Because a woman has a high hairline that looks like your dad's does not mean she has higher than average levels of testosterone. What it does mean is due to genetic factors she has a high hairline. There may be doping issues with women at the Olympics but to start your post with that comment about Ledecky is irresponsible.

No, I don't think it's a good idea to introduce widespread "testosterone normalization" to tackle an issue caused by a tiny percent of the population.

I'm NOT saying that anyone mentioned doped;I said the OPPOSITE; that they were all BORN THAT WAY.

Please read what I wrote again. The thesis of this thread is to discuss hyperandrogenism and how to deal with it, NOT DOPING.

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DFL > DNF > DNS

At the very least, all individuals with the same number of testes that I possess should be required to either race in the men's race or relinquish said testes or not race.

Hugh

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Genetics load the gun, lifestyle pulls the trigger.

There may be doping issues with women at the Olympics but to start your post with that comment about Ledecky is irresponsible.


LOL. Did you read the OP or just a sentence?

"I also have my woman's intuition about Katie Ledeckie's hairline that suspiciously looked more like my Father's than mine"

Im not sure a high hairline like Ledeckie has had since she was young necessarily indicates a higher level of testosterone. Plenty of women just have higher hairlines.

according to the dictionary a female is: "of or denoting the sex that can bear offspring or produce eggs, distinguished biologically by the production of gametes (ova) that can be fertilized by male gametes."

therefore someone who has testes and no ovaries should not be racing with other females (as defined by the dictionary)

Im not sure a high hairline like Ledeckie has had since she was young necessarily indicates a higher level of testosterone. Plenty of women just have higher hairlines.

OF course it is genetics that gave her that high hairline, but it could also be an indicator that she also got a high dose of T in her genes too. It may not be the smoking gun, but you can look at some women(who don't dope) and see a lot of details that would add up to getting more man gene hormones than most other women. Very high muscle definition, facial hair, and kicking the shit out of everyone in the world in your sport are also indicators.. (-;

I'm going to assume the level of naturally occurring testosterone in women follows a normal distribution similar to the distribution of many other genetic factors (e.g. % of fast twitch muscle fibres).

Do you want to exclude individuals, male or female, who happen to fall in the tails of the genetic lottery?

Testosterone isn't the only genetic factor that affects performance.

Following that logic we'll need to set height limits for basketball players.

Life isn't always fair.

Testosterone isn't the only genetic factor that affects performance.

Following that logic we'll need to set height limits for basketball players.

Life isn't always fair.

I agree, you race with what you were born with, within the guidelines and rules of sport. If you got shortchanged on T, HGH, EPO, and superior strength and agility, hopefully you got computer skills, or are a really nice person. Sport is there to tell us what is possible by the undoped human body, and which people fit that profile who also rise to the top. They are our yardsticks, even though most of us only come up to a foot or two compared to us. We like, need, want to know these things..

In April 2011, the International Association of Athletics Federations announced it was adopting rules and regulations governing the eligibility of females with hyperandrogenism, effectively meaning there was an upper limit for women’s testosterone levels with anyone above it required to take hormones to lower them to more “normal” levels to compete. This, I would argue, is "reverse doping".

This ruling was deemed discriminatory because men's endogenous testosterone was not also tested. I am only guessing, but if the ruling next year goes back into place that women will again be tested for endogenous testosterone, then men will also be tested.

That will be a thorny ruling that opens up a can of worms for both men and women because men can use the same argument that women have to their advantage.

The other problem is that without a ruling, countries that wish to "harvest gold" would do so by testing for hyperandrogenous females as the most promising athletes. Unless, of course, testosterone levels make no appreciable difference in sports performance ;-)

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DFL > DNF > DNS

I think it would be interesting to see competitions with mmol/kg rankings or something similar. It would be a bit like spec racing series in automobile racing.

The argument about a tiny percent of the population is not quite an excuse for dismissing biological androgeny when they are a dominant subset of the female category, and can possibly (likely) become a larger subset in high level competitions as they get selectively recruited into high level training programs. Everyone wants to win right?

I also don't think we should be judgmental of these athletes, as some may not be aware of or have any ability to control their natural biology, nor should I or anyone expect them to. I just think that women should be able to look at the elite benchmarks and be able to have some reference for female potential that is not the result of statistically "male-like" testosterone levels.

This ruling was deemed discriminatory because men's endogenous testosterone was not also tested//

I don't think you are understanding the whole picture here Sally. There is a reasonable reason to test women and have an upper limit, but not the men. You may think it is discriminatory but it is not. You see the women that might fall into the category of basically having the same physiology as men are at an advantage. There is not group above men for them to have an advantage over. So the buck kind of stops with us on human performance, and guys with the highest levels will of course have an advantage over other guys. No alien category above men as of yet, so really not discriminatory at all.


Now I have not really though about the situation you have brought up enough to tell you my real opinion on it. SHould there me female limits, or a point where you are basically a man?(physiologically speaking of course) My gut reaction is no, if you were born a woman in every other way except for your hormones, you are still a woman, and should compete as one.


But is there a person that is in-between, a missing link so to speak? I don't know, maybe, and if so then perhaps there should be some limits. Sounds like that is what is being proposed?

this is not flame bait!

Racism is bad. I think most of us agree on that.

Is sexism bad too?

I remember back in 1972, even here in New Zealand we were bombarded with the talk of the ERA (equal rights amendment) in the US. I remember asking my mother what it was all about. In simple terms she explained that it was so men and women would be treated the same. As a boy, I'd sorta assumed that was the case anyway.

I was small for my age, and got picked on a lot at school. Guys would beat me up. I'd wait to get them back and get them with surprise attacks so to speak. I'd retaliate against boys. I also had run-ins with girls so I'd do the same with them. They'd treat me badly so I'd beat them up when I could. I treated boys and girls the same. In hindsight, I've been for equal treatment of girls/women as long as I can remember.

As I got older, I learned that beating people up, even in retaliation, isn't a great idea, as it just perpetuates the problem. Just look at the middle east. When's that all going to stop?

Getting back to women, why do we accept that with alleged equal rights for men and women, that women get a separate set of events. Surely women that are similarly in favour of equal treatment for woman, would be queueing up behind me saying that women's events should be abolished. For some reason, I can't see the line forming.

yes, I know that generally, men are faster, stronger, whatever, but surely those people that have fought so hard for equal rights would continue the battle to abolish women's events? Or do they just want to cherry pick the advantages of equality that they want?

If women would compete with men, they'd be able to stop worrying about competing against manly women so to speak.

Since the above won't ever happen, I'd suggest that upper limits be set for women & men and people have to pass the test to race. (and I won't even get started on men supplementing T. It's just wrong, and old guys just need to get a clue and figure out they're getting old. It's life.)

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TriDork

"Happiness is a myth. All you can hope for is to get laid once in a while, drunk once in a while and to eat chocolate every day"

The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) ruling is what I was quoting. In other words, it's their opinion, not mine. CAS gave IAAF until July of 2017 to figure this thing out.

I am postulating that if a female-specific endogenous testosterone level goes back into place again, with exogenous hormone use to modulate it, then it will logically follow that male-specific levels must be enforced as well. We'll see...and I anticipate that this ruling will have broad ramifications across the athletic spectrum, as a beginning and not as an end.

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DFL > DNF > DNS

I'm not sure about possiby/likely. We have a decent history now of women in elite athletics, mostly with little-to-no regulation of the definition of "woman." And there's scant evidence of growing inter-sex "infiltration" into the elite ranks. Or even growing participation at the lower ranks. Most people probably couldn't name one example other than maybe Semenya. Not that physical appearance alone is a reliable sign - reliable either as a positive or a negative. Is the worry that Semenya's mainstream publicity will "inspire" women with some typically male physiology to make elite competition a goal? Possibly, but somehow I doubt this is like the eve of some new era of women's athletics.

No, "equal rights" for women in athletics doesn't mean abolishing women-only competition and requiring women to compete with men. It could, arguably, mean providing women the option of competing with men should they choose to, e.g. Michelle Wie. Otherwise the "right" is giving women the same opportunity to compete against each other that men do. A right that was largely denied to many women until the last 100 years or so.

And, no, you haven't cleverly discovered some hypocrisy in feminism. There. We're done with that. Back to the "inter-sex" discussion.

No, No & Done. On your say so? Phhhttt

This is a place for discussion. So discuss. As in, give me some points to support your side of the argument. I gave some points and you took your bat and ball and went home, not wanting to play. Really?

