What is a Woman? The Boxing Brouhaha at the Paris Olympics and the Y Chromosome Debate

In the recent Paris Olympics, two boxers, an Algerian woman, Imane Khelif, and a Taiwanese woman, Lin Yu-ting (who both won gold medals), were accused of being men igniting a worldwide firestorm during which celebrities such as Donnald Trump and JK Rowling weighed in. Of the two boxers, Khelif received the bulk of the vitriol when she defeated Italian boxer Angela Carini in 46 seconds. Carini forfeited the match due to experiencing intense pain in her face and nose. She said she had never been hit with such a powerful punch, and she refused to shake her opponent’s hand (although she apologized later).

Imane Khelif

Even though Khelif and Yu-ting had been competing in boxing for years and had been beaten in several bouts by other women, they improved their boxing and competed in the 2023 International Boxing Association (IBA) Championship, where they were disqualified due to test results which have not been officially released. The nature of the tests employed, and their rationale and methodology, remains confusing. For the Paris Olympics, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) suspended the IBA from overseeing Olympic boxing due to governance issues and took over the organization of the Olympic boxing bouts allowing Khelif and Yu-ting to participate.
 
On social media, people labelled the decision to allow Khelif and Yu-ying to participate as women boxers: inexcusable, shameful, unacceptable, and an injustice. They wrote that men who compete as women are mediocre, and that rewarding them with gold medals for beating up women is an abuse that betrays hatred and discrimination against real women. People shared photos of folds in Khelif’s shorts or videos of Khelif tucking in her shirt to imply she had male genitals. Some individuals claimed that they were transgender, which is not true. Although most critics mentioned the appearance of the boxers and made comments about high testosterone levels being unfair, what most of them seemed to agree on is the notion that that having a Y chromosome made its bearer a man and therefore unqualified to compete as a woman. In order to address this notion, we need to understand what men and women are.
 
Designating members of our species “men” and “women” or of any species “male” and “female” is a classification. Classifications often address aspects of the physical world and, when applicable, its social structures by grouping individuals that are similar in the same categories. Human beings classify things in order to deal with the complexity of our environment and make it more predictable and manageable. But what has to be remembered about classifications, is that most of the time they don’t cover all the individuals being classified. What I mean by this is that, for example, in a binary classification such as male or female, or men or women, there are in between cases. There is a certain number of individuals that share similarities with both groups and do not fit neatly in one group or the other. These individuals are referred to as intersex cases. Now let’s deal with the Y chromosome.
 
During embryonic development, the genes in the Y chromosome trigger a masculinization program through the production of testosterone that results in a fetus developing into a male. But sometimes there are problems where the genes in the Y chromosomes do not function well or get transferred to an X chromosome or when there is resistance by the body to the masculinizing program. All in all, there are about 40 different recognized medical conditions that can produce individuals with anatomical structures from both sexes. Many of these individuals are assigned their sex at birth based on their external genitalia and they grow up with their assigned gender, only to discover years later that they don’t have the “right” chromosomes.
 
A few of these chromosomal males or females have abilities of the other sex. For example, some people born with the XY chromosomal makeup develop into anatomical females with a uterus (Swyer syndrome). Although these individuals lack ovaries, with a donated egg and medical help they can get pregnant and have children. So if you think anyone with a Y chromosome is a man, you have to explain how some of these “men” can get pregnant and have children. What is the point of declaring someone who has a Y chromosome to be a man, if the Y chromosome is not working as it should? Some people born with the XX chromosomal makeup can have high levels of testosterone (hyperandrogenism) due to several genetic conditions. Should these high-testosterone XX women be allowed to compete without any restrictions? After all they don’t have a Y chromosome.
 
Clearly whether a person should be included in the category “women” goes beyond merely not having a Y chromosome.
 
These intersex cases are human beings that deserve to be respected and not bullied or discriminated against.  Just consider the crucible that South African athlete Caster Semenya went though back in 2009 when she won a medal at the Berlin Olympics, and her status as a woman was questioned. She endured invasive and humiliating tests and the results were leaked to the press. Everyone chimed in with an opinion about her body. She had to go into hiding and endure trauma counseling. After an 11-month investigation (during which she was banned from competition) she was cleared to compete again and her record allowed to stand. Now Khelif and Yu-ting are being subjected to the same ordeal.   
 
Considering all athletic differences, women’s records are on the average 9 to 12% lower than men. Thus we have decided that men and women’s sports should be separate because men have what we perceive to be an unfair advantage over women. As a large part of this advantage is due to the effects of testosterone on the tissues related to athletic performance (bones, muscles, lungs, etc.), many people advocate lowering testosterone levels in women with high testosterone levels (regardless of chromosomal makeup) to “even” the playing field.
 
But not all differences in athletic performance are due to motivation, discipline, and hard work within the background of an even playing field. Among the population of men and women athletes, there are individuals whose genetics give them an advantage over their peers in areas such as height, strength, oxygenation capacity, etc. So, is it OK for these people with a genetic advantage over their same sex peers to compete, but not women who have naturally high testosterone levels? Which genetic advantages are acceptable and which aren’t?
 
Science won’t give us the answer to this question because a decision one way or the other depends on our beliefs, values, and notions of what is or isn’t fair play. But what is not fair is to insult, denigrate, and humiliate women who have been assigned this gender since birth and who have lived their lives as such.
 
The image of Imane Khelif by the Algeria Press Service is used under an Attribution 3.0 Unported license.
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