No. of Recommendations: 13
Dope1:And Khelif was denied permission to box in earlier events because he/she doesn't meet the criteria.
Khelif is not a "he/she," Khelif is a female, assigned female at birth.
She competed in the Women's World Boxing Championships in New Delhi in 2018 (finishing in 17th place). She competed in Russia the following year. She competed in the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games, reaching the quarterfinals, and she finished second in the 2022 Women's World Championships in Istanbul.
The Russia-led International Boxing Association (IBA), which is not recognized by the International Olympic Committee (IOC), disqualified Khelif after a gender eligibility test allegedly found she has XY chromosomes (the IBA has said the specifics of the test are confidential but alluded to the chromosome abnormality).
IOC spokesperson Mark Adams said at a news conference this week: “These boxers are completely eligible. They are women on their passports, they are women who have competed in the Tokyo Olympics and have been competing for many years, I think we all have a responsibility to tone it down and not turn it into a witch hunt.”
Yeah, too late for that.
Khelif has followed all the IOC rules and has passed the IOC's standards. The fact that the unrecognized Russia-led IBA disqualified her is immaterial.
The IOC issued a statement today, referring to the IBA ban, stating that it “was taken without any proper procedure — especially considering that these athletes had been competing in top-level competition for many years. Such an approach is contrary to good governance.”
What you have done, unsurprisingly following Russia's cue, is conflate transgenderism with hyperandrogynism — the excessive production of testosterone by female bodies — and intersexuality.
Amy Broadhurst - who fought and beat Khelif during the 2022 World Championships - said: “Have a lot of people texting me over Imane Khelif. Personally I don't think she has done anything to ‘cheat’. I think it’s the way she was born and that's out of her control. The fact that she has been beaten by 9 females before says it all.”
No matter what you mistakenly believe, Khelif was a female at birth, has always identified herself as female, has been boxing since she was a child, has lost several matches to other female boxers, and the IOC is allowing her to participate in the Olympics as a female because she's a female.
You're welcome.
