Talk:Sex verification in sports

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June 2008

you mention that the olympic council foasia continues the practice--vis a vis gender verification by sex chromatin. this is not true. OCA has also stopped routine GV by chromatin test since 2000 and only conducts investigations when there is a challenge about a particular athlete of if some abnoramility is detected during dopign control tests. it followes the principles enunciated in the IOC consensus document onthis subject of 2003 and the IAAF policy on gender verification of 2006.

dr m jegathesan chairman medical committee olympic council of asia <dmjega@pc.jaring.my> User:219.94.53.161 6:59, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Out of date

Article seems out of date. According to news reports, the gender verification will still be in force at the Beijing Olympics in 2008. --Voidvector (talk) 20:06, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

While the official policy of the International Olympic Committee is against gender verification, the 2008 Olympics are administered by the Olympic Council of Asia, who still use it (which is mentioned in the article). I'm not sure it actually needs to be updated, unless this causes particular controversy or comment during the Beijing games. Terraxos (talk) 01:25, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Gender or sex?

This article is titled 'gender verification in sports', but shouldn't it be called 'sex verification'? After all, 'gender' refers to a range of differences between men and women that include social behaviour and self-identification, whereas 'sex' refers to the strictly biological. Surely the latter is what they are testing for: not which 'gender role' an athlete identifies with, but their biological sex? Robofish (talk) 01:58, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

The term "gender verification" is far more common in literature on the topic than "sex determination. See for example [1], [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], [7]; "sex verification" brings up no links on pubmed.

That said, your basic point is correct. For example, in a letter to JAMA, Daniel R. Wilson wrote:

In their Commentary "Gender Verification in the Olympics," Dr Simpson and colleagues were imprecise in their use of "gender," given that the topic at hand is clearly "sex," not gender. ... Confusion of sex for gender blurs significant aspects of their respective meanings. The former denotes objective biological capacities and constraints of a physical organism. The latter denotes more subjective features of sociocultural roles acquired in specific cultural and social milieux.

to which the authors replied:

We are certainly aware of the argument for biological precision using "sex" and thus would acknowledge Wilson's contention that consistency and scientific accuracy should dictate its use. However, convention among health care professionals has long been that gender is preferable in describing intersex individuals, given the charged nature of the word sex and given that gender connotes self-identification of a person's rearing. Of course, it is sometimes necessary to describe both gender and sex when referring to specific individuals. In addition, the IOC has always used the phrase "gender verification" and to have used a different term in our Commentary would have been confusing.

So, it seems to be more a matter of established convention in the field, and not pure biological precision. Wikipedia as a tertiary source needs to follow the convention, and therefor we use the former in the title as per WP:COMMONNAMES. Abecedare (talk) 02:20, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Also, consider that it is not strictly true that "gender" means one thing and "sex" means something else. The word gender actually has four definitions and "state of being male or female, sex" is one of them. Darkfrog24 (talk) 01:25, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

I agree with Abecedare that we should follow convention in this case. We still call it "single-sex education" and not "single-gender education" because "sex" was the term in use when the phrase was coined and popularized. Darkfrog24 (talk) 01:26, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

The page should indeed be called sex verification. It's absurd to confuse sex and gender in this age. Just because uneducated and ignorant reporters constantly get the two confused doesn't mean that Wikipedia should follow suit. For example, most reporters in the mainstream media continue to confuse religion and ethnicity by reporting on strife in Iraq as being dominated by the conflict between “Kurds, Sunnis and Shiites". Does this mean that Wikipedia should follow suit? Wikipedia is an encyclopaedia, not a repository for common wisdom. It needs to stop bowing to popular prejudices and adopt more gravitas.Colenso 16:28 (UTC) Wednesday 29 October 2009

Please see the citations above. We are not talking about "uneducated and ignorant reporters" here, but about the established convention in the related academic community. Abecedare (talk) 16:38, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

The "expert" you quoted incorrectly refers to these people as "intersex" which means they are hermaphroditic not transgender (or the more correct term would be gender nonconforming, since transgender is the lifestyle choice of living as the opposite gender not the condition itself). The page should clearly be called sex verification. They are not verifying gender, they are verifying sex. Gender is something you self identity as not something that can be verified scientifically. But obviously the trans advocates are not going to allow that so..... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.207.136.200 (talk • contribs)

I'm actually in agreement in that the article should really be titled sex verification in sports (I just made that redirect) as gender does not equate to physical sex. How and ever, just to point out that it's been repeatedly shown that being transgender is no more a "lifestyle choice" than being gay. People do choose to transition, however which is a completely different matter. As to the article, this is primarily about variation of sex differences and how this applies to competitive sports, and trans* implications only get a three-line mention - Alison ^❤ 21:58, 21 November 2014 (UTC)

Princess Anne test

The paragraph concernig Princess Anne needs citation.

