Discrimination in Sport

The incident

This incident is about a person named Caster Semenye. She is an Olympic 800 m competitive runner. The struggle for her is that the IAAF has decided it’s not fair or right for her to compete as a woman. She has no ovaries and no womb. Her testosterone levels are three times more than the average woman. Because her testosterone levels are so high, many feel it is unfair for her to compete in the women’s event. It is her right to identify as a woman. Many in the world of medicine would describe her as intersex or a hermaphrodite. For any other woman to dupe their bodies to match the levels of hormones in Semenye’s body, they would be banned from this running event. In order to avoid such humiliations being repeated on others, the IAAF decided to judge a person’s right to compete in female events by the body's level of testosterone. Semenya started to take drugs to lower her testosterone levels.

Steps taken

The victim fought for her rights. She tried hard to compete in a woman’s sport, but with her testosterone levels being that of a man’s, she tried to bring those levels down to that of an average woman.

Organization accused

The organization, IEEF accused in this case, tried to work around all the possibilities to allow her to compete as a woman by adjusting the rules to be the person's right to compete as a woman by the body's level of testosterone.

Later on it was proven, there is no evidence to link hyperandrogenism to improve performance. Now the upper limit for female non-drug induced testosterone levels has been removed.

The result

It got to be very complicated and challenging. The problem with using a person's testosterone levels to determine if they can compete as a woman meant that Semenya would need to dope to bring her levels down. Where a woman using dope to increase her levels so she would be at the same level as Semenya She would be banned from the event. I feel it would be an advantage to have a lower level of testosterone but no advantage to someone in Semanya’s situation. It certainly was positive for her as once her testosterone levels were lowered she was able to compete, and she did very well once again in her event. At this point another athlete who also is hyperandrogenic complained of the IAAF rules being unfair. Later it was proven that there is no evidence to link hyperandrogenism to improve performance. Now the upper limit for female non-drug induced testosterone levels has been removed, it has made a difference for Semenya. She is back at the top of her game. She happily focused on the issues that concern her training, performance, eat and sleep, and she is pleased with this.

This event did create progress. I’m not one to completely agree with it. I feel a woman has an ovary and a wound not just a testosterone level issue. But I guess that could be argued as well. I feel we are born, a male, or female. The body parts we are born with should still be who we are forever no matter what surgeries we choose to undergo throughout our lifetime. We should have the right to dress and decorate ourselves as well as change things on our body to make ourselves feel and look the way we wanted to. But I feel you are born, either male or female and that is your life identity. This is just my humble opinion.

Tie into a larger societal issue?

No, I don’t think so. People seem to continue to find things to be unhappy about. Always wanting things to change. Hoping to improve. Some things should just be left alone, however. I’m not saying you can’t change your body to how you feel, you would like it to be. But you were born a male or female, and that should never change in my mind. How our world has changed in the past year, years is not about to stop changing. Perhaps the future holds just simply an 800 m run. Won’t matter if you claim to be a male, female, they, or even a cat. You are a runner. One competing in a running event at your fastest pace possible for a distance of 800 m. Good luck to all !

Will discrimination ever disappear?