# Caster Semenya and Gender Tests in Sports **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 20, 2009, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088 "2009-08-20T16:19:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2009, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088/1 "2009-08-20T16:19:45Z")
I caught this news story at the top of my Gmail. [Semenya’s father dismisses speculation](http://sports.espn.go.com/oly/trackandfield/news/story?id=4411235&campaign=rss&source=ESPNHeadlines) > [@](#): > > Semenya dominated her rivals to win the 800 on Wednesday despite revelations that surfaced earlier in the day that she was undergoing a gender test. Her dramatic improvement in the 800 and 1,500, muscular build and deep voice sparked speculation about her gender. [snip] About three weeks ago, the IAAF asked the South African athletics federation to conduct the gender test after Semenya burst onto the scene by posting a world leading time of 1 minute, 56.72 seconds at the African junior championships in Bambous, Mauritius. [snip] Weiss said the testing was ordered because of “ambiguity, not because we believe she is cheating.” If the tests show that Semenya is not a woman, she would be stripped of her gold medal. Something about the idea of forcing an athlete (always female, never male) to submit to a humiliating barrage of tests to prove that she fits society’s binary idea of male/female, and then stripping her of the honors she worked so hard to achieve if she doesn’t, really makes me angry. How do other people feel about gender verification tests for gender-segretated sports? Any difference between “in general” and this specific instance? ---
**Author:** ![magellan01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@magellan01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magellan01)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2009, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088/2 "2009-08-20T16:27:47Z")
> [@Shot\_From\_Guns](#): > > Something about the idea of forcing an athlete (always female, never male) to submit to a humiliating barrage of tests to prove that she fits society’s binary idea of male/female, and then stripping her of the honors she worked so hard to achieve if she doesn’t, really makes me angry. > > How do other people feel about gender verification tests for gender-segretated sports? Any difference between “in general” and this specific instance? I feel pretty much the opposite. While it may be embarrassing for her (assuming she is, in fact, a she), it’s seems like a simple, practical solution. Because if she is really a he (which has happened before), then all the women she is competing against don’t have a chance and all THEIR hard worked can not get rewarded. Fact is, men are stronger and faster than women. If you want to erase the lines, then a woman would never win any race ever. That doesn’t seem like a good thing, does it? [Here is an article about it.](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1207653/Womens-800m-gold-medal-favourite-Caster-Semenya-takes-gender-test-hours-World-Championship-race.html) Scroll down to see other athletes that were not actually women. ---
**Author:** ![Sinaijon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dc4da7/32.png) [@Sinaijon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sinaijon)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2009, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088/3 "2009-08-20T16:30:38Z")
> [@Shot\_From\_Guns](#): > > Something about the idea of forcing an athlete (always female, never male) to submit to a humiliating barrage of tests to prove that she fits society’s binary idea of male/female, and then stripping her of the honors she worked so hard to achieve if she doesn’t, really makes me angry. Well, that’s just it. If she doesn’t conform to society’s binary idea of male/female, then she didn’t have to work so hard. A good male high school half miler would be a world class female half miler. ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2009, 4:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088/4 "2009-08-20T16:35:54Z")
But chances are, if something does come up on the test, she’s not going to be a flat-out, “normal” XY man. She’ll probably be intersexed. So, she might get an unfair advantage competing in women’s sports, but she’d be at an unfair disadvantage in men’s sports. Michael Phelps has [a bunch of interesting quirks to his physiology](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_phelps#Physique_and_training) that make him an especially good swimmer–do you want to strip him of his medals and records and ban him from competing again because he had an advantage against people who don’t have the same physical makeup as him? ---
