, but what is being reported is that the early tests before the race apparently showed she had high testosterone levels and then the following examination showed she has a intersex condition with internal testes and no uterus or ovaries.

Interesting to think about a world in which there is a recognised inter-gender class...

[diB4u]

Dib4U - Take this with a grain of salt, because these are all press leaks, but what is being reported is that the early tests before the race apparently showed she had high testosterone levels and then the following examination showed she has a intersex condition with internal testes and no uterus or ovaries.

Interesting to think about a world in which there is a recognised inter-gender class...

True .... ;)

testostrone is a weird thing, theres conditions withing women fertility issues that are resulted in having too much testostrone, and i believe theres conditions resulting in where men produce a higher level of estrogen.

For example a woman like myself with PCO has the same level as transmen on their first year of hormones.

:2cents:

[TwylaTwobits]

Nope, not just physical matters, what I'm saying is that when she has been always treated as female, looks female, was raised as a female, she is a female, period.

There is no reason to penalize or add a footnote to the sports charts on the basis of something she had no control over.

She didn't do this, nature did, therefore it's NATURAL.

[MetaSexual2]

Follow up - one of the only decent articles I've read in the press about intersex issues:

Don't Call Them Hermaphrodites (http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-09-16/dont-call-them-hermaphrodites/)

[Hephaestion]

Not really possible to be a hermaphrodite human. It would mean having two sets of genitalia - one male and one female.

The genetic composition determines male or female in any incomplete expression.

Transexuals may alter their external appearances but intenally the genetic composition remains. Any extreme alteration requires hormonal intervention to maintain the transition.

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[Hephaestion]

".......Trans men and women can take shitloads of hormones and get all the cosmetic surgery they want but none of this makes them actual real or biological men or women....."

It depends on what you call 'biological'. It is correct to say that genetically they have not altered. However, appearance and phsyiology may be altered dramatically with medical intervention to the extent that they may compete successfully with unalterd 'specimens' for mating rights and territory irrespective of fertility success.
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