Runner Caster Semenya said to be a hermaphrodite

South African runner Caster Semenya, 18, made headlines worldwide last month when it came out that she would undergo gender testing to verify her first place finish in the women’s 800 metre race at the 2009 World Championships in Athletics. Semenya has always identified herself as female, but her visible masculine characteristics and deep voice brought her gender into question. The results are supposedly in, and Semenya has reportedly been identified as a hermaphrodite. The thing is, these reports have been leaked to the press and weren’t supposed to be officially released for a few months. Her family is understandably upset:

MOKGADI Caster Semenya’s family and South African athletics bosses are outraged at an alleged leak of a medical investigation that reportedly found the 800m world champion has “both male and female sexual characteristics”.

Yesterday, the Australian The Daily Telegraph quoted a “source closely involved with the Semenya examinations” at the International Association of Athletics Federations as saying that tests, including “various scans”, showed she had internal testes and no uterus or ovaries.

“Tests conducted during the World Athletics Championships in Berlin last month, where Semenya’s gender became the subject of heated debate following her victory in the 800m, revealed evidence she is a hermaphrodite, someone with both male and female sexual characteristics,” the Sydney tabloid reported.

The IAAF has said it will release the report only in November, after consulting Semenya.

Spokesman Nick Davies did not respond last night to queries on the alleged leak.

The Times informed Semenya’s family of the Australian newspaper’s report on the gender tests performed by IAAF doctors last month.

The 18-year-old’s mother, Dorcus, fumed and accused the media of “causing the family pain” by continuing to report on the controversy.

“Why must jealousy drive people to say such bad things? Why are you bringing all this?” she said, before hanging up.

Semenya’s grandmother, Maphuthi Sekgale, was shocked and angry on hearing the news: “They are crazy. It can only be jealousy that makes them say that she is a man.

“I raised her as a young girl and I have no doubt that she is a girl.

“As the family, we don’t care who is saying what and we also don’t care, even if she won’t be running internationally, but we will always support her athletic talent,” she said

The Daily Telegraph claimed “Semenya has three times the amount of testosterone a ‘normal’ female would have”.

It said the IAAF “is ready to disqualify Semenya from future events” and has not ruled out stripping her of her gold medal.

Athletics SA president Leonard Chuene told The Times last night that he was appalled at “how far people are willing to go to pull down Semenya’s victory”.

“What you are saying to me is like swearing at this little girl. We have no idea where these allegations are coming from because we were told by IAAF that the results would only be out in November,” said Chuene, who has repeatedly denied any gender tests were conducted on the athlete.

Chuene accused unnamed people in Europe of “making up their minds about Caster”.

“[They] will continue spreading these stories until they have ruined her name,” he said.

The Australian report quoted the unnamed IAAF source as saying: “There certainly is evidence Semenya is an hermaphrodite. But the trouble is the IAAF now has the whole ANC and the whole of South Africa on their backs.

“Everything is going to have to be done absolutely by the book, no question of a challenge to our findings,” it said.

ANC Youth League spokesman Floyd Shivambu — whose organisation gave Semenya R50000 after her win — said the report might be based on “malicious rumour”.

“I think we need to find the real truth before we can give these claims a platform,” he said.

“We need to know who is saying this. We should be careful that we are not giving them a platform to confirm a rumour that is not yet verified by the IAAF.”

[From TheTimes.co.za]

Last year I caught a special on NPR about transgendered athletes that aired during the controversy over gender testing for the Beijing Olympics. Transgender author Jennifer Finney Boylan was a guest, and she convinced me that transgender and ambiguous gender athletes have a right to compete. She wrote a very compelling op-ed in the NY Times about this issue if you’d like to read her arguments. I also agree with an editorial in The Nation that says that sex testing in athletics needs to stop and that “The idea that an 18-year-old who has just experienced the greatest athletic victory of her life is being subjected to this very public humiliation is shameful to say the least.”

Does Semenya have an inherent advantage over other female athletes if she was born with hidden male characteristics? It’s not her fault, and she seems to have been unaware of it up until now. It may look obvious to us, but her family sounds mortified and they swear that she’s a woman. Should we tell her she can’t compete because she’s not “100%” female? Supposedly she didn’t even suspect this. Should we bar everyone that’s not born strictly male or female from competing in athletic competitions? Should we relegate them to “other” status and make them compete in a separate but unequal category? What about athletes with excess testosterone or androgen? Semenya worked hard for her success, it wasn’t achieved because she had some latent testes. She beat records and she won the race. Surely that counts for something.