Caster Semanya & Information That Should Have Been Kept Private

Friday, September 11th, 2009

I just wanted to say how sad and disappointed I am that Semanya’s deeply personal medical information has become public news, quite possibly without her consent. WTF, news media? Is it really so important that the world know these personal details? Couldn’t it have been enough to report that Semanya will be keeping her medal? Some of the offensive and derogatory comments and assumptions that have be made by both reporters and people commenting on articles because of all this crosses all sorts of lines. This is private, personal medical information that should NOT have been released to the public at large by anyone except Semanya if she was comfortable and chose to release it. She identifies as female, and the investigation results show there was no conscious or drug-induced effort to hide knowledge or anything physical to the contrary. Can’t that be enough? Why should the public be entitled to know anything more than that? (And I’m not entirely sure even that much is our business, honestly.)

Also, from rm‘s post (scroll to the last bullet point):

I don’t know how Semenya self-identifies, and I’ve not got a vested interest in it. But until she tells us otherwise, she’s a she, and she’s fucking fast on the track and I fucking wish the media and everyone else would stop telling us what she thinks, what she feels, and who she is. Only Semenya can do that. But then again, we’ve never been very good at letting women speak for themselves, have we?

Caster Semanya

Monday, August 31st, 2009

Anyone else following the Caster Semanya story? She’s the South African runner whose gender has come under intense scrutiny by the athletic world because she doesn’t fit neatly into their gender segregated categories as either female or male. Lauren McLaughlin talks briefly about Semanya, the rigid either/or of athletics, and the continuum of gender here.

I don’t feel knowledgeable enough on the issue to properly comment or add my two cents, but I do feel for this woman who is being subjected to this intense probing of her most basic (and private!) biological and personal self. I also have several long-standing problems with gender segregation in sports and games that I have no solution for.

More links here and here and here and here.