Caster Semenya

[mummybear701]

Semenya has yet again ignited the debate on testosterone levels in women athletes, such that her own career is under threat. These arbitary levels suspended a few years ago would force women with excessive testosterone to take hormone suppressing drugs or lose their right to compete. She has already faced humiliating gender testing throughout her career.

There are a few other women in this category, notably the 800m at the Rio games.

Personally I could live with that, but sadly many people will be "awww but you are further marginalizing this poor group of people".

A large part of why the women's category was invented in the first place was to ensure that girls' sport is supported and girls could grow up dreaming of becoming world-beating athletes.

If competitions become dominated by intersex (and trans), something will have been lost. Girls will grow up knowing that they have no chance of competing internationally, and countries greedy for gold medals will stop bothering with girls' sport and put their energies into scouting for intersex (and trans) talent instead.

If we are OK with this as the future of women's sports, then fine. If we are not okay with this vision of the future, then I think we need to draw a hard line and say "You must have been assigned female at birth by medical authorities and never have been through what might be described as a male puberty, either natural or artificial." Would this exclude Semenya? Not sure.

Or we can define XX chromosomes plus a womb as being a disability and put it into the Paralympics as a category....? I'm being semi serious.

Again, the poverty issue needs to be addressed. It's no coincidence that both Caster and Dutee Chand grew up in poverty so their medical diagnoses weren't recognised until they got to a high level of competition. What's the likelihood of a girl in the U.K. making it past 16 without a period and not being investigated? I'd be really interested to find out if any promising young female athletes in any sport have self selected themselves out of top level competition after an intersex diagnosis and aren't ever heard of. Controversy around these athletes could be avoided if girls and young women around the world had better access to health care.

I believe there is a higher rate of this disorder in sub-saharan africa anyway. So race does enter the equation as well, it's been portrayed as nasty rich white women versus poor black.

I feels sorry for Caster Semenya, too. Her privacy has been invaded although she has done nothing wrong. I wish her all the best.

Can't find any evidence it's more common in certain parts of the world. But race does come into it: Lynsey Sharp was wrongly accused of being racist by people who thought criticism of Semenya stemmed from what is perceived to be "feminine" i.e. the western ideal.

www.findingdulcinea.com/news/sports/2009/nov/Caster-Semenya-and-the-Ambiguity-in-Determining-Sex.html

"Intersexuality is much more common in South Africa, says Dr. David Segal, an endocrinologist a Johannesburg hospital, who estimates that as many as 1 in 200 South Africans have some level of intersexuality.

"

The IAAF are going to be announcing a new ruling about testosterone levels and whether athletes such as Caster can compete in November.

www.google.co.uk/amp/www.skysports.com/amp/more-sports/athletics/news/29175/11327685/caster-semenya-facing-ban-as-cas-look-at-iaaf-evidence-on-hyperandrogenism

I feel for Caster. She has always followed the rules and done everything asked of her. There was an awful thread on here a while back with people calling her a man and being really unkind.

I think this case is really separate to the General trans/sport cases. I also think it’s quite disingenuous of TRAs to use (and I do mean use) caster as a lever.

To me, a man who has self IDd as a woman is aware of their sex, and aware of the fact that they will have an unfair advantage.
Should they compete with women? No, full stop. There’s no physical difference from simply self IDing - nothing physical has changed (and indeed even if testosterone levels were lowered the core Male physiology remains.) to me this is a black and white no. It’s cheating. So Hannah mouncey? No. Should not compete against women.

Caster has gone into sport with fair intentions - she has not set out to cheat, nor to deliberately have unfair physical advantages. As far as I’m aware she was not aware of her physiological status until he testing was ordered. The media going over her private life has been quite abhorrent, invasive and yes I think quite racist.
Should she and others like her compete in the women’s events? That to me will depend entirely on a case by case thorough (and medically private and disclosed only to the deciding body) examination of her personal physiology. IF she is deemed to have a physiology no woman could ever attain naturally then unfortunately the answer is no. If she is deemed to have a physiology within what is naturally attainable for a woman then yes.
It’s hard on her, because she is not to blame for this, but the higher ideal of sport as a leve and fair field has to apply, or there’s no point doing it.

