2024 Paris Olympics General (non-Basketball/Track & Field) Discussion Thread

[gavran]

NBA level refereeing in waterpolo today. I'll take it.

[gavran]

Vogel is a god tier goalkeeper. She should get a BJ from Luca Szűcs.

[Nuntius]

1) There is no evidence that Khelif and Yu-ting actually have XY chromosomes. The official statement of the IBA does not actually say what kind of test they failed and why. All we know is that the president of the IBA, Umar Kremlev, said that this is why they were disqualified in an interview with Russia Today but, afaik, he hasn't provided any evidence for his claim.

That's just asinine...
The IBA is the body that tested her and its president gave the statement, he is liable to defamation if he is lying, that's evidence and a good one at that, it's twisted to suggest otherwise.

No, that was a claim. Claims do not substantiate themselves. Claims need to have evidence that actually substantiate them if we want to refer to them as evidence. Until that evidence is presented, these claims are just claims.

In this particular case, it is important to note that Bergmaniac did finally present evidence of that claim in post #785. Alan Abrahamson stating that he has seen these test results and that the tests were indeed about XY chromosomes is finally some form of verification for the claims that Kremlev made. I've been asking for that kind of verification throughout this thread and now it's finally here.

But at the time of the post you were quoting, that verification was not yet posted. Up until that point, it was still just a claim.

[Nuntius]

Yeah, that's very mature and rational approach.

I can't imagine anything more rational than just not believing anything coming out of Russia.
It might be false or true, who knows? Just it can't be used as a source.

This is about the IBA Vs IOC, you inserted Russia into this and disqualified president statement by association, not only that, you proceeded to call me a Putin fan, you clearly are abscessed with Russia for some reason, don't drag me or the subject matter into this, FWIW, I have Putin as war criminal who should burn at the stake if it makes you feel any better.

If memory serves me right, Ryoga Hibiki lives in Poland. The reason that Ryoga has for their "obsession" with Russia is quite literally that they pose an existential threat to Ryoga and their loved ones. If Russia succeeds in taking over Ukraine, Poland could be next. This is not a hypothetical question for the people living in the region. It's their reality. Everyone living in that region is either forced to rely solely on Russia and hope they don't turn against them or doing everything in their power to protect themselves from them.

[MVP1992]

I was wondering how an Aussie would win gold in skateboarding. Of course he is a American-Australian man that was born in San Diego - grew up in Australia and then moved back to SD when he was 14 to train.

I understand why he represents Australia though but he's as good as he is because he trains in the best place to train for Skateboarding in the world.

He has spent two-thirds of his life in Australia. Took up the sport in Australia and started competing in major competitions when he was just 8. And when he moved back at aged 14, he won the Dew Tour Am Bowl Final from the get-go. I would say his foundations were already set if he was competing locally for at least 6 years and could win an American competition from the get-go. You guys can’t take credit for that. It is alright to be disappointed since Team USA had high hopes of winning gold, but he sees himself as an Australian and sees America as a place to compete professionally against other riders.

We'll give you back your skateboard star if we can have back Aussie Kyrie Irving through his prime for the Boomers

[Nuntius]

If all of this is a "Russian disinfo campaign" why didn't the two athletes in question just go to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, win their cases easily and clear their names? Are the IBA using all this for their own PR and to score some culture war points? Sure they are, probably with Putin's backing. But that doesn't necessarily they have invented this whole thing from whole cloth and the test results were fake or something like this. The whole "Everything I don't like is a Russian disinfo so I don't need to check anything further" claim which has been so popular ever since 2016 is so silly.

Here is an article by Alan Abrahamson, an American journalist who worked for NBC and Los Angeles Times and covered the Olympics extensively for decades and has co-written a book with Michael Phelps - - https://www.3wiresports.com/articles/2024/8/5/fa9lt6ypbwx5su3z20xxnfzgtao0gy . He claims to have seen the tests of the two boxers and that they are from ISO certified laboratories located lacated outside of Russia

Here is a key passage.

3 Wire Sports has seen the test results and a June 5, 2023 IBA letter to the IOC that says tests of Khelif, one in New Delhi, a prior test in Istanbul at the 2022 world championships, “concluded the boxer’s DNA was that of a male consisting of XY chromosomes.”

For both Khelif and Lin, the New Delhi test – from, as IBA disclosed Monday, the independent Dr Lal PathLabs – consists of three pages. In part:

The first page provides, along with basic identifying information for each athlete and date and time of sample collection, result summary – “abnormal” – and interpretation – “chromosome analysis reveals Male karyotype.” The second page offers photographic representation of the 22 paired autosomes and then, for each athlete, further depicts an X and a Y chromosome. Page three makes plain that the lab is a “national reference lab” and, as well, accredited by CAP, the Northfield, Illinois-based College of American Pathologists, and certified by the ISO, the Swiss-based International Organization for Standardization.

