The punch felt around the world
Imane Khelif and Angela Carini's short Olympic boxing match has brought to light sport's problem with women.
The Olympic women’s welterweight boxing match between Algeria’s Imane Khelif and Italy’s Angela Carini sent shockwaves around the world. Khelif - who has a disorder of sex development (DSD), including heightened testosterone levels - battered Carini before the Italian retired from the bout after 46 seconds. ‘I have never felt a punch like this’, she said after the fight.
At a time when the participation of male athletes in women’s sport categories is such a live issue, this brutal inequality shocked millions. Indeed, before Khelif and Carini’s bout, the Irish boxer Kellie Harrington said she would refuse to compete against any boxers who are biological males. But it is the authorities, not individual athletes, who should be taking responsibility. Despite all of this, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and many in the sports establishment and media continue to bury their heads in the sand and pretend all is well.
Khelif is one of two boxers at the centre of controversy at the Olympics. Along with Taiwan’s Lin Yu-ting, both boxers had previously been deemed ineligible for the female category by the International Boxing Association, likely because of a cheek swab establishing that they have XY (male) chromosomes rather than XX chromosomes (female). As the charity Sex Matters points out, the IOC has allowed the two to participate in the Paris Olympics on the basis that ‘their passports say female’. If the IOC is prioritising bits of paper over previous medical examinations, this is clearly a problem.
There are some who have pointed the finger at Khelif for agreeing to step into a ring with an unfair advantage. But it is important to maintain the distinction between the few athletes with the unusual case of DSD, and the likes of swimmer Lia Thomas, cyclist Emily Bridges or weightlifter Laurel Hubbard. While the former may or may not have lived as a female from birth, the latter three are ‘trans’ - having been born and gone through puberty as male, but now identifying as women and therefore entering women’s categories. Notably, men becoming transwomen often achieve more success competing against female athletes than they did against males.
Nevertheless, in sport, biology is not quite everything, but it’s almost everything - the different social conditions and categories we give to people outside the ring or the pool become irrelevant in contests which require an even playing field for strength, endurance and power. On average, men (or perhaps more precisely, people with ‘male advantage’) can run faster, jump higher and punch harder than women and this is particularly true at elite level. If this were true in only a handful of cases, it would make no sense to distinguish sporting categories based on sex. The differences are consistent and tend to be overwhelming.
In the case of boxing, this is not merely a matter of fairness, it can be downright dangerous. The punching power of male boxers can be extraordinary - as illustrated by a darkly amusing anecdote. In the 1990s, actor Mickey Rourke decided to quit the screen for a while to pursue his other passion, boxing. He was no mug, being undefeated in eight professional fights. But he was no match for one legendary boxer, he told the BBC in 2005: ‘I once did a little sparring with Tommy Hearns. He hit me at two in the afternoon and I went down to a knee. At four in the morning, I was still throwing up.’
Quite simply, the Khelif punch became a symbol for everything that has gone wrong in women’s sport. Yesterday morning, the Today programme on BBC Radio 4 broadcast an interview with the Team GB rower Lola Anderson, fresh from her Olympic gold medal in the women’s quadruple sculls. When asked what her teenage self might make of her achievement, Anderson spoke passionately about how women’s sport had changed in her lifetime - how important it was for her to be able to watch women compete and achieve in ways she thought might not be possible. This championing of women’s sport is completely undermined by the inclusion of biological males in the contest.
If nothing else, this spectacle has proved to millions around the world the importance of preserving women’s sport for women. Commentators on many mainstream outlets have been hesitant to talk about what happened - some even suggesting that Carini wasn’t as hurt as she made out. From the lionisation of the Lionesses to incessant Nike adverts championing Girls That Run, we seem to love to talk about women’s sport, until those women want it to be for women only.
The IOC has since released a statement in defence of Khelif and Lin, arguing that the IBA’s previous decisions were ‘sudden and arbitrary’ and that these athletes have been ‘competing in international boxing competitions for many years in the women’s category’. At the same time, prominent female athletes - like former Olympian Sharron Davies - have pointed out that simple tests would eliminate confusion and end this ‘vile circus which benefits no one’. But instead of listening to female athletes - those who are most effected by these injustices, sometimes losing podium places, sometimes getting hurt - sports authorities and commentators routinely dismiss such suggestions as ‘transphobic’ or ‘bigoted’. Indeed, the IOC is refusing to engage with women’s complaints, simply stating that the ‘current aggression against these two athletes is based entirely on this arbitrary decision’.
Life isn’t always fair - sport is a great example of this fact. Sport can’t be unendingly inclusive - there must be rules, requirements and restrictions in order to ensure a level playing field for athletes. Proof - hard, cold facts - must play a bigger role than what we feel. In the name of inclusion, women are being told to step aside. This isn’t fair, and it isn’t right. It’s time we started demanding that, when it comes to women’s sport, women are most important.
Geoff Kidder and Ella Whelan work at the Academy of Ideas.
BOXING: DON’T COUNT IT OUT
In this Letter on Liberty, writer and boxing enthusiast Chris Akers argues that boxing, more than any sport, has a unique way of tapping into the consciousness of the poor, the disgruntled and the forgotten. For all its flaws, he writes, boxing has been the vehicle by which people in poverty have escaped to better surroundings. From Muhammad Ali to Lovemore N’dou, boxing’s greats have often used the sport to highlight political injustices and social issues.
‘Boxing can cut through class, race and religion - the expectation of respect for anyone who steps in the ring gives the sport its unique power. Boxing develops individuals as fighters, as people and, crucially, inspires a sense of hope in the darkest of times.’