**Author:** ![Cheesesteak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cheesesteak/32/3694_2.png) [@Cheesesteak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheesesteak)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2009, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088/5 "2009-08-20T16:43:05Z")
If sports are gender segregated for competitive reasons (and the vast majority are) then testing is the only way to ensure that the competition is fair. At a minimum, testing should be an available resource, so that cheating is highly discouraged. In this case, it is entirely possible that she is a genetic oddity, raised from birth as a female, but with underlying male genetics that would rightfully disqualify her from a gender segregated event. In sports, I generally consider the Men’s event an “open” event, where anyone could compete, male or female, as long as there are no underlying safety concerns, such as in Boxing. ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2009, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088/6 "2009-08-20T16:46:08Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > [Here is an article about it.](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1207653/Womens-800m-gold-medal-favourite-Caster-Semenya-takes-gender-test-hours-World-Championship-race.html) Scroll down to see other athletes that were not actually women. If you’re going to cite something, you might as well make sure it’s giving good examples. 1.) Ewa Kłobukowska had “one chromosome too many” (it was never specified what her specific chromosomal abnormality was). This probably gave her absolutely no advantage in sports. 2.) Hermann “Dora” Ratjen (a) had ambiguous genitalia, although he did identify as male, and (b) was forced to compete as a woman by the Nazi government. The Olympics don’t even use gender testing anymore, and even allow trans athletes to compete as the gender they identify as after SRS and hormone therapy. ---
**Author:** ![holmes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e95f7d/32.png) [@holmes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/holmes)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2009, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088/7 "2009-08-20T17:31:58Z")
Right and since it appears she (Klobukowska) had a child, I am not sure exactly how that particular mutation disqualified her from being an “actual” woman…extra chromosome or not. ---
**Author:** ![Henrichek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/5daacb/32.png) [@Henrichek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Henrichek)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2009, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088/8 "2009-08-20T17:52:57Z")
Why not test everybody prior to the race? Then there wouldn’t be the humiliation of being singled out for testing. Checking the chromosomes shouldn’t be so costly, or is it? ---
**Author:** ![Zsofia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/7bcc69/32.png) [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2009, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088/9 "2009-08-20T18:07:59Z")
I just feel sorry for anybody who doesn’t _know_ they have a chromosomal abnormality and has to find out that way. ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2009, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088/10 "2009-08-20T19:22:00Z")
> [@Henrichek](#): > > Why not test everybody prior to the race? Then there wouldn’t be the humiliation of being singled out for testing. Checking the chromosomes shouldn’t be so costly, or is it? 1.) It’s not just a chromosome test. Gender is a lot more complicated than a lot of people think–there are a lot of ways to be “in between” male and female. Especially in the case of people who don’t \*\*know \*\*they’re intersex, there’s a lot of ambiguity in terms of how genetics, physiology, and hormones all interact. 2.) To quote from a Journal of the American Medical Association article cited in the Wikipedia article on [gender verification in sports](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_verification_in_sports): > [@](#): > > [G]ender verification tests are difficult, expensive, and potentially inaccurate. Furthermore, these tests fail to exclude all potential impostors (eg, some 46,XX males), are discriminatory against women with disorders of sexual development, and may have shattering consequences for athletes who ‘fail’ a test. [snip] Gender verification has long been criticized by geneticists, endocrinologists, and others in the medical community. One major problem was unfairly excluding women who had a birth defect involving gonads and external genitalia (i.e., male pseudohermaphroditism). [snip] A second problem is that only women, not men, were stigmatized by gender verification testing. Systematic follow-up was rarely available for female athletes “failing” the test, which often was performed under very public circumstances. Follow-up was crucial because the problem was not male impostors, but rather confusion caused by misunderstanding of male pseudohermaphroditism. ---
**Author:** ![DrCube](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a3d4f5/32.png) [@DrCube](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrCube)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2009, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088/11 "2009-08-20T19:27:11Z")
> [@Zsofia](#): > > I just feel sorry for anybody who doesn’t _know_ they have a chromosomal abnormality and has to find out that way. ☹ Me too. Weren’t there some East German Olympic athletes in the 60s who were tested and found to have XXY chromosomes, instead of just XX? Just where are athletes like that supposed to compete? Perhaps we should add a third sex to Olympic events? “Coming up: Men’s 400m, Women’s 1500m, Intersexed Steeplechase”? ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2009, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088/12 "2009-08-20T19:51:09Z")
> [@DrCube](#): > > Intersexed Steeplechase I would totally go see that band, by the way. ---