I want to thank you for this post. I've been asking for this kind of evidence that you presented ever since that discussion started back in page 10. My first post on that subject was post #185. Your post providing verification for Kremlev's statement was post #785. It's astounding that it took 600 posts until some evidence was finally provided but better late than never. Once again, I thank you for this post.

Another interesting tidbit in that Alan Abrahamson article that you linked is that it provides the updated version of the IBA rulebook. The one I provided earlier in the thread (the one that was the top result on Google, to be specific) was effective as of September 2021. The one that Abrahamson is providing in his article is the updated version, effective as of May 2023.

And in that updated version, the rulebook DOES finally mention XX and XY chromosomes. Specifically, if you search the document for the term "chromosome" you get two results.

Result #1:

“Men/Male/Boy” means an individual with chromosome XY. For this purpose, the Boxers can
be submitted to a random and/or targeted gender test to confirm the above, which will serve
for the gender eligibility criteria for the IBA Competitions;

Result #2:

“Women/Female/Girl” means an individual with chromosome XX. For this purpose, the
Boxers can be submitted to a random and/or targeted gender test to confirm the above, which
will serve for the gender eligibility criteria for the IBA Competitions.

So, now we finally know the parameters we are working with. We know what the IBA means by "gender test". They mean a chromosome test. And we know what is their criteria for who they consider male and who they consider female. It's the XX/XY binary. That's what the IBA means when they say "male" and "female".

Do I consider this a scientifically accurate way of classification? No, I do not. According to that classification system, an individual with Klinefelter syndrome, for example, that has XXY chromosomes is either both or neither. It is a flawed classification system, in my opinion, but my opinion of it is not the point here.

The point here is that we finally have some clarity and can speak on a factual basis here. We finally know the parameters that the IBA is using. That's a good thing. That can help the discussion move forward and onto the crux of the matter.

[Nuntius]

6. I'm not the one who should be deciding what those clear guidelines are, but I'll say this:

If a transfemale or intersex athlete can beat all cisfemales on Earth at a sport, it's naive to think it isn't because of advantages associated with male sexual development.

prefacing my comment that we don't really know what is Khelif's medical situation and that we are speculating, as this is very sensitive information and the Russian IBA is not a reliable source.

the thing here is that where you put the line thinking it's a clear demarcation it most likely won't. There will be athletes just near the limit that will have an advantage over the others. This will be a moving target by default, at the moment the women that don't pass that limit should be allowed to compete without all this madness around them.

Madness that is incredibly offensive and disrespectful, as the tone of the general discussion completely ignores how delicate and personal this is and on the contrary people seem to just want to see the ladies involved suffer.
My 2 cents: don't call this gender testing, there have to be objective parameters that you must respect to compete. Don't load it undermining a person identity just to score against the "libtards".

So first, perfectly reasonable for you to respond to me, but I wrote just one post and emphasized I didn't know specifics of the situation for a reason.

Since you replied to me I'll say this:

1. I agree with you at this point - based on what I now know about the IBA, some of which from its head actively doing stuff this past week - that the IBA is not a reliable source, and think it best to proceed as if there is no testing indicating either XY chromosomes or past-official-threshold testosterone. This to me basically renders the entire specific debate without basis. If further evidence comes up in the future pertaining to this athlete or others, it would make sense for people to still object, but not now - to the extent that my information matches with everyone else.

2. I've thought a lot about this in the past week, and had a number of conversations within my household. I think allowing intersex people with external female genitalia, and thus have identified as female from day 1, might be the most reasonable approach. Not making a definite statement - as I said before, I'm glad I'm not the one who has to make the decision, and I'm not a scientist in the relevant domain - but given that this is simply how things simply had to be in the deeper past before the technology, and the world survived, it will survive if we continue it.

Now, one of the major things that I won't deny concerned me, and really still does, is the fact that this is now happening in a combat sport, and female combat sports didn't exist in the olden days. It's one thing when we're just talking about who wins a race, but quite another when we're talking about something violent that can cause life-changing bodily damage on a time delay.

At the same time though, there is no numerical test we can give intersex boxers that will ensure their opponents won't receive such damage, because that damage is inherently a risk of the sport and those who choose to pursue it. So this is about risk mitigation rather than risk elimination, and that makes it all the more complicated to decide where said threshold should be.

I had frankly assumed that an organization sounding as official as the IBA surely must be using a standard that was pre-established by scientific analysis, and given my limited understanding of the science, I was content to defer to that, but as stated above, I now believe that to have been an incorrect assumption.

I want to thank you for this post. I really, really do. Being willing to shift your stance based on the information presented indicates that you approached this topic with an open mind and discussed the topic in good faith. This is actually rather rare these days. A lot of times, people (and I'm definitely including myself here) approach a topic with their mind already made up and use these discussions only to further dig in their heels. So, yeah, I do want to congratulate for your stance here.

[Nuntius]

We aren't talking about the average person here, though. We're talking about elite athletes.

