Sex-Testing Female Athletes (NYTimes)

[Xuzi]

A long but interesting read. I remember the scandal surrounding the runner from SA (and I felt so bad for her), but had no clue it was so standard to make female athletes prove just how female they really are. :(

 

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/07/03/magazine/the-humiliating-practice-of-sex-testing-female-athletes.html?ribbon-ad-idx=7&src=trending&module=Ribbon&version=origin&region=Header&action=click&contentCollection=Trending&pgtype=article&referer=http%3A%2F%2Fm.facebook.com%2F

Edited June 29, 2016 by Xuzi

[Ravin]

Link?

 

 

[Xuzi]

Oops, sorry. Link added!

[Guest]

It's sickening that such a completely corrupt organization weilds this much power and can so easily humiliate and ruin someone's life. The IOC serves no purpose that I can see. I'm curious how their little olympics goes next month. I mean it's a GEAT idea to hold the Olympics in a struggling country in financial crisis, who can't pay its police officers, and is enduring and infectious disease outbreak unlike anything in recent history. The ego of the collective IOC never ceases to amaze me. I hope she at least is getting some support from someone somewhere. How humiliating.

[Guest]

I'm sorry. I just don't get this. I went and read the article again and it made me even angrier. Are they going to start testing mens' T levels and root out the ones with naturally high levels. They have a separate section for transgendered people but no protections for women? So you would have an easier time calling yourself trans and competing as a woman that if you lived your entire life as a woman and had no clue anything was amiss until these (not scientifically agreed upon) tests were administered? It makes me wish ALL female athletes across the world were in a position to stop competing until these agencies came to their senses. Then again they probably won't care because female athletes are clearly second or third class citizens as far as the IOC is concerned.

[MercyA]

Very interesting, Xuzi. Thanks for posting.

[TravelingChris]

I remember the East German swimming women.  They definitely had something added to them.

[LucyStoner]

Hormone levels in men and women vary greatly. Some women naturally produce more testosterone than the average woman.

 

Also, it casts suspicion on women whose face, height and/or build challenge what we think women should look like.

 

It's a load of you know what!

Edited June 30, 2016 by LucyStoner

[SparklyUnicorn]

That's pretty harsh.  Cheating of various forms happens though so I don't know the answer.  I remember looking at some of the Chinese gymnasts and thinking some of them looked way too young and China has been known to cheat with the age requirement.

 

An article about that:  http://london2012.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/08/flashback-friday-age-controversy-follows-chinese-gymnasts/

 

But really what they did to the first woman in the story is pretty darn extreme and way too much. 

[Guest]

The Olympics are such a hot mess, it is getting hard to be excited.

[goldberry]

Thanks for sharing that, I had no idea that went on.

[tm919]

I seriously don't understand how this is even a thing. To me it's like disqualifying an athlete because they are too tall and it gives them  "unfair advantage." Doesn't this describe most Olympic athletes? Compared to most people they are too tall, too short, too this, too that. Maybe I've naive but I keep thinking of my husband who got "too tall" for gymnastics... yes, there are people who defy the trend, but many sports favor a particular body type and the people who reach the top of the ranks often are several standard deviations from the "norm" in some way -- it's one, among the MANY, reasons they end up at the top.

Edited July 1, 2016 by tm919

[kbutton]

The first time I'd ever heard about the whole concept of intersex status was directly from debate about Olympic qualifications. It's terribly sad that people who are intersex themselves sometimes (apparently fairly often) hear about it for the first time from debate about Olympic qualifications--if they aren't experiencing personal or health concerns over it, they might not have ever wanted or needed to know. It's awful to have find out something so intimate in such a public way, especially in the context of being disqualified for something you love to do. How horrible.

Edited July 1, 2016 by kbutton

[Rebel Yell]

The physical exam just sounds so degrading. So sad for those women!

[SparklyUnicorn]

The first time I'd ever heard about the whole concept of intersex status was directly from debate about Olympic qualifications. It's terribly sad that people who are intersex themselves sometimes (apparently fairly often) hear about it for the first time from debate about Olympic qualifications--if they aren't experiencing personal or health concerns over it, they might not have ever wanted or needed to know. It's awful to have find out something so intimate in such a public way, especially in the context of being disqualified for something you love to do. How horrible.

