Should Caster Semanya be allowed to compete as a woman? Tipped for 800m gold, she has no ovaries, nearly as much testosterone as a man and has sparked a huge ethical debate
- Caster Semenya, 25, a South African runner, is tipped to win the 800m
- But the athlete has ignited a debate about gender at the Olympic Games
- Semenya has testosterone levels three times the normal level in women
- She has no womb or ovaries but rather internal testes due to abnormality
Of all the stars at Rio, few are as hotly tipped for resounding victory as 800m runner Caster Semenya. Fewer still can match “her” for controversy.
There are those who say she should not be allowed to compete in the Olympics women’s 800m, which she is almost certain to win. No doubt they would also like to see her stripped of her former victories — gold and silver at the 2009 and 2011 World Championships and silver at the London 2012 Olympics.
It is not accusations of doping that dog the South African, though it does come down to chemistry. The question is whether she is, in fact, a biological woman.
Semenya, 25, has testosterone levels three times the normal level found in women and approaching those of a man. Furthermore, she has no womb or ovaries, and instead, owing to a chromosomal abnormality, internal testes.
As a result, her appearance is startlingly masculine: her face and physique bring to mind the likes of those East German female hammer throwers of the Sixties and Seventies, whose young bodies were irredeemably masculated by cruel state-sponsored doping programmes.
Though such figures were often the subject of jocularity here in the West, these women’s lives were ruined and often shortened. And just as we should tread carefully when discussing such cases, we should also treat that of Caster Semenya with sensitivity.
It is clearly not her fault she has the condition hyperandrogenism, which causes her body to produce and absorb an excessive amount of male hormones. Though Semenya, as is her right, identifies herself in societal terms as a woman, many in the world of medicine would describe her as intersex or a hermaphrodite.
So with a physique more typically masculine than feminine, is it fair to allow Semenya to compete as a woman? This awkward question must be asked for her presence in the women’s competition presents ethical dilemmas.