**Author:** ![Henrichek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/5daacb/32.png) [@Henrichek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Henrichek)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2009, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088/13 "2009-08-20T20:14:14Z")
> [@Shot\_From\_Guns](#): > > 1.) It’s not just a chromosome test. Gender is a lot more complicated than a lot of people think–there are a lot of ways to be “in between” male and female. Especially in the case of people who don’t \*\*know \*\*they’re intersex, there’s a lot of ambiguity in terms of how genetics, physiology, and hormones all interact. > > 2.) To quote from a Journal of the American Medical Association article cited in the Wikipedia article on [gender verification in sports](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_verification_in_sports): Ah, I had some suspicions that it wasn’t as easy as I thought. My first assumption was just that they had to identify and count the chromosomes. Thanks. So, what characteristics are required in an athlete for them to be assigned a specific gender in these tests? Are there some international rules that are agreed on in most sports? ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2009, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088/14 "2009-08-20T20:31:17Z")
> [@Henrichek](#): > > Are there some international rules that are agreed on in most sports? Well, the agency in question in this particular instance is the IAAF, and I managed to find the [IAAF Policy on Gender Verification](http://www.iaaf.org/mm/Document/imported/36983.pdf) [**PDF**]. It doesn’t lay out the specific criteria for determining whether a person is “male” or “female,” but it does make concessions for conditions that would not give the athlete an advantage, or would only give her a small one. ---
**Author:** ![Acid\_Lamp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Acid\_Lamp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acid_Lamp)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2009, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088/15 "2009-08-20T21:33:36Z")
> [@Shot\_From\_Guns](#): > > How do other people feel about gender verification tests for gender-segretated sports? Any difference between “in general” and this specific instance? It doesn’t bother me one bit. A woman has female chromosomes, hormones and anatomy. That anatomy is different in important ways from males regardless of outlier performance overlap. Generally speaking, males are larger, stronger, faster, and possess a great deal more muscle mass than women. That is WHY we have gender segregation, to ensure that the athletes compete on as level a playing field as possible so that the finest among them can win. If someone is so physically ambiguous, and also possesses a physical performance that is in the questionable zone, it is not unreasonable to ensure that a transsexual is not performing in an unfit category. A person who went through natural puberty as a male has an unfair advantage over natural women assuming the same level of athletic conditioning. ---
**Author:** ![Acid\_Lamp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Acid\_Lamp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acid_Lamp)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2009, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088/16 "2009-08-20T21:38:24Z")
On reply I noticed that the thread has mentioned true intersex individuals. While rare, I should think that they ought to compete in the Men’s event. Any intersexing that results in more masculine secondary sexual characteristics is also likely to result in a physique and physiology that few, if any women could fairly compete against. ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2009, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088/17 "2009-08-20T21:40:40Z")
> [@Shot\_From\_Guns](#): > > The Olympics don’t even use gender testing anymore, and even allow trans athletes to compete as the gender they identify as after SRS and hormone therapy. Really? Anyone can claim to be any gender they like and that claim is accepted at face value no matter what? That seems desperate for abuse. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2009, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088/18 "2009-08-20T21:46:22Z")
> [@MaxTheVool](#): > > Really? Anyone can claim to be any gender they like and that claim is accepted at face value no matter what? That’s a pretty brutal twisting of **Shot from Guns** actual words. ---
**Author:** ![Henrichek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/5daacb/32.png) [@Henrichek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Henrichek)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2009, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088/19 "2009-08-20T21:46:40Z")
> [@MaxTheVool](#): > > Really? Anyone can claim to be any gender they like and that claim is accepted at face value no matter what? > > That seems desperate for abuse. I think the hormone therapy is key in that policy. I would guess that taking hormones for a couple years would really affect the advantages they would otherwise hold. ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2009, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088/20 "2009-08-20T21:57:02Z")
[Related Straight Dope column on gender identification in sports.](http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2782/switch-hitter) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caster-semenya-and-gender-tests-in-sports/507088.md?page=2)