Sorry Caster Semenya, you aren’t a woman

P.P.S. Caster Semenya won the women’s 800m in Zurich in 1:56:45, as expected, on 1st September 2016, to win the Diamond League.

P.S. Caster Semenya won the Olympic women’s 800m, as expected, in 1:55:28 on 21st August 2016.

Tom Fordyce, writing on the BBC’s website, said Semenya’s Olympic win would ignite previous controversy about the athlete.

So it proved, with Britain’s Lynsey Sharp, Canada’s Melissa Bishop and Joanna Jozwik from Poland all saying the testosterone-fueled Semenya has an unfair advantage.

SEMENYA HAS INTERNAL TESTES, NOT OVARIES

Semenya was sadly born ‘intersex’, with physical characteristics typically associated with both men and women.  Externally, one assumes ‘she’ looks like a woman.  But Semenya lacks a womb or ovaries, and it is the latter which produce the female hormones oestrogen and progesterone.

Instead, according to Mike Hurst in the Australian Daily Telegraph, Semenya has internal testes.  These are doing what they do and generating the male hormone testosterone.  Women, especially athletes, do produce that hormone but at a maximum level less than a tenth that of the maximum for a man.

Caster Semenya ‘self-identifies’ as a woman but might equally ‘self-identify’ as a man. It’s a matter of choice.  But men’s races would be more difficult for Semenya to win. Kenya’s David Rudisha won the 2016 Olympic men’s 800m in a time of 1:42.15.  Women’s races are an easier touch.

DIAGNOSED WITH HYPERANDROGISM

Fordyce says Semenya made no public comment after a gold-medal-winning performance at the world championships in Berlin seven years ago, and neither have officials. Semenya won the 800m by the biggest margin in history.  The athlete has tried not to release much information.  Nevertheless, details of internal organs have emerged.  It is also conceded there is a resulting diagnosis of hyperandrogenism, which leaves testosterone levels far in excess of the vast majority of women.

Testosterone is the principal male sex hormone. It promotes among other physical effects muscle mass and strength. Women athletes do have testosterone, but at much lower levels than men. IAAF decided post-Berlin that an intersex athlete with the condition had an unfair advantage over the other women competing.  It is like an in-built performance-enhancing drug.

IAAF THRESHOLD RULE CHALLENGED

Four years ago, the IAAF decided that if a competitor had around three times higher levels of testosterone than naturally occured in 99% of female athletes, that competitor could not compete.  Even that ‘three times’ threshold looks absurdly high.

Caster Semenya took medication to suppress testosterone levels, and her/his results dropped back.  In London, in 2012, she/he had to settle for silver.

Then another intersex athlete, Indian sprinter Dutee Chand, challenged the IAAF’s hyperandrogenism regulations. The Court for Arbitration in Sport ruled in July 2015 that the IAAF had failed to provide enough evidence that testosterone improved female performance.

Dutee Chand, on the world stage, is actually not that fast.  All sorts of factors affect running speed.  I’ll never beat Kelly Holmes.  (And don’t throw Phil 4:13 at me either.)  But elite men as a group run faster than elite women, and that is down to their testosterone levels.  In its controversial decision, the CAS suspended the hyperandrogenism regulations until July 2017 to give the IAAF time to gather evidence.

UNFAIR TO GENUINE WOMEN

In the meantime, Chand, Semenya and any other intersex athletes are free to compete without medication.  Fordyce writes that Semenya’s subsequent results have been remarkable. She has not been ‘remotely challenged’ in races since (July 2015), he writes.

We can all agree Caster is made in the image of God and should be treated with due respect.  The real question is, should an intersex person with her/his characteristics be allowed to compete in women’s sports events?

Should we just close our eyes to the immediate and obvious disadvantage of true women lining up against someone with male internal organs built like a brick outhouse?  Who should the athletics authorities be fair to?  Athletic events are staged around the Bibilical assumption that God ‘made them male and female’.  There is no intermediate ‘intersex’ category.

LEVEL PLAYING FIELD DEMANDED BY THE ALMIGHTY

‘We separate men and women into categories because we want women to be able to win some competitions,’ says Eric Vilain, professor of human genetics at UCLA and consultant to the IOC medical commission. ‘There is 10 to 12% difference between male and female athletic performance.’  But he says IAAF have  been set an impossible task.  The article in which he is quoted also says women’s sports will not survive if the CAS ruling stands.

Simple justice dictates if an athlete comes along with a genetic condition that does not fit into the male/female divide, then sadly he/she should only be able to compete against men, not against women.  To allow intersex athletes to compete in women’s events is unfair to genuine women athletes.

The word of God demands a ‘level playing field’: Proverbs 16:11 A just weight and balance are the LORD’S: all the weights of the bag are his work.

The same will also apply if a man-woman ‘transgender’ athlete demands to compete.  And there will be the same outcry from sexual politics activists.  Athletics has to take a stand now.

CASTER MARRIED A WOMAN

The story gets murkier.  According to South Africa’s Sport24 website, Caster Semenya ‘married’ a woman last December in what was described as a ‘traditional’ wedding ceremony.

Semenya and her/his long-time girlfriend, Violet Raseboya, held the ceremony in Ga-Dikgale in the Capricorn District of Limpopo.

The website says: ‘According to reports, Semenya and Raseboya got engaged in May last year.  Semenya was quick to dispel those reports, saying, “There is no wedding. Don’t believe the rumours you read in the news,” according to the Sowetan website.

‘However, according to the Daily Sun website, Semenya, 24, sent her parents to Raseboya’s family in Polokwane to negotiate lobola (dowry).

‘An insider revealed at the time that both families were happy to negotiate lobola, with Semenya’s family paying R25,000 (around £1,400).’  Dowry in Africa is paid by the man’s family to the woman’s.

That fits, because sadly, Caster Semenya, you are not a woman.

YOU CAN RUN ON FOR A LONG TIME

One day, Caster Semenya’s times will be deleted and medals re-allocated.  That will be sad at a personal level, but the athlete is knowingly employing an unfair advantage over genuine women.  That is contrary to justice.

As the song goes:

‘You can run on for a long time,
‘Run on for a long time,
‘Run on for a long time,
‘Sooner or later God’ll cut you down.’  (Johnny Cash – view on youtube.)

Find out how to join Christian Voice and stand up for the King of kings (clicking on the link below does not commit you to join)

Please note that persons wishing to comment on this story must enter a valid email address. Comments from persons leaving fictitious email addresses will be trashed.