Male Boxer Khelif Barred from Female Category After Rule Change
Boxers must undergo mandatory sex testing before competing, World Boxing announced last week.
The statement specifically bars male boxer Imane Khelif from competing in female boxing until he undergoes sex testing. He was set to make a “competitive comeback” next week at the Eindhoven Box Cup in the Netherlands, the BBC reports.
Khelif won gold in female, welterweight boxing at the 2024 Olympics, despite questions about his eligibility. A year earlier, the International Boxing Association disqualified him from women’s competition after two independent blood tests found he had XY chromosomes.
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) required no such tests. Anyone with a female designation on their passport could compete in the women’s category, as Khelif did.
Four months after his gold medal win, journalists unearthed a medical report showing French endocrinologists diagnosed Khelif with a rare disorder of sexual development (DSD) in 2023.
5-Alpha-Reductase deficiency is an exceptionally rare DSD causing male babies to produce too little dihydrotestosterone, which stunts the early development of reproductive organs. Doctors commonly mistake babies with 5-Alpha for girls.
But 5-Alpha does not stop men from producing and responding to testosterone. Khelif went through male puberty, with all its athletic advantages. Upon examination, endocrinologists found he not only had XY chromosomes, but normal male levels of testosterone and male reproductive organs.
Khelif’s diagnosis must have been terribly confusing and disheartening. But it also should have prevented him from boxing against women in the Olympics.
Instead, he and his team downplayed the diagnosis as “a problem with [Khelif’s] chromosomes.” He entered the women’s category in the Olympics after knowing about his biology for nearly a year.
By all accounts, he planned to continue beating women up this year. Thank God World Boxing stopped him — and let’s pray the IOC will adopt similar, common sense eligibility requirements in 2028.
Additional Articles and Resources
Olympic Women’s Boxing Champ is Officially a Man
Two Men Win Olympic Gold for Battering Women
Olympic-Sized Stupidity: It’s Wrong for Men to Fight Women
Olympic Privilege? Officials Protect Sports – But Only at the Highest Level
Male and Female Biology Matters
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