Note: The Morning Mile is a column written about the intersections of sports, pop culture and politics written by Culture Editor Ryan Shepard. The views of Ryan Shepard do not necessarily reflect those of Def Pen writers, editors and staff.
Within the last three years, women’s boxing has experienced a boom in popularity. From Alycia Baumgardner’s grudge match with Mikaela Mayer to Seniesa Estrada’s battle with Yokosta Valle, there has been no shortage of big moments for the sport in recent years. Not to mention, Katie Taylor and Amanda Serrano are set to fight in front of more than 200 million Netflix subscribers this fall and Claressa Shields is the subject of an upcoming film from Academy Award winner Barry Jenkins. Still, none of the stars mentioned have been the most talked about fighter in women’s boxing this past month; that distinction belongs to a woman from Ain Mesbah, Algeria. Her name is Imane Khelif, and despite widespread attempts to spread misinformation, she is a woman who will attempt to win gold at the 2024 Summer Olympic Games on Friday, August 9.
On August 1, the Algerian amateur stepped into the ring, hoping to advance to the quarterfinals. While she achieved her goal, she did so in an unprecedented fashion. Forty-six seconds into the fight, her opponent, Angela Carini, was hit with a right hand and elected not to continue with her Olympic campaign.
“After the second punch, after years of experience, I felt a strong pain in the nose. I said enough, because I didn’t want. I couldn’t finish the fight after the punch to the nose. So it was better to put an end to it,” Carini said after the fight.
Carini’s decision to end the bout in the first round and her subsequent comments ignited a social media firestorm. As video of the bout circulated throughout social media, X accounts with large followings, such as Libs of TikTok, and media personalities on outlets like FOX News suggested Khelif was not a woman.
“How can a biological male boxer possibly be allowed to compete against a biological woman?” FOX News Joe Concha contributor asked.
Those who claim Khelif is not a “biological woman” often tie their arguments to statements made by the International Boxing Association (IBA) last year. After Khelif beat Russia’s Azalia Amineva and Uzbekistan’s Navbakhor Khamidova at the Women’s World Boxing Championships, the IBA claimed Khelif and other athletes tried to deceive the organizations by pretending to be women. As a result, her four wins at the Women’s World Boxing Championships were ruled as no contests and she was not allowed to compete in the championship round.
“Based on the results of DNA tests, we identified a number of athletes who tried to deceive their colleagues and pretended to be women. Based on the results of the tests, it was proven that they have XY chromosomes. Such athletes were excluded from the competition,” Russian sports luminary and IBA President Umar Kremlev stated.
Despite saying that Khelif pretended to be a woman, the organization nor Kremlev disclosed any concrete evidence to support their claims. Instead, they publicly misgendered her and then argued that they couldn’t share important details about the test because it would violate her privacy. However, there is evidence that contradicts the IBA’s claims. Khelif’s passport states that she is a woman, and her home country of Algeria has banned gender-affirming care that would allow athletes to transition if they wished to do so. Furthermore, the Algerian Olympian has never publicly identified as anything other than a woman, and she has competed in previous Olympic Games as a woman. The IBA also worked with the International Olympic Committee to set the boxing guidelines for the 2020 Summer Olympic Games, in which Khelif was approved to compete as a woman.
Unfortunately, the IBA and those who have used their past statements to support their arguments have not stopped their onslaught. Instead, the IBA has seemingly doubled down on its previous claims. On August 5, 2024, the organization issued a statement regarding its testing at the Women’s World Boxing Championships. According to their testing, they have determined Khelif possesses XY chromosomes commonly found in men and concluded she experiences differences in sexual development (DSD).
“Differences in sex development (DSD) is a group of rare conditions involving genes, hormones, and reproductive organs, including genitals. It means a person’s sex development is different to most other people’s. Sometimes, the term Disorders of Sex Development is used, as is Variations in Sex Characteristics (VSC) or Diverse Sex Development. Some people prefer to use the term intersex,” an entirely separate statement from the UK’s National Health Service reads.
