Gender, Inclusion, Community, Health, Sport and Empowerment
Caster reveals her agony over sex test
BONGANI MDAKANE | 09 July, 2011 23:53
An emotional and depressed Caster Semenya has revealed the humiliation and anguish she endured when doubt was cast on her gender.
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Published July, 2011
NOTICE
The Court of Arbitration for Sport [CAS] in Lausanne Switzerland, has approved jurisdiction to enable us to file legal case: “Human Rights and the Oppression of Women’s Gender in International Sport” to be issued by Kristen Worley (Canada) Cycling and Mianne Bagger (Denmark) Golf v/International Olympic Committee [IOC].
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Three (3) Key Recent References:
Volume 9 Issue 6 – June 2011 World Sports Law Report
Eligibility: The IAAF hyperandrogenism regulations and discrimination
Author: Shawn Crincoli – Associate Professor of Law
Touro College, New York, USA.
For Full Article “Click Here”
Volume 9 Issue 4 – April 2011 World Sports Law Report
IAAF: hyperandrogenism rules are challenge proof
Author: Andy Brown [WSLR], UK.
For Full Article “Click Here”
NYTimes – April 24th, 2011 – Redefining the Sexes in Unequal Terms
Author: Prof. Alice Dreger, clinical medical humanities and bioethics.
Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern University. Chicago, Illinois, USA.
For Full Article “Click Here”
Published July 2011
PLAY THE GAME 2011 Programme Committee confirms today, Inclusion First Foundation presentation “Little Difference, Huge Impact: The Gender Challenge to Sport” – October 3-6th. Cologne Germany.
This could not have been received at a better time. I received confirmation early this morning from the organizers from Play The Game in Denmark, that I have been approved by the Programme Committee to present on behalf of our new foundation.
Play The Game Conference 2011 - “Bringing change to the heart of sport.”
For the seventh time Play the Game will gather stakeholders in sport to join the discussion on essential issues in world sport at the world communication conference Play the Game 2011 – bringing change to the heart of sport.
The conference offers a unique forum for dialogue on sport. Over 13 years and six world conferences, Play the Game has become the only international forum where leading stakeholders meet face-to-face in free and fact-based debates about the most important challenges to modern sport.
For Further Details about Play the Game: “Click Here”
For Further Details about Inclusion First Foundation: “Click Here”
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Published June 10th, 1011
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Volume 9 Issue 4 April 2011
IAAF: hyperandrogenism rules are challenge proof
The International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) is confident that its rules on the eligibility of females with hyperandrogenism will withstand legal challenge when they are published on 1 May. Hyperandrogenism is a medical condition involving excessive production of hormones (androgens) such as testosterone.
Guidelines published by the International Olympic Committee on 5 April and the IAAF rules allow a female with hyperandrogenism to compete in women’s events ‘provided that she has androgen levels below the male range (measured by testosterone levels in serum)’. “We have received good feedback from lawyers and human rights experts”, said an IAAF spokesperson. “It is the only way to deal with this issue from a medical point of view. If we don’t have rules on this, we will also face legal challenge from other female athletes.”
Kristen Worley, founder of the Coalition of Athletes for Inclusion in Sport, questioned basing eligibility rules on androgen levels. “It flies in the face of the overwhelming evidence of the tremendous hormonal variability among humans”, she said. “This sets up many other young people for the devastating treatment that Caster Semenya experienced.”
Both the IAAF and IOC also dismissed concerns that by making an athlete who fails a hyperandrogenism test ineligible, they are posing a threat to their privacy. ‘A female athlete who declines, fails or refuses to comply with the eligibility determination process under the regulations shall not be eligible to compete in women’s competition’, read a 14 April IAAF release. Both the IAAF and IOC said there had been similar cases in the past that had been kept private. “Early detection for example under the Athlete Biological Passport will eliminate this issue”, said an IAAF spokesperson.
The IOC’s hyperandrogenism rules are scheduled for approval at the 123rd IOC Session in Durban, 1-9 July. “Once all athletes have their own biological passports, a case would be identified by abnormal hormone levels”, said an IOC spokesperson. “Since it may take some years for biological passports to become fully applicable, we will rely on the following mechanisms to trigger an androgen investigation: (i) the athlete may have symptoms that make her consult her team doctor; (ii) a pre-participation health examination may reveal there is a problem; (iii) a suspicion may arise in the doping control station; or (iv) a doping control analysis may reveal an abnormal hormone pattern”.