 

That's not even the worst thing that often happens to them.  For a long time if a baby was born with male and female genitalia they'd basically surgically alter the baby, sometimes not even really telling the parents exactly the details of that and then would tell them to raise the baby as a girl when in fact they had nothing indicating one way or another (it's easier to alter someone to be a girl than the other way around).  Sometimes the baby would grow up and be distraught over being raised a girl because they never felt as if they were a girl.  So recently a lot of intersex people have spoken out against this and say they believe the individual has the right to decide that and that should not be done automatically when they are a baby.

[TravelingChris]

I don't think they should be able to compete.  They aren't women.

[SparklyUnicorn]

nm....

Edited July 1, 2016 by SparklyUnicorn

[LucyStoner]

I don't think they should be able to compete. They aren't women.

Who isn't a woman?

[kitten18]

I don't think they should be able to compete. They aren't women.

Did you read the article?

Who are not women?

[Ausmumof3]

That is pretty sad. I wonder what the long term solution to gender based competition in sport is though? Maybe all sports competition should be opened to both genders? Obviously many women lack the physical strength to compete with men but maybe extreme athletes wouldn't so much. It seems like as long as we have gender based sports though this is going to be a problem.

[frogger]

I agree Ausmumof3. I know it would be terribly hard for a woman to compete with a man in say powerlifting but it is what it is. I mean it's not fair that a short guy doesn't have much of a chance to be a basketball player either. Perhaps we should just have competitions instead of women's only competitions.

[momacacia]

I wonder what the long term solution to gender based competition in sport is though? Maybe all sports competition should be opened to both genders? Obviously many women lack the physical strength to compete with men but maybe extreme athletes wouldn't so much. It seems like as long as we have gender based sports though this is going to be a problem.

Without gender-based sports, women would very rarely, if ever, win, even among the elite athletes.

 

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/08/we-thought-female-athletes-were-catching-up-to-men-but-theyre-not/260927/

[Ailaena]

 

I feel as though there are some competitions that should be segregated - mostly contests specifically of strength and speed - simply because most men are stronger/faster than most women. But why are things like downhill skiing segregated? Or shooting? Or equestrian? Archery?? Diving? Can a woman not make a horse run as fast as a man can? Does a man make a horse jump higher?

 

Now I said diving, but now I'm not sure. Are the standard men's dives more difficult than the standard women's dives? In platform as well as springboard? Probably, right? Do men do synchronized swimming? Sigh... It gets difficult :/.

 

But I still think downhill skiing and shooting should not be segregated >:(

[frogger]

Men would still dominate skiing. Grater mass helps overcome friction and it takes a great amount of strength to keep those turns so perfectly in line.

 

The sports I know women compete with men in are usually endurance based which includes mental and physical fatigue issues. Lael Wilcox just won overall in the 4,200 mile Trans Am Bike Race after biking to the start of the course from Anchorage, Alaska. Also, there have never been separate male/female categories for the Iditarod. I don't know about diving and gymnastics and such, other than women don't even have a "rings" event which is based so much on upper body strength.

 

 

Edited to add: That doesn't change the fact that some men are 5 feet tall and some are almost 7 feet and those discrepancies exist in women too yet unless you are in wrestling or boxing none of that matters. Girl's just wrestle with the boys in their weight class in high school.

Edited July 1, 2016 by frogger

[kiwik]

I don't think they should be able to compete. They aren't women.

If they had had gender reassignment surgery I would agree about competing but these are young women who are female on their birth certificate and have been raised as girls, often in societies where being female is a distict disadvantage. All athletes have traits that make them stand out and this is just one.

 

Now if poor families were castrating boys and so they could pass them off as girls that would be different but I think the castration may defeat the purpose.

[LucyStoner]

I feel strongly that there is a need for competitive women's sports and don't think the solution is to have everything be co-ed.

