These are difficult issues to deal with. They should not be mixed with race. I don't see any grounds for this being considered racial discrimination, because other black women contestants too may have the same grievance against her.
At the same time, one must try to bracket this with fraud. It's quite possible that she may have never been aware of her medical condition. I'd think it overwhelmingly probable, not just possible. Gender is to a large extent a state of the mind, of the way you get conditioned to think based on the behavior of those around you, and the upbringing you get.
Becoming a world champion comes at the cost of a lot of relentless hard work, dedication and perseverance. And she should be held in esteem for that.
Whether her physical constitution, hormonal effects, and concomitant musculature can be considered an unfair advantage should be deliberated on by an experts panel, including both medical and physiological experts, as well as sociological ones. We have to account for the mental effect it'll have on the person in question as well, for no real fault of hers.
In no way is this episode an affront to any race. People who propound such theories are grossly mistaken.
Santhi Soundarajan has a message for Caster Semenya, the South African track star whose gender has sparked an international athletics row: "She should not abandon the fight." Soundarajan lost her 2006 Asian Games silver medal in the 800 m after failing a gender test. "I come from a small village and had no one to fight for me," Soundarajan said in an interview with TIME on Aug. 29. "I hope Semenya will come out of this better than I did."