How do we decide how competition should be had? Race is out, although I did have a humourous discussion with a friend, where we could give smaller medals to white guys in running races. First white guy gets gold medal, but it's smaller than the winners gold medal. However, (rightfully), we don't split things by race. We DO split things by gender. Why? I find that interesting, particularly since gender is becoming much more recognized as a continuum, rather than a binary thing. Still, it's apparently OK to separated competitors by gender, even in light of gender issue questioning/bending by some women. Women have their own division, then complain that some women aren't woman enough?

Should we have age groups at the Olympics? weight classes in running like in boxing and such? Eye colour? Hair colour?

What differences in humans should we select, to distinguish, for separate classification? Hell, I run pretty fast for a fat guy, but since I'm not boxing, I don't get a weight class? Sounds unfair to me.

And why limit it to human divisions? There's horses at the Olympics afterall. They don't get a medal and they do virtually all the work? How insane is that? I was at a resort and there was crab racing. It was pretty fun to watch (after a few cocktails). Maybe that should be in the Olympics next time? But how do you test T levels in a female racing crab? You're right, it's all too hard.

BTW, men race against everyone, all comers, not just men (except that all women that I know of so far, elect to compete against other women, instead of racing equally in the human race (pun intended)

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TriDork

"Happiness is a myth. All you can hope for is to get laid once in a while, drunk once in a while and to eat chocolate every day"

Yes, really. I'm game for intellectually honest discussion. You're acting the part of a freshman philosophy major after the 12th bong hit.

Now with name calling? That's disappointing, and I'm being polite. Attack my ideas, not me if you wouldn't mind. Thanks

The discussion is about women that are living between a traditionally accepted woman's place on the continuum, closer to a man's place on the continuum. My point is that if we abolish the women only division, the problem goes away, and I'm right! You might not like that I'm right, but arguing how much of a woman a particular individual woman might be, would be rendered moot and it would be one open division focussed on determining the best in a given competition.

While you seem to disagree with my position, and that's entirely up to you, please don't pretend there isn't any validity to my position. IF women raced in the open division, they'd almost always lose (but women seem to do well in endurance events). It appears that losing before the race even starts is not palatable to women. I can understand that. I'm, old, fat and slow enough to have zero chance of winning. I am however, mature enough to race for the joy I get out of it, and test myself to be the best I can be, and see where my best ends up in the grand scheme.

If your search my past posts, you will see that I've argued against AG in tri, and that extends to gender too. The way I see it, we can have divisions in competition, argue about what constitutes a reasonable way of dividing people into divisions, or we can just have one division. Multiple divisions is leading to arguments, like this ST discussion), gender testing etc etc. having one division would eliminate all that and we could all just focus on being the best we can be.

Or we could just meet in your dorm room with Michael Phelps and suck the hell out of a bong and be friends.

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TriDork

"Happiness is a myth. All you can hope for is to get laid once in a while, drunk once in a while and to eat chocolate every day"

I like the idea of having testosterone ("T") levels regulated, with supplementation legal to either go up or down where you should be. I've read about numerous guys/girls having their T levels tested but, AFAIK, my T levels have never been tested. Maybe I'm way low and can really get faster with some legal T. I like this idea. :)

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

I'm not easily offended, but for some reason your post leaves a really bad taste in my mouth. You do realize that if we had everyone race together, then women would never come close to winning anything, right? And if we had horses run track events, humans would never win either? And then why bother to train/compete/participate?

I also think you're confusing "rights" with the rules of fair competition.

  

I'm not easily offended, but for some reason your post leaves a really bad taste in my mouth. You do realize that if we had everyone race together, then women would never come close to winning anything, right? And if we had horses run track events, humans would never win either? And then why bother to train/compete/participate?

I also think you're confusing "rights" with the rules of fair competition.[/quote]

Several things.

Firstly, I don't mean to offend. I intend to have open robust discussion.

Two, you being offended does not mean I can't put forth my side of the discussion.

Women wouldn't automatically be eliminated from winning. Generally yes, but not always. Endurance running is won by women sometimes. At Challenge Wanaka a number of years ago, a woman was leading near the end of the swim, until one of the men decided that getting chicked wasn't good enough for him. He passed her, but that may have been a contributing factor why he had to pull out on the run. Women can compete with men on a level playing field and from time to time they can win. I have no hope of winning and get beaten by women all the time. While I don't like getting beaten by women, I don't like getting beaten by men either! I'm secure in my manhood that I have no problem with a woman that's better than me, beating me. Women are people afterall.

We have horses doing drunk dancing (or whatever they call it) I doubt it will be long before they make Usain Bolt look stupid in the hundred metres :-) And how many pigeons have to die in the shooting? (OK, that one was just silly but....). And I think you'll find that back in the day, there were horse vs man running races (I think about 40 miles) and the humans won a fair number of those races.

If winning was the only motivation for competing, virtually everyone would give up now. Only 10 possible winners would show up at Kona, but thousands of us spend our kids inheritance giving it a shot for no sensible reason. Not winning, is no reason to not compete. If that's your reason, give up now because as I haven't seen your name at on the winners list at Kona, you probably shouldn't waste time training either.

I take no offence and being beaten by anyone that's better than me. If they beat me, all it shows is that they were faster on the day. I'm still good at my job, still a good father and husband, and so many other things. They're faster that me, whoopdie do.

If women choose to not race in the open division, so be it, but to cry foul when a winning woman isn't woman enough, well that is just sour grapes and that offends ME.

Now where's that bong, I have a swim workout to get to ;-)

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TriDork

"Happiness is a myth. All you can hope for is to get laid once in a while, drunk once in a while and to eat chocolate every day"

Allowing doping "up" pretty much guarantees a majority of competitive athletes will be "supplementing". It is pretty easy to lower T levels with hard training. Pretty much the same as making T legal. I don't like the idea of having to take T as a prerequisite for competitive racing.

..

All I'll say is my 10 year old daughter, who does't know anything about testosterone or anything of the like, asked me during the women's 800m final why there were men running in the race?

there is any number of issues here and not least of which is this is not related to just levels of testosterone

chromosomes, usually an indicator - xx for women, xy for men have specific conditions attached to them where women can test xy

a female spanish athlete called Martinez Patino had breasts, vagina, internal testes, no ovaries or uterus and males doses of testosterone which was inert - after the years of debate the experts declared her a woman - something she was pretty aware of from the outset

having settled on the fact that they'd determined she was a woman, to avoid this, the IAAF convened a group of international experts to determine the differences between the sexes. The conclusion that group came to was - dont ask us

neither body parts or chromosomes unequivocally differentiate between males and females and in 2011 when asked again a member of that group said they could not come up with any different 20 years on than they had in 2000 when the advice was to stop testing

(this is a paraphrase of the Sports Gene)

I've a good friend who is a rocket scientist endocronologist - one of the most internationally respected world leaders in his field - a very obscure sub-set of intersex conditions - his view is that there is no means of clearly identifying one sex from the other

thats not to say that you can not differentiate - you can put in tests with limits and say above X or without Y an individual is one or the other, but in the real world people do not present like that and even in the womens field of the 800 at Rio, discounting the first 3 across the line, the T levels of the balance of the field will not be identical, so lets say a limit is established which is X and the first 3 are out, a woman comes along who by every single conceivable physiological and genetic test is female but they're 0.1% higher than the limit set for T - are they really out? its a little like trying to level the playing field in sports which require 20/20 vision and someone comes along who has 20/8 and are we really going to suggest that because the average norm is 20/20 that the other individual should have their sight reduced so they do not have an advantage

I think the conclusion of the panel that examined this once before is there is no clear means of differentiating, so don't ask us to tell you how to do it. Thats not to say sports can not come up with some way of doing it, but I suspect in light of the fact that the IAAF and IOC can not find a panel that would support them in the past in seperating genders, so long as that is the case, any female athlete who is penalised for their natural born condition probably has an excellent chance of appealing any decision at CAS

read Epstein - brilliant book

And what did you tell her?

Did you explain that some women have more masculine features and likewise some men have more feminine ones?
That's what it comes down to. Humanity is a spectrum. We usually ignore it, until someone's far enough from the norm to make us feel uncomfortable.

