Olympic Boxers Don’t Want to Talk About the Gender Controversy

TIME

Lin Yu-Ting, the Taiwanese boxer competing for the Chinese Taipei Olympic delegation defeated Sitora Turdibekova of Uzbekistan in a unanimous decision in her opening bout at North Paris Arena on Friday.

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00:00Hi, I'm Sean Gregory from Time reporting live north of Paris at the boxing arena for the Olympics

00:07where today Lin Yuting defeated her opponent from Uzbekistan in her opening bout.

00:13She advances to the quarterfinals

00:15as does Iman Khalif from Algeria. These two boxers were

00:20suspended by the International Boxing Association at World Championships last year

00:26for unspecified

00:28gender violation. We don't really know much about it.

00:32There's been a lot of controversy about the participation of these two boxers here at the Olympics. Here's what we don't know.

00:38We don't know their condition. We don't know their testosterone levels. Are they intersex athletes or do they have

00:48disorders of sex development which can cause high high levels of

00:53testosterone in female athletes. Here's what we pretty much do know. They are not transgender athletes.

01:00There's been a lot of misinformation about that.

01:03I think that athletes who have, let's say, male genetic traits should not be allowed to participate in women's competitions.

01:11Not because you want to discriminate against someone,

01:13but to protect the right of athletes to compete at equal levels.

01:18There's a lot of regulations. They are able to compete because they've identified as female on their passport.

01:24I think the question you have to ask yourself is

01:27are these athletes women? The answer is yes, according to eligibility, according to their passports, according to their history.

01:35A test which may have happened overnight was a made-up test, which is new.

01:40I don't think we should give that any credence at all. If we start acting on every issue,

01:45every allegation that comes up,

01:48then we start having the kind of witch hunts that we're having now. According to the IOC, Khalif

01:54grew up in her country as a woman. According to UNICEF, that's been her life.

02:00The Algerian boxer was born female, was registered female, lived her life as a female,

02:06boxed as a female, has a female passport. This is not a transgender case.

02:11I know you're not saying that, but there has been some confusion that somehow it's a man fighting a woman.

02:17This is just not the case. Scientifically, on that there is consensus.

02:21Scientifically, this is not a man fighting a woman, and I think we need to kind of get that.

02:26Lin Yuting, same thing. There have been a lot of people in Taiwan who have come out in support of her, saying

02:32she's been a woman her whole life. So this is a nuanced conversation. It's a tough conversation to have.

02:38It is a conversation that will be ongoing as both fighters continue over the weekend in their quarterfinals.

02:45Stay tuned. Sean Gregory reporting for Time.

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