Goto Full Publication “Click Here”
Published May 2011
Oscar Pistorius the new A*Men Cologne – Represented as a modern day hero.
Brilliant and ground breaking! This is the positive messaging of change and inclusion we are working towards.
Just Fabulous!
Removing the boundaries of diversity. The possibilities are unlimited, doing it together.
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Goto – YouTube Advertisement – “Click Here“
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Published May 16, 2011
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A Brilliant Canadian Production!! – “It Gets Better Canada” – LGBT Celebrity Canadians share their stories for the It Gets Better Project
Nearly 30 Canadian celebrities have taken part in Canada’s version of ‘It Gets Better.’ It’s a half-hour video (launching November 2nd in Toronto) and fundraiser for Ontario’s LGBT Youthline. One of the celebrities in the film, Rick Mercer, will be on the show tonight to discuss this great campaign.
“It Gets Better Canada” UTube Video – “Click Here”
Many LGBT youth can’t picture what their lives might be like as openly gay adults. They can’t imagine a future for themselves. So let’s show them what our lives are like, let’s show them what the future may hold in store for them.
Growing up isn’t easy. Many young people face daily tormenting and bullying, leading them to feel like they have nowhere to turn. This is especially true for LGBT kids and teens, who often hide their sexuality for fear of bullying. Without other openly gay adults and mentors in their lives, they can’t imagine what their future may hold. In many instances, gay and lesbian adolescents are taunted — even tortured — simply for being themselves.
Justin Aaberg. Billy Lucas. Cody Barker. Asher Brown. Seth Walsh. Raymond Chase. Tyler Clementi. They were tragic examples of youth who could not believe that it does actually get better.
While many of these teens couldn’t see a positive future for themselves, we can. The It Gets Better Project was created to show young LGBT people the levels of happiness, potential, and positivity their lives will reach – if they can just get through their teen years. The It Gets Better Project wants to remind teenagers in the LGBT community that they are not alone — and it WILL get better.
Goto “It Gets Better Project” website for more information “Click Here”
Learn more about the LGBT Youthline “Click Here”
Published May 15th, 2011
Canada captures two gold medals at Para-cycling World Cup
CANADIAN CYCLING ASSOCIATION
2011.05.05
CANADA CAPTURES TWO GOLD MEDALS AT PARA-CYCLING ROAD WORLD CUP IN AUSTRALIA
The women tandem of Robbi Weldon and Lyne Bessette, as well as Jaye Milley take top honours in road race
(Sydney, AUS – May 5, 2011) The Canadian Para-Cycling Team won three medals on the second day of the 2011 UCI Para-Cyling Road World Cup in Sydney, Australia, including two gold medals. The women’s tandem composed of Robbi Weldon and Lyne Bessette, as well as Jaye Miley both won the gold medal in the road race of their respective categories while the Canadian handcycling relay team took the bronze medal.
Jaye Milley of Calgary, Alberta dominated the road race in the C1 category, completing the 53.7-km course in a lightning fast time of 1:40.44, beating his closest competitor, Austria’s Andreas Kirkl, by more than eight minutes.
Milley, who has been on the National Team for less than a year, is learning rapidly and is becoming an athlete to watch for on the start line. Milley won the bronze medal in the Kilo time trial at the 2011 UCI Para-Cyling Track World Championships in Montichiari, Italy, this past March.
The women’s tandem race, won by the Canadian duo comprised of Paralympian Robbi Weldon of Thunder Bay, Ontario and Olympian Lyne Bessette of Knowlton, Quebec, was much different. In a thrilling three-tandem sprint to the finish line, it’s the Canadians that edged by just one second the tandem of Jayne Parsons and Sonia Waddell of New Zealand, second, and the British duo of Lora Turnham and Fiona Duncan, third.
Goto to Full Press Release “Click Here”
Published May 6th, 2011
Frost Illustrated
Sports body to reject ‘I know it when I see it’ standard for women
May 4th 2011
“The International Olympic Committee and the International Association of Athletics Federations have a new policy to deal with athletes whose sex development is unusual.
The bad news is that the new policy appears biased and sexist which, critics worry, could trickle down to school-based sports. Players will be tested for testosterone and women with high levels will be excluded from games while men will not.”
