During the Paris Olympics, female Taiwanese boxer Lin Yu-ting (林郁婷) was the subject of a gender dispute.
The International Boxing Association (IBA) called her gender into question despite having no evidence. The International Olympics Committee (IOC) last year revoked its recognition of the IBA due to its failure to implement governance reforms.
Such attacks run counter to the Olympic spirit of fair competition.
At the end of 2021, the IOC announced a new “Framework on Fairness, Inclusion and Non-Discrimination on the Basis of Gender Identity and Sex Variations,” with 10 principles aimed at urging the international community to strive toward eliminating gender discrimination.
The first principle emphasizes inclusion, stating that there should be no discrimination in sports and event organizers must ensure a fair competitive environment.
The third principle states that eligibility criteria must not systematically exclude athletes from competition based on their gender identity or sex variations. Without evidence, athletes should not be subject to testing for the purpose of determining their gender identity or sex variations.
If eligibility is dependent on gender differences and disputes arise about whether a contestant is biologically female, the sixth principle outlines using evidence-based approaches.
To avoid unfair competition caused by closed-room decisions, eligibility criteria proposed by the event organizer must be subject to peer review.
Physically, legally and under IOC regulations, Lin is a woman. Any questioning of her gender is not only discrimination, but also undermines the legal systems of Taiwan and the IOC. The IBA stripped Lin of her bronze medal at last year’s Women’s World Boxing Championships under the pretext that she had failed a gender eligibility test.
However, no reliable evidence has so far been provided regarding its testing method, process and results. The IBA has also not allowed a third party review. This raises concerns about whether certain athletes have been targeted and treated differently, which is a serious contravention of the IOC’s principles of fairness, inclusion and non-discrimination.
With the IBA launching attacks toward Lin, Taiwan should be her strongest supporter. As the governing body, the Sports Administration should bring the case before the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Lausanne, Switzerland. Any ruling made by the court would be legally binding for all parties involved and apply to all IOC members and international sports organizations.
Although the process might be cumbersome and time-consuming, inaction would allow discrimination to persist, leaving Taiwan’s athletes to suffer in silence.
Wu Ching-chin is a professor in Aletheia University’s Department of Law and director of the university’s Criminal Law Research Center.
Translated by Nicole Wong
Concerns that the US might abandon Taiwan are often overstated. While US President Donald Trump’s handling of Ukraine raised unease in Taiwan, it is crucial to recognize that Taiwan is not Ukraine. Under Trump, the US views Ukraine largely as a European problem, whereas the Indo-Pacific region remains its primary geopolitical focus. Taipei holds immense strategic value for Washington and is unlikely to be treated as a bargaining chip in US-China relations. Trump’s vision of “making America great again” would be directly undermined by any move to abandon Taiwan. Despite the rhetoric of “America First,” the Trump administration understands the necessity of
US President Donald Trump’s challenge to domestic American economic-political priorities, and abroad to the global balance of power, are not a threat to the security of Taiwan. Trump’s success can go far to contain the real threat — the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) surge to hegemony — while offering expanded defensive opportunities for Taiwan. In a stunning affirmation of the CCP policy of “forceful reunification,” an obscene euphemism for the invasion of Taiwan and the destruction of its democracy, on March 13, 2024, the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) used Chinese social media platforms to show the first-time linkage of three new
If you had a vision of the future where China did not dominate the global car industry, you can kiss those dreams goodbye. That is because US President Donald Trump’s promised 25 percent tariff on auto imports takes an ax to the only bits of the emerging electric vehicle (EV) supply chain that are not already dominated by Beijing. The biggest losers when the levies take effect this week would be Japan and South Korea. They account for one-third of the cars imported into the US, and as much as two-thirds of those imported from outside North America. (Mexico and Canada, while
The military is conducting its annual Han Kuang exercises in phases. The minister of national defense recently said that this year’s scenarios would simulate defending the nation against possible actions the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) might take in an invasion of Taiwan, making the threat of a speculated Chinese invasion in 2027 a heated agenda item again. That year, also referred to as the “Davidson window,” is named after then-US Indo-Pacific Command Admiral Philip Davidson, who in 2021 warned that Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) had instructed the PLA to be ready to invade Taiwan by 2027. Xi in 2017
RSS