Olympics 2024: Debate over trans inclusion hits female boxers hard - Editorial

Algeria's Imane Khelif raises her arm after defeating Angela Carini, of Italy, in the Olympics Women's 66kg preliminary round boxing match. Photo / Getty Images

In recent years, the debate about transgender inclusion in sport has entered particularly heated territory.

The debate is now damaging the reputations of two women – both of whom were born female and have never identified as male or intersex.

Algerian Imane Khelif and Lin Yu-ting, of Taiwan, are competing in the boxing at the Paris Olympics.

Khelif and Yin were disqualified from the last year’s International Boxing Association World Championships after unspecified and unaccredited DNA testing.

In 2021, they competed in the same events at the Tokyo Olympics. At that time, nobody raised objections to them participating in the brutal combat sport.

The pair departed Tokyo without medals and without controversy. Few following their fortunes three years ago would have imagined that those who speak out against transgender women’s inclusion in sport would today find themselves arguing against the right of these two biological women to compete in a women’s event at the Paris Games.

Yet here we are.

What’s changed in the intervening years is that the tone of discussion in social media and online communities about gender issues and transgender rights has reached a dangerous fever pitch. (To be clear, neither of these women are transgender.)

We’ve seen the real-world outcome of this feverish online tone in Auckland where anti-transgender rights activist Posey Parker came to speak at a rally in Albert Park in March 2023 – protests, counter-protests and criminal charges ensued.

In recent years, celebrities like author JK Rowling and technology investor Elon Musk have expressed increasingly vociferous concerns on the subject, broadly against trans rights and vehemently against trans women participating in sport.

The Harry Potter writer has 14.2 million followers on Twitter, the social-media platform owned by Musk, who himself clocks in with 192.8 million – the platform’s algorithm serves up their messages to millions more. Their sharing of divisive messages on transgender rights has great influence across Twitter (which Musk is rebranding as X) and in other online spaces.

The tone of discussion has become so heated that those who argue against trans-inclusion in sport on the grounds of protecting women have now put themselves in a corner of arguing against the inclusion of these two women.

Rowling’s misunderstanding of the situation in Paris was highlighted by a post she made on Twitter shortly after Khelif’s victory. She commented that a photo of the two fighters showed the Algerian with “the smirk of a male who’s [sic] knows he’s protected by a misogynist sporting establishment enjoying the distress of a woman he’s just punched in the head, and whose life’s ambition he’s just shattered”.

The opponent Khelif defeated in 46 seconds was Angela Carini, of Italy. She withdrew from the fight after taking a heavy hit on the nose, a blow that dislodged her headgear. Getting whacked very hard in the face is a thing that happens in boxing; it happens a lot.

When Mike Tyson put Marvis Frazier on the canvas inside 30 seconds back in 1986, no one cried foul or demanded physiological testing. It’s a thing that happens in boxing.

After their fight on Thursday morning (NZT), Carini was supportive of Khelif.

The trans community – who are literally on the sideline of this event while simultaneously at the heart of the debate – already faces challenges and barriers to participation in sport. Now, a fight that isn’t even theirs is adding to the misconceptions about them.

Hear it as it happens with live commentary of the Olympic Games Paris 2024 on GOLD SPORT & iHeartRadio, plus comprehensive coverage on Newstalk ZB.