The 1936 Olympic games were held in Berlin. In Nazi Germany it was a matter of pride to show the superiority of the Germanic race and several scandals resulted. One of the lesser known scandals was that of Dora Ratjen who placed fourth in the women's high jump. Later on Dora Ratjen went on to set the women's high jump record in 1938 at the European Championships in Vienna. Shortly thereafter it was revealed that Dora Ratjen was in fact Hermann Ratjen, a male.
So began the long saga of top female athletes being accused of being male. And some athletics careers have been cut short as a result. Gender testing was mandatory in the 1960s right through until the 1996 games when several competitors failed the tests but all were later ruled as female.
Here is the latest Athletics gender controversy. South African runner Caster Semenya who cleaned up the field at the world athletic championships in Berlin last night has a very masculine appearance and athletics authorities have ordered gender testing. If she fails she will be stripped of her title and that will be that.
Two things puzzle me about this.
Firstly if there is ambiguity about Caster Semenya's gender why didn't the South African Athletics authorities get it resolved before sending her to Berlin. That would seem a no brainer, much less harmful and painful for her if she failed before going than if she fails now.
Secondly the IOC ruled in 2000 that transgender Athletes can compete as their new gender provided the reassignment occurred more than 2 years before the event and they are taking their hormones . It hasn't come up yet but it will.
Whatever the truth about Caster Semenya's real gender unless she is an actual fraud like Dora Ratjen she must surely have a greater claim to being female, having lived as one since birth than trans gender mountain biker Michelle Dumaresq, for example, who seems to have disappeared from sight after winning the 2006 Canadian Downhill Championships in a storm of controvery.