UPDATE (August 9, 2023 05:30 p.m. E.T.): Imane Khelif won welterweight gold on Friday, defeating China’s Yang Liu in a unanimous decision. Lin Yu-Ting faces Poland’s Julia Szeremeta in the featherweight gold medal bout Saturday.
There are no trans women at this year’s Olympics. There are two nonbinary athletes competing in their assigned sex at birth category, but no trans women. Years of anti-trans activists and conservatives openly raging at any sporting organization that even hinted at including trans women in women’s sports succeeded in killing the Olympic dream for any trans kids watching this year’s Games.
But none of that was enough for the internet transphobe brigade as the first week of the Olympics unfolded. First they noticed a woman with a very strong jawline on the American rugby team that took bronze in dramatic fashion Tuesday and incorrectly assumed she was trans. Next it was Facebook users reviving claims American swimming legend Katie Ledecky is trans, because of her shoulder width and musculature.
And since Thursday, the internet transvestigators have honed in on two boxers who — again — are not trans.
IBA officials never released details on the method or results of the gender tests.
After Italy’s Angela Carini quit 46 seconds into her fight against Algeria’s Imane Khelif, conservative politicians, including former President Donald Trump and Sen. Marco Rubio, and other anti-trans voices such as author JK Rowling and YouTuber Logan Paul took to social media Thursday to accuse Khelif of being a man. The rumor mill over Khelif ran wild, ranging from people claiming she was a trans woman, to others who claimed she’s just a cis man who hasn’t even transitioned and just wants to cheat. Similar accusations were levied against Khelif’s fellow boxer Lin Yu‑ting of Taiwan.
The true story is, of course, much more complex than can be explained clearly in a handful of rage tweets. Both Khelif and Lin were born as women. They have always identified as women. And for years they competed in women’s boxing, including at multiple world championships and the pandemic-delayed Tokyo Olympics. Both have posted numerous losses to cis women in their careers.
The anti-trans fury stems from last year’s world championships, when the International Boxing Association disqualified both boxers for failing “to meet eligibility rules.” IBA president Umar Kremlev claimed at the time that Khelif and Lin were “proven they have XY chromosomes.”
But the circumstances around that claim are hugely suspicious. The IBA, the Russian-led organization that suspended her, has actually itself been suspended by the International Olympic Committee over rampant governance problems and corruption issues. Kremlev, who is Russian, made his comments to a Russian news outlet after Khelif defeated a Russian boxer. IBA officials never released details of the method or results of the gender tests. Following the World Championships, Taiwan’s sports administration conducted their own tests and confirmed Lin’s eligibility for international competition. “We have no knowledge of what the tests were,” IOC spokesperson Mark Adams told The Washington Post. “They were cobbled together, as I understand, overnight [during the world championships] to change the results.”
It’s truly a shame that so many people have attacked Khelif’s gender when her true story is one of inspiration. Yet a lone, unverified claim, along with the boxers’ short hair, has led to masses of online anti-trans activists hurling abuse at two women simply for pursuing their Olympic dreams. Even some journalists like the Guardian’s Sean Ingle have called attention to the Italian boxer’s suffering and demanded explanations from the IOC. But according to The Associated Press, Carini “said she wasn’t making a political statement and was not refusing to fight Khelif.” This whole “controversy” shows how far the anti-trans movement will push in its pursuit to stamp out gender nonconformity from society. It already pushed trans women out of sports. Now it is going after anyone with a strong jaw or a muscular physique. What’s next? Are women with elevated testosterone levels (which can arise from diseases like polycystic ovary syndrome) going to be declared men? Where does it end? It’s truly a shame that so many people have attacked Khelif’s gender when her true story is one of inspiration. As a kid, she wanted to learn how to box, but her father forbade it, telling her that the sport was “not for girls.” Now she is competing at the Olympics. Yet even self-proclaimed feminists like Rowling want to ban her from boxing like Khelif’s father once did. Every day, it seems, anti-trans voices narrow who counts as a “real woman” in sports, in bathrooms and in life. Their fury and gender obsession come at the expense of women and girls who suddenly find themselves excluded from an increasingly restricted definition of womanhood. How much further must we bend to these ideologues? They succeeded in killing the Olympic dream for trans children everywhere. Now they want to push out women who do not meet their arbitrary standard of womanhood. Society has no need for gender police. It’s time we say, “no more.”
Katelyn Burns is a freelance journalist based in New England. 