In sports that depend on physical strength or endurance only a small percentage of the population with matching physical traits are in with a chance to be competitive at top level.
But there are an even smaller percentage that have even more obvious and significant advantages, be it due to high testosterone in women or a genetic condition in a man (e.g Robert Forstemann). They're just an extension of the same principle. Some people are better equipped to be competitive than others.
Is it perhaps ironic that many of those at the top of their sports complain about a fellow competitor who is just better equipped than them, suggesting that they have an unfair advantage. Those complaining have themselves an "unfair advantage" over most of the rest of the population.
It's those with a physiological advantage over 99% of the population complaining about someone who has a physiological advantage over 99.99% of the population...(or whatever the figures might actually be.)
Certainly we can say we want to set linits. We can define what a "normal" man or woman is. That's a slippery slope and a moral/ethical minefield. The logical conclusion would surely be that all sports have to be conducted on a genetic handicap system of some sort. Maybe Phelps gets a 5 second penalty because he has a long torso and big hands and feet. Maybe high jumpers get a penalty for being too tall or a bonus for being short. What about Usain Bolt? Did he have no unusual physiological advantages? Was it all just training?
Maybe we do the same in mental competition. Too clever? You get less time or an added element of difficulty.

We don't have to be politically correct or bury our heads in tha sand either. Just acknowledge that people are different. Sports aren't fair and never can be. If we're categorising competitors by sex and age, then as long as nothing's been altered artificially, I think we leave it alone. The remaining problem of course is if there is no unequivical definition of male or female that can be agreed to. There are cases where this is physically ambiguous.

And what did you tell her?

Good post my friend, I would like to hear their answer..

Tridork, I believe the problem goes farther than not woman enough.
Not woman at all is my understanding. So, imperfectly formed man with no female parts competing as female - is what we have.

Do you know if our T levels go back up when we rest/taper, hopefully to higher levels than initially??? I've had the feeling intuitively that my T levels have stayed fairly high over the years, but I've never seen any research on this. :)

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

Limits don't have to be about defining "normal." They can be about defining the extremes. Semenya has testicles, and no ovaries. You could make a rule, "If you have testicles, you compete with men." There, that solves Semenya. Is that a slippery slope, or ethical minefield? It's an ethical problem in that you might deny women like Semenya the opportunity to compete in the field they think they should. But it's also an ethical minefield letting her compete. You don't avoid ethical issues by doing nothing.

x2 to that part in bold above. Well said.

Yeah, I think where people get caught up is that eligibility to race doesn't need to be the same as gender identity. You identify as a woman, awesome. You have testicles, xy chromosomes, and no ovaries; sorry not eligible to compete in the women's category.

..

Unless you dug a very deep hole your levels will rebound with normal rest/taper.
..

That's true but when you have sought the counsel of experts and they say collectively "don't ask us" who do we think should make that decision

So in this case IAAF and IOC sought clarity were told to go whistle because even the people that deal with it for a living could not decide where the line is drawn

So, let's say they get a group of independent experts who give them the result they want this time round. I'm sure they might be able to find a group to tell them what they want to hear in exchange for cash. What happens next?

Eliminated athletes or athletes forced to take T suppressants get a lawyer head off to both CAS and every other justice system and argue with the former members of the last expert panel that the lines being drawn are arbitrary and discriminatory because there will be dozens of experts lining up to explain why caster is a woman. She may be at the acceptable or unacceptable bounotaries of what we think of as female but they'll argue she is because of x, y and Z and if she fulfills those criteria you can't prevent her from competing or compelless her to take drugs to suppress her natural levels

This battle is lost unless there becomes a clinical accepted standard for differentiating that is accepted by the courts and I'm not sure it's been tested or that there is at this point

Thankfully for us all, for millennia the human species has been able to figure this out without the aid of experts. A simple natural experience somehow magically works for most people: puberty.

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________
It doesn't really matter what Phil is saying, the music of his voice is the appropriate soundtrack for a bicycle race. HTupolev

Just a quick thought....don't ask who is or is not a woman. That's a political minefield. Simply define the thresholds that one would need to meet to compete in the "non open" division. So now you have an open division that males traditionally race in. You have a non open division that traditionally what we define as women race in. If you are over some extreme outlier limits then you just don't get to compete in that non open division

Except were not talking about most of us. We'recommend talking about .00001% of the population and as I pointed out earlier. Woman with breaststroke, vaginally - so apparently all the right bits in the right places doesn't realise there is an issue till she has a chromosome test stating she's a man

So perhaps we need something a litthe more sophisticated than a visual assessment of build and hairline and perhaps there are no clear hormonal boundaries

I'might sure if the IAAF and IOC use your argument semanya would not have a leg to stand on in court

Having just read "The Sports Gene", I tried to explain the Caster Semenya situation as best as I could to my kids (10 yr old boy, 13 yr old girl) and they seemed to get it at the "science" level. I even paused the DVR to explain it all prior to the race. But while actually watching the race, they were like..."That's a dude".

Help me out, guess I am real dumb. How is a person with testicles a woman? What is on their birth certificate? I have never heard they do a DNA test at birth to determine sex, I thought you just looked between their legs.


So when is a women a women, and when is a man a man? Wow, I am so confused now.

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Dave Campbell | Facebook | @DaveECampbell | h2ofun@h2ofun.net

Boom Nutrition code 19F4Y3 $5 off 24 pack box | Bionic Runner | PowerCranks | Velotron | Spruzzamist

Lions don't lose sleep worrying about the sheep

 
No, the thread is about testosterone levels being measured in womens' sports and how it is going to change sport in the future. In 2011, IAAF determined that the most flagrant example, Caster Semenya, did have significantly higher endogenous testosterone than the established normal female population and had to undergo exogenous hormone replacement (reverse doping, for lack of a better word). Dutee Chand, an Olympic 100 meter hopeful, was able to have this ruling thrown out by the CAS until July of 2017 because men weren't subjected to the same natural testosterone level testing.

I have seen what appears to be at least three examples of what might be naturally high testosterone levels in high-performing Olympic women. My question is what do you think the future brings for hormone testing, given that CAS threw out the previous ruling that did not involve men?[/quote]

Well this sort of opens up the whole field of what is normal and further, how do we determine it?

Back in the day, male/female was seen as a lot more binary, but that is changing for sure. With that taking place, deciding what is normal for both men and women gets a lot greyer. In this discussion, it seems to have switched from who has testes and who doesn't, to what is the acceptable level of testosterone for a person to have, to be male or female.

Is it right that women like Caster Semenya (with no testes as far as I'm aware) have to reverse dope just because of her natural (as far as I'm aware) high testosterone level? Or is this whole situation similar to how Alan Turing (the inventor of the computer, during WWII) was chemically castrated for being gay, at a time when homosexuality was seen as an abnormality and a crime.

Maybe as a society we haven't actually moved on much at all in the last 70 years. One of the big things I've taught my kids is to ask "What happens next?" If we use testosterone levels as the tool for determining gender, we end up with the Semenya's of the world being treated like gays were treated in the past. What happens next? Do we really want that world?

While my suggested "open" racing (men and women race as humans, not separate races for men and women), isn't palatable to many (primarily women as far as I can tell), and I can understand that to a certain degree, but it remains true that determining gender based on testosterone level would become a non-topic. Then, Caster Semenya wouldn't have to undergo the shameful reverse doping that's been imposed.

Rather than focussing on a few "grey area" women, I think the world would be better if we stopped the middle aged men juicing on testosterone so they could win their age group at the local 10k. To me, that is a much bigger problem. It's sign that a lot of men are pitiful examples of the gender.

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TriDork

"Happiness is a myth. All you can hope for is to get laid once in a while, drunk once in a while and to eat chocolate every day"

Where is the line? Man with no testes? Woman with high testosterone? Are you going to be the one to decide? Maybe I should be the judge? Or being sensible, someone else? Putin?. Drawing that line, anywhere, is fraught with difficulty. I don't believe that a hard and fast upper limit for a woman's testosterone level should be the sole decider. But that's just me.

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TriDork

"Happiness is a myth. All you can hope for is to get laid once in a while, drunk once in a while and to eat chocolate every day"

She's a hermaphrodite. Though the testing she's undergone remains private (for good reason), reading between the lines I'd speculate that her visually predominant sex organ is a vagina. E.g. either she has no penis, or the vagina dominates and the penis is vestigial. So you might be on point - they might have just looked between the legs -- maybe took a long awkward pause -- then said, "She's a woman."

So they called her a woman and she was raised as one. For fairly good reason.