 

The solution is to remember that biological sex characteristics aren't identical for all men and all women. Some athletes who have been gender tested are technically intersex, others are not but are incorrectly identified as such because the IOC is full of crap.

[wintermom]

Very interesting article. With so much doping and intentional cheating going on in sports, it's really sad that those individuals with naturally occurring differences outside the current accepted ranges get caught in the middle. 

 

The politics and money involved in elite sports certainly leads to both positive and negative consequences for those involved. This young woman from India, and thousands of others, wouldn't have pursued sports if it wasn't economically beneficial, and then that same factor suddenly becomes a negative. 

 

It would be really fun to have all the IOC members have to pass a fitness test in order for them to remain on the board. I'd pick a half marathon. ;) I think it might shake things up a bit.

I feel as though there are some competitions that should be segregated - mostly contests specifically of strength and speed - simply because most men are stronger/faster than most women. But why are things like downhill skiing segregated? Or shooting? Or equestrian? Archery?? Diving? Can a woman not make a horse run as fast as a man can? Does a man make a horse jump higher?

 

 

The Olympic equestrian events are co-ed.  As is the winter sport of curling.

 

Perhaps more interesting, there are the "mixed" events, with a co-ed team.  Pairs figure skating, etc.  It isn't an Olympic event yet, but there are "mixed relays" in world championship swimming, where the team must consist of two men and two women.

[Ailaena]

The Olympic equestrian events are co-ed. As is the winter sport of curling.

 

Perhaps more interesting, there are the "mixed" events, with a co-ed team. Pairs figure skating, etc. It isn't an Olympic event yet, but there are "mixed relays" in world championship swimming, where the team must consist of two men and two women.

Guess I should have done my research first :p I have no idea what made me think that equestrian events were single-gender. Skiing, though, I remember being so angry that I couldn't compete with the boys because I always blew them away in practice. I admit it may be different as an adult and men may have the advantage.

 

I like the idea of mixed things, that's interesting.

[SparklyUnicorn]

I feel strongly that there is a need for competitive women's sports and don't think the solution is to have everything be co-ed.

 

The solution is to remember that biological sex characteristics aren't identical for all men and all women. Some athletes who have been gender tested are technically intersex, others are not but are incorrectly identified as such because the IOC is full of crap.

 

Yep.  And hey sometimes you just are born with characteristics that make you better suited to certain sports.  I wouldn't have a fat chance in hell with basketball at 5 ft 1.  Should I say that's unfair?  6 ft plus women are rare, but there are lots of them on basketball teams.

 

Either way if they are going to have specific rules they need to test everyone somehow and not single people out and test them without them knowing what is going on. 

[wintermom]

The Olympic equestrian events are co-ed.  As is the winter sport of curling.

 

Perhaps more interesting, there are the "mixed" events, with a co-ed team.  Pairs figure skating, etc.  It isn't an Olympic event yet, but there are "mixed relays" in world championship swimming, where the team must consist of two men and two women.

 

I don't believe curling have ever been co-ed at the Olympics or in other major events. Certainly at the rec level there may be co-ed teams.

 

Shooting is co-ed at the Olympic level.

[kbutton]

That's not even the worst thing that often happens to them.  For a long time if a baby was born with male and female genitalia they'd basically surgically alter the baby, sometimes not even really telling the parents exactly the details of that and then would tell them to raise the baby as a girl when in fact they had nothing indicating one way or another (it's easier to alter someone to be a girl than the other way around).  Sometimes the baby would grow up and be distraught over being raised a girl because they never felt as if they were a girl.  So recently a lot of intersex people have spoken out against this and say they believe the individual has the right to decide that and that should not be done automatically when they are a baby.

 

There is a great documentary that was on Prime for a while (not completely G) about this. They interviewed people with a wide range of experiences in regard to "treatment" and upbringing. Some had horrendous experiences and some really good ones. Some had very clear feelings of being male or female early on that matched their upbringing, though even those individuals tended to have had surgery that had significant downsides, and that surgery tended to be performed early on. 

 

I think this is the video I saw in case others are interested: http://www.intersexionfilm.com/ They have a support forum as well.