Māra Libeka, Latvijas Avīze
Imane Khelif, a 25-year-old Algerian boxer, has become the champion of the Paris Olympics in the 66 kg boxing category and has decided to start a new fight after the end of the competition: for justice, dignity and honour.
The athlete has announced that she had lodged a complaint with the Special Unit of the Paris Public Prosecutor’s Office, responsible for combating hate speech online. Imane Khelif claims that she has been subjected to “intense cyber harassment”, the athlete’s lawyer, Nabil Boudi, told AP News. In a statement, he described it as a racist and sexist campaign against the boxer. Prosecutors must now decide whether to open an investigation, AP News reports.
During the Olympics, Imane Khelif’s name was much discussed on social networks and in media publications around the world, including Latvia, with various radically opposing opinions on whether or not Imane Khelif was a woman. Some, after seeing her body features and based on what Angela Carini, the Italian boxer who opposed Imane Khelif at the Paris Olympics, said that Imane Khelif’s punches were too painful, were convinced that the athlete was a man. Italian politicians and social organisations also added fuel to the already heated situation, outraged that Angela Carini would have to fight a transgender. The famous British writer J. K. Rowling also expressed her opinion on X, outraged that the International Olympic Committee would allow female boxers who had not previously passed a gender test to compete.
“Watch the whole video and explain why you are okay with a man beating a woman in public for your entertainment. This is not sport.” wrote J. K. Rowling.
But others pointed out that the Algerian woman’s passport states that she is a woman and that women may also have higher testosterone levels.
However, this scandal dates back to 2023, when the International Boxing Association (IBA) decided to disqualify the said Algerian athlete, as well as the Taiwanese boxer Lin Yu-ting, from the World Championships. The IBA issued a statement saying that the inspection found that both athletes did not meet the eligibility standards for women’s competition and that they had a competitive advantage over other women. The decision to disqualify was based on two tests conducted on both athletes. However, the IBA has not disclosed what specific tests were carried out, other than officials’ separate statements that both boxers had male XY chromosomes and high testosterone levels. Though it should be noted that
the International Olympic Committee (IOC) does not recognise the International Boxing Association because of its irregularities, scandals and disorganised organisation.
Therefore, the Olympic boxing competitions are currently under the supervision of the IOC and all the rules and the qualification system are at the discretion of the IOC. The decision by the IBA in the spring of 2022 (when the full-scale Russian war in Ukraine was in its first months) to lift restrictions on Russia and Belarus and allow their athletes to compete and display their flag and anthem also outraged the Western world. The president of the IBA is Umar Kremlev, Russia’s crony, and there are also suggestions that the International Boxing Association is in fact controlled by Russia.
Contradictory explanations
As the controversy spread, the International Boxing Association held a press conference in Paris on 5 August this year, at which the President, Umar Kremlev, and the CEO, Chris Roberts, tried to explain the reasons why the athletes in question had been refused entry to international competitions. Umar Kremlev joined the press conference remotely and used an interpreter. Both gave contradictory information about the athletes’ disqualification.
“The athletes were disqualified from the 2023 World Championships in India. The results of the chromosome tests proved that both athletes did not comply with the rules issued by the IBA,” said Chris Roberts.
Umar Kremlev, however, disagreed, revealing that “the tests conducted on the female athletes did not examine their chromosomes, but instead assessed the testosterone levels in their blood, and these were high, as seen in men.”
He pointed out that if female boxers wanted to prove that they were born female, they had to do it themselves.
The IBA stated that the tests carried out at the time were sent to two different laboratories accredited by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA). But the WADA stated that it does not carry out chromosome testing, but anti-doping tests
IOC: this is women’s boxing
As already mentioned, the International Olympic Committee is questioning the IBA’s statement on the Algerian and Taiwanese athletes. The IOC defended Imane Khelif and condemned those who spread misinformation.
“Let’s be very clear: we are talking about women’s boxing. We have two boxers who were born as women, who were raised as women, who have a passport of a woman and who have competed as women for many years. And that is a clear definition of a woman. There was never any doubt that they were women,” IOC President Thomas Bach told Canadian public broadcaster CBC.CA.
“We have seen misleading information about two female athletes competing at the 2024 Paris Olympics. Both athletes have been competing in international boxing competitions in the women’s category for many years, including the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, world championships and IBA-sanctioned tournaments.
These two athletes were wrongly defamed because of an arbitrary decision by the IBA. The athletes were unexpectedly disqualified in 2023 without any due process,”
said the IOC.
Receptors that do not recognise testosterone
There was also a lot of talk in opinion and news columns about the XX and XY chromosomes, about what then distinguishes a man from a woman and how there are exceptions when the gender is not clear? How is this situation viewed medically? This is what I asked endocrinologist Una Gailiša (in the picture) from Pauls Stradiņš Clinical University Hospital.
“The state institutions entering a person’s gender in a passport do not do so by choice. When a child is born, the gender is determined by a doctor in the maternity ward and recorded on the birth certificate. The set of chromosomes (XY for boys and XX for girls) is complete when the baby is still in the womb. No one checks the chromosomes when the baby is born. A visual inspection of the newborn tells whether it is a boy or a girl. However, there are certain rare diseases that can cause an error in gender determination. If such a person is later seen by the medical profession and it is found that he or she has been assigned the wrong gender because of a specific diagnosis, the gender in the passport can be changed based on a specific genetically confirmed medical conclusion,” explains the doctor. It is unknown whether the highlighted picture could have anything to do with the boxers in question, as medical information on certain people is confidential. However, endocrinologist Una Gailiša believes that a different situation could be more realistic.