But she has "hidden" testicles that presumably produce testosterone. A big deal in performance.

Hence my suggestion that you don't need to care about "identity" or "visual characteristics." Just go by testicles. It's a binary difference. There is no "spectrum" where you have to defined some arbitrary line.

That might not cover everything. But, to me, it's a reasonable solution to Semenya. I feel bad for her. It's not her fault - or really anyone's fault. But it seems like the right thing to do, to me.

If you look between Caster Semenya's legs, you're probably going to find girl parts. I think this is an issue of defining exactly what is women's sport. What is the definition of being a woman? How will this be definition be tested? If someone tests partially female and partially male, what then?

Men with no testes can likely get a TUE for testosterone. It's one of the few WADA exemptions for the hard-core steroids - total loss of ability to make it.

The governing bodies of sport makes and enforces, just like all other rules. E.g. the IOC and others.

It's not just you - it's pretty clear that it'd be difficult to make thresholds for testosterone levels.

Remember to wash out the bowl with warm, soapy water at least once per week for best performance.

Interesting, sounds like we do not even have all the "facts" to ask some of these questions.

If I step back and think of this, compared to things like Age Groups, weight classes, etc., we really are just playing games. Each person has advantages at birth to do certain things better than others. I am 6'5. Not tall enough to have considered college basketball, but plenty tall to do well in high school. Now, why did I have to play on the "male" team and not be allowed to plan on the "female" team?

I have 2 daughters, and 2 granddaughters. So,

I always smile when I hear females yell but we are not being treated equally. Pay, etc. But, then on the other side they say but in athletics, we cannot have just sport, we have
to break it up into male/female or it is not fair. And now we have this issue going on about what make a person female. Is it parts? Or T level? Or just how one feels in their head?
Wow, all of this makes my mind spin.

I guess I am just surprised more "women" are not trying to defend the split they got away from men by looking between the legs. Now with federal rulings that you can be whatever you want in your head and use any restroom, locker room, etc., how can there be anything relating to anything anymore as to whether one is "male" or "female"? Maybe it is time to step back and ask why are there even different groupings? Just seems like you cannot have things all ways, but we all know how little logic is used in discussions vs emotions.

Interesting times

---

Dave Campbell | Facebook | @DaveECampbell | h2ofun@h2ofun.net

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Lions don't lose sleep worrying about the sheep

But you also have women who have internal testes and produce an elevated level of testosterone as compared to "normal" women, but for some reason their bodies can't use ANY of it. So they get to compete as women even though they have testes? (And then you have Lance Armstrong who only has one...but I digress).

So you end up with this crazy-ass flowchart to determine who is a man and who is a woman when it comes to sport and competition. What it boils down to is that sport is a human-created concept to determine who was the fastest, etc. Then we decided that women should be able to play, too, but only compete amongst themselves. Swell. Again, completely human created concept. But then Mother Nature is like, "What the hell, nobody bothered to ask me. Ima throw a wrench all up in your reindeer games. Whatcha gonna do now?"

After reading this -
"So Semenya has a genetic advantage, by virtue of A) having a Y-chromosome and testes, and B) being unable to use that T and/or one of its derivatives enough to have developed fully male.
In that regard, if you approached it from the other direction, you could, relatively accurately, say that Semenya has a disadvantage compared to other males with XY and testosterone, because unlike them she cannot fully use T (and/or a derivative – depends on the exact condition)."
http://sportsscientists.com/...ster-semenya-debate/

I'm inclined to suggest that the "fairest" option is to allow her to compete in the Paralympics as a male.

we do not know the answer to what parts this person has or does not have.

But, as I posted, stepping to a higher level, this stuff about "levels" is just a joke. Really male/female/Age Groups/weight divisions, what are we trying to do?
We have one "person" who is the fastest in the 100 meters. Now, why do we have to break it down? Why have we not broken it down more by age, weight,
etc?

This now never ends, and I have no idea what is "right", which is why I just go exercise and have fun with sports.

---

Dave Campbell | Facebook | @DaveECampbell | h2ofun@h2ofun.net

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Lions don't lose sleep worrying about the sheep

Yep

---

Dave Campbell | Facebook | @DaveECampbell | h2ofun@h2ofun.net

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Lions don't lose sleep worrying about the sheep

"She's a hermaphrodite."

i'm not sure, but i think we say intersex now. i think hermaphrodite and retarded are in the same word bucket.

---

Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

Apparently the British press didn't get the memo. :) (Telegraph, and *cough* Daily Mail). You're probably right, I had been reading those articles, and something in the back of my mind told me the term was archaic, but I carried on. I'm happy to be corrected.

Not picking on you Slowman, but I've always found it odd that the most clinical of phrases with inoffensive roots become offensive merely by becoming the official label for an unpopular trait, like the two you've mentioned.

From http://www.etymologyonline.com:

hermaphrodite (n.) late 14c. (harmofroditus), from Latin hermaphroditus, from Greek hermaphroditos "person partaking of the attributes of both sexes, as a proper name, the son of Hermes and Aphrodite, who, in Ovid, was loved by the nymph Salmacis so ardently that she prayed for complete union with him and as a result they were united bodily, combining male and female characteristics.

retarded (adj.) 1810, "delayed," past participle adjective from retard (v.). In childhood development sense, "mentally slow," attested from 1895 (perhaps inspired by Italian tardivi).


The word "retard" quite literally means someone who is delayed, like how one delays or "retards" their timing in an engine, or how one can by "tardy" to class... but people learn to find any label offensive to an unpopular classification. The only thing to take offense to is demeaning prejudice. It seems to me like people feel these words become stained the way a perfectly good shirt becomes stained, and then choose to discard the word from the public vernacular without considering that it's the people's ill will that needs discarding and the word is only a proxy which has little effect to that end.

"Telegraph, and *cough* Daily Mail"

you're right. i knew i should've checked first to see what standards the british tabloids had set for manners and civility ;-)

---

Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

"the most clinical of phrases with inoffensive roots become offensive merely by becoming the official label for an unpopular trait, like the two you've mentioned."

while not disagreeing with you, i fall back on what a class of people themselves wish to be called, and use that as my standard. i often fall afoul of this and can write you chapter and verse. but when corrected i find it simply easier to stipulate to a targeted group's own preferred label.

---

Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

I have 2 daughters, and 2 granddaughters. So//

So you are cool with your daughters and granddaughters never being able to compete in professional sports? Very big of you Dave to commit their possible futures to the also ran pile to suit your world views. Hope they feel the same way when they are able understand what you feel they ought and ought not be able to do with their lives. Billy Jean King would be turning over in her grave, if she were dead of course..

Wow, putting words into my mouth? I just have questions. I have always told my daughters, and now granddaugthers they can be anything they want. My two daughters
are the bread winners in their families. So, no idea what you are talking about.

---

Dave Campbell | Facebook | @DaveECampbell | h2ofun@h2ofun.net

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Lions don't lose sleep worrying about the sheep

Wow, putting words into my mouth?

So you didn't say if women really want to be equal, then they should just all pitch up with the men?

If everyone wants to be "equal", and we are now told that what ever mentally you feel you are or what your are, etc.
and places no longer allow the use of the words male, female, since those are sexist, there is nothing
to pitch up against anymore, since the old rules are not the current rules, what ever those are.
And this is in ALL aspects of life.

---

Dave Campbell | Facebook | @DaveECampbell | h2ofun@h2ofun.net

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Lions don't lose sleep worrying about the sheep

Ok Dave, I have no idea what you just said. I just asked, did you say women should just compete with men if they want to be equal, pretty simple question, but apparently needs a very complicated answer..

Hello SallyShortyPants and All,

Perhaps in the not so distant future ..... humans will have their DNA 'adjusted' prior to conception to provide a body with the characteristics that provide an advantage in sports .... for instance more testosterone than the year 2000 humans .... male and female .....

Something along this line currently in evidence by giving HGH to children to make them taller .... but more sophisticated interventions might produce 'super humans' with double hearts and other adaptations for sports competitions.

Maybe a genealogical passport starting prior to conception will be required ...

For now we will probably stumble along as at present ...... adjusting and revising rules to provide a semblance of fairness in athletic competition to maintain exciting races that are interesting to participate in or watch.

Also in the not so distant future .... humans will likely be living much, much longer with extended youthful physical attributes.

A handicap system for various sports based on previous performance could level the field for these changes ..... and produce competitions that are compelling to participate in or observe ..... and help sell tickets.

