Posted on 09/19/2009 6:36:16 AM PDT by SkyPilot
PRETORIA, South Africa (CNN) -- The president of Athletics South Africa has admitted that he lied about gender tests on runner Caster Semenya before her gold-medal win at the World Athletics Championships last month.
Caster Semenya celebrates her gold at the world championships in Berlin.
The national sports body has always denied that it agreed to the tests before the race in Berlin, Germany -- an event that kicked off international controversy over the 18-year-old Semenya's gender.
But after South Africa's Mail & Guardian newspaper printed e-mails on Friday showing that ASA President Leonard Chuene was aware of the tests, he held a news conference to apologize.
"I now realize that it was an error of judgment and I would like to apologize unconditionally," Chuene said on Saturday, according to South Africa's SAPA news agency.
After receiving the results of the tests, the South Africa team doctor requested the 18-year-old Semenya be withdrawn from the 800-meter race she ended up winning, Chuene said.
But Chuene said he refused to do it because the sport's international governing body did not request withdrawal. He also said withdrawing Semenya might have looked bad.
"If we did not let her run, we would be confirming that she is not normal," Chuene told the news conference in the capital, Pretoria.
snip.............
This week, South Africa's minister for women, children and people with disabilities wrote to the United Nations to complain that Semenya had not been treated in line with international protocols on gender and quality.
"The questioning of her gender is based on a stereotypic view of the physical features and abilities attributable to women," she wrote in the letter, according to SAPA. "Such stereotypes demonstrate the extent of patriarchy within the world's sporting community."
(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...
Once again I understand the various views and should clarify the case of the South African athelete with the other cases. For in the case of Christine Jorgensen the former American GI and Robert Cowell, they were both men. This I know because Cowell fathered two children. He was a Spitfire pilot in WW2. Jorgensen served in the US Army.
It was the chemistry that was said to be their makeup. I do not doubt that. The virtual horror at the time was that they had operations to make them "women". Nobody, but a few, could even handle an idea of that.
I understand the athelete Semenya, has had serious emotional problems since. Her case is absolutely different from the two persons of the 1947 and 1951 era.
Every one of your cells is either male, or female. You cant fool God.
“This week, South Africa’s minister for women, children and people with disabilities”
Do women like being lumped in with underdeveloped people and the disabled?
“’The questioning of her gender is based on a stereotypic view of the physical features and abilities attributable to women,’ she wrote in the letter, according to SAPA. ‘Such stereotypes demonstrate the extent of patriarchy within the world’s sporting community.’”
If it were really such a patriarchy, they might not let women have their own category, or compete at all for that matter. Running is unladylike, after all.
Also, it’s not really a matter of stereotypes, but science. men have physiological features—most importantly muscle mass and masculine hormones—that make them faster runners.
“She’s also androgen insensitive (hence the female genitalia). That means she’s mostly IMMUNE to testosterone. 3 times normal might mean she has LESS effective testosterone in her system than most women.”
Then he/she must have won the race by such a wide margin because of his/her superior training. His/her maleness is some weird coincidence.
Please do some research into “Intersex” - the condition of having a body neither 100% male nor 100% female. One person in 60 is Intersexed, but most don’t know it, as it may be asymptomatic, or nearly so. You could be one of them.
So one in 60 is sexually malformed/weird. Do you also think that 1 in 10 are homosexuals?
So is your main shtick promoting that sexual weirdness is normal or a-okay?
Check Zoe Brain’s in forum comments if you want to see why s/he is posting on FR. Practically all comments are promoting transsexualism and similar weirdness.
Intersex is a group of conditions where there is a discrepancy between the external genitals and the internal genitals (the testes and ovaries)
Intersex can be divided into four categories:
46, XX Intersex
46, XY Intersex
True Gonadal Intersex
Complex or Undetermined Intersex
46, XX Intersex. The person has the chromosomes of a woman, the ovaries of a woman, but external (outside) genitals that appear male. This usually is the result of a female fetus having been exposed to excess male hormones before birth. The labia ("lips" or folds of skin of the external female genitals) fuse, and the clitoris enlarges to appear like a penis. Usually this person has a normal uterus and Fallopian tubes. This condition is also called 46, XX with virilization. It used to be called female pseudohermaphroditism. There are several possible causes: (see article at link)
46, XY Intersex. The person has the chromosomes of a man, but the external genitals are incompletely formed, ambiguous, or clearly female. Internally, testes may be normal, malformed, or absent. This condition is also called 46, XY with undervirilization. It used to be called male pseudohermaphroditism. Forming normal male external genitals depends on the appropriate balance between male and female hormones; therefore, enough requires the adequate production and function of male hormones. 46, XY intersex has many possible causes: (see article at link)
True Gonadal Intersex. Here the person must have both ovarian and testicular tissue. This might be in the same gonad (an ovotestis), or the person might have one ovary and one testis. The person may have XX chromosomes, XY chromosomes, or both. The external genitals may be ambiguous or may appear to be female or male. This condition used to be called true hermaphroditism. In most people with true gonadal intersex, the underlying cause is unknown, although in some animal studies it has been linked to exposure to common agricultural pesticides.
