The International Olympic Committee should hang its head in shame for allowing the disgraceful spectacle that occurred in women’s boxing this week.
The welterweight bout between Algerian Imane Khelif and Italy’s Angela Carini lasted just 46 seconds. Carini took two powerful blows to the head. The first dislodged her chinstrap and the second one smashed her face and left her with blood stains on her clothes. She withdrew from the match, saying, “This is unjust.”
This sparked outrage.
Khelif and Taiwanese boxer, Lin Yu-ting, both failed to meet gender eligibility tests at the Women’s World Boxing Championships in New Delhi last year.
The IOC dismissed those concerns on the grounds that, since the two boxers were identified as women on their passports, they were therefore eligible to compete against women.
After their disqualification from the World Boxing Championships, it was revealed that tests showed both boxers had unacceptably high levels of testosterone. International Boxing Association president Umar Kremlev reportedly told Tass news agency both the Taiwanese and Algerian boxers’ tests showed they had XY chromosomes typically found in men.
Controversies surrounding gender identity have plagued international sports events for decades. In the Soviet era, Russian and East German athletes routinely bulked up on a state-sponsored regime of anabolic steroids.
Back then it was called “cheating” and banned. These days, it’s called “inclusion” and the IOC tells those who complain to get over it.
It’s bad enough when trans athletes insist on competing against women in sports such as swimming and cycling. While grossly unfair, it’s not as dangerous as someone with the physical advantages of a male body punching someone who has been a woman all her life. Studies show a man’s punch is more than twice as powerful as a woman’s.
The international bodies governing sports such as swimming and cycling have developed comprehensive and fairer rules around gender identity. World Aquatics, the governing body of swimming, added an “open” category for trans athletes. Not surprisingly, no one signed up.
Khelif was defiant after the controversial win.
“I am here for gold. I will fight anybody. I will fight them all,” she told reporters.
The IOC must reconsider these harmful policies. They’re unfair and dangerous and will ultimately destroy women’s sports.