How Legitimate is the "Gender Complaint" Against Caster Semenya?
Filed by: Patricia Nell Warren
August 24, 2009 6:00 PM

http://www.bilerico.com/2009/08/im_tracking_the_investigation_of.php

As an Outsports.com writer who has been covering gender testing in sports, I'm tracking the controversy over South African teen track star Caster Semenya and whether she should compete as a woman. The complaint against tall, muscular Semenya has been blown sky-high by her astounding performance last week in the 800-meter run at the 2009 IAAF world championships in Berlin. She won by nearly 3 seconds in an event that's usually won by a split second.

Indeed, I wonder how deeply the investigation of Semenya is being skewed by sports politics. This isn't the first time in recent years that gender complaints have been lodged against women athletes of color from smaller countries. Mozambique's great runner Maria Mutola, also a powerful muscular type, was hounded by gender gossip for years, though she passed the test again and again.

I've been following the controversy on the US National Public Radio.  I don't know how the other outlets are treating it, but NPR is bringing up many points about why it is so difficult to ascertain the gender of an individual, how gender is not a binary condition, how physical sex and gender are not necessarily related, etc.  All good stuff.  I'm sorry for Caster Semenya, but with luck the controversy will open some minds to how we all are constructed differently and that gender and sex are much more complex than many people assume.

- Kate

was hoping to come by susan's and find a thread about this!

been posting articles on facebook and other forums. immediately people react, giving a lecture about why it's so necessary that sports divide competitors into male and female to be fair.

i have to ask them several times, "did you read the article?" because their statements show so much ignorance about how many different ways a person can be differently gendered...which i understand, because i didn't know all of that a few years ago. i'm just...surprised that they can't read.

then when they do start to understand, they say "well then those people should compete in their own olympics."



i'm not an expert on sports. but someone was talking to me as if they were certain caster was doping on testosterone, and that's not fair. if that were what's going on, wouldn't it be called a "drug test" not a "gender test"? can y'all help me out with that?