I’m a woman in sport, but numbers tell me otherwise
Progress has been made towards inclusivity, but there’s still a long way to go.
The 2024 Paris Olympics marked a historic milestone for intersectionality in sports, featuring nearly 200 openly LGBTQ+ athletes across numerous nations. Competitive sports have made positive strides towards promoting equality and recognition, but significant challenges remain.
Audiences were pleased with the expansive number of openly queer athletes seen throughout the Olympic field. Quinn, a dominant midfielder of the Canadian women’s soccer team, made their second appearance at the Olympics after becoming one of the first transgender, non-binary athletes to compete in Tokyo 2020. Nikki Hiltz, who describes themselves as “gender fluid,” represented the USA in the Women’s 1500m run, finishing seventh. Germany’s Timo Cavelius also made history, becoming the first openly gay man to compete in men’s judo.
While the LGBTQ+ representation in Paris was noteworthy, it didn’t go without controversy. Shortly after Algerian boxer Imane Khelif won gold in the Women’s 66kg boxing, social media tabloids surfaced and questioned the athlete’s eligibility to compete. While Khelif identifies as a cisgender woman, she showed signs of increased testosterone levels in unspecified gender eligibility tests administered by the International Boxing Association (IBA). This drew extensive criticism regarding whether Khelif should be allowed to compete in the female category.
Testosterone levels are the primary criterion for gender eligibility for female athletes in the Olympics. The sex hormone is produced in the testicles and the ovaries, and contributes to bone mass, fat distribution, muscle mass, and strength. Testicles typically produce a much higher level of testosterone, but ovaries also produce the hormone, meaning some females can show increased testosterone levels.
As a female athlete with polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS), this all hits close to home. In 2020, when I was first diagnosed by my doctor, I was told that I was producing increased levels of testosterone, resulting in weight gain, acne, and hair growth. PCOS, a mild form of hyperandrogenism, affects up to 1 in 10 females of reproductive age. Even though I’m not an Olympian-level athlete, I can still imagine the serious challenges that many female competitors face when it comes to hormonal health. Some studies have shown that females with PCOS perform better in physical tests than females who do not have PCOS. Despite this being a natural occurrence, the physical advantage attributed to high testosterone levels in women’s sports is why some athletes, like Khelif, have had their womanhood scrutinized.
Disorders of sexual development (DSD) are a set of common conditions that also impact testosterone in females. Some policies claim that athletes with DSD, such as Track-and-field athlete Christine Mboma, possess an unfair advantage. At the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, Mboma was barred from running the women’s 400m because of high testosterone. She decided to compete in the women’s 200m instead – an event that focuses on speed rather than endurance, and where high testosterone has less of an impact. Although Mboma brought home the silver medal, the rules and regulations inevitably left a shadow over her Olympic games.
While World Athletic rulemakers argue that increased levels of testosterone provide an unfair advantage through improved strength, muscle mass, and oxygen-carrying capacity, I argue that it’s unfair to restrict women based on genetic conditions. Imagine the outrage if NBA basketball players were banned from the league if they were over a certain height. The average league height is 6 foot 6 inches, putting the average NBA player well into tallest 1% of all Americans.
And yet, even though it’s more common for a woman to be born with a DSD than for a man to be the average height of an NBA player, nobody will ever argue for limits to the NBA’s most advantageous genetic gift.
So I say let women compete, and let’s stop using outdated forms of gatekeeping and testing for determining who can compete.
Arts & Entertainment Editor (Volume 51); Staff Writer (Volume 50) — Keira is going into her fourth year at UTM pursuing a double major in Communications, Culture, Information, and Technology (CCIT) and Professional Writing and Communications (PWC). When she’s not working or studying, you can find her nose deep in a good literary fiction novel, writing movie reviews on Letterboxd, or even training for the marathon that never seems to actually happen! You can connect with Keira on Instagram or LinkedIn.