---

Cheers, Neal

+1 mph Faster

W...T...F....???
Seriously...dude..wtf are you trying to say here? Did you have a thought that somehow eluded capture? Or, did you miss school on the day that coherent and logical writing was introduced?

Admittedly, your use of "split" did bring a smile to my ....lips. :)

Since that is not what I said, I gave you my thoughts, which yep, is not easy to understand, since this issue has NO easy answer

---

Dave Campbell | Facebook | @DaveECampbell | h2ofun@h2ofun.net

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Lions don't lose sleep worrying about the sheep

Sorry, I was being a bit flippant. I don't doubt that in the cases we are discussing we have no clear definitions. While you might argue I was reading out of context, I found it amusing that a rocket science endocrinologist might say "that there is no means of clearly identifying one sex from the other." If you had said, "in .00001% of the population there is no means of clearly determining sex" I wouldn't have quibbled.

So I didn't propose any argument re: Semanya, I'm just saying in the great majority of cases, we can clearly determine sex.

---

________
It doesn't really matter what Phil is saying, the music of his voice is the appropriate soundtrack for a bicycle race. HTupolev

I know that, the problem is that many athletes are at the ends of the bell curve in a variety of ways, height, weight, wingspan, torso length, musculature and hormones. setting limits on those as being normal / abnormal is not straightforwards, or rather it is for finding a partner, it may be less so in really specific cases

 
'Tis a slippery slope, indeed.

Basically, h2ofun is saying, "So...do you want to be equal or not? Because equal means, well, equal."

If you're arguing in support of being allowed to fight in combat situations (because women can do anything men can do, and sometimes better) but then argue for different qualifying standards for physical tests, what the heck is the point? Arguing for equality, but then insisting revised (read "unequal') qualifications or only competing against other women kind of kills your argument, does it not?

Now, not saying that there aren't some sports where women couldn't compete with men...ping pong, archery, rifle/shooting...and not saying that SOME women can't compete with the 90th percentile of men...for example, the Ninja Warrior stuff, triathlon/Ironman, etc...by and large men are going to come out on top in tests of physical prowess. That doesn't mean women are any less awesome than men any more than it means that the men who can't compete with the elite females are lesser human beings.

Everyone is different, men and women are different. Arguing for equal rights and access and pay and all is great. I agree. But trying to make an argument for actually being physically equal...well either they are (should compete against men) or they aren't (should compete against women).

Now, not saying that there aren't some sports where women couldn't compete with men...ping pong, archery, rifle/shooting...and not saying that SOME women can't compete with the 90th percentile of men...for example, the Ninja Warrior stuff, triathlon/Ironman, etc...by and large men are going to come out on top in tests of physical prowess. That doesn't mean women are any less awesome than men any more than it means that the men who can't compete with the elite females are lesser human beings. //

Sure some women are fit to do combat, but keep in mind that is not what I'm talking about, the 90%tile. I'm talking about the top of the spear, the 99.99%. So since we"know" women cannot compete with men at that level in sport, it made/makes sense for them to have their own division. Just like we have a division for kids, bigger kids, and young teenagers. Mixing in an argument that some women can be firefighters or soldiers and pass the tests, well that is not even close to what this argument is. Dave seems to want it to be, in his equal in everything argument, but they are separate issues.


I was just trying to make him see that, but of course I broke a long held promise to myself to stop trying to do that. I though that throwing in the future prospects of his daughters and granddaughters might shake his brain shake loose and a rational thought might just fall in, my mistake.. (-;

Yep, totally agree.

Was thinking about this more today. If some are saying that being born with High T for a female is "bad", what is good? But lets take another example.
We have some guys born with the ability to have very high Vo2 max compared to use mortals. Why are they allowed to compete? It gives them an unfair
advantage compared to the rest of us.

Yep, either equal is equal, or it is not. Picking and choosing, just like which rules in our sport are good or bad, is a no win. I totally see why various
groups have thrown their hands up saying we cannot pick a standard. Once we broke people into 2 groups based on a small set of parameters some though was okay,
we are screwed, when 100% of humans do not fit nicely into these two boxes.

---

Dave Campbell | Facebook | @DaveECampbell | h2ofun@h2ofun.net

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Lions don't lose sleep worrying about the sheep

So, only what you believe has to be the answer? Wow. If I acted that way I sure would not have been married for as long as I have been. :)

---

Dave Campbell | Facebook | @DaveECampbell | h2ofun@h2ofun.net

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Lions don't lose sleep worrying about the sheep

So, only what you believe has to be the answer?//

SO you don't believe women should have their own divisions in sports and should race against the men, gotch ya. Because that is what I believe, they should have their own divisions, and think have articulated it quite clear..

It's not that high t is good or bad, it's that it's an advantage. Unlike VO2, it's an advantage based upon a genetic difference(having male organs) and it is correctable(you can lower T, I'm not sure there is an anti VO2 max pill). I think the other thing is that as much as VO2 maxes vary, so do efficiencies and muscle makeup. Some people with high VO2, like Bjorn Daehle are great, but others with lower VO2 maxes like Frank Shorter are still able to compete at the front. It seems likely that high T in women's sports is more of a predeterminer of a competition than VO2 max.

If it were that simple, why are folks even talking about this? Is she not a women? And if not, why not is the question.

And now our society is changing to not what used to be defined as a male or female, by whatever one feels they are by what is in their head.
So how can you say a "man" can use all the "female" facilities when they identify as a "female", and society and laws protect this, but cannot also do sports as a "female"?
I have no answer, but in our world today, society is making things pretty interesting.

---

Dave Campbell | Facebook | @DaveECampbell | h2ofun@h2ofun.net

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Lions don't lose sleep worrying about the sheep

I agree same can spin it this way, but I also think it is fair to spin it that VO2 is an advantage like T, no matter what caused it.

---

Dave Campbell | Facebook | @DaveECampbell | h2ofun@h2ofun.net

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Lions don't lose sleep worrying about the sheep

I have no answer,//

Ok, just stop there and stop providing them then..

I have never provided an answer, or neither can anyone else. This is some ways is like the topic, what is better, a chevy or ford. Is there were an
easy answer, we would have it already, and all could agree.

---

Dave Campbell | Facebook | @DaveECampbell | h2ofun@h2ofun.net

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Lions don't lose sleep worrying about the sheep

I see it just the opposite. Monty seems sane. You're the one I'm surprised is married.

Is there were an
easy answer, we would have it already, and all could agree. //

But there is an answer Dave, I gave it to you. Women should race in their own division, not in the mens overall. That is what we have decided as a world, and until something really big changes, it will remain that way.


Now another argument is what constitutes a woman, that is an "entirely" different deal. Now instead of talking about the 10's of millions of women who do sport in the world, you are talking about a few that are extreme outliers. You seem to have confused those few with the millions, and somehow drawn some logic parallel to the situations.


I want your daughters and granddaughters to be able to have the choice of doing professional sport, that is my answer. Sorry you cannot come up with the same one..

Hmmm. I don't think it's spin, I think most of what I said is fact. With VO2 max you are talking about the best of the best being 10-20% above other highly trained athletes. With intersex athletes you are talking about testosterone levels 200-300% higher than the rest of the field.

Also, VO2 max tends to be trainable although we don't know to what extent but most of the highest scoring athletes tend to be Nordic skiers and it has long been speculated it's because their sport is full body and very aerobic, not because everyone with a high VO2 max becomes a Nordic skier.

Finally, you completely ignored my point that Testosterone outside of the WADA limits Seems to be more of a predeterminer of outcome of a competition than an abnormally high testosterone level. Again, we don't know fully how much but Caster Semanaya seems to have improved 4-6 seconds when she went off treatment.

Although your solution may solve the problems of intersex athletes, it would be a terrible thing for girls and women the world over who find hope and meaning in sport.

The reason that white dudes shouldn't get there own category is because there is no biological difference between races. There is a biological difference between men and women; there are unfortunately women whose societally defined gender doesn't match their X/y biology. They are unique instances that if solutions aren't crafted, then women's sport could be greatly altered. And there is potential for precedent as ideas about gender become more fluid.

The greatest problem is that the people who are the outliers are people, with emotions and identities, and the most obvious solutions are the most harmful to them. Excluding Dutee Chand from competing, requiring treatment, or asking her to race against men; are all manners of suggesting to her that she is not a woman in the form which she has identified for her entire life. Whereas to her, just because she undeveloped make organs hidden in her body, doesn't change that she is a woman.