That is why I asked what I asked. If the claim is that athletes like Semenya and Khelif have an advantage due to their intersex condition (which, again, is only speculative when it comes to Khelif and Yu-ting and only proven for Semenya) then shouldn't we measure how their performances stack up against other female athletes of their sport? Shouldn't that be the basis of the argument? The actual performance deviation that these athletes have, not some vague average.

For what it's worth, Christine Mboma who is intersex, won silver in the women's 200m at Tokyo in 2021 at only 18 years old. She also smashed every junior record in both the 200m and 400m, was only getting faster, and all of those records would probably would have been obliterated again by the time she hit 19.

Of course, this is nothing but a single anecdote, but I think she'll be an athlete worth tracking because of her age and the XY DSD rules that World Athletics has put in place. In order to continue participating, she had to undergo hormone therapy to reduce her testosterone to the "appropriate" range which she was willing to do. A few months ago, she was unable to meet the time qualifications to qualify for Paris probably in some part due to the testosterone suppression as having lower testosterone in theory should negatively impact her performance but I imagine it'd also take some time to grow into her new body. She's only 21 now so she's still young enough to compete and get even faster but the question of will she ever get back to her 18 year old form with these XY DSD rules in place is the one to track.

Good post. When I was reading about intersex athletes, Mboma's name did indeed pop up and I agree that we may hear more from her in the future.

This is what I want to know:

To what extent do the elevated levels of naturally-produced testosterone help these intersex athletes? Do we know that they get the same effect out of the testosterone circulating in their system that the rest of us do? I don't know if that's even an easy question to answer. After all, the reason why intersex people are born intersex is that their body doesn't treat androgen or testosterone the same way that the bodies of non-intersex people does.

In the absence of a scientific consensus on this, I really do think that we need to take this on a case-by-case basis.

[Pointgod]

We aren't talking about the average person here, though. We're talking about elite athletes.

That is why I asked what I asked. If the claim is that athletes like Semenya and Khelif have an advantage due to their intersex condition (which, again, is only speculative when it comes to Khelif and Yu-ting and only proven for Semenya) then shouldn't we measure how their performances stack up against other female athletes of their sport? Shouldn't that be the basis of the argument? The actual performance deviation that these athletes have, not some vague average.

For what it's worth, Christine Mboma who is intersex, won silver in the women's 200m at Tokyo in 2021 at only 18 years old. She also smashed every junior record in both the 200m and 400m, was only getting faster, and all of those records would probably would have been obliterated again by the time she hit 19.

Of course, this is nothing but a single anecdote, but I think she'll be an athlete worth tracking because of her age and the XY DSD rules that World Athletics has put in place. In order to continue participating, she had to undergo hormone therapy to reduce her testosterone to the "appropriate" range which she was willing to do. A few months ago, she was unable to meet the time qualifications to qualify for Paris probably in some part due to the testosterone suppression as having lower testosterone in theory should negatively impact her performance but I imagine it'd also take some time to grow into her new body. She's only 21 now so she's still young enough to compete and get even faster but the question of will she ever get back to her 18 year old form with these XY DSD rules in place is the one to track.

Good post. When I was reading about intersex athletes, Mboma's name did indeed pop up and I agree that we may hear more from her in the future.

This is what I want to know:

To what extent do the elevated levels of naturally-produced testosterone help these intersex athletes? Do we know that they get the same effect out of the testosterone circulating in their system that the rest of us do? I don't know if that's even an easy question to answer. After all, the reason why intersex people are born intersex is that their body doesn't treat androgen or testosterone the same way that the bodies of non-intersex people does.

In the absence of a scientific consensus on this, I really do think that we need to take this on a case-by-case basis.

Bless you Nuntius, you’re doing God’s work in this thread. No way I would have the patience that you have. Since you’re pretty knowledgeable about the situation I have two questions.

1. Has there been any documented proof that these two women are intersex? They’ve been competing since the last Olympics, surely this would have come up before throughout their career no?

2. Couldn’t a lot of this be attributed to the different requirements in testing between the IOC and IBA (even though the IBA seems shady as hell).

[California Gold]

I was wondering how an Aussie would win gold in skateboarding. Of course he is a American-Australian man that was born in San Diego - grew up in Australia and then moved back to SD when he was 14 to train.

I understand why he represents Australia though but he's as good as he is because he trains in the best place to train for Skateboarding in the world.

He has spent two-thirds of his life in Australia. Took up the sport in Australia and started competing in major competitions when he was just 8. And when he moved back at aged 14, he won the Dew Tour Am Bowl Final from the get-go. I would say his foundations were already set if he was competing locally for at least 6 years and could win an American competition from the get-go. You guys can’t take credit for that. It is alright to be disappointed since Team USA had high hopes of winning gold, but he sees himself as an Australian and sees America as a place to compete professionally against other riders.

We'll give you back your skateboard star if we can have back Aussie Kyrie Irving through his prime for the Boomers

That's an even trade off - we have too much talent on this basketball team anyway. I'm actually surprised Kyrie didn't want to go against the grain and play for Australia.

