If you have a very high level of testosterone ...

I think I'm going to wait for the results of the research currently being carried out as to whether raised testosterone really does give much of an advantage before I rush to judge.

However it seems a bit odd for an athlete genetically better suited to 800m than me to complain about someone even better suited. Particularly when that athlete has had access to training facilities far above anything a lot of other athletes get. Raised levels of testosterone is surely nothing compared to the differences in training provision between say Ukraine and the USA.

Also if Semenya was significantly better I think the other athletes would have a stronger point. As it was she didn't win by much and was nowhere near the world record. Eminently beatable as far as I can see.
 
stencilface said:
There should surely be an upper limit that's different for box sexes as far as testosterone is concerned?

I do think it's unfair that people with a natural but not necessarily 'normal' hormone levels are allowed to compete against people who fall into the traditional zones of hormone levels (sorry that's written really badly!). It's a bit like a runner with a third leg isn't it?

There didn't used to be enough Paralympic athletes for a games did there, maybe there needs to be a separate competition for those that fall in terms twilight zone between male and female.
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It's very like a swimmer with size 14 feet and partly webbed toes .... oh, hold on .....
 
I agree, Essentially the ruling said that athletics has 2 years to prove it is conferring the advantage they say it does - as opposed to other possible advantages of being intersex.
Yes she might be running better than when she was being testosterone suppressed but that might be for different reasons/am not sure how they do the suppression so it might be a factor of that if that makes sense, rather than the reduced amount itself.
 
I have just looked up her condition. She has a Y chromosome, testes, no uterus and no ovaries. That makes her a man. She is only really a female because she was brought up as a female. Now I know that, I agree with the athletes who say it is unfair to compete against her.

I think the definition should be what your DNA says you were born as. I am sorry for trans gender people and people with confused DNA and mixed body parts, but only as sorry as I am for a deaf person who wants to sing in a choir, for example.
 
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Rapidash said:
I think I'm going to wait for the results of the research currently being carried out as to whether raised testosterone really does give much of an advantage before I rush to judge.
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The fact that testosterone is banned worldwide as a doping agent suggests it might well impact on performance.

I do wonder whether this would be a topic of conversation if we were talking about naturally elevated levels of oestrogen instead.
 
It gets so difficult as no one wishes to hurt anyone's feelings or discriminate especially now a days. They are going to have to come up with some restrictions with who can and cannot compete in certain classes.

Maybe the whole men and women thing has to change. More toward restricted and unrestricted. Those who measure x amount on the scale are eligible to compete in restricted sections ( which would be 99% female). But means those who either do not identify with a gender or score more toward being a male still can compete in the open class (mainly male). Daft idea I know... But can't really think of a better solution. I too thought she looked very physically different from her piers.
 
It's banned because it is a steroid, other than that the science really doesn't seem to be there at the moment to define the advantage. Lets face it all the elite women run faster than most men ;).
 
ester said:
It's banned because it is a steroid, other than that the science really doesn't seem to be there at the moment to define the advantage. Lets face it all the elite women run faster than most men ;).
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Yes, but she's 6 seconds faster than herself over 800 metres when she doesn't have testosterone levels massively higher than a woman without testicles. If she didn't have a Y chromosome I'd say this was a 'swimmer with big feet' issue, but if she does it isn't fair to other female athletes. We separate men from women in almost all competition for a reason.
 
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ester said:
It's banned because it is a steroid, other than that the science really doesn't seem to be there at the moment to define the advantage. Lets face it all the elite women run faster than most men ;).
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Oh I get that, but it's not the only steroid that's based on a natural hormone, EPO's another one.

Replace 'runner with naturally high levels of testosterone' with 'naturally high levels of EPO' - is that tested at the same time?
 
All which is based on genes, and there are a couple hundred they have identified with links to performance, there will be more. https://www.newscientist.com/articl...mpid=ILC%7CNSNS%7C2016-GLOBAL-webpush-Semenya
Maybe we should just scrap the women and just say fastest person :p (very very tongue in cheek)

I think the athletics federation lot thought they had found a nice neat solution to the problem, I'm not sure they have.
 
