A pair of female sprinters from Namibia can’t compete in the Olympics this year, even though the biologically male Laurel Hubbard can compete in weightlifting for team New Zealand.
Sprinters Christine Mboma and Beatrice Masilingi cannot compete in the 400-meter dash due to naturally high testosterone levels. World Athletics requires that for women to compete in events such as the 400-meter and one-mile runs in track, they must lower their testosterone levels to 5 nanomoles per liter.
It’s unclear if these athletes are intersex and have XY chromosomes as well as internal testes instead of ovaries. However, what is clear is that these two not being able to compete while Hubbard can compete is a failure of liberal compromise.
The general rule for athletic competitions should be that biological men compete against men and biological women compete against women. While the transgender sports issue is somewhat of a nonissue at lower amateur levels in many states, where lawmakers can’t name a single instance of it happening in their respective state, it matters in the Olympics. The Olympics is something people dedicate years of their lives training for, and yet, a man with biological advantages over a woman can come in and take a spot. That’s not fair at all.
The testosterone level policy is bunk. What matters is whether or not someone is a man or a woman. Some people have natural athletic advantages over one another. If that person is an XX chromosome woman, she should be allowed to use those advantages and compete against other women. If that person is a man with XY chromosomes, let him use those advantages to compete against other men. And if it turns out that Mboma and Masilingi are intersex, then let them compete in a worldwide competition for intersex athletes that includes other talented runners such as Olympic gold medalist Caster Semenya.
Meanwhile, it shouldn’t matter if Laurel Hubbard has low enough testosterone levels to compete because Laurel Hubbard is a man. Hubbard was able to train for years while identifying as a man, producing much higher testosterone levels than the average woman. The Journal of Applied Physiology notes that men, on average, have 26.4 more pounds of muscle than women (72.6 pounds versus 46.2 pounds). Men also typically have 40% more upper body muscle mass than women and 33% more lower body muscle mass, according to that same study.
This isn’t an issue that should require intense debate: Accept biology and move on.
Tom Joyce (@TomJoyceSports) is a political reporter for the New Boston Post in Massachusetts. He is also a freelance writer who has been published in USA Today, the Boston Globe, Newsday, ESPN, the Detroit Free Press, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the Federalist, and a number of other outlets.