Hello h2ofun and All,

h2ofun wrote in part: "Help me out, guess I am real dumb. How is a person with testicles a woman? What is on their birth certificate? I have never heard they do a DNA test at birth to determine sex, I thought you just looked between their legs."

A Caucasian cyclist lying in a hospital bed after a crash with a broken collar bone and other injuries was approached by a young new student nurse.

"How are you doing sir? I am here to give you a sponge bath", she said.

Struggling to speak with the plastic oxygen mask covering his nose and mouth, he mumbled, "Are my testicles black?"

She answered, "I am sorry sir I am only authorized to bathe you above the navel."

Again, much agitated, he asked, "Are my testicles black?"

Fearing his agitation would worsen his health the nurse carefully pulled down the covers, lifted his hospital gown, grasped his manhood and moved it to the side for a clear view, peering intently at his testicles.

"No, sir, your testicles look fine."

Struggling again to move the oxygen mask from his nose and mouth he said, "Nurse ..... that ------ was ------ very ------ nice ------ but ------ please ---- listen ---------- carefully ......

Are ....... my ........... test .......... results ......... back?"

---

Cheers, Neal

+1 mph Faster

Well, I hate to break it to you Dave, but no, things aren't that simple. No one has seen Caster's biology but what is supposed is that she has undeveloped and undescended testes and an XY chromosome makeup.

Of course there is the intersex athlete discussion; and then also, the hypoandrogenism discussion, although I don't know how many women lie outside the first category and remain in the second,

But to the women who are compelled to compete against her, it might.

I'm all for being compassionate to intersex. But also the women who are compelled to compete against intersex athletes who have what appear to be a musculature and hormone profile consistent with a male athlete.

As I wrote above, you don't avoid an ethical dilemma by letting everyone do what they feel like.

Someone's going to be hurt . You just have to choose who.

Thank you for just saying it. I thought that point was so obvious that it went without saying, but apparently it needed saying.

I don't think nothing should be done. I was just pointing out that it's a really jarring ing for the intersex women involved. I actually thought testosterone suppression therapy was fairly humane and the least intrusive. But I'm not sure what options has after the CAS decision.

I don't think your referring to the solution that suits most women is the "most obvious". Surely reverse doping people isn't as obvious as us all racing as one? Divisiveness is a major problem around the world and leads to a crap ton of conflict. Race, religion, even down to clan and family. How about we stop figuring out how to be different, so we can all be "big frog in little pond" and learn to accept being "small frog in large pond"? We're all just humans afterall. We bleed red when we're cut, we cry when our parents die, and so many other things tie us together as people. Why divide people into arbitrary groups?

---

TriDork

"Happiness is a myth. All you can hope for is to get laid once in a while, drunk once in a while and to eat chocolate every day"

"The reason that white dudes shouldn't get there own category is because there is no biological difference between races."

However, there is indeed a biological difference between races. If you haven't done so, please read "The Sports Gene". In the afterword in the paperback edition, Epstein actually talks about several instances where pretty conclusive research findings have been kept under wraps because the researchers were so afraid of the societal backlash from the results of their study.

I'm really glad Epstein had the stones to write about some of the topics he did. People are so afraid to touch anything to do with race these days.

I think hormone suppression actually sounds fairly horrific. Sounds something similar to the "chemical castration" that's been used experimentally on sex offenders.

But, call me cruel, I don't see an outright ban for certain women from women's competition as something awful. They'd still get all the avenues for recreation and competition at non-elite levels (I'd hope). It's not the end of the world not being fast enough to compete at the Olympics. I'm not, and I've managed to handle it. I understand it'd be more jarring for an already-elite athlete. But still, I think the definition of "woman" in the context of sport has to have some enforceable definition. Or else maybe I have that shot at the Olympics after all!

I think it's ridiculous trying to regulate endogenous testosterone levels for determining competition eligibility.... least common denominator. If you have a Y chromosome you are ineligible to compete as a female. Let the genotype not the phenotype be the determining factor.

Yeah, I'm inclined to go with something like that. Far less a barbaric can of worms than normalizing hormone levels.

First and foremost, your quote and italicizing skills are far beyond mine.

"Making Caster Semenya reverse dope is bad for a woman." Technically speaking, umm, err, no. It'd be bad for an intersex person.

I'm not super up to date on race and biology, but genetically speaking, the only real differences Tend to be outward and they are actually fairly minuscule, not muscle development, etc. https://partners.nytimes.com/...i-genetics-race.html . Now, I don't know how to explain the phenomena we see, which is that 90% or more of the top 100m runners tend be black, but it's not necessarily something that is because of some biological difference tied to skin color. And to the extent there may be differences, I don't believe that they begin to touch the extent of difference we saw for a treated versus untreated Semanaya. Although, I may be more inclined to feel that way because I've known lots of fast white dudes(sub 10.4, sub 46).

And, I guess, in some ways you are the more progressive person because you seem insistent on saying that Chand and Semenaya are women. Which is what most of my academic friends seem to say: they are women because they identify as women, let them compete as women. Scientists tend to come down on the other side, they are not biologically speaking women, ergo, don't let them compete as women.

I know that you're just trolling me and a few other people hard. But I think we need to really stand up for the impact that sports have on some girls and women, and that non gendered competition would drastically change that landscape. Not to mention, it would in and of itself probably reoccur(sponsors and fans would search out the best women, potentially recreate places for them to compete, etc), even if abolished.

Interesting, I've always been taught that there is no difference but in line with my other post. The difference between a pre treatment and post treatment Semanaya was pretty vast.

Anyway, I'll put that book on my list, I'm not afraid of new information.

Seemingly different than many people, I have the ability to make decisions that impact badly on me if they are for the greater good or are fairer.

In this case, it seems to me, that women can't accept losing (to men in this discussion) Fair enough, losing sucks. I don't recall ever winning anything of any consequence. I'm used to losing. I think women need to learn this skill also. After there is a separate set of competitions for women, and they still lose, they blame someone for not being woman enough and want to re-define what it is to be a woman. That just smacks of sour grapes to me.

Either their are two genders (men and women) or there is a continuum. If we go with the binary option, then to me at least, Caster Semenya is a woman. If we go with there being a continuum of genders and this seems to be tacitly accepted by the use of the term "intersex", then how and where to draw the line between men and women becomes an absolute minefield and can only ever be contentious. If on the other hand, as I have suggested, we simply ignore gender as a divider, then the problem is resolved.

Sure, there would be fallout, and victims with my proposal, but there is fallout with the current delineation between men and women, and even a new (testosterone based?) dividing line would also be rife with problems. Would 'women' slightly above the T limit, be able to reverse dope to just below the line to be allowed to compete as women? What about low T men (naturally low at young competitive age. or reverse doped men at older age) be allowed to compete as women since they fall below the arbitrary testosterone limit? If we are forcing some athletes to reverse dope, does that mean we should 'allow' others to do it to compete as women? Efeminate men, that are gay. They shag men, and have low T. Are they simply imperfectly developed women? Should they be allowed to compete as women too?

Clearly some of the above is silly, but I'm simply trying to highlight the point that drawing a line, particularly using testosterone as a determination of gender, is ridiculous. It could be part of the equation, but adding more parts, just makes the determination even more difficult to determine and unfathomable to police.

---

TriDork

"Happiness is a myth. All you can hope for is to get laid once in a while, drunk once in a while and to eat chocolate every day"

What you describe is what Caster Semenya did in order to compete until 2015, when the ruling was overturned. She lost some, but not all of her speed. As others have mentioned already in this thread, her T levels were triple that of then highest normal allowable level, so no small advantage for someone that thinks of hormone levels as performance enhancing.

As someone who replaces my female (estrogen and progesterone) hormones due to aging, I can attest that it's not a big deal, but it definitely helps. I posted because if/when rules are changed again, men will be impacted as well because everyone will have to be tested, not just women. Life and competition will go on; my guess is that we will simply have new rules.

---

DFL > DNF > DNS

I completely agree with you about the hairline thing. But I do find her record swim very suspicious. She smashed the record out of the park. Almost all new WR's are by incremental amounts because athletes have become so specified and train year round for particular events and the talent pool is so big now that the difference between the top is very small. It is almost unheard of for a record to be broken that significantly.


But we do live in a society that is innocent until proven guilty. Outside of her amazing performance, there is nothing substantial to suggest doping. We have to live with that until new evidence becomes available.

