Perspective: To compete in the biggest track events, Caster Semenya has to take medications to decrease her testosterone level. If she declines, she can't compete on the grandest stage. The ruling shows how far we have to go in understanding gender.
By Jerry Brewer Jerry Brewer Sports columnist Email Bio Follow Columnist May 1 at 12:30 PM In the intricate and emotional case of Caster Semenya, there is no such thing as fair. Her situation vexes traditional sports logic. It challenges the inflexibility of the way we divided athletics long ago: Males are easily defined as males and should compete against other males; and females are easily defined as females and should compete against other females.
On Wednesday, the Court of Arbitration for Sport ruled against Semenya’s appeal in the landmark case and chose to uphold the International Association of Athletics Federations rule. It took the panel of three judges more than two months to decide, by a 2-1 margin, that the IAAF is right to have a policy targeting the testosterone levels of women in competing at distances ranging from 400 meters to a mile.
Ultimately, this was a decision to protect 99.9 percent of competitors at the expense of the other 0.1 percent. Neither the IAAF nor CAS arrived at it easily. But they thought it was essential, in this situation, to prefer parity in order to promote the sport’s growth and maintain the integrity of competition.
We all accept that our bodies possess differences in athletic abilities. And we’ve always accepted a necessary division of men and women. But we never accounted for biological overlap, and now that gender is more fluid than we realize, the IAAF just wants to force normalcy, even if that never really existed.
For now, we just know this: Semenya lost an appeal during a time in which the sports world is just coming to terms with the DSD dilemma. It could have long-reaching ramifications throughout all levels of sports. But let’s hope, in time and with greater knowledge, we can revisit this policy and our current instincts about DSD.
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