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Michael Cook
Michael Cook is editor of Mercator
Thankfully, Kamala Harris staunchly opposes sexual violence against women, as, indeed, anyone with a scrap of decency should.
Just a few days ago, she said: “It is the responsibility of all of us – governments, international organizations, civil society, and individual citizens – to actively confront conflict-related sexual violence and to work to rid our world of this heinous crime and to do what is necessary to hold perpetrators accountable.”
Bravo! Who could disagree? Vice-President Harris voices the consensus of a sane world.
With the exception of the International Olympic Committee.
The IOC is allowing two male boxers to compete against women in the Paris Olympics this week. Boxing is ritualised violence. Its purpose is to punch opponents’ heads in, to lay them out flat on the matt. The loser can end up with broken bones, bleeding, concussed, or even dead.
But the IOC’s position is that male boxers can self-identify as women. So Imane Khelif, of Algeria, and Lin Yu-Ting, of Chinese Taipei (Taiwan), will be competing against women. Khelif will fight Italy’s Angela Carini tomorrow and Lin Yu-Ting will fight on Friday.
While neither of them has openly identified as trans, they were both disqualified from the Women’s World Boxing Championships in March last year for having “XY chromosomes.” Critics have speculated that Khelif and Lin have a Difference of Sexual Development (DSD) disorder, where the genitalia are atypical in relation to the chromosomes or gonads. Whatever the answer is, they punch like guys.
Mexican boxer Brianda Tamara went into the ring against Imane Khelif. She felt lucky to have survived. She wrote on X:
“When I fought with her I felt very out of my depth. Her blows hurt me a lot, I don’t think I had ever felt like that in my 13 years as a boxer, nor in my sparring with men. Thank God that day I got out of the ring safely, and it’s good that they finally realized [what was going on].”
No one should be surprised. The power of a male’s punch is 162 per cent greater than a woman’s, according to research by the University of Utah. The least-powerful man in experiments was still stronger than the most powerful woman.
According to a position paper by the Association of Ringside Physicians, transwomen (i.e., natal men) should not be allowed to fight women:
Transgender women retain significant anatomic differences and proven physiologic advantages over otherwise matched cisgender women, resulting in mismatched opponents. This increases the risk of serious injury in the cisgender women.
A spokesperson for the IOC, Mark Adams, said earlier this week that Khelif and Lin had passports which identified them as women and that they had competed for years against women – including at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics. “I would just make the point that they were eligible by the rules of the federation, which was set in 2016 and which worked for Tokyo to compete as women, which is what they are, and we fully support that.”
Translation from IOC-speak: Nothing to see here, move on, please, move on. please. Women get their heads punched in all the time. Move on, please.
“Ridiculous,” tweeted tennis legend Martina Navratilova. “They might have the right (female) passports but they do not have the female bodies!!!”
The controversy over Khelif and Lin is also about politics. The IOC is distancing itself from the International Boxing Association because it is controlled from Moscow. In fact, there may not be any boxing at the Los Angeles Games in 2028 because of the dispute. The IBA, which ran the Women’s World Boxing Championships, uses a genetic test to confirm sex; the IOC allows anyone to compete who has been approved by the local federation. According to the IOC’s 2023 Framework on Fairness, Inclusion and Non-Discrimination on the Basis of Gender Identity and Sex Variations, “athletes should be allowed to compete in the category that best aligns with their self-determined gender identity, provided they meet relevant eligibility criteria.”
Whether its apparatchiks are motivated by politics or gender ideology or both, the IOC is demonstrating criminal indifference to women boxers’ safety. If Khelif and Lin’s opponents end up brain-damaged or dead, the IOC will have blood on its hands.
“The physical abuse of women on an Olympic stage eliminates the integrity of all Olympic events and risks lifelong injury or even death for female athletes.,” says Marshi Smith, of the Independent Council on Women’s Sports. “This deceit cannot be allowed to continue.”
The Olympics is a magnificent spectacle. But blinded by gender ideology, the IOC seems determined to ruin it.
This article was originally published by Mercator.