Maybe to even things up we should make everyone compete on horseback, that is after all the only Olympic sport not split by gender ;)
 
"Maybe we should just scrap the women and just say fastest person (very very tongue in cheek)"

I know you aren't being serious ester but if we do get to the stage where we allow intersex women with naturally high testosterone levels and also trans women to compete in women's events for fear of offending anyone then there won't be many events for which it is worth even the most supremely talented woman athlete training for. Equestrian events and motorsports would still be "do-able" but anything relying on muscular strength and so on would be a lost cause in my opinion.
 
I think unless you have categories for everything (native Americans used to recognise 5 genders for eg) you really need to be strict on the male female classification otherwise there's no point really. Un PC as it is, and however gender fluid modern life may become, I just can't see mainstream sport adapting to accept anything but male and female.
 
stencilface said:
I think unless you have categories for everything (native Americans used to recognise 5 genders for eg) you really need to be strict on the male female classification otherwise there's no point really. Un PC as it is, and however gender fluid modern life may become, I just can't see mainstream sport adapting to accept anything but male and female.
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I agree. .

Fiona
 
ester said:
All which is based on genes, and there are a couple hundred they have identified with links to performance, there will be more. https://www.newscientist.com/articl...mpid=ILC%7CNSNS%7C2016-GLOBAL-webpush-Semenya
Maybe we should just scrap the women and just say fastest person :p (very very tongue in cheek)

I think the athletics federation lot thought they had found a nice neat solution to the problem, I'm not sure they have.
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I get that article's reasoning, but muscle mass, blood type, power, speed etc are things that are fairly individual. Some are suited for sprint running, others for distance etc, but your sport isn't defined by that, not in those categories anyway. Sport is defined by whether you're a man or woman, nothing less, nothing more.

So I'm not sure gender, inter-sex etc can be put in the same big box as muscle type or make up of blood. I've studied a lot on sex and gender (albeit from a social construct point of view) and I guess it depends on how you want to define what is a man and what is a woman. Some would argue that a human being that has testes, not ovaries, is a man. Others would say 'well do you need to have ovaries to fit the social construct of what is being female/a woman?'
 
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I know a few people who are trans. One is currently transitioning, and is every bit as strong as they always were. Another who is several years post surgery is possibly slightly less strong, but this is due to the fact they no longer train and compete in the sports they did before.
Based on my experience, I would say those who are trans should not be allowed to compete as women.
 
One of the difficulties regarding the changing of body shape etc of trans people, is that unless it happens pre-puberty, then the muscle/bone/fat ratio is likely to be that of the original biological sex of the person. So female to male trans are unlikely to have the same bone/muscle density as some one who was born male and vice versa, which would have implications for athletic performance.
 
cold_feet said:
I see it as just another physical attribute you are born with. You can't change it. There can't be many positives being like this, why should you be excluded from making use of it?
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Being a man is just something you are born with. And men are excluded from the women's events.

If we have women's competition then we need to define what being a woman means for purposes of qualification

A lot people without clearly defined external sex organs have traditionally been brought up as female as that was the best guess available at the time/considered easier for them. It may be what is on their birth certificates too. That doesn't mean it is necessarily the gender they resemble most closely in many ways.

We don't treat rigs as mares.

I'd tend to think a chromosomal classification (this competition is for XX athletes, not 'women' per se) might be a better arbitrary line to draw than a hormonal level one as it is currently more fixed (surely any male athlete could take testosterone suppressants to meet at arbitrary level for that in theory?) which goes to YorksG's point too. But if we have segregated competition we need to segregate. And that will inevitably be hard for some individuals with unusual circumstances.

Edited to add: not against people taking hormone suppressants for medical (including potentially mental health related) reasons, just think it is a potentially harmful thing to encourage purely for sport.
 
