why the participation of hyperandrogenic or intersex athletes in women’s competitions is contested by some

The case of Algerian boxer Imane Khelif is the latest in a long series that began with the famous Caster Semenya.

“A parody [de combat] which ridicules all Olympic sports.” This is the final judgment of tennis legend Martina Navratilova, after the expeditious victory in the round of 16 of the boxing tournament of Algerian Imane Khelif, accused without proof of being too masculine, by television viewers, or figures of the Italian far-right government, such as Giorgia Meloni or Matteo Salvini, rushing to the aid of her opponent, Angela Carini, who apologized in the Italian press for this controversy. “I feel sorry for my opponentsaid the Italian boxer. If the IOC said she could fight, I respect that decision.”

According to her profile released by the IOC before the start of the tournament, Imane Khelif was born with “disorders of sex development” (DSD), an acronym for rare congenital diseases that affect chromosomes and testosterone levels, according to a study by the University of Berlin. A hyperandrogenic person’s body thus displays a high level of male hormones, such as testosterone.

Some of these people are intersex. To use the UN definition, “Intersex people are those whose physical or biological characteristics, such as sexual anatomy, genitalia, hormonal functioning or chromosomal pattern, do not fit conventional definitions of masculinity and femininity. These characteristics may manifest at birth or later in life, often at puberty.”

The controversy arose in particular because Imane Khelif was excluded from the world championships last year after failing a test whose nature the International Boxing Federation refuses to specify. Faced with the controversy after the Italian’s withdrawal from the Olympics, the IBU initially took refuge behind medical confidentiality, before its president declared to the Russian news agency Tass that the DNA tests the boxer underwent in 2023 revealed that she had XY chromosomes, generally associated with the male sex.

“As soon as a woman achieves an impressive performance, she is accused of being a man”notes Loé Petit, head of the Intersex activist collective.

“To assume that a physically strong woman cannot be a real woman is misogyny.”

Loé Petit, head of the Intersex activist collective

to AFP

For Denis Quinqueton, co-director of the LGBT+ Observatory of the Jean-Jaurès Foundation, this is a “false debate” : these personalities “are not legitimate to say anything about athletes, only the International Olympic Committee can decide”.

The case of Imane Khelif is reminiscent of that of the hyperandrogenic South African athlete Caster Semenya, prevented from competing in her favorite distance, the 800m. She had refused to comply with treatments required by the international athletics federation, World Athletics, whose aim is to lower her testosterone levels. The middle-distance runner has been waging a legal battle for many months to break the rules of the body and beyond: “This fight is not just about meshe wrote in a column published at the end of 2019 in the New York Times. It’s about taking a stand and fighting for the dignity, equality and fundamental rights of women in sport.”

According to InterAct, the intersex advocacy associationabout 1.7% of the world’s population is affected. Many don’t even know it. A study conducted in 2014 by Anglo-Saxon scientists highlighted that the ratio of hyperandrogenic people among top athletes was higher than this world average. In athletics alone, the sport where this debate is most heated, there are six cases of world-class female champions, in addition to the media-friendly Caster Semenya. These include the Indian sprinter Dutee Chand and Francine Niyonsaba (Burundi) and Margaret Wambui (Kenya), both Olympic medalists in the 800m in Rio in 2016.

But does this high testosterone level give them an advantage? Several studies, including the one conducted by World Athletics to establish its regulations, have shown that there is not necessarily a cause-and-effect link between a high level and great performances. Worse, in some cases, it constitutes a disadvantage leading to a drop in performance. And, to complicate matters, some male athletes can have particularly low levels and perform just as well.

For the defenders of Caster Semenya and the other athletes involved, the question of the legitimacy of these regulations concocted in the West and which apply to athletes from emerging countries is also at stake. Indian researcher Payoshni Mitra, one of the directors of the Center for Sport and Human Rights, tweeted after one of Semenya’s successes in her (still ongoing) legal marathon: “The world of sport must pay attention to this landmark decision, as must the Western European countries where most of the sporting institutions are based.”

Paradoxically, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), which partly ruled in favor of Caster Semenya in 2019, did not demand the repeal of World Athletics regulations using a convoluted formula: “The committee considered that the DSD rules were discriminatory, but the majority of the Committee considered that, on the basis of the evidence presented by the parties to the proceedings, such discrimination is a necessary, reasonable and proportionate means of achieving satisfactory results.” An argument that is very similar to that of Sebastian Coe, the big boss of world athletics: “The regulations we are introducing are there to protect the sanctity of fair and open competition.”

Officially, the IOC does not consider the case of intersex athletes to be a problem. “Many women can have testosterone levels equal to those of men, and still be women.”IOC spokesman Mark Adams reaffirmed on August 1. The Algerian boxer Imane Khelif had thus participated in the Tokyo Games in 2021. She had been eliminated in the quarter-finals of her category without any of her fights making the slightest splash.

“All athletes participating in the Paris Games boxing tournament comply with the rules of eligibility and registration for the competition.”

This includes presenting a medical certificate, but no testosterone level limit for female boxers, according to the rules of the competition.

For her part, Caster Semenya, who also won her case before the European Court of Human Rights, will not be present on the purple track of the Stade de France during these Games. The International Olympic Committee delegates the rules of the athletics competition to World Athletics, which is not the case in the noble art, for which the International Boxing Federation is in disgrace with the IOC.