Goto to Full Article “Click Here”
Other Reference
NYTimes April 24th, 2011 – Redefining the Sexes in Unequal Terms
Prof. Alice Dreger, clinical medical humanities and bioethics.
Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern University.
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Published April 4th, 2011
IAAF – Releases Today HA Regulations – Explanatory Notes re Hyperandrogenism – Continued Aggression, Oppression and Medicalization of Women Athletes.
A tremendous setback for women’s participation in sport, human rights and Olympic Movement.
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“Despite the well documented sorry history of the medicalization of women, it medicalizes the definition of womanhood one more time, taking the expression of embodied gender identity out of the hands of the very humans involved, and setting up many other young people for the devastating treatment that Caster Semenya experienced. Moreover, it flies in the face of the overwhelming evidence of the tremendous hormonal variability among humans.
What is further shocking, the IAAF and IOC projecting the athletes health is at risk and or see as “abnormal” to purposely publicly mislead to legitimize their policy and unsupported actions. Where in-fact most high performance female athletes have raised level of androgens for various natural reasons, ad that that they are some of the healthiest women on the planet. Only to be presumed “unwell” when being ONLY confronted by the IAAF and IOC.
In the elite mens division, there are are no set limits – in-fact promoted and take advantage of to push the male human performance barriers.
This is a social ethics problem, which in-fact has whatsoever nothing to do with the athletes themselves. This is an entrenched and historical problem of sport, IOC and IAAF and how ALL women are perceived as high performance athletes as women in sport.”
Kristen Worley – Canadian High Performance Elite Athlete/Gender Educator
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“The bad news is that the new policy seems sexist in its philosophy. Indeed, it is so sexist that it may even count as a violation of Title IX, which will matter because the international policies will undoubtedly trickle down to school-based sports.
The hormones in question are not naturally exclusive to men. Women and men naturally make androgens — sometimes called strength-building hormones — including testosterone.
Yet despite the fact that testosterone belongs to women, too, the I.O.C. and the I.A.A.F. are basically saying it is really a manly thing: “You can have functional testosterone, but if you make too much, you’re out of the game because you’re not a real woman…”
“…Yet this newly proposed biological reduction of women to a hormonally disadvantaged class of people — one medically made disadvantaged, if necessary — struck many of us as regressive from the standpoint of women’s rights. Indeed, it reminds me of those itty-bitty shorts that college women’s volleyball players must wear. They each sexualize the bodies of female athletes as a requirement of play. They each insist that a woman never be manly.”
NYTimes April 24th, 2011 – Redefining the Sexes in Unequal Terms
Prof. Alice Dreger, clinical medical humanities and bioethics.
Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern University.
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“How can the I.O.C. and I.A.A.F. claim that they support the full inclusion of women when they reimpose a medical test for their very identity? It’s a huge setback for human rights and the integrity of the Olympic movement.”
April 24th, 2011 – Redefining the Sexes in Unequal Terms
Former Canadian Olympian, Dr. Bruce Kidd
University of Toronto.
Download Official IAAF Document PDF Release “Click Here”
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Other Supporting References of the Historical Impact of Gender Testing
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Journal of Human Sport & Exercise
An approach to the biological, historical and psychological repercussions of gender verification in top level competitions
JOURNAL OF HUMAN SPORT & EXERCISE – VOLUME 5 | ISSUE 3 | 2010 _________________________________________________________________________________________
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The University of Western Ontario Medical Journal
Gender verification testing: Necessary for the integrity of international athletics, or inexcusable breach of personal privacy?
Volume 79, Number 2 – Endocrinology -Published Spring 2010
Published May 2nd, 2011
This article is a reflection of Canada’s commitment and leadership to diversity, social ethics and inclusion. In April, we convened in Ottawa as a select panel, hosted by the Canadian Centre of Ethics in Sport. Unanimously condemning gender testing and the Stockholm Consensus despite the sorry history of which they were designed too medicalize women and the definition of womanhood, taking expression of embodied gender identity out of the very hands of the very humans involved , and setting up many other young people for the devastating treatment that Caster Semenya experienced. Moreover, it flies in the face of the overwhelming evidence of the tremendous homonal variability among humans.