[Nuntius]

For what it's worth, Christine Mboma who is intersex, won silver in the women's 200m at Tokyo in 2021 at only 18 years old. She also smashed every junior record in both the 200m and 400m, was only getting faster, and all of those records would probably would have been obliterated again by the time she hit 19.

Of course, this is nothing but a single anecdote, but I think she'll be an athlete worth tracking because of her age and the XY DSD rules that World Athletics has put in place. In order to continue participating, she had to undergo hormone therapy to reduce her testosterone to the "appropriate" range which she was willing to do. A few months ago, she was unable to meet the time qualifications to qualify for Paris probably in some part due to the testosterone suppression as having lower testosterone in theory should negatively impact her performance but I imagine it'd also take some time to grow into her new body. She's only 21 now so she's still young enough to compete and get even faster but the question of will she ever get back to her 18 year old form with these XY DSD rules in place is the one to track.

Good post. When I was reading about intersex athletes, Mboma's name did indeed pop up and I agree that we may hear more from her in the future.

This is what I want to know:

To what extent do the elevated levels of naturally-produced testosterone help these intersex athletes? Do we know that they get the same effect out of the testosterone circulating in their system that the rest of us do? I don't know if that's even an easy question to answer. After all, the reason why intersex people are born intersex is that their body doesn't treat androgen or testosterone the same way that the bodies of non-intersex people does.

In the absence of a scientific consensus on this, I really do think that we need to take this on a case-by-case basis.

Bless you Nuntius, you’re doing God’s work in this thread. No way I would have the patience that you have. Since you’re pretty knowledgeable about the situation I have two questions.

1. Has there been any documented proof that these two women are intersex? They’ve been competing since the last Olympics, surely this would have come up before throughout their career no?

2. Couldn’t a lot of this be attributed to the different requirements in testing between the IOC and IBA (even though the IBA seems shady as hell).

1) Bergmaniac posted in post #785 an article by Alan Abrahamson in which he claims that he has seen the test results. In the article, there is also a photograph of the IBA letter that Khelif received notifying her of her disqualification as well as a link to the updated IBA rules in which it is stated that the IBA conducts gender tests and uses a chromosomal basis for determining who is male and who is female. That's the documentation that I have seen so far.

Is this definite documentation like in the case of Caster Semenya (an individual that has been tested and her intersex status and particular intersex condition is not in doubt)? No, it isn't. But it is definitely a stronger case than simply taking Kremlev at his word and it does allow us to discuss this topic on some kind of basis.

2) Yes, this could definitely be attributed to the different requirements in testing between the IOC and the IBA. We now know that the IBA (even if that was amended after the fact) does perform gender testing. We know that they specifically test for chromosomes since their definition of who is male and who is female was purely a chromosomal one. We also know that the IOC does NOT test for chromosomes and instead relies on a person's assigned gender at birth. The requirements here are significantly different and they have definitely contributed to this whole discussion.

[Mavrelous]

1) There is no evidence that Khelif and Yu-ting actually have XY chromosomes. The official statement of the IBA does not actually say what kind of test they failed and why. All we know is that the president of the IBA, Umar Kremlev, said that this is why they were disqualified in an interview with Russia Today but, afaik, he hasn't provided any evidence for his claim.

That's just asinine...
The IBA is the body that tested her and its president gave the statement, he is liable to defamation if he is lying, that's evidence and a good one at that, it's twisted to suggest otherwise.

No, that was a claim. Claims do not substantiate themselves. Claims need to have evidence that actually substantiate them if we want to refer to them as evidence. Until that evidence is presented, these claims are just claims.

In this particular case, it is important to note that Bergmaniac did finally present evidence of that claim in post #785. Alan Abrahamson stating that he has seen these test results and that the tests were indeed about XY chromosomes is finally some form of verification for the claims that Kremlev made. I've been asking for that kind of verification throughout this thread and now it's finally here.

But at the time of the post you were quoting, that verification was not yet posted. Up until that point, it was still just a claim.

Nonsense.
If Nuntius said I have medical tests for Iman Khleif and know she is XX chromosome, that's a claim and a weak one.
If president of IBA, who we know did perform a test, and is actually liable for his statemnts, and we do know Iman did try to appeal its results, says this, then that's evidence and it's asinine to suggest otherwise.

[Nuntius]

That's just asinine...
The IBA is the body that tested her and its president gave the statement, he is liable to defamation if he is lying, that's evidence and a good one at that, it's twisted to suggest otherwise.

No, that was a claim. Claims do not substantiate themselves. Claims need to have evidence that actually substantiate them if we want to refer to them as evidence. Until that evidence is presented, these claims are just claims.

In this particular case, it is important to note that Bergmaniac did finally present evidence of that claim in post #785. Alan Abrahamson stating that he has seen these test results and that the tests were indeed about XY chromosomes is finally some form of verification for the claims that Kremlev made. I've been asking for that kind of verification throughout this thread and now it's finally here.