Until a source is provided, I may suggest a good reason for the Princess Anne not to be tested other than being daughter of host country's head of state. The equestrian events in the Olympic Games are sex insensitive (including here, both riders and horses). So, unless otherwise stated, I would be assuming that every female competitor in equestrian events (including, of course, Princess Anne) were not ever tested for sex (it was unnecessary) thus making irrelevant the remark on Princess Anne.

The question comes out today because of the Semenya's affaire: Spanish newspaper El País is providing information on gender verification in sport including that very Princess Anne's affair. I donot know wether wikipedia is the source of that sentence or not.

Etaoin Shdrlu (talk) 19:56, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Indeed, this seems to be a hoax. There were no separate equestrian competitions for men and women, see Equestrian at the 1976 Summer Olympics. --91.32.91.85 (talk) 22:55, 17 September 2009 (UTC)

I don't think it's a hoax, but I don't know exactly what to do about it. The cited article, a 1984 UPI article, states: "Although women who compete against men -- in such events as shooting, archery and equestrian sports -- are not required to take the test, most do. [¶] Not every woman takes the test. Royal courtesy prevailed in 1976 for Britain's Princess Anne, an accomplished horsewoman who competed in the Montreal Olympics." [8] --Metropolitan90 (talk) 05:07, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

A long time later but the cited part makes no sense and the actual source provides no clarification. If they are not required to take the test how is someone not taking the test a "royal courtesy"? If person A chooses to take a test they are not required to but person B does not, that does not mean person B had any courtesy regardless of whether most people are person A. Was she given the card despite not taking the test? Was she not even asked (assuming that woman equestrian athletes are normally asked of they want to take the test)? The source provides no explanation for how it was a royal courtesy when a random no body could seemingly have been in exactly the same position as her. Nil Einne (talk) 07:37, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

Contradiction

Sex testing has been done as recently as the Atlanta Olympic games in 1996, but is no longer practised, having been officially stopped by the International Olympic Committee in 1999.

Is this perhaps supposed to mean that it is no longer practiced by the Olympic commission? As poor Caster Semenya has discovered, it is still practiced by other bodies. Darkfrog24 (talk) 00:35, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

We need to check the sources on Dora Ratjen

The article reads as follows:

* Prior to the advent of sexual verification tests, German athlete Dora Ratjen competed in the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin and placed fourth in the women's high jump. She later competed and set a world record for the women's high jump at the 1938 European Championships before it was revealed that she was actually a man named Hermann Ratjen who was forced to disguise his gender by the Nazis.

But the article on Heinrich Ratjen does not describe any deliberate cross-dressing, Nazi-forced or otherwise. It describes a natural intergender. We should figure out which article is correct and change the incorrect one to match. Darkfrog24 (talk) 19:55, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Afaik it's well-known now that the conspiracy theory about Dora / Heinrich Ratjen being forced by Nazis to cross-dress was based on unfounded rumors: [9] (Nazis used to put cross-dressers into concentration camps, not into the Olympics), in particular Ratjen was raised as a girl, lived as a girl and didn't adopt the name Heinrich until after he was found out to be a man (albeit one with unusual sexual organs). I've removed the incorrect passage.--95.91.150.36 (talk) 15:29, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

Minor edits

Please do not mark edits as minor unless they are utterly uncontroversial, such as spelling mistakes, typos etc. Any form of additional content should not be marked as minor. see Minor_edit. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Martin Hogbin (talk • contribs) 10:00, 18 December 2011

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Requested move 4 May 2016

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: Move. We have consensus for this move, with important caveats. Several supporters noted that Google evidence suggests "sex verification..." is less common, but it's clear that the term is established, increasingly common, and more factually correct according to the current definitions and procedures. As such I find consensus sufficient to move. Cúchullain ^t/c 15:17, 24 May 2016 (UTC)

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Gender verification in sports → Sex verification in sports – It has come into common use to separate gender and biology (transgender people, nonbinary people, etc.) Ashyon (talk) 00:36, 4 May 2016 (UTC)

• Comment any evidence to back up this claim that it 'has become common'?  InsertCleverPhraseHere  09:21, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

Google trends indicates that Sex verification is more common, although this is likely because it has 'sex' in it.