Una Gailiša: “A person can be born genetically male. The development of male gender is determined by the hormone testosterone. It is particularly high during puberty, when boys mature into men.
But there is a condition – androgen insensitivity syndrome – where the body’s receptors, which should react to testosterone and change this maturing body, do not recognise it.
Genetically, a man (XY) is born, he has testosterone, but this hormone does not work at all and this man develops as a woman.
At puberty, the breasts grow, the male genitals do not develop fully because there is no testosterone, which determines their development, and there is no uterus. If testosterone is not working, then development goes to the female side, because part of the testosterone in the body is converted into the female hormone oestrogen.
The receptors do not recognise testosterone and cannot be triggered. We can give testosterone all we want, but for the individual affected by the disease it will be like water.”
Such a man is considered a woman. Dr Una Gailiša explained that the disease also slows down the physical development of a man because testosterone does not work.
The fact that Imane Khelif is visually masculine does not mean that she could be a man. Many women have masculine features and muscles larger than some men, but are we therefore going to blame them for their visual appearance when we meet them?
“Information about a person’s health is very confidential. The athlete has said she is a woman and, like all athletes, she is subject to doping controls. Obviously, it has been appropriate and there is no reason to doubt that something is wrong,” says the doctor.
But why is there such an atypical human development? Una Gailiša says that
receptor insensitivity is being studied and is not only related to testosterone, but also to other processes that occur in the human body. However, the rarer the disease, the more difficult it is to study.
However, what is more common worldwide than androgen insensitivity syndrome is the increasing number of people who want to change their gender at some point in their lives. IOC guidelines state that transgender women who have changed their gender before the age of 12 can compete in the women’s category. At the Paris Olympics, there were two – 1500 metres runner Nikki Hiltz from the USA and Quinn from the Canadian women’s national football team, who became Olympic champion in Tokyo three years ago. Worth mentioning is also Laurel Hubbard, the New Zealand weightlifter who competed at the Tokyo Olympics and was the first transgender woman to compete in such a large-scale event. The two boxers from the Paris Olympics, Imane Khelif and Lin Yu-ting, were not included in this category, although they were wrongly named as transgender on social media.
“Most often, these people start to feel inappropriate for their gender at puberty. Gender-affirming hormone therapy or gender affirmation surgery is only performed after the age of 18, or only when a person is an adult. If they do not have surgery on their gonads, they will have hormone therapy to bring their body closer to the opposite gender.
Rarely, but not exclusively, children who develop severe psychological problems related to their gender identity at the onset of puberty may also attempt suicide.
It is then decided, together with the doctors and the patient’s parents, to stop puberty with medication. These are situations where natural hormones are blocked – testosterone in a man or oestrogen in a woman – and puberty does not start. Then, after reaching the age of majority and following a psychological assessment by a psychologist and a psychiatrist, gender-affirming hormone therapy can be started. However, it is more often the case that a person has already had puberty and has undergone full gender maturity. In the case of a man, testosterone has affected the development of masculine bones and muscles. After the decision to change gender from male to female, testosterone is blocked or the gonads are operated on and treatment with oestrogens is started. The longer a man has lived in the male gender with testosterone levels that are appropriate for a man, the more permanent changes to the body are likely to have occurred. But studies are needed to assess more precisely what effect testosterone has on muscle mass, bone mass and whether it is permanent,” says endocrinologist Una Gailiša.
Doctor: Biology is no right or left
Linda Rautiainena, Latvian doctor working in Finland (opinion republished from social network X): “Since the discussion is going to the level of “it is transphobic to name a person’s biological gender” and “it was said by someone right-wing, so it must be a lie”, I will write to those who still are not blindfolded.
Biology is an exact science, it does not care about us being right or left.
Let’s imagine a situation once happened in life. A male patient comes to the doctor because he has been coughing and having difficulty breathing for a long time. The doctor sends him for a spirometry, which assesses lung function. The patient has undergone gender confirmatory treatment as an adult, i.e. his biological gender is female. Either the doctor does not know this or is afraid of being “transphobic”, so this information is not included in the referral. The test is performed and the result shows the patient’s lung function to be well below normal, so the patient has to be treated with strong drugs.
And here is the moral of the story – why biology sometimes matters – spirometry has different norms for women and men. And before anyone brings up misogyny again, this is the same biology that does not know such terms.
Puberty under androgen influence ensures that at the population level the chest is larger, has more muscle and bone mass, which provides greater lung capacity. So biological gender is important here, not because someone is “right” or “wrong”.
In the context of the discussions in recent days [during the Paris Olympics], it is sad to see both sides going at each other “hey, liberals, but that is a dude!” – “but her passport says woman, you Putinists!”.
Man or woman or other, it should not be a subject of dispute at all.
In my opinion, the only discussion and the only question for the International Olympic Committee to answer should be whether it is ethical for female athletes who have had so-called male puberty to compete in the female category (and this can only be the case if there is a Y chromosome), not whether the athlete in question is male or female.
And why exactly “male puberty” is an important factor here – because the effects of androgenic hormones after puberty are to some extent irreversible; the bone density, muscle mass differences from females still remain significant, even though testosterone levels are then artificially reduced.
And before anyone starts whining about “small men” and “big women”, in biology it is common to talk about populations, in Latvian – the great majority. And to answer the question, I do not think it is ethical. Professional sport is an “elite club”, not a human right.”
