Imane Khelif Announces Switch to Pro Boxing After Paris Controversy

Brittany M. Hughes | October 25, 2024
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Algerian Olympic gold-medalist boxer Imane Khelif, who caused quite a stir during the Paris games last summer after being cleared to compete in the women’s competition despite failing to meet gender requirements at the World Championships in 2023, is all set to go pro.

Khelif announced the switch from amateur boxing to professional status earlier this week, where the officially recognized heavyweight champ will presumably box women.

“I will soon enter the world of professional boxing,” Khelif said. “I have many offers. Currently, I have not made up my mind about where I will enter professional boxing. But very soon I will take this step. We, as Algerians, would like to see our level in the field of professionalism.”

Both Khelif and Lin Yu‑ting of Taiwan were OK’d to fight in the women’s competition at the Paris Olympics over the summer, despite the International Boxing Association having barred both boxers from fighting in women’s 2023 championships “following a comprehensive review and was intended to uphold the fairness and integrity of the competition,” saying at the time that tests had come back indicating that both Khelif and Yu-ting had “XY’ chromosomes identifying them as biological males.

In fact, according to The Guardian, an internal IOC info website provided to journalists states that Khelif was “disqualified just hours before her gold medal showdown against Yang Liu at the 2023 world championships in New Delhi, India, after her elevated ­levels of testosterone failed to meet the eligibility criteria.”

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But since then, the IBA has been removed from running Olympic boxing events, a job that was passed over to the IOC’s Paris 2024 Boxing Unit, the governing body that cleared both Lin and Khelif to compete and which has far more lax rules surrounding trans athletes. Both Khelif and Yu-ting, who competed in the heavyweight and featherweight categories, respectively, went on to win gold medals in their divisions.

The whole situation unsurprisingly sparked outrage among defenders of women’s sports, who rightly argued that men shouldn’t be permitted to box against women. The controversy and subsequent statements by both the IOC and Khelif’s family, who provided photos of a younger Khelif purporting to show her as a little girl, led many experts to suspect that Khelif may have been born with a Disorder of Sex Development (or DSD), an umbrella term for a host of rare developmental conditions including some that can cause a biological male to appear female at birth. Despite their outward genital appearance or sex of rearing, individuals with these conditions often experience elevated levels of testosterone during the onset of natural male puberty, which would enhance that person’s athletic abilities and create a serious physical disparity with women against whom they’re competing in sports.

It was never confirmed whether Khelif - or Yu-ting, for that matter - were, in fact, born with a DSD, and Khelif declined to clear up any very relevant questions as to whether the boxer is a biological female with female hormone levels.

As for the IOC, a spokesperson said simply, “I would just say that everyone competing in the women’s category is complying with the competition eligibility rules. They are women in their passports and it is stated that is the case.”

I guess that'll have to be good enough for any women who gets pummeled in the pro ring now, too.

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