NY Times ESSAY – Sports
Redefining the Sexes in Unequal Terms
April 23, 2011
The good news is that the International Olympic Committee and the International Association of Athletics Federations, the governing body for track and field, have worked hard to come up with a new policy to deal with athletes whose sex development is unusual.
Although sports officials contend that this reworking is not a specific response to the fiasco surrounding the South African runner Caster Semenya, what happened to Semenya constitutes reason enough to seek reform. Surely no athlete should learn from watching television, as Semenya did, that her sex has been called in question on the international stage. And no athletes should have to face the previous patchwork policy on sex testing, wondering what will happen if their particular condition is not clearly explained in the rules.
The new policy no longer allows any room for a simplistic “I know it when I see it” approach to who counts as a female athlete. Women who test in the male range for functional testosterone will have to have their levels chemically squashed in order to play. (Functional testosterone means not just the amount the body makes, but also how the body responds to it, because some people’s cells lack receptors to respond.)
The bad news is that the new policy seems sexist in its philosophy. Indeed, it is so sexist that it may even count as a violation of Title IX, which will matter because the international policies will undoubtedly trickle down to school-based sports.
The hormones in question are not naturally exclusive to men. Women and men naturally make androgens — sometimes called strength-building hormones — including testosterone.
Yet despite the fact that testosterone belongs to women, too, the I.O.C. and the I.A.A.F. are basically saying it is really a manly thing: “You can have functional testosterone, but if you make too much, you’re out of the game because you’re not a real woman.”
To my knowledge, there is no equivalent of this biochemical policing in men’s sports. If a man has a mutation that gives him a big advantage — say he makes lots of testosterone — he can count that as a natural advantage. Indeed, at least now, men and women are allowed all other advantageous biochemical mutations.
The idea behind this policy is to make a move toward creating the mythical level playing field. But what is really being leveled here is the bodies of female athletes. Thus the game being played seems to be a kind of controlling who will count as a sexually appropriate woman: submit to being made sexually “normal” through hormone treatments or you cannot compete.
The I.O.C. and the track federation would probably say that the typical man’s functional testosterone level is orders of magnitude higher than the typical woman’s. True enough, but the same large variations could be true for other naturally occurring differences between classes of athletes, and yet it is only women who are being limited in terms of natural biochemical advantage.
At a meeting hosted by the Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sport last week in Ottawa, a group of us mulled over this problem. We were all sympathetic to the I.O.C. and I.A.A.F.’s struggle. Sports has surely grown up past the age of sexual innocence, but it has not found its way. There is no perfect solution, one that is reasonably objective, universally applicable and universally satisfying.
Yet this newly proposed biological reduction of women to a hormonally disadvantaged class of people — one medically made disadvantaged, if necessary — struck many of us as regressive from the standpoint of women’s rights. Indeed, it reminds me of those itty-bitty shorts that college women’s volleyball players must wear. They each sexualize the bodies of female athletes as a requirement of play. They each insist that a woman never be manly.
In Ottawa, I met the former Olympian Bruce Kidd, a leader in international sports policy who served for nearly two decades as the dean of the faculty of physical education and health at the University of Toronto.
In a follow-up e-mail correspondence, he wrote: “How can the I.O.C. and I.A.A.F. claim that they support the full inclusion of women when they reimpose a medical test for their very identity? It’s a huge setback for human rights and the integrity of the Olympic movement.”
Alice Dreger is a professor of clinical medical humanities and bioethics at the Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern University.
Goto Full Article – “Click Here”
Published April 26, 2011
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Bolt redefined “limit” of how fast a “MAN” can run – Johnson
Jamaica Observer
Monday April 18th, 2011
Timely Article – Interview with Usain Bolts coach Brooks Johnson speaking on how
Usain’s performances changed the landscape on what the limits are to human performance and pushing those limits.
Important to note:
Coach Johnson must be speaking about “MENS” performances as there are “NO” placed “LIMITS” based on ones MALE gender and or physiology or naturally producing high hormone levels. In-fact, those very facets are exploited and pursued in male high performance sport, as coach Johnson suggests about Usain Bolts unique competitive advantage and physiology is in-fact seen as taking to a whole new level and chasing human limitations.
Where in the case of women, as the IOC and IAAF have just done by further the medicalization of women and their gender, which flies in the face of overwhelming evidence of the tremendous hormonal variability in women, of which most most if not the majority of high performance women have, which assists like the men, with other physiology qualities makes them high performance competitors in their given sport.
