Elite sports people speaking up!

[Signalbox]

There seems to be an increasing number of sports people speaking up about the problem of males completing in women's sports which is positive. Thought it might be useful to have a thread of those who are risking sticking their heads above the parapet. Obviously the likes of Sharon Davies, Mara Yamauchi and Martina Navratilova have been bravely doing this for sometime but now we appear to have a few current athletes as well who are prepared to risk the mob to ensure women have fair competition. Is it too much to hope for that there will be a snowball effect?

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/articles/cvgk0w726w1o

Man wins BBC’s women’s footballer of the year award 🥇

https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/articles/c8jypk4xz7xo.amp

It's just utterly meaningless, isn't it?

Do you think the BBC have a duty of care? I mean they must know what will be inflicted on this player on Twitter? It’s like the BBC put Icarus in a catapult.

BB put BB in this situation.

And there will be plenty of support - women's football is captured. Most fans and players think BB is a woman with an unfortunate medical condition which is responsible for BB appearing male. They therefore feel sorry for BB and this sympathy is likely to be a good part of the reason why BB won the accolade.

“BB put BB in this situation.”

Cannot be said enough.

Absolutely sickening.

Absolutely disgusted by the BBC, it feels like they are trolling women at this point. They know the issues, particularly in football with the protests last week at Wembley, did they cover those?

So there are two posts about this on BBC Sport (my bold).

First one contains this disclaimer:
She received the most votes from readers of the BBC Sport website after a five-player shortlist was announced last month.
The shortlist - based on performances from September 2023 to August 2024 - was selected by a large panel of experts involved in football around the world, including coaches, players, administrators and non-BBC journalists.

Second one, another disclaimer:
Orlando Pride and Zambia striker Banda was one of five contenders shortlisted for the accolade for their achievements over the last 12 months, chosen by a panel of experts including coaches, players, administrators and journalists.
This panel did not include any BBC personnel, and the winner was voted for by the public.

In other words BBC saying 'nothing to do with me guv'. Now admittedly this is thin gruel but I would suggest it is a pretty huge step forward for the BBC who a few months ago would be claiming full credit for the award

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/articles/c3e8d344vndo
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/articles/c8jypk4xz7xo

I wonder who was on the panel. Why do I assume that it will be more men than women.

That's what they're going to use to reply to the complaints then.

. edit wrong thread

I just find it really remarkable that women's football is big business in the States, and the star player appears to be male, and presumably nobody much says anything about it. Like Clinton's "Don't ask, don't tell"? We see none of the protests by opponents that we see in junior and amateur sports, and (I presume) no reams of angry articles in the Press. So everybody just sucks it up? Because, money?

I've just noticed this and I wasn't sure where to post it. Remember the boxer that wasn't as high profile as Imane Khelif?

https://archive.ph/Jqkiq

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/boxing/2024/11/27/lin-yu-ting-olympic-boxing-champion-quits-gender-questions/

Even after reading the article several times I'm still confused as to what's happened, or rather why it's happened. From the statement from World Boxing Lin seemed to be cleared to compete.

“Unfortunately, as World Boxing is newly established and still navigating the development of its operational mechanisms, it lacks the clear regulatory policies of the IOC that ensure the protection of athletes’ rights.
“Additionally, World Boxing’s medical committee has yet to establish robust confidentiality procedures to safeguard the medical information submitted by Taiwan regarding Lin Yu-ting.”

How hard is it? et your act together, World Boxing.

I wonder if we'll really get to see Khelif boxing in Liverpool next year. I wouldn't put my shirt on it. Presumably these 'World Championships' will feature proper sex testing.

The World Boxing Cup finals was due to be Lin’s first international competition since the Games and she had already travelled to Britain when Taiwan’s sports administration announced she had withdrawn after World Boxing questioned her eligibility.
“She is female, meets all eligibility criteria, and successfully participated in the women’s boxing event [in Paris], winning a gold medal,” the sports administration said in a statement.
“Unfortunately, as World Boxing is newly established and still navigating the development of its operational mechanisms, it lacks the clear regulatory policies of the IOC that ensure the protection of athletes’ rights.
“Additionally, World Boxing’s medical committee has yet to establish robust confidentiality procedures to safeguard the medical information submitted by Taiwan regarding Lin Yu-ting.”
Lin Yu-Ting's federation is not willing to allow the boxer to take a sex screening test, presumably because they know what it will show, and World Boxing won't let the boxer compete in the female events without verifying Lin's sex. The stuff about World Boxing policies and procedures is just chaff.

That meant the Paris 2024 competition took place under IOC rules that do not prevent those born with <a class="break-all" href="https://archive.ph/o/Jqkiq/www.telegraph.co.uk/health-fitness/fitness/strength/what-is-dsd-boxer-intersex-olympics/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">differences of sexual development (DSDs) competing in women’s events.
Oh my God, Telegraph. Not "those with DSDs". Males with DSDs. Men with DSDs.

IMO, World Boxing said what they had to say to keep on the right side of the IOC, but when push came to shove, they wouldn't let a male person box a woman.

Why should the corrupt IOC be regarded as the capo di tutti capi of sporting organisations?

Especially since boxing looks set to be dropped from the 2028 Olympics.

World Boxing doesn't even need to suck up to the IOC.

Makes sense. Lin & team knew it would be a fail so made up some bullshit re: privacy and record keeping in order to avoid doing the test.

Although tbf if you fail a ‘gender test’ for a female sports category by being biologically male, it’s pretty much impossible to keep those results private - either you are female and eligible to compete or male and disqualified 🤷‍♀️

The only way to ensure privacy for DSD athletes is to do sex verification tests for all athletes proposing to compete in the female category as early in their sports career as possible, that way any disqualifying results will occur out of the public eye.

The media won’t report on teenage male DSD athletes in female competitions if they are swiftly stopped from competing before it impacts on female athletes.
It’s the unfairness that drives the media attention.

Exactly.
Perhaps sex screening tests done at school in the last year of primary school.

You would never get that rolled out on a global basis and it would be the places it is needed most that would be least likely to do it. It would probably need to be sport bodies that did it, ideally at what ever the equivalent of county level is but certainly before anyone competed at international level.

I was thinking of kids in the UK, tbh. Do kids have medicals at school these days? (No idea, I have no children!)

Anyway - whether it's sports bodies or GPs or local authorities who do it, I think it should be done at the earliest opportunity and for all the children, because you don't know who is going to compete or not. And it avoids nasty surprises later on.

I think in the UK any ambiguities of sex are further investigated at birth these days. I can't think of a single DSD in sport case to come from Europe.

The children of non-European immigrants may not have had the benefit of a sophisticated healthcare system.

Perhaps we are talking at cross purposes. I am unclear if you are objecting to sex screening for UK kids in principle or objecting to the suggestion of doing it in primary school.
Sex screening for sex "passports" is for the benefit of the other competitors. It should be done on all children, so as not to single anyone out and because we don't know which children will want to compete. I also think it should be done as early as possible because a child may be thought to be one sex when s/he starts competing, which could be at a very young age. With a sex passport, other competitors or their parents can discreetly challenge, or be definitively reassured that everyone in the U10s girls' football competition is female.
Policies of sports governing bodies will have to change to protect the female category, but that's a separate issue.