Hello SallyShortyPnts and All,

https://www.theguardian.com/...ncer-risk-nearly-300

Excerpt:

"Women who rely on the most commonly used form of hormone replacement therapy are roughly three times more likely to develop breast cancer than those who do not use it, according to a study whose results suggest the risk of illness has been previously understated."

---

Cheers, Neal

+1 mph Faster

This is such a common sense suggestion that I find it hard to believe that it is not used. My understanding has always been that the presence or absence of the Y chromosome solely determines a person's genetic sex. This would simplify matters greatly. :)

---

"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

Except there are people with Y chromosomes that are immune to testosterone, so this is where this gets a bit complicated.

Ummm, not trying to be flippant or argumentative but why does this necessarily complicate things??? Perhaps these peeps are less "masculine" but I would *think* they would still be consid male???

---

"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

Its hands down the best non-fiction book I've read in years. Its fascinating and the lack of willingness on the part of scientists - for largely good reasons - to publicly address some of the issues is because they will cause societal issues -

One of the problems that they face is that they understand some of the genetics and physiology involved but not all of it, and even if they did, it does not account for other individual factors such as work ethic, so you can have all the hardware but non of the software and do nothing. The issue is both are a continuum and its not really clear to what extent any individual factor takes precedent.

The areas of the focus of the Sports Gene are pretty diverse - baseball players vision, basketball players height and wingspan, highjumpers Achilles tendon's, the kelenjin distance runners and jamaican sprinters as well as some of the issues around gender

in each area some pretty compelling evidence is provided to explain performance and the sprinter one is interesting simply because many of the non-jamaican sprinters - it turns out - are related to the same Jamaican area through their family tree

I think one of the lessons from the book is that if you can, or where you can, identify a rare marginal gain over the rest of the human race such as leg / torso ratio combined with leg muscle and mass such as the kalenjin have, if you can then set up a system that identifies the potential runners early, and then get the ones with the work ethic you just start a distance running factory.

Sprinters - Jamaica, have done exactly the same thing which is why Bolt is running not playing cricket or football

When these "peeps" are born with female genitalia, raised as "female", and gain acclaim as women athletes, the matter becomes...complicated :)

Sincerely,
Captain Obvious

I do , of course, agree that the simple question of " 'x' or 'y' "? ought to be the determinant ....

What if you are Y but have all female genitalia and all testosterone is inert. Martinez-patio being the case study.

Should she be excluded and forced to compete with men when she is androgen insensitive?

I think this is the part that hasn't been well addressed in this thread. When the decision to exclude an athlete gets sprung as a sort of "gotcha" only when they make a breakthrough at the international level it starts to seem tragic and unfair. Sure it would be a bit painful to find out the first time you went out for the local girls track team that you don't qualify officially as a "girl" for high level competition, but at least you could decide to spend your time and energy on some other pursuit. When the athlete thinks they have done everything right (they were raised as a woman, didn't dope, etc), have sacrificed other life goals, etc and then only finds out about some arbitrary rule at the Olympics it naturally strikes a cord as unfair.

What was your point in posting this photo?

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Re: Is it time to revisit the issue of testosterone for men and women in athletics? [sixt3]
Andrewmc
Aug 24, 16 0:31
Views: 52
What if you are Y but have all female genitalia and all testosterone is inert. Martinez-patio being the case study.

Should she be excluded and forced to compete with men when she is androgen insensitive





Yes. Someone like Martinez should not be allowed to compete as a woman. Matrinez is a man who happens to have an androgen receptor site problem so presents phenotypically as a female.

Andrew

Your question raises an important issue, and is the significance of my post.

It is unfortunate for some individuals who present as female, but who cannot utilize the "benefits" of the 'y' chromosome they are born with. Scientifically, they are male, though raised as female, and the presence of the 'y' chromosome is the line in the sand.

When these "peeps" are born with female genitalia, raised as "female", and gain acclaim as women athletes, the matter becomes...complicated :)
Sincerely,
Captain Obvious
I do , of course, agree that the simple question of " 'x' or 'y' "? ought to be the determinant ....

Well, I'm glad you agree that X or Y should be the determinant. I wonder why the "elite panel" Andrew mentioned from The Sports Gene did not see it this way??? Possibly b/c they are "too close to the data", are overly concerned with being precisely correct, and can not see the proverbial forest for the trees. I've been that way myself sometimes, so I know of what I speak. :)

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

I think it's ironic you mention Bjorn Daehle, but in this thread there has been no mention of Eero Mantyranta, who had a genetic condition that increased his red blood cell count. I see this as a similar situation, where there is a genetic disposition to 'enhanced performance,' but the athlete in question has taken no explicit action to engage in 'performance enhancing' activity.

I would also contend that there is some genetic predisposition to VO2. If there's an AG classification, why not a VO2 classification? I see no reason that someone should be required to take a pill to lower their T level, as you suggest, but people with high VO2 can compete against people with lower VO2. If total equality is really what we're going for, let's all race, in the words of Pre, "to see who has more guts," and not to see who has a better genetic makeup.

competing in "open" categories we expect the winners to be biological outliers in some respects at least - they are the best human performers.
the difference in the women's category is that it is not open. by definition it is excluding ~50% of the population who happen to have some biological advantages (much as many of us would get our asses whipped by top women in most sports)
AG is a simple definition and reflects the fact that at different times in our lives we have different capabilities. notably, an AG win is not seen as the equal of an open win whereas an open women win is generally seen in similar light to an open men win.
both categorisations encourage people to make the most of themselves competing with vaguely similarly disadvantaged opposition

VO2 is by in large the determining factor in many sports so if we categorised on it we might as well not hold any competition. it is also something that can to some extent be trained rather than set at birth. it would be interesting though to try this, sort of like standard classes in motor racing - everyone has the same engine, see who can tune it best and then leave it to tactics and guts

if any categorisation, i'd take issue with weight classes in sports like weightlifting. to a fair extent if you want to lift heavy you should build muscle mass to the point where you shouldn't need a lighter weight class. i don't however want to encourage any more acceptance of large size as a norm though...

but yeah, it has already been suggested that we should get rid of all category competitions given the distortion of results and difficulties drawing the lines. there are pros and cons to that...

personally i say you can compete as a woman if you are undebatably female ie low T, no testes, no Y chromosome, normal lady parts etc. otherwise you can only compete in open (aka mens). tough on someone who's been raised as a woman and only finds out otherwise when they get to serious competition but thems the breaks. better to maintain integrity for the other 99%.
what would AGers think if i claimed to be 50 only for it to turn out that my parents had miscounted when i was a kid and actually i was only 45? (semi-serious)

Robert Forstemann has been mentioned. Same kind of deal. I'm willing to let those go.



We're not going for "total equality," a strawman argument frequently brought up in doping threads. Taking advantage of superior genetics is a perfectly valid avenue to athletic success. We're merely trying to define a reasonable dividing line between men and women because that is a dividing line we've decided to draw for ourselves. And nature is being a biatch and not making that line easy to draw in some cases.

I think we're kind of on the same page here. As you said, you'd let genetic exceptions go. To me, personally, I think doping, and anything related insofar as it bars a person from competition, has to include some sort of intent. I find it totally unreasonable to bar someone from competition when they have personally taken no action to cause an unfair competition. Establishing some sort of acceptable T level is equivalent to establishing an acceptable red blood cell level, yet one we can let go and one we can't?

The equivalent strawman to counter my argument would be a 'typical' male attempting to compete as a woman, and I suppose our 'self-drawn line' would be enforced in that situation, somehow, but I don't think that scenario applies to this thread.

I've no idea why they would have reached the decision they did but one could speculate and make the case that as physicians that they would be looking at the person holistically - not just the lab results - but psychologically as well and that in the case of a individual who's XY but has female phsyiology and an inability to utilise testosterone, who has been raised as a female and for an intents and purposes is treated as a female and viewed as a female by society that to exclude them from competition when they possess no advantage does not stack up.

To reach the conclusion that they should be excluded for being XY you'd have to make the case that its both in sports interests and not harmful to the individual concerned and clearly in the case of a woman - which they would be for the purposes of this conversation - who has been raised as a woman who has not material advantage over the rest of the field to exclude them could have serious pyschological consequences whilst it would have no bearing at all on any result - in the sense that they have no advantage going in to an event

I suspect that making the case in court would also be quite difficult - not because we can not all sit here and say "its really straightforwards, XY means you can not compete with females". I'm pretty sure that a court would not limit the basis of its decision in determining gender to a single factor, and as soon as it starts to look at other factors the discussion becomes much more complicated.

