Caster Semenya- how can I explain this to DH?

[AngeloMysterioso]

Watching the athletics on TV, and they had a little video and debate about Caster Semenya. DH who can be completely pig headed at the best of times says the girls competing against her are just bitter because they can't win. A debate ensues between us about it- he's saying it's essentially the same as average height basketball players complaining about tall men having an advantage because of their height, or white sprinters complaining that black sprinters have an advantage because of their musculature. He is absolutely insistent that it's basically the same thing. How the hell do I make him understand?!

The problem is we don't know what the results are because no-one will publish them. There is an interesting article here:

www.flotrack.org/article/58552-iaaf-releases-new-study-as-it-tries-to-reinstate-rules-on-testosterone#.WYjfMLLyvrc

As regards CS not winning, the athlete is intersex - is that not correct - but identifies as a woman? Obviously if CS competed with men then the times would be pretty slow, perhaps CS just fits somewhere on spectrum of athletes - is better than most women and some men but not as good as the men.

To be honest I think separation by sex in some sports is arbitrary. Football, diving, floor gymnastics for example.

It's a difficult one in running. If the main but not only advantage in basketball is height, and you have a tournament of 6ft women and a tournament of 6ft5 men, which should the 6ft5 woman play in? She may be taller than the women but that doesn't mean she has the hand span to deal with the bigger mens' basketball or the power to sink a throw from a line that is further from the net. However, the advantage in the womens' game would be pronounced.

I'm not sure what I think really. If she had won I might have agreed more.

James Lynsey Sharp was universally slated for speaking out about Semenya after the Rio800m final (although I notice the BBC appeared in her favour tonight).

timeismovingon no it is not 'correct' that she is intersex. That has just been speculation in the media.

This seems to be a point fundamentally missed in this thread.

Caster and her parents might not have realised Caster was genetically male with male gonads, but the moment Caster started competing in elite events and people queried her sex because she looks very masculine she should have been tested and told she can't compete as female in elite events.
If being a woman doesn't mean you are genetically female in sport then having women's events is pointless and there should just be one class.
Having separate women's events because XX women have different hormones and physiology so very very rarely win against elite men is pointless if you start allowing athletes with Y chromosomes to enter them.

**She also has a same sex marriage.

What. The. Actual?
How is who she is married to in any way revelant. You've lost the argument in that one sentence. Unless you think as a gay woman I shouldn't be allowed to play sport?

At the end of the day, she's either got XX or XY chromosomes - and then a condition that has made her appear as biologically ambiguous in terms of her sex. But she IS either male or female

The simplest of googles suggests it's really not quite that clear cut and simple.

Catsize -

I am undecided. I feel sorry for Semenya due to all the hassle and bullshit she will have faced experienced growing up. She has boobs and no penis - but has obviously male features, voice, musculature etc.

But this is not her choice! It's a totally different argument to trans women running with women!

Where did PPs get the fact that she has no vagina etc but Undescended testes? Poor Semenya, for having her very private life made public.

I though Paula Radcliffe raised very pertinent points, though - but the answer is hard.

There is more evidence and informed opinion that she is male with undescended testes than that she has XX chromosomes and ovaries. None of the conspiracy theorists can point to "evidence" that she has XX chromosomes. If she had it would have been published.

How do you get that from instagram, beep?

The only way to solve this without it affecting women is having another category

Firstly, we don't know for definite that CS is intersex. She was raised and identifies as a woman. Secondly, intersex affects a tiny, tiny proportion of the world's population. We are talking about one woman who runs the 1500 metres. Is she supposed to be in a category of her own because it would be so extremely unfair to Laura Muir and all the 'real women' that there was someone out there who beat them. Jeez, she didn't even win this time, she hasn't won every race, the races she has won have often been close calls against other women. But yet her presence is threatening to all female athletes?

Thank you 2 Rebecca well said

To be fair though there are at least 2 other men competing as women in the international 800m circuit.

All are from african countries where they hide it as not having been discovered due to lack of money/medical access.

PNGirl you clearly haven't watched much football, diving or floor gymnastics then. Men are, in the main, physically stronger than women, hence they run faster, jump higher, tackle harder and kick a football further.

And people like the OP make homophobic comments about her, too. Because it is homophobic to bring in her sexuality.

At no point have I made any comment at all about her sexuality.

Honey, you are trying to be so right-on and liberal here that it is painful.

The facts are that there was enough "ambiguity" about Caster Semenya's sex in 2009 for the IOC to order medical testing. This is an unusual move and not something which happens routinely. Semenya then did not compete again until a separate ruling over testosterone levels as hers were so high compared with the majority of women. The most obvious explanation for all of this is that Semenya is intersex. There really aren't any other logical explanations for it all.

So yes it might be "speculation" as the medical reports haven't been published, but it's informed speculation with logic at its heart.

Your evidence she has a Y chromosome is literally 'she looks a bit manly and has high testosterone'.

That's not evidence. That is speculation.

Beep- so if I go on Instagram and search for CS, I will find a load of photos of her 'testicles', which she gets out in her everyday life, will I? Interesting. A man AND shamefully exhibitionist. Who would have thought it.

It's not right-on and liberal to state the simple fact that nowhere has it been carergorically stated that she is actually intersex. Her being intersex has been speculated openly in the media and by other athletes. But it is not an empirical truth that she is intersex like some posters are arguing.

If it makes me right on and liberal for sticking to cold hard facts then so be it. I don't see either of those words as damning insults.

The IAAF accepts the conclusion of a panel of medical experts that she can compete with immediate effect.

Please note that the medical details of the case remain confidential and the IAAF will make no further comment on the matter.

A panel of medical experts with the test results in their hands (I presume, could've been on a pc screen..) concluded that she was allowed to compete. But I forgot, half of MN are obviously way more qualified to determine her sex based on articles in the daily mail. Contact the IAAF, they must know about this immediately.