But at the time of the post you were quoting, that verification was not yet posted. Up until that point, it was still just a claim.

Nonsense.
If Nuntius said I have medical tests for Iman Khleif and know she is XX chromosome, that's a claim and a weak one.
If president of IBA, who we know did perform a test, and is actually liable for his statemnts, and we do know Iman did try to appeal its results, says this, then that's evidence and it's asinine to suggest otherwise.

So, your argument is that since Kremlev is the President of the IBA then any claim that he makes should be taken as evidence? In other words, you are claiming that it is his position itself that validates and proves the claim. That's what is generally known as the argument from authority and it is a logical fallacy.

Science doesn't work like that. A claim isn't considered to be evidence simply because someone in a position of authority said so. A claim is considered to be evidence when there is enough evidence to substantiate it. That evidence can come in many forms. It could be some kind of physical evidence or it could be an independent verification of said claim from a different source. But that evidence does need to exist before we accept a claim as evidence.

It is definitely your right to believe a claim without needing further evidence. It is definitely your right to believe a source for whatever reason you want. I'm not trying to tell you what to believe and what not to believe. What I am saying is what needs to happen before a claim can actually be considered evidence.

[Ghetto Gospel]

We aren't talking about the average person here, though. We're talking about elite athletes.

That is why I asked what I asked. If the claim is that athletes like Semenya and Khelif have an advantage due to their intersex condition (which, again, is only speculative when it comes to Khelif and Yu-ting and only proven for Semenya) then shouldn't we measure how their performances stack up against other female athletes of their sport? Shouldn't that be the basis of the argument? The actual performance deviation that these athletes have, not some vague average.

For what it's worth, Christine Mboma who is intersex, won silver in the women's 200m at Tokyo in 2021 at only 18 years old. She also smashed every junior record in both the 200m and 400m, was only getting faster, and all of those records would probably would have been obliterated again by the time she hit 19.

Of course, this is nothing but a single anecdote, but I think she'll be an athlete worth tracking because of her age and the XY DSD rules that World Athletics has put in place. In order to continue participating, she had to undergo hormone therapy to reduce her testosterone to the "appropriate" range which she was willing to do. A few months ago, she was unable to meet the time qualifications to qualify for Paris probably in some part due to the testosterone suppression as having lower testosterone in theory should negatively impact her performance but I imagine it'd also take some time to grow into her new body. She's only 21 now so she's still young enough to compete and get even faster but the question of will she ever get back to her 18 year old form with these XY DSD rules in place is the one to track.

Good post. When I was reading about intersex athletes, Mboma's name did indeed pop up and I agree that we may hear more from her in the future.

This is what I want to know:

To what extent do the elevated levels of naturally-produced testosterone help these intersex athletes? Do we know that they get the same effect out of the testosterone circulating in their system that the rest of us do? I don't know if that's even an easy question to answer. After all, the reason why intersex people are born intersex is that their body doesn't treat androgen or testosterone the same way that the bodies of non-intersex people does.

In the absence of a scientific consensus on this, I really do think that we need to take this on a case-by-case basis.

I honestly can't imagine too much research is going to be done on the effects of testosterone in intersex people because really in the grand scheme of things it doesn't matter outside of sport (i think). Frankly, if it's only for the purpose of sport, I think the resources should be allocated elsewhere. We do know that World Athletics believes that there is enough science to suggest that the elevated levels of testosterone would create enough of an advantage that the testosterone needs to be regulated though.

How do we take it on a case-by-case basis? By case-by-case do you mean by athlete or by sport? There are definitely some sports where elevated testosterone may not be as much of a factor like the equestrian ones or perhaps some of the shooting ones. I can't imagine using a subjective test on an athlete-by-athlete basis because at that point, you're just asking for controversy if the athlete in question is competing for a medal. I think what makes the most sense is allowing the international governing body of each individual sport to set an objective standard and criteria to allow the athlete to compete going forward like World Athletics has done.

[Mavrelous]

No, that was a claim. Claims do not substantiate themselves. Claims need to have evidence that actually substantiate them if we want to refer to them as evidence. Until that evidence is presented, these claims are just claims.

In this particular case, it is important to note that Bergmaniac did finally present evidence of that claim in post #785. Alan Abrahamson stating that he has seen these test results and that the tests were indeed about XY chromosomes is finally some form of verification for the claims that Kremlev made. I've been asking for that kind of verification throughout this thread and now it's finally here.

But at the time of the post you were quoting, that verification was not yet posted. Up until that point, it was still just a claim.

Nonsense.
If Nuntius said I have medical tests for Iman Khleif and know she is XX chromosome, that's a claim and a weak one.
If president of IBA, who we know did perform a test, and is actually liable for his statemnts, and we do know Iman did try to appeal its results, says this, then that's evidence and it's asinine to suggest otherwise.

So, your argument is that since Kremlev is the President of the IBA then any claim that he makes should be taken as evidence? In other words, you are claiming that it is his position itself that validates and proves the claim. That's what is generally known as the argument from authority and it is a logical fallacy.

