Knocked Out

Boxing's Olympic transgender problem

Forget the drag queens mocking the Last Supper, or the dirty river which threatens to make the triathlon a duathlon, or the convicted rapist still living in the athletes’ village.

The Games of the 33^rd Olympiad are but hours away from their biggest controversy yet.

That’s because Imane Khelif of Algeria in welterweight (66kg) and Lin Yu-Ting of Taiwan in featherweight (57kg) are about to have their first bouts in the women’s boxing.

On the surface that seems unremarkable – except that both boxers are biological men.

Even though they competed as women at the Tokyo Olympics, the International Boxing Association (IBA) has banned them from competition. In March last year Khelif was prevented from taking part in the final of the Women’s World Championship because a DNA test had shown XY chromosomes. The IBA President said at the time that Khelif was “trying to fool colleagues and pretend that they were a woman.”

At those same World Championships in New Delhi Lin Yu-Ting was stripped of a bronze medal after tests showed the XY as well.

You would think a couple of athletes being banned by their International Federation from winning medals at World Championships would mean the end of their boxing aspirations – especially in Olympic women’s competition.

But the International Olympic Committee (IOC) have had a major falling out with the Russian-led IBA over a variety of issues, mostly related to perceived corruption by Eastern European nations. Consequently the IOC has stripped the IBA of its status as the organizer of boxing at the Olympic Games.

The IOC delegates the management of sports at the games to International Federations (IFs) like World Athletics, World Aquatics and the International Cycling Union.

So for the first time boxing at the Olympics is  being run by the IOC itself, or rather an entity established just for these games called the Paris 2024 Boxing Unit.

The IOC has been more than happy to follow the various IFs’ stance on transgender athlete eligibility . So for instance the American swimmer Lia Thomas wasn’t picked for Paris after World Aquatics ruled any swimmer who transitioned from male to female after puberty couldn’t take part in women’s events.

It’s the commonsense way to approach this issue, especially when it comes to sports where natural male strength gives a transitioned woman an unfair advantage. You would think that it would be an even more logical direction to take when it comes to contact sports like boxing where the potential for athlete injury is always high.

But incredibly the IOC have moved in the opposite direction. They’ve said that both Khelif and Lin can compete as women, despite being biological men, because it states in their passports that they are women.

The IOC spokesman, sorry spokesperson, Mark Adams has, when commenting on the matter, reverted to that weasel word so beloved of woke politicians. Adams says that the rules regarding who can compete in female competition were “complex.”

No they’re not. Those born with a penis compete in men’s events. Those with a vagina line up for women’s competition.

But unlike its various member IFs the IOC can’t think linear on this matter. Mr Adams – one presumes he’s a mister – says the IOC’s position was for sports to try to balance fairness in female sport with inclusivity.

“That’s a difficult balance. In the end it’s up to the experts for each discipline. They know very well where there is an advantage and if that is a big advantage then that is clearly not acceptable.”

As Adams made those comments, video emerged showing Khelif in a bout from December of 2022. In it Khelif batters Mexico’s Brianda Tamara so hard that Tamara said afterwards “her blows hurt me a lot. Thank god that day I got out of the ring safely.”

The day before Khelif is due to fight Italy’s Angela Carini, with Lin – top seed in the featherweight division- scheduled to box on Friday, the IOC is standing firm despite the potential for unfairness – and injury to opponents. Both will compete.

As the howls of outrage come from many fair minded fans, intriguingly there is little about the early lives of either Khelif or Lin. The most basic question is “were they born male?”

If the answer to that is yes, then it has to be asked at what age did they start transitioning to female? If it was past the age of 12 – which is the age most IFs use as the beginning of puberty – then they should not be competing as females.

The politics of the IOC-IBA dispute is boiling away in the background of this eligibility war. Mr Adams from the IOC says eligibility should be done by the federations. Except the IOC won’t let the IBA do that for these Olympic Games.

 It must also be remembered that both these boxers have competed at the Olympics before without distinguishing themselves.

But three years on from Tokyo  it may be a different story with them both now potential medalists.

If Lin and Khelif get to stand on the Olympic podium next week, expect the transgender athletes conflict to be ratcheted up another level.