DanMargarita.com

According to several media outlets, there has been murmuring that her deep voice, muscular build and astonishing records are due to the fact that she is actually a man.

Is this poor sportsmanship, racism or sexism? Probably a bit of all three, but elite athletes have certainly been questioned about their true gender before. People of a certain age will remember the snickering over the “female” athletes of the former Eastern Bloc, whose masculinity made them appear more imposing than the famed “Steel Curtain” defense of the great Pittsburgh Steelers teams of the 1970’s.

Only after the fall of the Berlin Wall did we officially learn that these poor creatures (I can only describe them that way) were, unbeknownst to them, given steroids, which caused those masculine appearances and later, major health issues. They wouldn’t have looked out of place with bolts on their necks.

Some pre-steroid era attempts were made to just plain cheat in the 1936 Berlin Olympics. Polish sprinter Stella Walsh, dubbed “Stella the Fella” at the time, was discovered upon her autopsy, to possess male genitalia. That is, she was a man, not some bizarre collector of male genitalia.

The Nazi’s, eager to prove the superiority of the Third Reich, entered a high jumper named Dora Ratjen, who later turned out to be a man named Hermann. I guess you could say she was “Dora the Gender Explorer.”

At least Dora/Hermann gave up the ruse after the Olympics, while spent Stella kept up the masquerade until her death. Whether that was simply a lifestyle choice or a reluctance to admit that he’d competed against women in the Olympics, is unknown.

It didn’t work anyway, as Dora/Hermann finished fourth, meaning that he probably had to endure taunting from his friends for being beaten by three girls.

“’I thought something was a bit funny,’ recalled one athlete, ‘because she had a deep voice and snored in her sleep. What's more, she also had to shave her face,’” quotes the British newspaper the Daily Mail.

This does not appear to have been the case with Semenya, as medical science is now aware of medical conditions in which gender identity is not so clear-cut. Oh, the things you can find out on the Internet.

The Mail also rhetorically mused, “Surely, one would think, determining one's sex is as simple as removing one's underwear and taking a look.”

Apparently not. Maybe one should look at the underwear itself to find out. Is it a jock strap or a jogging bra?

Another UK paper, The Guardian (The Brits seem much more up on the kinky stuff then us Yanks), one in 15,000 people born have a condition where they are born with male XY chromosomes instead of female XX chromosomes, but due to a protein mutation, appear as female. This means that next time you’re at a ballgame at Fenway Park, there will be two people there who might seem like attractive women, but are actually dudes.

“They would look and behave like a girl," Birmingham University Professor Wiebke Arlt told the Guardian, specifically referring to people with this condition, and not women at Fenway Park.

"Many models and film stars have this disorder. They are very tall and slender featured, very beautiful with peachy skin,” he added.

And you thought it was all plastic surgery.

Conversely, the opposite can be true and a condition called congenital adrenal hyperplasia may cause one to “look on the outside like a boy," says Arlt, "but once a month they may have blood in their urine.”

The teenage years are tough enough for anyone to deal with, never mind finding out that you’re not the gender you thought you were.

Traditionally, children born with duel sex characteristics have been known derisively as “hermaphrodites.” With modern medicine making the public aware that this is a natural, albeit unfortunate and rare condition, they are now referred to more compassionately as being “intersex.”

Fortunately, we live in an age when many of these issues can be discovered early and corrected.

When the next Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue comes out, I will certainly look at it with a jaundiced eye…but I will look at it.