Complex or Undetermined Intersex Disorders of Sexual Development. Many chromosome configurations other than simple 46, XX or 46, XY can result in disorders of sex development. These include 45, XO (only one X chromosome), and 47, XXY, 47, XXX -- both cases have an extra sex chromosome, either an X or a Y. These disorders do not result in an intersex condition where there is discrepancy between internal and external genitalia. However, there may be problems with sex hormone levels, overall sexual development, and altered numbers of sex chromosomes.
Zoe Brain, the individual with unusual chromosomes, is no longer with us.
What ever one's views, certainly knowledge is the key. I own that I must go over and over your post later. Regretfully one of our number is suspended or otherwise. I do not have the facts on that.
Anyway, I would think that the press- the media, who now cry out about what ever their pet peeve is on the handling of the subject of the athlete, are the one's to blame.
They do not care about people, they care about sensation.
While it is hard to gather all of the facts, here is what we know for sure: In July 2008, Semenya was eliminated in the first heat of the World Junior Track Championships, having run a modest 2:11.98 for 800 meters and finishing in seventh place. Three months later, Semenya won the 2008 Commonwealth Youth Games 800m title in 2:04.23, an improvement of over 7 seconds. (According to IAAF spokesman Nick Davies, this is what first caught the IAAF’s eye.) In March 2009, Semenya ran 2:00.58 in the 800 at a local South African meet, slicing almost 4 additional seconds off Semenya’s best time of 2008. In July 2009, Semenya ran 1:56.72 to win the African Junior Championships in Bambous, Mauritius, decimating the World Junior Women’s record for 800 meters and improving upon Semenya’s last time by almost 4 more seconds. (That was the fastest time of 2009, senior level included.) Then in August 2009 at the World Championships, Semenya ran 1:55.45, another WJR, to take gold. (That was still more than two seconds slower than the current women’s world record, but it was another personal best by over a second.)
2:11.98 to 1:55.45 in just over a year? That is a monumental drop of over 16 seconds — in a relatively short race, where incremental improvements are typically measured in a maximum of a couple of seconds.
All you need to do is look at the times to understand that something is amiss here.
July 2008 2:11.98 at the 800 meters distance.
October. 2:04.23
March 2009 2:00.58
July 2009 1:56.72
August 2009 1:55.45.
What little I know about performance enhancing drugs, is that one of the natural elements within the body is testosterone. I understand this athlete did show a high level of this. Yes, 800 meters is too short a race to usually see a marked level of improvement.
At a guess, I would venture the athelete is not complicite in anything herself- though I don't know that. The urge to see international triumph has seen both China and East Germany do some very questionable things.
We shall see.
He is Dr Eckart Arbeit. He is formerly of East Germany. I understand, though I do not have the data, he was accused of the horrible and unethical usage of drugs. This included ruining a woman for life. This in East Germany.
Oh oh.
The Australian press reports indicated that while Semenya has female external genitalia, Semenya has no ovaries or uterus and has a set of testes enbedded in Semenya’s abdomen, which are producing masculinizing levels of testosterone three times higher than those found in an average female. (And while any number of circumstances (a birth defect, ovarian disease, a hormone-producing tumor) could cause a woman to have unusually high testosterone, there has been no proof that this is the case with Semenya.)
Contrary to Zoe Brain’s assertion, there has also been no proof so far that Semenya has either partial or complete androgen insensitivity syndrome. In fact, most athletes with CAIS, such as María José Martínez-Patiño, the 1986 Spanish national champion in the 60-meter hurdles, who was genetically male, have totally unambiguous external female characteristics and could not in any way be mistaken for a male — unlike Semenya, who has virtually no such characteristics except for a vagina.
I think what you’re probably seeing with Semenya’s dramatic reduction in times in just over 13 months is the influence of the extra testosterone, which is being metabolized and has resulted in a deep voice, clearly masculine musculature, and other masculine external physical features. If this turns out to be true, there’s no way Semenya should be allowed to continue to compete as a woman.
We are caught at the cross roads as thinking beings here. On the one hand, one could consider the person themselves. Then there is the fact of athletes who have dedicated themselves for a life time goal. Thus faced with such a situation they are completely outclassed.
The greater good of the majority is the paramount consideration in my view.
It would need a master of human relations to figure out a satisfactory solution that would please all. In any case, your information is most important and had that information been known initially, much of the sensational aspects of the case might have been avoided.
A person’s gender is a sociological concept. A person’s biological sex is not (or at least to a much, much smaller degree). As a child, Semenya was a tomboy, engaging in sports typically considered to be the domain of boys, and never wore dresses. Semenya actually began running to train for association football, but was disqualified at age 14 for being too rough with the other girls. It was only then that Semenya developed a renewed interest in running and began to compete in that sport.
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