Science doesn't work like that. A claim isn't considered to be evidence simply because someone in a position of authority said so. A claim is considered to be evidence when there is enough evidence to substantiate it. That evidence can come in many forms. It could be some kind of physical evidence or it could be an independent verification of said claim from a different source. But that evidence does need to exist before we accept a claim as evidence.

It is definitely your right to believe a claim without needing further evidence. It is definitely your right to believe a source for whatever reason you want. I'm not trying to tell you what to believe and what not to believe. What I am saying is what needs to happen before a claim can actually be considered evidence.

Agaim, that's just nonsensical.
Argument from authority is when someone position makes his opinion worth more, despite othet arguments having more substance, that's not the case here, at all.
Kremlev isn't giving his opinion, he's giving results of a test he was in charge of ordering and he has access to it results, he is also liable,.for his statements.

[Nuntius]

I honestly can't imagine too much research is going to be done on the effects of testosterone in intersex people because really in the grand scheme of things it doesn't matter outside of sport (i think). Frankly, if it's only for the purpose of sport, I think the resources should be allocated elsewhere. We do know that World Athletics believes that there is enough science to suggest that the elevated levels of testosterone would create enough of an advantage that the testosterone needs to be regulated though.

How do we take it on a case-by-case basis? By case-by-case do you mean by athlete or by sport? There are definitely some sports where elevated testosterone may not be as much of a factor like the equestrian ones or perhaps some of the shooting ones. I can't imagine using a subjective test on an athlete-by-athlete basis because at that point, you're just asking for controversy if the athlete in question is competing for a medal. I think what makes the most sense is allowing the international governing body of each individual sport to set an objective standard and criteria to allow the athlete to compete going forward like World Athletics has done.

I do understand the points you are raising. Resources are definitely not infinite. But if the claim is that we care about fairness then I don't see any other way to ensure that the standards set are objective and fair.

The international governing bodies of each individual sport already do set their own standards and criteria to allow athletes to compete in their respective sports. That is already happening. Problems arise when those standards are based on outdated science. That's when controversies erupt, imo.

[Nuntius]

Nonsense.
If Nuntius said I have medical tests for Iman Khleif and know she is XX chromosome, that's a claim and a weak one.
If president of IBA, who we know did perform a test, and is actually liable for his statemnts, and we do know Iman did try to appeal its results, says this, then that's evidence and it's asinine to suggest otherwise.

So, your argument is that since Kremlev is the President of the IBA then any claim that he makes should be taken as evidence? In other words, you are claiming that it is his position itself that validates and proves the claim. That's what is generally known as the argument from authority and it is a logical fallacy.

Science doesn't work like that. A claim isn't considered to be evidence simply because someone in a position of authority said so. A claim is considered to be evidence when there is enough evidence to substantiate it. That evidence can come in many forms. It could be some kind of physical evidence or it could be an independent verification of said claim from a different source. But that evidence does need to exist before we accept a claim as evidence.

It is definitely your right to believe a claim without needing further evidence. It is definitely your right to believe a source for whatever reason you want. I'm not trying to tell you what to believe and what not to believe. What I am saying is what needs to happen before a claim can actually be considered evidence.

Agaim, that's just nonsensical.
Argument from authority is when someone position makes his opinion worth more, despite othet arguments having more substance, that's not the case here, at all.
Kremlev isn't giving his opinion, he's giving results of a test he was in charge of ordering and he has access to it results, he is also liable,.for his statements.

1) Did Kremlev present any physical evidence during that interview? Did he present a copy of those tests? Did he make a copy available to the press? The answer to all of those questions is no.

Yes, Kremlev does have access to the test's results. That's obvious. But since he didn't accompany his claim with any kind of physical evidence then all we have to go by is his word. That makes it an evidence-free claim and therefore opens it up to doubt.

2) As for Kremlev being liable for his statements. Liable to whom? What kind of repercussion can Kremlev face if he was to misrepresent anything?

Could he be sued for libel? Not really. Given his connections, no Russian court would ever allow that.

Could he be threatened by sponsors pulling their funds? Nope, the IBA's only sponsor is Gazprom.

Could he be threatened with repercussions towards the IBA? Nope, the IOC has already pulled their recognition of the IBA. What more can they do?

I mean, seriously, CAS ruled that the IBA should hold new elections and the IBA was like "nope, we ain't doing that". They straight up refused CAS and faced zero repercussions.

So, yeah, I don't buy this argument at all. Kremlev knows that he won't face any repercussions as long as the current political situation stands.

[Ghetto Gospel]

I honestly can't imagine too much research is going to be done on the effects of testosterone in intersex people because really in the grand scheme of things it doesn't matter outside of sport (i think). Frankly, if it's only for the purpose of sport, I think the resources should be allocated elsewhere. We do know that World Athletics believes that there is enough science to suggest that the elevated levels of testosterone would create enough of an advantage that the testosterone needs to be regulated though.