I do not have an answer for this - I have sympathy for everyone in the field, for a variety of different reasons. I saw CS crush the field at a diamond league earlier this year, and as soon as she walked out, its pretty clear she is physically very different. At the same time, whilst she is at one end of the spectrum, there are others for whom the differences are far less clear.

I think that part of the problem here is that the only way that this can be definitively solved is to have a hard line XX or XY but I also recognise that for many of the individuals concerned, and the concerned of the physicians, scientists and others involved that they may see this as being far more nuanced than a hard line in the sand would suggest

http://www.cnsnews.com/...e-male-female-sports

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Dave Campbell | Facebook | @DaveECampbell | h2ofun@h2ofun.net

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Lions don't lose sleep worrying about the sheep

Read the article dave, and they guys logic is a flawed as many here that are advocating for women to compete against men for overall winners.

Once again, being good enough to get in the army or other services is a little high bar that many women can get over. Competing in sport at the highest levels in the world is a bar that "NO" women can get over, thus elimination womens professional sport all together. To equate one to the other is like saying that everyone over 60 must compete in the 20-24 AG now, because we are all human, aren't we? We make up these categories for a reason, and the reasons for women having their own sports have not changed since they started getting a crumb of equality in the 1970's.

But I have already said all this, this author has no idea what he is talking about, but makes for good headlines I guess. Certainly he does not have 2 daughters and 2 granddaughters.

That is evidence of what?

I've two daughters. Till puberty they're likely to be able to go head to head with boys but at about 11 it's game over, they'll be physically slower, weaker, have a higher body fat percentage and will, for the purposes of competition, be different

Why would you think for one second it makes sense to mix them

You are one of the loudest individuals banging on about how you do for your age relative to your peers. Why would you deny your daughters and grand daughters the same privalege

Will there be a post on building a lap pool magic?

Was yours concrete?

I just love when a few try to say I said something I did not.

As usual, cannot have a discussion on all sides of an issues with some wanting to make it personal.

Oh well.

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Dave Campbell | Facebook | @DaveECampbell | h2ofun@h2ofun.net

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Lions don't lose sleep worrying about the sheep

Why don't you explain why you posted the article and share your thoughts on it?

Andrew

My feelings are very much in line with what you have clearly presented here. Thank you for taking the time to share.
It is , indeed, very unfortunate for the athletes affected - both the individuals with physiological anomolies, and the other women looking for a level playing field. This issue is, IMO, not one of women's rights to equality to men , as has been brought up in this thread, but the right to compete fairly amongst themselves.

The quest for a compassionate solution to a delicate scientific challenge continues...

Dave
The article you posted a link to seems to be arguing that if some women want equality in one vocation , that being the military, then in that writer's opinion all women ought to be forced to compete against men in all areas of life and sports.... I may have misunderstood the writer's intent, but that is my takeaway.

By linking to this article, it appears that you support his opinion... Hence, the questioning of your beliefs of how your daughters and granddaughters ought to be treated wrt equality.

Simply posting the link without a comment leaves your opinions open to interpretation...

You and others, IMO, just miss the point I always try to bring up.

I watch Fox, CNN, ABC, NBC, CBS, etc. I want to hear ALL sides to an issues. It is not about what I "agree" with or not, since, IMO, all this stuff is just
folks OPINIONS, and really means nothing. I love to debate. I love discuss. I love to look at all sides of things without emotion. But so so few folks can do this,
let alone do this would accusing the other of what their "position" on a topic is.

I believe in todays world you have to talk about what being 'female" vs "male" is. Seems to me you cannot ignore what the government is forcing upon society.
Is it not legal that a "male" can play on a high school "female" team because they identify as "female?

All I think any of us want is things to be "fair". Problem is, life is not fair. I have NO idea the solution, never have suggested one. I just tell my kids be the best you can
be, life is way to short to get all worked up on most of this stuff.

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Dave Campbell | Facebook | @DaveECampbell | h2ofun@h2ofun.net

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Lions don't lose sleep worrying about the sheep

It is nuanced. But the rules of sport should not be. That's the conflict.

But it also let's you play silly little passive / aggressive games where you get to say "What? I didn't say that (even though I really did)....I'm just trying to 'discuss' it."

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Chicago Cubs - 2016 WORLD SERIES Champions!!!!

"If ever the time should come, when vain and aspiring men shall possess the highest seats in government, our country will stand in need of its experienced patriots to prevent its ruin." - Samuel Adams

Dave
Perhaps I am guilty of missing your point, and I apologize for my earliest post to you - I just could not figure out what you were intending to say:)

This last post was a kind attempt to show you how your post of the article link came across , to me at least... No intention of disrespect there.

WRT to you enjoying debate and discussion, perhaps more structure in your comments so that your point is made clearly.
Without that ...well.....your comments are left wide open for interpretation...and if folks interpret in a similar way...well....logically don't you think that it then must be the way it was written?

Peacefully, :)

Was this directed to me ?? Or Dave?
I hope that I can learn, as well as share, by participating here, and apologize if I have not been a good neighbour :)

I have learned a long time ago on social media, let alone ST, that no matter how you write something, some will ALWAYS take it half empty.

Something I have been taught, and need to do a better job using in my life, is seek to understand, before trying to be understood. But, it took me lot of year to
get to this point. This is why I just ignore the bullies, since engaging in the mud with them only make two muddy folks. :)

I do think this is an interesting topic. Just too bad we cannot seem to be able to discuss all sides of it, thoughts about it, respect each persons ideas,
and keep an open mind. Oh well, I just pick the jewels out of the mud. And there are lots of great folks on this forum with great ideas. I am learning
new stuff all the time.

I posted the link to the article to just provide another persons thoughts. Never said I agreed, or disagreed, which does not matter. Every persons opinion
has the right to be respected. Or do we now have "safe places" on ST? :)

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Dave Campbell | Facebook | @DaveECampbell | h2ofun@h2ofun.net

Boom Nutrition code 19F4Y3 $5 off 24 pack box | Bionic Runner | PowerCranks | Velotron | Spruzzamist

Lions don't lose sleep worrying about the sheep

No, not directed towards you.

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Chicago Cubs - 2016 WORLD SERIES Champions!!!!

"If ever the time should come, when vain and aspiring men shall possess the highest seats in government, our country will stand in need of its experienced patriots to prevent its ruin." - Samuel Adams

This issue is very "nuanced" mainly b/c no one wants to hurt anyone's "feelings". If we draw the hard line in the sand, the very, very few affected women/men will be hurt to some degree, but they will get over it. You just can't please all the people in every aspect of every subject all the time. I don't mean to seem overly hard-ass but basic biology texts across the decades have cited the XX vs XY chromosome as the distinguishing feature between female and male. Let's just use this very basic fact and straighten the situation out. As you said, the rules of sport should not be "nuanced".

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

Your hard to understand because you lack the ability to write (and think?) coherently in English. Also because you just try to be contrary to everyone. You 'make a point' and then backtrack and claim it was just a question, even though it was clearly interpreted as your opinion.

Thread from 2016 , new CAS decision re: Castor Semenya and others. 1500 metres uncertain, rules don't apply to the 5 k.https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2019/apr/30/caster-semenya-runners-discrimination-case?CMP=share_btn_link[/url]

It's not 1:1, but how'd that work out for the UCI when they arbitrarily set a max hematocrit at 50?

You had folks naturally low able to dope to the gills, and folks screwed who had a natural hematocrit near the limit already.

Yes, they couldn't directly measure EPO yet and used it as a proxy. But still, it essentially threw gasoline onto the doping fire.

FIFY

https://www.theguardian.com/...-discrimination-case

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DFL > DNF > DNS

Nevermind

I think the obvious rebuttal to this general proposal and line of thought is that there are hundreds of factors that determine performance, many of which are congenital as well as unquantifiable, and we've selected a single one (age and birth sex aside) by which to categorize participants. The consensus among academicians in sport science is that elite athletes are born, not made. How many normalization tables are we prepared to generate in order for a competition to be considered "fair"?

Give an elite marathoner as much testosterone as you want; they're never going to be a competitive shot putter.

Edit: But I do agree that it's thought provoking and we should be prepared for similar discussions in the legislative world.

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