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They started off with the chromosome designation, but it was causing issues.

I am going to post this article again because I do think it is worth a read with regards to the history of this issue. In the 60s all female athletes were tested and if they had Y markers were not allowed to compete.
A woman with an XX pair of chromosomes might pass and be granted her “certificate of femininity,” even if she had a masculine physique, ambiguous genitalia, and high levels of testosterone—all perhaps resulting from a sex-hormone-producing adrenal tumor or a genetic condition such as congenital adrenal hyperplasia.
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- OR the opposite, they tested XY with no evidence of any male characterstics or athletic advantages.
http://www.slate.com/articles/sport...enya_be_allowed_to_compete_against_women.html
 
I don't really know what I think about this. It is extraordinarily complicated, that's for sure. On the one hand, it does seem incredibly unfair on non-hyperandrogenic athletes if raised testosterone levels truly do give a significant advantage. I think they do, based on the fact that testosterone is a banned substance, but I'm interested in the scientific arguments behind it. At the same time, I feel incredibly uncomfortable with the idea of persecuting someone because of the way they were born. Should Semenya and athletes like her be banned from competing or forced to take hormone suppressants because of a condition they were born with? But does it undermine fair play to let her compete? Is fair play more important than human rights? I just don't think there is any easy answer here and I'm very glad that I'm not one of the people who will have to make a decision!

I do think this is an issue that is going to run and run - the 800m final has put it firmly in the spotlight and there is no denying the fact that if you didn't know better you might be forgiven for thinking that the photos from the medal ceremony showed a men's medal ceremony. It is a shame that we can't simply celebrate these women as the extraordinary athletes they undoubtedly are, but at the same time I do understand the controversy. I don't really know what I think, which isn't very useful I know!
 
Interesting article.

Now I've realised how much subjectivity (and frankly invasivness) there is in other tests I'm now even more in favour of the old Y test.

No advantage to be gained by undergoing potentially damaging hormonal or surgical treatments and a clear outcome. In the occasional cases of false positives there would be unfairness but as far as I could tell there was only one documented case of that.

Probably calling something a "certificate of femininity" is actually an issue now. Would be more accurate to call it a certificate of Y chromosome absence or something because obviously feminity is a different thing.

Interestingly (for me) I also work in a field where women with high testosterone levels are over represented. We are still at a disadvantage to the men though. But we don't have positive discrimination...

Edited to add: asking people who identify as women but have a Y chromosome (or other, better objective criteria if one/a set of them can be found) to compete in an open competition doesn't mean they can't compete, at whatever level, it just means they can't compete in the special competition for Xx (or whatever) athletes. Same as having a veteran's class doesn't mean younger people/horses can't compete (at whatever level they are able) elsewhere
 
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I think surely the easiest way is xx female xy male you compete as that. Im sure if a woman has naturally high testosterone or what ever it is that gains her a benefit in that sport that's great at least there is something they can do, because im sure everything else in life is probably not quite so easy and if that means the other women not being able to win at that time then sorry its bad luck, bad timing but at least they are all round normal so can probably have a normal life and ok they haven't won the gold but at the end of the day, life goes on.
 
And if you are XXY or XYY, that's why it starts to get complicated ;) and I do think for most hormones/the body's ability to dictate more about sex than XY genetics so I am not sure if a straight XY test is going to keep everyone happy
 
ycbm said:
Essentially this article says 'people should stop complaining about Caster Semenya being male and competing in a race for females because she was born poor and that was a bigger disadvantage than female athletes running aginst her had.'

Sorry, I do not accept that argument.
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I think it was more that having a high level of testosterone is not the only advantage an athlete can have over others. (And Caster Semenya isn't actually male - she's hyperandrogenic.)
 
The article was heavy on opinion and light on fact. I placed no reliance on it. I think that women's sport will be all but eradicated if women with testes and/or trans women are allowed to race against women without testes.
 
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