The case of Santhi Soundarajan, the Asian Games runner stripped of a silver medal for failing a gender test, turns curiouser and curiouser. Theories being floated include the possibility that Soundarajan is hormonally abnormal:

Gender tests are only carried out if another person becomes suspicious… it was a fellow athlete from India, but this could not be independently verified….

… according to her coach, P Nagarajan, she underwent several tests - including those for estrogen and progestoerone (hormone) levels - before leaving for Doha…

“The uneven diet of poor rural people in India often give rise to deficiencies that lead to all sorts of natural hormonal imbalances,” said Sunitha Rao, a gynaecologist based in Chennai. Santhi’s friends were quoted as saying that her mother has been worried for a decade that her daughter had not gained puberty. [Link]

Or she has chromosomal abnormalities (XXY would apparently be ok in athletic competition):

The presence of two X chromosomes is taken as confirmation of the athlete’s female gender. Test results for about one in 500-600 athletes are abnormal…

The first athlete to fail a sex test was Polish sprinter Eva Klobukowska in 1967, who won a 4×100 relay gold at the 1964 Tokyo Olympics. She was found to have a rare condition which gave her no advantage over other athletes…

Genetic anomalies can allow a person to have a male genetic make-up but be physiologically female. Spanish hurdler Maria Patino, who failed a gender test in 1985, was reinstated after it was found that she was resistant to the strength-promoting qualities of testosterone… Eight athletes failed the tests at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics but were all cleared by subsequent physical examinations… [Link]

Very few are publicly asking the rather prurient question of genitalia, or the simplest explanation, that Soundarajan could be intentionally masquerading as a woman:

Sisters Tamara and Irina Press won five track and field Olympic gold medals for the Soviet Union and set 26 world records in the 1960s. Their careers suddenly ended when gender testing was introduced. [Link]

Those of ambiguous gender see it as vindication for their very real persecution:

“This should be an eye-opener to the humanitarian discriminations faced by people with ambiguous gender”… sexual minorities face a lot of human rights violations… they did not get ration cards, voting rights or passports… sexual minorities are denied jobs both in the government as well as private sector. [Link]

It all begs the question: what defines a woman? And are those answers different in competitive sports, mating and friendship?

Related posts: The Crying Games (updated), Everybody was wushu fighting, The Pump, Truly the Asian Games