Google books sources are 451:2,540 in favour of 'gender' but when screened for only 21st century sources it is 12:47 in favour of 'gender' (slightly lower recent ratio).

Google News sources are 78:3,960 in favour of 'gender' and for the 21st century it is 44:286 again in favour of 'gender' (considerably lower recent ratio).

Google Scholar sources are 347:895 in favour of 'gender' and for just since 2015 the ratio is 59:117 again in favour of 'gender' (slightly lower recent ratio).

Long story short while there is a trend toward increasing usage of 'Sex verification', the overwhelming number of sources still use 'Gender verification', both in the long term, as well as in more recent sources. per WP:COMMONNAME the correct choice here is 'Gender verification', however, this is a very good case of a place to ignore all rules and I'm going to Support it anyway (per the reasons discussed below by Alison).  InsertCleverPhraseHere  11:42, 24 May 2016 (UTC)

• Support: Using "gender" here is a factual error.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  10:06, 13 May 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose - Gender may be more accurate but "gender verification" is still much more common than "sex verification". Mark Schierbecker (talk) 22:28, 22 May 2016 (UTC)
• Support - "Sex refers to the biological and physiological characteristics that define men and women. Gender refers to the socially constructed roles, behaviours, activities, and attributes that a given society considers appropriate for men and women." - World Health Organization. So yes, sex is more factually correct. I'd rather choose fact over google hits - Alison ^❤ 04:16, 23 May 2016 (UTC)
• Support per Alison. Anarchyte (work | talk) 09:11, 24 May 2016 (UTC)
• Support "sex testing" fits use in a new paper by the UN Special Rapporteur on health, see here. This document also highlights how out of date this page is: the report points out in paragraphs 55-57 that sex testing just shifted in form from chromosomal testing to testosterone testing. That policy framework was only suspended mid last year (details in UN Special Rapporteur paper). Trankuility (talk) 09:38, 24 May 2016 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Update, May 2016

I've just finished a major update, with an attempt to consolidate cases and rationalize the historical material to encapsulate information on the three distinctly different phases of sex verification testing: physical examinations, chromosome testing, and testosterone testing. I've added many new references and checked previously highlighted concerns with existing citations.

I have also split out the (very small amount of) material on transgender athletes, for two reasons. Firstly, sex verification testing was clearly initially not designed to permit competition by transgender athletes. Secondly, Transgender in sports is clearly supposed to be a main article on participation by transgender people in sport. Trankuility (talk) 05:39, 29 May 2016 (UTC)

Such cases have included female genital mutilation and sterilization

No such claim in the document linked--Kkkkkk8888 (talk) 09:42, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

Paragraph 56 of the cited document is quoted in the text on "Hormone testing". It reads (my highlights):

56. Recently, certain international and national sporting federations have instead introduced policies banning women with testosterone levels exceeding a certain threshold from participating in competitive sport. However, there is insufficient clinical evidence to establish that those women are afforded a “substantial performance advantage” warranting exclusion.46 Although currently suspended, following the interim judgement in Chand v. Athletics Federation of India and the International Association of Athletics Federations,47 these policies have led to women athletes being discriminated against and forced or coerced into “treatment” for hyperandrogenism. In fact, a number of athletes have undergone gonadectomy (removal of reproductive organs) and partial cliteroidectomy (a form of female genital mutilation)48 in the absence of symptoms or health issues warranting those procedures.49

That is, the citation clearly mentions FGM and gonadectomy (sterilisation). Trankuility (talk) 11:38, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

References

research shows that the benefits to gender testing do not outweigh the disadvantages

How can one show something as inherently subjective as benefits and disadvantages? The source is also not research, but rather an essay which argues a normative suggestion ("gender verification’ in sports should be abolished)".

Peer Review by Sofia

Hey Sherilene,

I sincerely enjoyed your topic. This is a situation that at times people refrain from talking about. I believe that knowledge is our biggest advocate and the more we know, the better. Thank you for a great read. I wanted to mention a few things about your article that I feel could use some attention even though it is very minimal. I think your introduction grabbed my attention and informed me on what I was about to read. I did notice a few spelling and grammatical errors throughout the whole paper. Although, it was not many, I did find some commas placed in incorrect locations such as here:

The International Association of Athletics Federations ceased sex screening for all athletes in 1992,[12] but retained the option of assessing the sex of a participant should suspicions arise. However, this is problematic as well. Non-white fem....

I believe it should read: However, this is problematic as well, non-white female athletes are disproportionately targeted for.....

I also really appreciated the separation of sections as well; I believe you covered everything especially by century.