The IOC and IAAF, feel they are empowered OVER women to DENY women the fairness and ability to compete, perform at their very best, by regulating imposing standards of womens gender and physiology. Solely imposing standards by men of womens gender, and allowing men to run and or participate with NO LIMITS in-fact promoted, by men for men.
Coach Johnson’s comments reflects the true narrative of the issues of gender in sport as it pertains women and mens development and participation in sport.
“MONTEGO BAY, St James — Legendary American track and field coach Brooks Johnson says that the exploits of Jamaican sprint superstar Usain Bolt is helping to change people’s perception of the limit of the human body to run faster.”
Coach Johnson further stating:
“The beautiful thing about Bolt is that he can inspire people in other events to do what he did in his events, to totally change the landscape, to totally change the perception of what is the limit or close to the limit of human performance and that is what you see…”
For Full Article Review “Click Here”
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Another Key Reference:
The Observer
Sunday 21 November 2010
As Anna notes unknowingly, when we speak of “scientists do not know how fast people run or human physical limits,”limits, as her article indicates is based on solely mens performances… Her article specifically reflects this.
As the IOC/IAAF have created continued physical barriers for women to seek the same and or above performances. Of which, MEN the “PEOPLE” she is speaking of, are in-fact just MEN. WOMEN are not “PEOPLE” in sport thus justifies humiliating practices of gender testing to prove womanhood, and barriers to women’s position in sport, moreover to seek best performances with NO LIMITATIONS as men have enjoyed in high performance sport.
Gender testing, Stockholm Consensus and recent statements by the IOC/IAAF reflect this very clearly, to continue to oppress ALL women, women performances and excellence at the International and Olympic levels of sport participation.
Published April 18th, 2011
IOC Press Release – IOC addresses eligibility of female athletes with hyperandrogenism – Adopts the Coalition of Athletes for Inclusion in Sport (CAIS) Recommendations.
The Executive Board (EB) of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) today confirmed the need to set up clear rules to determine the eligibility of female athletes with hperandrogenism in female competitions, starting with the Olympic Games in London next year.
“Important to Note: This statement by the IOC is a public omission that “gender testing” of female athletes was never needed. Many athletes in the last several years so physically and publicly violated (human rights/discrimination) by gender testing which proves nothing, could have been so simply dealt with as simply as a blood test within the anti-doping model.”
IOC Coalition of Athletes for Inclusion in Sport (CAIS) Recommendations:
For Full Document Release: “Click Here”
Coalition of Athletes for Inclusion in Sport (CAIS) Recommendations:
The Guiding Principles for Inclusion in Sport “Click Here”
An incredible moment (6) years of hard work and amazing support from experts around the world and support of Canadian Sport leaders made it possible. We will never see one more athlete in modern sport history receive such harm by failed policy as it pertains to ones individual diversity and or identity.
Published April 5th, 2011
Oscar Pistorius sets new personal best to fuel Olympic Games dream
24 Mar 2011
Oscar Pistorius’ dream of competing at both the Olympic and Paralympic Games at London 2012 has moved a step closer after the South African sprinter set a new personal best.
Double amputee Pistorius clocked 45.61 seconds to win the 400 metres at the Provincial Championships in Pretoria last night. This time is under the ‘B’ standard qualifying time for the World Championships – which take place in Daegu, South Korea in August and September – and the Olympic Games.
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Does it get any better than this… What a week for breaking barriers and go forward for diversity. A sweeping change how we do sport is coming!!
Published March 25th, 2011
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Lancet 2005; 366: S38 María José Martínez-Patiño
Personal Account A woman tried and tested
“As I was about to enter the January, 1986, national championships, I was
told to feign an injury and to withdraw from racing quietly, graciously, and
permanently. I refused. When I crossed the line first in the 60m hurdles, my
story was leaked to the press. I was expelled from our athletes’ residence, my
sports scholarship was revoked, and my running times were erased from my
country’s athletics records. I felt ashamed and embarrassed. I lost friends, my
fiancé, hope, and energy. But I knew that I was a woman, and that my genetic
difference gave me no unfair physical advantage. I could hardly pretend to be
a man; I have breasts and a vagina. I never cheated. I fought my
disqualification.”
Download Full Review “Click Here”
Published March 22nd, 2011
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