Article about access to sport, and competing in sporting activities. Read our briefing page.
IHRA has made a formal submission to the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in response to a questionnaire seeking information to fulfil its mandate in Human Rights Council resolution 40/5 on the elimination of discrimination against women and girls in sport.
The UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights has published an essential new background note on human rights violations against intersex people.
The Court of Arbitration for Sport has issued a press release outlining a majority decision against Caster Semenya and Athletics South Africa in their case with the IAAF. Caster Semenya is a Black South African cisgender woman, born with a variation of sex characteristics, seeking to compete in the sex category she was assigned at…
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Overnight in Geneva, the UN Human Rights Council adopted without a vote a resolution on the elimination of discrimination against women and girls in sport. The resolution responds to the situation of Caster Semenya, a cisgender women, born with a variation of sex characteristics, who is the target of 2018 IAAF regulations. Those regulations aim…
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A briefing on issues affecting people with innate variations of sex characteristics in sport settings.
In a new joint paper in the Journal of Bioethical Inquiry, Katrina Karkazis and Morgan Carpenter detail the choices and harms involved in unnecessary regulations affecting the participation of some women with intersex variations in elite sport. In April 2018, the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) released new regulations placing a ceiling on women…
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For a complete overview on issues relating to intersex people in sport, read our briefing paper on sport The ACT Human Rights Commission has published a guide to the inclusion of transgender and intersex people in sport. Unfortunately, the guide homogenises intersex and transgender populations in a way that both makes intersex inclusion far more…
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The Darlington Statement is a joint consensus statement by Australian and Aotearoa/New Zealand intersex organisations and independent advocates, agreed in March 2017. It sets out the priorities and calls to action by the intersex human rights movement in our countries.
Body shaming is an intersex issue, perhaps even more than any other issue. This post intersperses quotations about intersex infants and children with quotations about the bodies of public figures.
Much of the reporting on some women athletes participating in the Rio Olympics is insupportable. It makes assumptions about their bodies, sex, gender identity and expressions that is deeply concerning. Much reporting fails to acknowledge the lack of scientific evidence for body policing by sporting institutions, and the deep personal cost of such assumptions, which…
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OII Australia and eight partner organisations collaborated in Rainbow Votes, coordinated by Corey Irlam. The Rainbow Votes coalition appreciates the comprehensive responses by the Australian Greens, Australian Labor Party and Liberal National Coalition to our 2016 LGBTI election survey. Members of the Rainbow Votes coalition of LGBTI rights and health organisations have assessed the content…
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Last November/December, I was very kindly invited to Geneva for a meeting with Dainius Pūras, the UN Special Rapporteur on health, in connection with a report now published on sport and healthy lifestyles and the right to health. The report (A/HRC/32/33) is an important one, particularly given an exemption in federal Australian anti-discrimination law that…
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