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The IOC introduces genetic testing for women and excludes transgender athletes. It is a step back into the past that is also politically motivated, comments Raphael Späth.
When is a woman considered a woman? This question has been controversially discussed in sport for years. Is it fair for transgender athletes, i.e. women who were assigned male at birth, to start in the women’s category? And what about athletes like Caster Semenya, the middle-distance runner from South Africa, who identifies as a woman, was assigned female at birth, but has naturally high testosterone levels?
What is clear: This debate is complex, there are many nuances, many different factors, many ambiguities, including at a scientific level. However, the International Olympic Committee has now made a decision that is anything but nuanced, but rather uses methods that were abolished decades ago: Anyone who wants to compete in the women’s class in the future must undergo a genetic test that checks the set of chromosomes. Anyone who fails this test is thrown out.
IOC contradicts itself
The IOC is contradicting itself: a good 30 years ago, the International Olympic Committee abolished the previous genetic tests on the grounds that such tests were not justifiable from an ethical or medical point of view. The medical consensus was that the set of chromosomes alone is not decisive for athletic performance. Instead, the IOC later set testosterone as the benchmark for performance – this was also scientifically controversial.
That’s why a few years ago the IOC went a step further: instead of prescribing testosterone limits, the largest international sports association put human rights first. No one should be excluded because of their own gender identity; instead, every sports association is obliged to adopt its own regulations – and this solely on the basis of scientific studies that clearly show that certain female athletes have clear physical advantages due to their biological requirements.
It is not known who was part of the working group
The problem: To date, there are only a few scientific studies that deal with transgender or so-called DSD athletes (women with “Disorders of Sex Development“i.e. variants of gender development) like Caster Semenya. Of course, this is also due to the dwindling number of female athletes to whom this applies. The only study of transgender athletes supported by the IOC shows how complex the issue is – it should have been the start of long-term studies in this area.
Instead, the role is now backwards: Instead of finding regulations that take into account these findings and social developments in recent years, the IOC is putting a stop to all female athletes who do not conform to the female norm. The so-called SRY genetic test will serve as the basis for this – a test that was described by the inventor and many other scientific experts as insufficient to determine athletic performance. It is not publicly available which scientific studies the IOC’s decision is based on. Only the select inner circle of the IOC knows who exactly was part of the working group that developed these new regulations.
Coventry fully on the Trump line
But what was explained transparently is that this decision was also made with the 2028 Summer Olympics in mind. The games will take place in the USA in 2028; it will be the last major sporting event with Donald Trump as president, the pioneer in the US culture war against transgender athletes. The exclusion of transgender athletes was already one of the Republicans’ most important issues in the 2024 election campaign – even though the number of trans* competitive athletes in the USA can be counted on one hand.
Since he took office, the US government has passed corresponding laws; in many states and virtually the entire college sports system, transgender athletes are now prohibited from competing in the women’s category. Donald Trump has also made it clear that he does not want to see any trans* athletes competing in Los Angeles. The new IOC President Kirsty Coventry has now fulfilled his wish. Unlike her predecessor Thomas Bach, she follows Trump’s line and uses the same discriminatory formulations, repeatedly talking about biological men instead of transgender women.
The new rules are a clear violation of existing human rights conventions and data protection regulations; even the United Nations has advocated against the introduction of mandatory genetic tests in recent weeks. Rather, they are a step back into the past, into times long thought forgotten. Exclusion instead of inclusion – that has been the new motto in world sport since today.