I did feel that the last section seemed a bit biased when you used words such as "some much-needed attention". Although I agree with you, I feel that these articles should have an unbiased take.

There was also a part in the beginning where you mentioned the name of a female, but I am unaware of her case. Her name is Foekje Dillema.

I am very impressed with the work you have done as it is evident that you have done some serious research and properly cited all of your sources.

I want to take a minute to congratulate you on some fine work.

I really do love the way you have structured this article.

Congratulations,

Sofia Romero — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sofi rromero (talk • contribs) 00:25, 4 April 2019 (UTC)

acsh.org as a source

I'm not sure this counts as a good source (wp:rs) here, the article reads like an opinion piece or blog post. — Jeraphine Gryphon ^(talk) 21:17, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

Fair enough, even though written by a possibly credible individual, I agree. However, if that is true, the wikipedia article itself also reads as a one-sided opinion piece in opposition to sex verification. There is another side to the issue of sex verification in sports, and although it is highly correlative to polar opinions on transgender athletes in sports, this article only presents one opinion, without presenting any opposing considerations. This article is not presenting subjective realities, intelligent design, or magic. This article has, however, eliminates some scientifically verifiable facts, vis-à-vis genetic gender has a bearing on performance outside of the last 12 months' history of testosterone. Or, genetic females who have (demonstrably) historically been marginalized in sport, have expressed their own (demonstrable) suffering at this new form of marginalization by genetic males. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hardgumbo (talk • contribs) 02:10, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

This article could use updates, but we need to get our info from 'reliable sources' (according to Wikipedia standards). Feel free to have a go at it, or dropping some sources here for discussion. Are you sure you're not actually looking for the Transgender people in sports article? This article here is specifically about the process of verification. (P.S. In this present environment it's less controversial to use terms like "transgender woman" and "cisgender woman", even on talk pages. I'm not sure "genetic male" is even a real term. 'AMAB' (Assigned Male At Birth) is an alternative, though I'm not sure if it's used in articles here.) — Jeraphine Gryphon ^(talk) 04:11, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

A term like genetic male may not be a term of art, but it has clearer meaning than AMAB (to me, obviously). I believe it would be understood in the scientific community as meaning "having an XY chromosome", without getting too wordy about it, or as vague as AMAB. So having my hands tied from using clear scientific language does dissuade me from 'having a go at it'. I was also reverted for trying to edit for clarification an unattributed and vague (really false) statement under the heading of "Sex verification of men"... "although there are no known cases where a man actually does compete as a woman". There are plenty of known cases of genetic (XY) men competing as women. It feels like the burden on me to properly edit this into a clearer more complete article is greater than that on the person who wrote it in the first place or reverts my edits.Hardgumbo (talk) 21:00, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

Wikipedia policy is clear on not referring to transgender women as men. There is already a separate section on transgender people in sports as well. Reliable sources these days use assigned male at birth most commonly and it is the most clear language.Rab V (talk) 23:25, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

Edited accordingly.Hardgumbo (talk) 13:27, 30 June 2020 (UTC)

You can't claim "many known cases" without citing a source. WP:V. — Jeraphine Gryphon ^(talk) 00:09, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

Any yet the author can claim "no known cases," without citation. First of all, there are many known cases. Second of all, it implies a dishonest conclusion to the reader that there is therefore obviously no need for sex verification. That is like saying (before his downfall) Lance Armstrong was never caught doping, and therefore there is no need for testing in cycling. I will delete the uncited no known cases.Hardgumbo (talk) 16:42, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

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Disputed neutrality

I have added a disputed neutrality template to this article per WP:NPOV.

As another editor has pointed out in a previous discussion, this article reads as a one-sided opinion piece in opposition to sex verification.

The article mentions no or minimal arguments in support of sex verification, in contrast to multitude of arguments in opposition. It uses weasel words (MOS:WEASEL) when attributing some of these arguments: e.g. "Scholars question", "commentators question", "others opposed" and "has been regarded by many". MOS:SCAREQUOTES are also used: e.g. considered "unfair" , not being "true" women and "unfemineinity". Expressions of WP:DOUBT are used when the basis of sex verification is discussed: "The protocols claimed", "perceived to give unfair advantage".

Factual assertations in the article are often sourced to commanteries, essays or other opinionated sources. While this can be acceptable, the fact that the majority of the sources seem to oppose and no sources appear to support sex verification further implies bias in the article itself.

~~~~ 86.50.119.75 (talk) 07:29, 21 April 2023 (UTC)