International Olympic Committee announcement today! Will it be regarding female sports?

I think the IOC has side stepped defining male or female but has instead specified that the tamales category is only for those who are SRY negative with some exceptions relating to androgen insensitivity.

My comments about examination intended to address the grim postings about 12 year old athletes have there labia spread and there breast squeezed. I was intending to highlight that if such examinations were conducted, this would take place to ascertain their diagnosis - not at the behest of the IOC.

In any sport, onboarding onto national or elite pathways should include an SRY screen. Any surprising findings can then be taken forward by the family, who can subsequently decide where elite competition fits into their future plans. The intimate and intrusive nature of the medical examinations will be based on diagnostic necessity, not IOC rulings

@Brainworm I don’t know what the follow up tests to a failed SRY test might be but the obvious one would be a cell culture to determine whether a Y chromosome is present. Hardly invasive.

I also wonder what the actual IOC definition of male is. Could be a. Has a Y chromosome b. Has an active SRY gene c. Has an SRY gene regardless of whether it is active.

I know several people that had promising sporting careers ended by illness or injury. I have a relative who was on his way back from signing a professional footballing contract when he was involved in a serious car accident and never played again. A friend's DC was predicted for great things in their sport when the were diagnosed with leukemia in their teens. It is absolutely heart breaking for them and it must be awful to discover you have a DSD in any circumstances but that sadness, upset and distress doesn't give a free pass to destroy someone else's career, to shatter their dreams.

@GriseldaandMike 💯

Even if I were to believe that he had no idea that he wasn’t not female prior to 2009, he did know well before the 2016 Olympics. He very well may have been exploited by the scouts that look out for boys with DSDs but he is now behaving abominably in his continued attempts to gaslight the world. Too many people have been hoodwinked by him.

Three men. All three medalists in the event were male. Three women lost out on medals, three women lost out in places in the final, three women didn't make it to the Olympics. And beyond that those female athletes may have had funding cut or sponsorship deal drops. Fund cuts can impact not only those currently being funded but can ripple down and impact the next generation too.

It’s heartbreaking 💔. They ALL knew they were competing against men. The interviewer knew as well. This wasn’t a poor woman being criticised for not meeting some stereotype of femininity, this was an organisation allowing a man to cheat.

Have a Google for other interviews with him. There's one of him on a chat show nothing remotely feminine about him.
And yes I think he does have kids.

His wedding is also worth a Google.

When endocrinologists examine children to determine Tanner stage, there can be examinations that are uncomfortable/ embarrassing. For example, a boy’s testicles might be palpated to determine the size of the testes. Doctors seek assent from the child to undertake these examinations and consent from parents. If the child has Gillick Competence consent is sought from the child..

If, following IOC eligibility screening, a child discovers, unexpectedly, they had an SRY gene, this will trigger medical investigations that are unrelated to the IOC. If/ where these are invasive and embarrassing, this in no different investigations undertaken for non athletes when concerns arise about sexual development.

We know that this hyperbole reflects straw grasping and creates noise away from the key point that it is right to exclude those who have gone through male puberty.

The NHS is piloting genetic screening at birth. Going forward, there is no chance that a baby born in the UK will be raised as a girl without their parents knowing they have a Y chromosome and a DSD. It’s not long until all this is moot within a UK context.

And of course, some people might say that if a 12 year old potential female athlete failed a buccal swab test then further investigation would be appropriate to uncover the reasons why, which might lead to hitherto unrecognised issues. After all , who knows what the outcome would have been had Semanya and others been tested at 12 and their DSD recorded.

And I very much doubt that that would necessitate the scaremongering and ridiculous physical examinations that KM describes so lavishly.

So interesting that Semanya voices deep voice concern about young female athletes being subjected to sex verification tests. Seems a bit strange coming from someone who while claiming to be female, was nevertheless happy to be photographed full frontal on the beach at age 15 wearing only a pair of shorts, indeed he was not only happy to be photographed but was also prepared to use the photograph in their autobiography. It’s almost as though Semanya has never been a young woman and doesn’t understand that for young female athletes a sex verification test will involve a mouth swab. It’s only when you are clearly not a young female athlete that more personal sex verification involving blood tests and scans might need to be used.

And how does Semanya account for the increased height, muscle development and physical strength that occurs when young men go through puberty. Because going through puberty for young women doesn’t trigger those dramatic ( and permanent) physical changes.

Something is causing that male development, and if it ain’t male puberty Semanya, then what is it? It isn’t environment, diet, parental genetic inheritance, or wishing very hard because it happens to young men of all races, in all parts of the world.

IAAF General Secretary Pierre Weisse said of Semenya, "She is a woman, but maybe not 100 per cent."

😡

worth watching again short interview with Lyndsey Sharp straight after Rio 2016 Olympic 800m final

What a dick.

What nonsense. No scientific evidence that going through male puberty confers advantages??

And saying we shouldn't be dividing people. Isn't that the exact point of having different categories in sport? And then saying that when it comes to things like boxing, it's a dangerous sport and people know what they are getting in to. Is Caster suggesting we should therefore get rid of weight divisions, age divisions etc and let it be a free for all? Or is it just sex we shouldn't categorise by? 🤔

The Sky News presenter clearly realises these are nonsense arguments, but is too frightened to push back on them.

That voice. That body. That attitude - masculine entitlement everywhere.

And it's slowly coming out that women who raced against Semenya guessed that he was male. Didn't he father a child, or is that an urban myth?

I did feel for Semenya when the whole DSD thing came out though. Being an athlete in a country with a terrible history of racism against the majority population, and less well-resourced health system meant that his DSD probably wasn't picked up. And like the boxer, Khelif, with the DSD, a culture which emphasises a particular kind of masculinity means that a "defective" male baby will be seen as "female" because - well, because that's what women & girls are seen as - defective males ...

None of that was his fault, and his situation was really difficult, and not of his own making.

Until he dug his heels in, as he does in this interview.

Money 💰, root of all evil

If you were ever in doubt about the incelism...

They still get attention and fawning.

It's all about that.

And getting one over on women.

Lots of men like getting one over on women because they hate women.

Semenya's arguments are completely ass backwards. As to why he wants to cheat? Firstly, except perhaps if he wakes in the wee, small hours, he doesn't see that he's a cheat. Secondly, what do you think his life would have been if he hadn't been scouted by a crook? If he'd been a 'normal' man or if he'd actually been female. No-one would have heard of him. The money, attention and fame wouldn't have been there. In fact his DSD, all the controversy that generated, supercharged it. Just like Khelif. I couldn't name a single gold medal winning boxer, in either the male or female classes, other than him and Lin Yu-Ting. I don't think Vogue put any of them on their covers either.

seriously, why do they want to cheat their way to medals? Where’s the satisfaction in that?

Caster Semenya’s not happy, particularly that the decision’s been made by a woman. What a surprise.

news.sky.com/video/share-13525242

I'm getting the word... nonce.