How do we take it on a case-by-case basis? By case-by-case do you mean by athlete or by sport? There are definitely some sports where elevated testosterone may not be as much of a factor like the equestrian ones or perhaps some of the shooting ones. I can't imagine using a subjective test on an athlete-by-athlete basis because at that point, you're just asking for controversy if the athlete in question is competing for a medal. I think what makes the most sense is allowing the international governing body of each individual sport to set an objective standard and criteria to allow the athlete to compete going forward like World Athletics has done.

I do understand the points you are raising. Resources are definitely not infinite. But if the claim is that we care about fairness then I don't see any other way to ensure that the standards set are objective and fair.

The international governing bodies of each individual sport already do set their own standards and criteria to allow athletes to compete in their respective sports. That is already happening. Problems arise when those standards are based on outdated science. That's when controversies erupt, imo.

In the absence of conclusive scientific research, personally, I think I've seen enough anecdotal evidence to suggest that intersex athletes have an "unfair" advantage. Another example is the 2016 Olympic podium for the women's 800m being 3 intersex athletes.

The international governing body of boxing (IBA) did have some standard/criteria even if it wasn't carefully outlined. I think the issue here is the IOC dispute with the IBA. The IBA sent a letter to the IOC confirming Imane's condition and the IOC chose to sever the relationship with the IBA (perhaps for good reason), leading to a complete disregard for the sex tests and instead opted to use their own sex verification process which apparently is to just check what was recorded on her passport.

[madskillz8]

1) Did Kremlev present any physical evidence during that interview? Did he present a copy of those tests? Did he make a copy available to the press? The answer to all of those questions is no.

He can't share medical specifics of a such a test. At the end of the day, it is not a doping case where Imane is accused with such a misconduct. That Russian guy shouldn't have talked about this stuff in the first place. If that's the evidence we are looking for, we won't be getting these results. And we really shouldn't learn about someone's disorders and medical tests. Remember when even NBA didn't announce players actually having Covid, instead they used a reference to "health and safety protocols". For the same reason.

IBA does testing regularly, like every other time, and their testing is often accepted by other prominent organizations, including IOC. Already said it multiple times in this thread, recently a Turkish boxer is barred from Olympics based on IBA's testing which is still an open case.

https://www.iba.sport/news/iba-and-ita-celebrate-five-years-of-anti-doping-cooperation/
https://olympics.com/ioc/fight-against-doping/ita

Thus, IOC finds IBA testing reliable, because of the involvement of prominent organization: ITA. Therefore, the problem here is not whether the tests are real, or manufactured by one corrupt Russian. The actual problem here, IOC is against gender testing. Otherwise, IOC can EASILY verify whether that the tests from that corrupt organization who let Russian boxers in their organizations is indeed correct. Again, if their testing is correct, IOC still does not see it as a reason to bar Imane. Why?

IOC openly supports the inclusion of trans athletes in women's sports and I don't know if we can really assume they think different when it comes to SDSs and intersex athletes. Thus, trying to discredit IBA and their testing is meaningless, and moving the goal post with a speed of a 100m runner. Btw, it is a completely different discussion, I am just talking about how IOC is mismanages the process from day one instead of addressing the issue. They had committees getting tons of money for years just to develop policies proactively. At this point, I feel for Imane and think this situation is escalated because of IOC was trying to avoid their responsibilities to create a fair competitive environment by making vague statements to discredit IBA's testing. The problem was never IBA's testing. It is not IBA's testing today.

[Nuntius]

I honestly can't imagine too much research is going to be done on the effects of testosterone in intersex people because really in the grand scheme of things it doesn't matter outside of sport (i think). Frankly, if it's only for the purpose of sport, I think the resources should be allocated elsewhere. We do know that World Athletics believes that there is enough science to suggest that the elevated levels of testosterone would create enough of an advantage that the testosterone needs to be regulated though.

How do we take it on a case-by-case basis? By case-by-case do you mean by athlete or by sport? There are definitely some sports where elevated testosterone may not be as much of a factor like the equestrian ones or perhaps some of the shooting ones. I can't imagine using a subjective test on an athlete-by-athlete basis because at that point, you're just asking for controversy if the athlete in question is competing for a medal. I think what makes the most sense is allowing the international governing body of each individual sport to set an objective standard and criteria to allow the athlete to compete going forward like World Athletics has done.

I do understand the points you are raising. Resources are definitely not infinite. But if the claim is that we care about fairness then I don't see any other way to ensure that the standards set are objective and fair.

The international governing bodies of each individual sport already do set their own standards and criteria to allow athletes to compete in their respective sports. That is already happening. Problems arise when those standards are based on outdated science. That's when controversies erupt, imo.

In the absence of conclusive scientific research, personally, I think I've seen enough anecdotal evidence to suggest that intersex athletes have an "unfair" advantage. Another example is the 2016 Olympic podium for the women's 800m being 3 intersex athletes.

Everyone is allowed to have their opinion on this. Personally, I just do not have the required knowledge to make any kind of determination which is why I was talking about taking this on a case-by-case basis.

