WASHINGTON, D.C. — Our Bodies, Our Sports, the nation’s first and only coalition of women’s advocacy organizations fighting for fairness in women’s sports, issued a letter to U.S. Congress urging swift action against the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and any other sport organization that has supported the IOC in condoning barbarous practices that disregard the basic safeguarding of women.
Our Bodies, Our Sports (OBOS) coalition has been widely recognized for its work standing up for female athletes and fair play, and for creating the largest, most ideologically diverse women’s movement fighting to protect women’s sports.
Upon return of the U.S. delegation from the Paris Olympic Games, OBOS asks Congress to explore all actions that can be taken to “apply maximum pressure upon the IOC and any other sport organization” that has provided aid and comfort to the IOC in its failure to uphold equal athletic competition for female Olympians.
This letter comes days after OBOS served U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee (USOPC) CEO Sarah Hirshland and Board Chair Gene Sykes a demand letter calling upon the USOPC to forcefully condemn the IOC’s sanctioned abuse of women before the unjust boxing matches between Italy’s Angela Carini and Algeria’s Imane Khelif and Uzbekistan’s Sitora Turdibekova and Taiwan’s Lin Yu Ting. Hirshland and Sykes have not responded to the letter.
Khelif and Yu Ting were previously barred from the Women’s World Boxing Championships last year in India by the International Boxing Association (IBA) after failing the gender eligibility criteria. In a statement released ahead of Khelif and Yu Ting’s Olympic events, the IBA said, “This decision, made after a meticulous review, was extremely important and necessary to uphold the level of fairness and utmost integrity of the competition.” These tests “conclusively indicated that both athletes did not meet the required necessary eligibility criteria and were found to have competitive advantages over other female competitors.” These decisions were legally binding.
The IOC permitting unfair competition in the women’s boxing ring at the Paris Olympic Games abandons the principles of fairness and equal opportunity for women which the Olympic Charter pledges to uphold, says OBOS.
OBOS women’s rights organizations, feminist organizations, sports organizations, female Olympicans and lawyers include the Independent Council on Women’s Sports, Women’s Declaration International USA, Concerned Women for America, Independent Women’s Forum, Women’s Liberation Front, Women’s Sports Policy Working Group, Champion Women, Independent Women’s Law Center, Young Women for America, Independent Women’s Network, International Consortium on Female Sport, and Independent Women’s Voice, and renowned athletes Riley Gaines and Olympians Martina Navratilova, Donna de Varona, and Nancy Hogshead.
The letter was emailed to all 535 Members of Congress.
Our Bodies, Our Sports has requested a response from Senate and House Leadership.
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The Our Bodies, Our Sports coalition formed in 2022 to defend women’s sports and the integrity of the female sporting category. Despite political and ideological differences, members of the coalition stand together with gratitude for the generations of female athletes who came before us and in defense of all the women and girls who will come next.