The same applied to pistorius - the criteria was solely ‘blades - unfair advantage mechanically or no?’

I really feel for caster in all of this. She’s pretty blameless and is now being used as a TRA lever it seems.

TerfinUSA

I can't find any published evidence to back up that statement. I've searched Pubmed for a combination of intersex, South Africa, Johannesburg etc. Either way, it could well mean that the broad term of "intersex" is more common, but partial AIS doesn't seem so. For example, baby girls with congenital adrenal hyperplasia are picked up at birth. Boys, if they don't die soon after birth present with salt wasting crises. So while "intersex" may be more common, I doubt Caster's specific condition is. There's nothing published anyway.

She won the 800m easily. Commentator said she looked like she could go another lap. I wonder if she runs within herself to avoid too much controversy?

I said at the start this should not be conflated with trans issues like the weightlifter and its regrettable it is. I haven't seen discussion elsewhere this has happened but no doubt it could be used that way. I have felt for Caster since 2009, its a difficult case but its not her fault.

AnotherQuoll genuine question, how do you define Caster in sex categories? Its generally accepted she is indeed female sex, albeit with some ambiguities.

Would having category's based on testosterone work

No, I don’t think it would. The problem is not simply ‘how high is your testosterone level?’ It’s a question of physiology.

A Male physiology is shaped by testosterone - if you take an adult male and then reduce their testosterone you’re not altering the physiology by much at all - the core heart/lung volumes are still there. The height, the length of levers (limbs) etc. Similarly increasing testosterone in a woman won’t change her core physiology. You do get some differences in endurance and muscle mass but humans are not that plastic.
So to use testosterone alone is a very crude measure

Sport needs to develop a set of physiological markers and bounds. I recognise that this is hard to do but I think in the interests of fairness to athletes like caster and to sport as a whole it should be done.
I feel extremely sorry for her - she has been treated appallingly in the media.

Notbad. I think Lynsey Sharpe’s criticism of Semenya was mainly down to being a bad loser but my views on her are probably skewed by her ‘Big Djok Knew’ joke

If Caster Semenya is banned, and trans identified males are allowed to run simply because they have a testosterone level of less than (insert random, impossible-for-natal-women-to-achieve-without-drugs here) then it makes an utter mockery of the whole system.

Sport needs to develop a set of physiological markers and bounds

In the past they had. It was very simple - XX, low testosterone was a woman. Otherwise athletes competed with men. Now that testosterone level is the divider, not sex, it's bound to be murky.

At what stage will natal women be allowed to take testosterone supplements to raise their levels to that of the highest allowed to compete as a woman? To level the playing field for them

I think to compete as a woman you should have XX chromosomes (or no Y chromosome) or believe yourself to have XX chromosomes due to normal female development.
If you believed yourself to be XX and then discovered you were XY then that's unfortunate for the individual but fairness for the majority of women should take priority.

I admire Caster, she is doing what she has to do but this is something that needs addressing not because of Caster alone but the other intersex athletes in the event. In such a short time it is now the norm to have 2 to 3 intersex athletes in most 800meter finals. If this remains the norm how long will it be before a biological women wins again or how long before a biological women does not qualify for a final.

Agree it encourages unscrupulous countries to scout out intersex athletes for elite sport and Africa will have more undiagnosed intersex athletes as fewer prenatal ultrasounds. Fairness for XX women should take priority.

There are absolutely countries who would scout for young girls with “useful” developmental differences. I wouldn’t put it past oil-rich Equatorial Guinea for example to scout the entire continent and encourage parents of useable girls to immigrate (they’ve recently had their women’s football team banned from international tournament because it included 8 Brazilians with hooky paperwork - they also played two siblings in the squad for four years who are now claimed to be men). And that’s without considering what the likes of Qatar and Russia are capable of.

The numbers should still be small in absolute terms though.