Social media has erupted in condemnation of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) for its decision to allow two boxers who failed IBA gender tests to compete as females in the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris this week.
The overwhelming victories by Algerian boxer Imane Khelif on Thursday and Taiwan fighter Lin Yu-Ting on Friday have caused an uproar in sports.
Both boxers were barred from IBA-sanctioned events in 2023 because they did not satisfy the gender testing required by the organization’s latest rules.
In 2023, the International Boxing Association (IBA) President Umar Kremlev explained his organization’s decision to disqualify Taiwan’s Lin Yu-ting and Algeria’s Imane Khelif from competing in the IBA’s 2023 Women’s World Boxing Championships, according to Russia’s Tass News Agency. “Based on DNA tests, we identified a number of athletes who tried to trick their colleagues into posing as women. According to the results of the tests, it was proved that they have XY chromosomes. Such athletes were excluded from competition,” Kremlev said.
Despite the drama, Khelif and Lin have been declared winners in their first bouts.
Social media users were incensed with many characterizing the two boxers as males and excoriating the Olympics for allowing competitors with unfair advantage to fight against women in the brutal sport of boxing.
Former marathon runner and two-time Olympian Mara Yamauchi blasted the IOC for its decision, which she said was “unfair, unsafe, and wrong.”
Activist Maya Forstater slammed the 2024 Games on X, saying it is “unfair.”
Harry Potter scribe J.K. Rowling allowed that the two boxers may have a genetic condition that makes identifying their gender more difficult, but insisted, “Someone with a DSD cannot help the way they were born but they can choose not to cheat; they can choose not to take medals from women; they can choose not to cause injury.”
As the Telegraph reported, “Two-time Olympic champion Nicola Adams called allowing those ‘not born as biological women’ to compete both ‘unfair’ and ‘dangerous.'”
Former Olympic fencer Julia Bracewell is also decrying the IOC’s actions.
On Thursday, she wrote, “I am a former Olympic fencer and have been on various sports governing bodies boards. I was involved with Scottish Rugby’s gender policy. I am horrified at what has happened and am adding my voice to Sharon’s and other much better known sports women.”
Tens of thousands of others have also piled on:
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