New study blasts IOC on gender testing

A familiar debate is resurfacing just in time for the London Olympics.

In the June edition of the American Journal of Bioethics, a group of gender studies experts and anthropologists authored an article critical of the IOC’s potential handling of future gender testing of athletes.

Although the IAAF and the IOC formally stopped systemic gender testing more than 10 years ago, both governing bodies still do retain the right to individually test if there is a highly suspicious situation where an athlete’s gender is called into question.

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Semenya story takes another strange twist

In the wake of the 2009 track & field world championships a scandal broke out surrounding South African 800m runner Caster Semenya. Questions swirled about drug use and then gender after she won gold with a surprise 1:55:45 performance.

Semenya’s improvement of eight seconds in less than nine months in the 800m (and four seconds from her previous race to the world championship final) caused the IAAF to investigate, leading to the controversial gender test and an untimely and poorly handled leak of the fact of the test itself.

Ultimately, Semenya was cleared and allowed to resume international competition (although the results of the report were never released, for privacy reasons). But questions remain about the efficacy and ethics of such testing.

This new study claims that even the current approach to gender testing is highly flawed, unjust and could produce a ‘witch hunt’ like situation.

Specifically, the authors of the study call into question how the IOC and the IAAF determine what is ‘male’ and ‘female’. One would, inaccurately, assume that the simplest method of determining gender would be a definitive chromosome test. Unfortunately, a chromosome test can not account for complicated genetic abnormalities, where, for example, an individual with one gender type set of chromosomes can in fact develop hormonally into what would be considered the opposite gender.

The IOC and the IAAF now approach the testing by determining androgen levels in the athlete — where testosterone levels determine ‘maleness’. The authors of this study argue that testosterone levels are a poor means of determining gender in ostensibly female elite athletes because there is no clear way to define what is a ‘normal level’ of testosterone in a high level female athlete’s body. Also, it could be the case that individuals with abnormal hormone levels or mutations that allow for a different sort of handling of hormones would naturalistically rise to the top of athletics, just as, say, those with high VO2 max levels tend to do.

The study claims that these governing bodies were threatened by Semenya’s “spectacular win” and “powerful physique” and did not necessarily have legitimate grounds for calling into question the athlete’s gender. There were also claims at the time that the accusations were racially motivated.

One thing is clear going into London: the IOC will have to pick it’s battles very carefully regarding questions of gender at the games.

The women’s world record in the 800m is 1:53.28, set in 1983 by Czech runner Jarmila Kratochvilova. It is the longest standing world record in track & field. Kratochvilova’s record has a been besieged by doping rumours for years.

Former middle distance runner accused of gender fraud, rape

A shocking story out of West Bengal has emerged following a criminal complaint by a female partner of former Indian middle distance star runner Pinki Pramanik that she was violently beaten and raped by the retired athlete.

Pramanik is now being asked by police to undergo a gender test, although the reason for that request is not yet clear.

Pramanik had won multiple international events during her career, including a silver in the 2006 Commonwealth Games in Australia.

When asked about the status of her victories, the Indian Athletics Federation stated that they would await the outcome of the investigation before making a decision on how to proceed.

Another Indian middle distance runner, Santhi Soundarajan, was famously stripped of her 2006 Asian Games silver medal after failing a gender test.