Women's rights under attack

India Willoughby, a trans woman, has suddenly noticed this problem.

If only women had been pointing out this loophole for years. It's a puzzle why they didn't. Still, at least a trans woman has come along to tell us, so I'm sure men will at last start to take notice.

Also, the ECHR findings do not say that Semenya has XX chromosomes - in fact it says the opposite.

The complaint was that Semenya didn't want to have to take testosterone suppressing treatments in order to compete against women - he wanted to have his male body unaffected by female hormones, which is understandable, but also to compete against women with that male body. That's the bit that I consider to be wrong.

regulations of the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF – now called World Athletics) entitled “Eligibility Regulations for the Female Classification (Athletes with Differences of Sex Development)” (“the DSD Regulations”) requiring her to take hormone treatment to decrease her natural testosterone level in order to be able to take part in international competitions in the female category. Having refused to undergo the treatment, she was no longer able to take part in international competitions. Her legal actions challenging the regulations in question before the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) and the Federal Court were rejected.

While the proceedings were ongoing, the IAAF amended the list of differences of sex development (DSD) covered by the DSD Regulations; from that point onwards, they applied only to “46 XY DSD” athletes, that is, to persons with XY chromosomes, not to those with XX chromosomes. In other words, athletes with XX chromosomes having an increased level of testosterone were no longer subject to these Regulations.

So if Semenya had been female, ie with XX chromosomes, she would not have been affected by the World Athletics rules in the first place.

Proof that Semenya is male.

From the European Court of Human Rights link that allegedly disproves the CAS ruling. It doesn't. It accepts that Semenya is biologically male, but finds that some males should still be allowed to compete against women.

I mean, I just did prove it, with links about the CAS ruling and to the ECHR ruling that specifies that Semenya has XY chromosomes, male testosterone, and went to court to be allowed to compete against women with his natural male hormone levels.

How anyone can find that fair to women is beyond me.

Michael Phelps is a man, and is within the male range albeit at the top end of some measurements (but far from the tallest etc man ever, since there have been many cases of gigantism where men were taller or longer-limbed than him. Semenya is also male. The idea that because some men or women are at the extreme end of measurements means that a chromosome-based sex screen test is meaningless is bizarre. We're mammals - that means we're male or female, regardless of the fact that some males and females have disorders of sexual development. They aren't somewhere in between: Semenya's DSD is one that only affects males. That he has it actually proves that he is male.

To put it another way: my dog doesn't like men - so do you think she might struggle to identify Semenya as male, or do you think she'd just know, same as she always knows?

ETA Also to @89897 who said something similar: (about "clinging to a chromosome 🙄):

So it's your opinion that XY chromosomes are not an indication that a person is male??

Does this only apply to humans or do you think that in other mammals with the XY and XX sex chromosomes, the same uncertainty exists?

How for instance do you explain that cat fur colour, mainly carried on the X chromosome, leads to orange being a colour found far more often in males (about 80%) while tortoiseshell is the female equivalent, seen only rarely in males?

Inexplicable? Because it would be very hard to explain that statistical correlation if the XX chromosome did not correspond to females - in both people and cats, and XY to males.

Well I notice the chromosome-deniers don't want to tell us whether this applies only to human mammals or whether it's a general thing, applying also to cats and dogs.

I presume that's because they know very well that the idea that the X and Y systems of sex chromosomes is somehow not related to the sex of the resulting person is an anti scientific point of view, as logical as insisting that the earth is only 6000 years old, and possibly flat.

All beliefs which I'm perfectly happy for people to hold, by the way. I just refuse to pretend to believe them myself, no matter how happy that would make the people concerned. These days, the fundamentalist christians generally know better than to try to force others to believe and that's a great development compared to when the DUP used to shut children's playgrounds on a Sunday back in the day.