And speaking on the particular case that triggered this discussion, Imane Khelif and Lin Yu-ting, I do not believe that their records are good enough to constitute an outlier. Therefore, it doesn't appear evident to me that they have an unfair advantage.

The international governing body of boxing (IBA) did have some standard/criteria even if it wasn't carefully outlined.

Did they? I'm not so sure about it. Their 2021 rulebook did not outline any rules in regards to gender testing. None. The terms "XX", "XY" and "chromosome" were never mentioned in that rulebook.

It looks like they added these guidelines after they had already disqualified the two athletes. I believe that the following sentence taken from the IBA minutae is enough evidence of this:

The Board requested that the IBA Head Office establishes the procedure to follow in similar
cases in the future and to be reflected in the IBA Regulations.

https://www.iba.sport/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/BoD-meeting-minutes_New-Delhi_FV-approved.pdf

That seems to be when those criteria were first established.

I think the issue here is the IOC dispute with the IBA. The IBA sent a letter to the IOC confirming Imane's condition and the IOC chose to sever the relationship with the IBA (perhaps for good reason), leading to a complete disregard for the sex tests and instead opted to use their own sex verification process which apparently is to just check what was recorded on her passport.

I do not believe that the way the timeframe is phrased in this sentence is accurate enough.

According to the IBA, they sent IOC that letter on June 5th, 2023. Here's a link to the letter itself and one can see that it is indeed dated on June 5th -> https://www.iba.sport/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/Ltr-fr-IBA-to-IOC.pdf

The IOC acknowledged that letter on June 16th, 2023.

And, yes, the decision to fully withdraw the IBA's recognition was finally ratified on June 22nd -> https://olympics.com/ioc/news/ioc-session-withdraws-recognition-of-international-boxing-association

However:

As mentioned in the IOC article above, that decision was based on the IOC Comprehensive Report on the Situation of the IBA that is dated June 2nd. Here's that report and as one can see at the bottom, it is indeed dated on June 2nd -> https://stillmed.olympics.com/media/Documents/News/2023/06/2023-06-IOC-Comprehensive-Report-IBA.pdf?_ga=2.204982870.732664871.1685948118-11722081.1652867343

But that was not the start of the conflict between the IBA and the IOC.

The IOC has suspended the IBA's recognition ever since 2019 -> https://olympics.com/ioc/news/ioc-wraps-up-final-day-of-the-134th-session

Here's an excerpt from the above article:

Boxing tournament at Tokyo 2020

The IOC Session approved the proposals made by the IOC Executive Board (EB) on 22 May 2019: boxing will maintain its place on the sports programme of the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020, while recognition of the International Boxing Association (AIBA) by the IOC will be suspended and evaluated after Tokyo 2020.

That was before Kremlev was even voted in as a President, by the way. The conflict between the two entities predates Kremlev.

The IOC then decided to maintain the IBA's suspension in 2021 -> https://olympics.com/ioc/news/ioc-eb-maintains-suspension-of-aiba-s-recognition-expresses-serious-concerns-with-regard-to-iwf

Here's an excerpt from the article above:

Following the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 this year, the IOC EB took note of the various unresolved concerns remaining within AIBA, specifically in the areas of governance, finance, and referees and judges (R&J). The IOC Director General and the IOC Chief Ethics and Compliance Officer were asked to follow up the situation and analyse the various elements available with a view to producing a new assessment.

The IOC EB today heard their intermediate report and tasked them with defining a roadmap in consultation with AIBA to address the following areas of concern, in particular, but not limited to:

With regard to finance, to increase financial transparency and sustainability, including through the diversification of revenues;
With regard to the credibility of the boxing competitions, to change its R&J process to ensure its integrity under the monitoring of PwC, including a monitoring period for AIBA’s own competitions ahead of the Olympic Games Paris 2024; and
With regard to governance, to ensure the full and effective implementation of all the measures proposed by Professor Haas and his team, including the change of culture.
Keeping the IOC EB updated.
Should the above-mentioned conditions be met by AIBA to the IOC’s satisfaction, the suspension of AIBA’s recognition could be lifted in 2023.

The IOC's timeline doesn't change at all throughout this. The initial decision to suspend their recognition was in 2019. They said that they'd revisit this issue after the Tokyo Olympics and they did exactly that. After the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 then, they decided to maintain that suspension and said this suspension could be lifted in 2023 if IBA meets their conditions.

Did the IBA meet their conditions? Nope. They did the exact opposite by refusing to hold new elections as the CAS proposed and kicking out the Ukrainian Boxing Federation for purely political reasons.

So, when 2023 rolled around, the IOC did what was expected out of them. They withdrew their recognition altogether. This withdrawl was a long-time coming and the IBA kept making things worse for themselves. Heck, it was so obvious that the IBA was getting the boot that World Boxing was established back in April of 2023, a good two months before the IOC officially withdrew its recognition of the IBA.