Early Friday morning, CNN tried to claim that conservative outrage that Algerian boxer Imane Khelif was allowed to fight in the women’s tournament at the Olympics despite previously failing a gender test was a bunch of fake news stirred up by Vladimir Putin hacks. Later that night, during Laura Coates Live, The Atlantic’s Jemele Hill added another charge: racism, especially racism against black women, despite the fact that Khelif is Arab, not black.
Coates agreed with her colleagues’ take that much of the controversy is built around misinformation, “And to be clear, this is not a transgender woman. This is a woman who is being used as a poster child to try to convey some other culture war. And the fact that she is being used in that way is something that is just so unbelievable to so many people.”
Yes, some people have wrongly labeled the boxer from Algeria, of all places, transgender, but so what? There is no right to be an Olympic boxer. If Khelif has an unfair advantage over the competition due to some rare condition, it is more than fair to ask if she should be allowed to compete.
However, Coates didn’t want a nuanced conversation about that. Instead, she wondered, “And you have to wonder, why is it such a polarizing issue? Why is it so hard to believe that someone could be an exceptional athlete and a woman?”
For people like Hill, the answer is always race:
Well, it's not – we're going to peel back some layers. Let's peel them all back. Because there are some commonalities here, and it's the commonalities that women of color face who are athletes. Always constantly having their physique, their appearance compared to men. We saw this with Serena Williams throughout her career, because she's strong, she's powerful. Unlike other tennis players that she played against or were part of her era, she had one of the most powerful serves, if not the most, that you had seen in tennis. And constantly, she had to face caricatures and stereotypes that she was a man. So, these are very specific attacks that are often directed at women of color, especially black women.
Hill then tried to change the topic by declaring that Khelif’s critics are hypocrites because they haven’t spent as much time condemning the Netherlands for having a convicted child rapist on their beach volleyball team, but, to be fair, CNN hadn’t exactly covered that either.
Wrapping up, Hill declared, “The things that are damaging women's sports and are damaging participation are lack of investment, lack of resources, and lack of media coverage. Those are the things that hurt women's sports. It is not the presence of trans women. And using trans women as a weapon in what is a broader issue about women's sports is frankly disgusting.”
Coates brought the segment to a close by agreeing, “And of course, using her as a boogeyman to convey all of those things. And you know, when you said what you said, if you want to protect women and daughters, she is a woman, she is somebody's daughter, and she is a woman in sports. It conjures up that old statement, ‘ain't I a woman?’ Jemele Hill, thank you so much.”
What if one believes that child rapists and people who fail gender tests should not be allowed to compete?
Here is a transcript for the August 2 show:
CNN Laura Coates Live
8/2/2024
11:44 PM ET
LAURA COATES: And to be clear, this is not a transgender woman. This is a woman who is being used –
JEMELE HILL: No. This is a –
COATES: – as a poster child to try to convey some other culture war. And the fact that she is being used in that way is something that is just so unbelievable to so many people. And you know what? We've been here before, in a way. I mean, when I heard about this, it brought to mind the South African runner, Caster Semenya. And obviously these are distinct scenarios, but the idea of competitive advantage, if you've just read her guest essay in the New York Times from last year, it is unbelievably compelling, and it's reignited a lot of debate about fairness in women's sports. And you have to wonder, why is it such a polarizing issue? Why is it so hard to believe that someone could be an exceptional athlete and a woman?
HILL: Well, it's not – we're going to peel back some layers. Let's peel them all back. Because there are some commonalities here, and it's the commonalities that women of color face who are athletes. Always constantly having their physique, their appearance compared to men. We saw this with Serena Williams throughout her career, because she's strong, she's powerful. Unlike other tennis players that she played against or were part of her era, she had one of the most powerful serves, if not the most, that you had seen in tennis.
And constantly, she had to face caricatures and stereotypes that she was a man. So, these are very specific attacks that are often directed at women of color, especially black women.
And then beyond all that, I heard a whole lot of people who were ready to be loud and wrong about this, chime in, using women against other women, saying, we need to protect our daughters. We need to protect women's sports.
Meanwhile, the Dutch, they have a volleyball player, who was a convicted rapist, convicted of raping a 12-year-old who was playing at the Olympics. I didn't see any of those same people with those “protect our daughters,” “protect women and girls in sports.” And often when it comes to issues of equity, when we're talking about financial investment, when we're talking about giving female athletes and women's sports appropriate media coverage, where's that “protect women's sports” crowd then?
Where's Donald Trump's tweets about protecting women and protecting women's sports when we're talking about how women are under-invested in when it comes to sports?The things that are damaging women's sports and are damaging participation are lack of investment, lack of resources, and lack of media coverage. Those are the things that hurt women's sports. It is not the presence of trans women. And using trans women as a weapon in what is a broader issue about women's sports is frankly disgusting.
COATES: And of course, using her as a boogeyman to convey all of those things. And you know, when you said what you said, if you want to protect women and daughters, she is a woman, she is somebody's daughter, and she is a woman in sports. It conjures up that old statement, “ain't I a woman?” Jemele Hill, thank you so much.