Ultimately, the IBA states, “Definition of Men/Male/Boy = individual with chromosome XY. Definition of Women/Female/Girl = individual with chromosome XX.” However, health professionals from around the world beg to differ. Dr. Claus Højbjerg Gravholt of Denmark says it’s impossible to characterize everyone with a Y chromosome as a male and everyone with an X chromosome as a female.
“If I showed you pictures of my patients without any clothes on, you would say, well, these are females that I’m looking at,” he explained to The Independent.
“But, in fact, they actually have a Y chromosome. And so it’s really coming back to, what is sex? Is sex something you can see out of the chromosomes? No, it’s not. Is sex something that you can see depending on which hormone, estrogen or testosterone, you preferentially produce? No, it’s not. Sex is much more complicated.”
Those siding with the IBA may argue that those experiencing differences in sexual development may produce more testosterone than their competitors, allowing them to become stronger and punch harder. Regarding Khelif, there is little evidence to support this claim. In 50 amateur bouts, she has not exactly earned a reputation as a knockout artist.
“She’s only had [six] knockout wins, so I don’t think she’s the monster puncher that we were all led to believe [she was] when she hit the Italian girl in the Olympics yesterday. It just makes you stop and rethink,” former super middleweight champion Carl Froch pointed out.
Dr. Shane Heffernan of Swansea University also tells BBC that there aren’t enough known and studied athletes with a DSD to make a valid scientific conclusion about whether they have an advantage.
“Females with a DSD known as androgen insensitivity syndrome have XY chromosomes; they produce testosterone; but their bodies aren’t equipped to process it. So they don’t get any of the benefits from that testosterone, like males do,” he explained to BBC’s Gender and Identity Correspondent Sofia Bettiza.
With that said, it is important to point out that Khelif has routinely stated that she does not have a DSD. The only evidence of Khelif having a DSD comes from the IBA, an organization deemed so incompetent, corrupt, and poorly run that the IOC cut ties with it before the 2024 Summer Olympic Games. In fact, the IOC has even publicly pushed back against the IBA in support of Khelif.
“There’s a whole range of reasons why we won’t deal with this. Partly confidentiality. Partly medical issues. Partly that there was no basis for the test in the first place. And partly data-sharing of this is also highly against the rules, international rules,” International Olympic Committee spokesman Mark Adams said earlier this week.
“The whole process is flawed. From the conception of the test, to how the test was shared with us, to how the tests have become public, is so flawed that it’s impossible to engage with it.”
In addition to the IOC, Khelif has the support of her Algerian compatriots. The nation’s leading, daily newspaper called her “an iconic figure in national sport.”
“Thank you Imane Khelif for making all Algerians happy, with this strong and wonderful qualification for the final,” Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter.
“All Algerian women and men are with you.”
If the president of a nation that has gone as far as to ban gender-affirming care does not question her identity, what does that say about those who do? If the IOC, an organization accused of corruption for decades, believes the IBA is too corrupt to work with, what does that say about the IBA? If she only has six knockouts in 50 fights, what does it say about those who continue to purport this narrative that she is an unnaturally strong power puncher?
On Friday, August 9, Khelif will enter the ring with an opportunity to earn Algeria’s first gold medal in women’s boxing. Sure, there will be a long line of detractors with unfound claims ready to delegitimize her accomplishments, but their ignorance and false outrage must not dim her immense light. Her lasting impact must not be defined by those who wish to hurl insults fueled by bigotry and ignorance, but rather, it should be how she pushed past incredible obstacles to become one of the first three athletes to represent Algeria in women’s boxing at the Olympics in 2021. She will be remembered for inspiring a new generation of women looking to excel in the sweet science. Khelif is a pioneer, a fighter and for anyone who questions her, she is a woman.
