"Women's" Boxing at the Olympics
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FFS
Italian boxer Angela Carini, who abandoned her welterweight round of 16 bout against Algeria's Imane Khelif after 46 seconds on Thursday, says she does not consider the bout as a defeat.
Carini's opponent Khelif has been in the spotlight for failing a gender eligibility test at the 2023 World Championships.Khelif, a silver medallist at the 2022 World Championships, was disqualified hours before her gold medal bout at the worlds in New Delhi when she failed to meet the International Boxing Association's (IBA) eligibility criteria.
She was, however, ruled eligible to compete in the boxing competition at the Paris Olympics, which is being organised by the International Olympic Committee.
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I had read elsewhere about one of the two banned (at one time) fighters and their punching power...A previous opponent said it was unlike anything she had ever experienced. When the it hit her, the power - and subsequent pain - was unlike anything she had ever experienced in the ring.
It ought to be. Even if castrated, early development in the male produces the base for much more powerful upper body muscles.
Look, my daughter has a high school state championship ring for power lifting. Her coach's daughter set a world record in the bench press. I've been around some really strong young women. They are not anywhere near the guys.
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There seems to be a dispute regarding Khelif, with some saying that Khelif failed a chromosome test (XY) and others saying Khelif failed a testosterone test and Khelif is an actual XX female that was born with a condition that produces excess testosterone for a woman.
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From a comment:
4th yr med student: The boxer isn’t transgender. They have Androgen insensitivity syndrome, in which case your receptors basically don’t respond to testosterone made by your body. These people are XY and develop & live as women because they look fully like a woman externally, and many don’t even know they have it until they don’t menstruate/are infertile because of it. Look up pictures online of people with it, they look entirely female. Not sure the deal with this boxer and still not agreeing with it, but this isn’t the same as someone transitioning from male to female after undergoing male puberty (which actually does disqualify you from my understanding). It’s more of a complex genetic anomaly but certainly not a straight up man
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@89th said in "Women's" Boxing at the Olympics:
From a comment:
4th yr med student: The boxer isn’t transgender. They have Androgen insensitivity syndrome, in which case your receptors basically don’t respond to testosterone made by your body. These people are XY and develop & live as women because they look fully like a woman externally, and many don’t even know they have it until they don’t menstruate/are infertile because of it. Look up pictures online of people with it, they look entirely female. Not sure the deal with this boxer and still not agreeing with it, but this isn’t the same as someone transitioning from male to female after undergoing male puberty (which actually does disqualify you from my understanding). It’s more of a complex genetic anomaly but certainly not a straight up man
That is being disputed. There is no record of this in the boxer’s medical record until the IBF testing. The IBF president reportedly called them a man looking for a competitive advantage. At the end of the day, you need a standard, and the genetic testing is the cleanest. If it’s XY, then it’s XY.
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@89th said in "Women's" Boxing at the Olympics:
Agree. Maybe he needs to enter the special olympics?
So he can beat the hell out of a disabled person?
These individuals of dubious gender either naturally occurring as in the boxer’s case or medically induced, need their own category in competitive sports.
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@Mik said in "Women's" Boxing at the Olympics:
Assuming this is a natural aberration it’s a shame and I feel for her. But again, letting her compete is a tyranny of a tiny minority. The rest of the world should not have to bear her burden.
I don’t know. Michael Phelps has a body perfectly designed for swimming. A genetic rarity indeed. We don’t disallow him to participate because of it.
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@jon-nyc said in "Women's" Boxing at the Olympics:
@Mik said in "Women's" Boxing at the Olympics:
Assuming this is a natural aberration it’s a shame and I feel for her. But again, letting her compete is a tyranny of a tiny minority. The rest of the world should not have to bear her burden.
I don’t know. Michael Phelps has a body perfectly designed for swimming. A genetic rarity indeed. We don’t disallow him to participate because of it.
Michael Phelps DNA isn’t XYDOLPHIN, either. I’m comfortable using DNA as the dividing line, even if there are a very very few in this world that won’t work for.
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If this person was genuinely born XY with female genitalia, it still raises questions about muscular and bone development, etc… I get your argument, @jon-nyc . Would Andre the Giant be disallowed from the heavyweight wrestling matches because of an unfair size advantage? But if she’s got the biological advantages of a dude and she’s XY, then that’s a reasonable cutoff.
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@LuFins-Dad Agree.
Seems to be an unfair advantage. If things were physically the same between men and women, there would not be separate categories in sports.
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@jon-nyc said in "Women's" Boxing at the Olympics:
She’s lost to plenty of women in the past. The reason this match was so fast is the opponent dropped out.
Besides, could that really be the rule? You’re only allowed to be just so much better than everyone else lest you’re disqualified?
The rule here was whatever is on your passport.
The rule for the IBF was genetic. If they came back XY, it came back XY. That seems pretty cut and dried to me. Just because this person has lost to women in the past makes it no less a potential mismatch.
Can a woman beat a man boxing? Yes.
Should she have to?
If this is a genuine intersexed person, then again, I feel all of the compassion in the world for them, but that doesn’t mean they should fighting women if they have a man’s bone density and muscular development.