Barbra Banda

I might be wrong on this but I THINK that Zambia qualified through good performance in the American cup of Nations and I THINK that this tournament has a 'no men' rule, meaning that BB didn't play... FIFA's stance on this is notably different from that of CAF in that they let teams self assess (no, I'm not joking), hence BB being cleared to play.

There were three other players in the Zambia squad who failed the gender eligibility tests last year. Strength and speed are very important in football.

Either the competition is for women, or it's not. Either it's fair, or it's not.

There were four women who did not get the chance to earn a minimum of £23,000 - hard currency. Perhaps Zambia wouldn't even have qualified for the WWC if it wasn't for the male players. In which case there is a squad of 23 women players from another country who have missed out. It should matter to you.

That's not even a case of "looks masculine" (I'm thinking of Fatima Whitbread for example), that's a man.

Zooming in on the Zambian team photo is interesting.

I thought it was a known thing that some countries purposely scouted people with known alternative characteristics knowing it made them particularly good at women’s sports? I’ve seen links to it on here.

Let's shove a man into every team to make it fair.

Their Wiki page also says they boxed prior to football. Winning all bouts and other women then refused to fight with her. Dear God.

I don't love this (what with BB being male and all) but can't bring myself to get too excited about it, at the end of the day there was still room for 22 other players in BB's country's world cup squad, and whilst he'll doubtless bang in a couple of goals I can't think that the rest of the team will be strong enough to influence who qualifies for later rounds etc.

So fucking angry.
This is Semenya all over again.

Thanks Hellofabore. They completely ignored what the female athletes said, that's so frustrating.

I think the female category should be just for females, draw a very hard line. Maybe it's tough for males with CAIS but they can join in the push for an open category.

It's actually a really simple decision. Males always have an advantage in sports invented to showcase male athletic strengths. The entire reason for creating women's categories in the first place was to allow women to shine. It's the source of the advantage as much as the size of it which is the reason that the category excluded males. Women cannot be men, or match men, no matter how hard they train. Therefore all males should be excluded.

It's simple to determine who is male or female in cases of doubt.
It's fairer to exclude males as a class than as individuals or subgroups.

It only gets complicated because of some people's insistence that female sport can be a consolation prize for men who can't compete, or aren't "really" men, because fairness and a level playing field is optional for women's competition. Disabled men do not compete against able-bodied women (they would beat them in some cases because - male advantage), and having certain DSDs is comparable to having a disability. (Not 46 xy, 5-ARD, though.) Women's sport celebrates exceptional females at any level of competition. A CAIS athlete is neither female, nor exceptional, except in comparison to other athletes with the same condition. Fairness in the competition is more important than an individual's disappointment at not being able to compete.

I'm not haranguing anyone on these boards, I'm referring to the attitude of the sporting authorities. There is evidence of a women's version of the Olympic Games in ancient times, but the modern Olympics was conceived as a celebration of masculinity and the male form. Women were to be decorative, or crown the heroes, not to compete. But Alice Milliat and her friends had other ideas!

OFFS...

From the article "At the time of testing, all female athletes at the Atlanta Games were offered a questionnaire written in both English and French asking whether in their view testing of females should be continued in future Olympics and whether or not they were made anxious by the testing procedure.18 Of the 928 athletes who responded, 82% felt that testing should be continued and 94% indicated that they were not made anxious by the procedure. Forty-six athletes were made "anxious" by the testing requirements that preceded their competitive events. No males were found to masquerade as females, and all females who were found to be SRY positive competed. While a similar proportion of females failed the test as in previous Olympics (Table 2), it is noteworthy that on this occasion no false positive tests were found and no athlete was barred from competition.'

So, 82% of the women answered that they felt sex testing should continue when surveyed at the 1996 Olympics. This was ignored.

In 1996, 8 of the 'female' competitors were found to have a DSD. 7 were CAIS and 1 was 5ARD. This was a rate of 1 in 423 and hence you will see it said that CAIS athletes are found in higher proportions in the female sports categories than in society in general.

Therefore, future discussions will be about whether these athletes do or do not have an advantage. That will be one of the most difficult decisions really. However, this article does point out that 5ARD athletes were still competing as female athletes in the Olympics.

This might help.

www.nature.com/articles/gim2000258.pdf?origin=ppub&utm_medium=affiliate&utm_source=commission_junction&utm_campaign=CONR_PF018_ECOM_GL_PHSS_ALWYS_DEEPLINK&utm_content=textlink&utm_term=PID100045542&CJEVENT=f4d4c8630a0411ed831b01a80a1c0e11

Was that for the CAIS type of DSD? Surely they must have anticipated people like Semenya. Or they just didn't care.

Imagine how the majority of the players must feel. They are pretty much gagged from talking about it or face unrelenting abuse on social media.

I think you've accurately described how the whole world works 😥

Cheek swabbing used to be standard until around 1996/97. It was changed to allow male people to compete in the female category if they had a difference of sex development.

Thanks to poster who said it's just a cheek swab.

So what should happen is this. When an athlete registers with their sports association a cheek swab is taken to confirm sex alongside their name, date of birth etc.

If they reach international level this is taken again and held alongside their details, very simple.

All this drug testing is important to stop cheats. Let's not forget people like Semenya are taking drugs to reduce their testosterone.
Honestly you couldn't make it up!

Not only that, but when surveyed, the vast majority of women support sex verification testing.

As far as I can see the logic seems to be "men can be easily caught out using cheek swabs" combined with "men make a huge fuss when they're caught out" plus "it's not going to cause a problem for anyone except women if we just let them have what they want".

It's just so obviously, glaringly, blatantly un-fucking-fair that I want to scream.

Given that sports people suffer the indignity of having to be watched having a wee for the love of their sport and desire to participate a cheek swab would be a walk in the park.

If all it takes is a cheek swab then this whole farce needs to end immediately. It's so simple to do so why aren't they doing it? It's as if they don't want to actually know how many men are currently being described as women with high testosterone.
people.

By they i don't mean the individuals but the organisations responsible for these things.

'Excluded due to "manly body".

That's the trouble with men.they have manly bodies.

To clarify, the men testers watch the men pee and the women testers watch the women pee. Another example of where sex matters.

But yes, you’re right, drug testing alone doesn’t lend itself to any dignity, it’s just part of what elite athletes go through. And given sex can be verified in nearly all cases by a saliva swab for karyotype, sex verification is not remotely undignified.

https://www.givemesport.com/88029892-africa-cup-of-nations-barbra-banda-reportedly-excluded-due-to-manly-body/

from article:
"situation is similar to that of South Africa’s Caster Semenya, who is currently unable to compete across a number of distances due to the World Athletics regulations for athletes with differences of sex development" in women's track and field.

Account to a wise poster elsewhere:

What GiveMeSport leaves out is that the WA regulations only apply to XY athletes with a small number of conditions that exclusively affect the sex development of males.