The Human Race

According to Dr. Bowen-Simpkins, one in 3000 are born with an intersex disorder. I read an article once that claimed the number was much higher than this.

What is happening to Caster Semenya – the scrutiny, the violence of the exposé, the brutality of the jokes, the outrage on all sides – is what happens when society is forced to confront a truth its entire construction is based upon denying: that there are more than two genders, that humanity cannot be so simply divided, severed, in half.

Gender division gives power structures something to stand over. When someone tries to run headlong into it, or run across its tightly regulated boundaries, and then dare to celebrate their victory in doing so, they must be mercilessly exposed, revealed to the masses, denounced as an anomaly, a deviance from the norm: unverified and illegitimate. Would anyone have asked any questions, or cast any doubt over her identity, if Caster Semenya had not been winning her races?



She can run, but she mustn’t win, because the winner must be the Human and everyone knows that humans are only male or female. In the human race as we understand it, Semenya can only lose.

(All credit to South Africa for rallying to her side).

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