New gender dispute

Huge fuss about trans athlete at Paralympics!

Valentina Petrillo

(Bild: GEPA; instagram.com/valentina_petrillo)

The Olympic Games in Paris have barely come to an end and the Paralympics in Paris are already in the starting blocks - and with them apparently renewed discussions and fuss about the gender of participants! While the female boxers Imane Khelif and Lin Yi-ting, who were widely regarded as male, caused a stir at the Olympics, the focus is now on transsexual Valentina Petrillo ...

The visually impaired Petrillo, born Fabrizio, will be competing for Italy in the 200 and 400 meters in the T12 class for visually impaired athletes at the Paralympics from 28 August. Between 2015 and 2018, Petrillo competed as a man and won eleven national titles in Italy. In 2019, the then 50-year-old Italian, father of two, began hormone therapy and after a year he started competing in women's competitions.

"Welcome under the current guidelines!"
"The historic value of being the first trans woman to compete in the Paralympics is an important symbol of inclusion," Petrillo recently told BBC Sport. Andrew Parsons, President of the International Paralympic Committee (IPC), emphasized that "Petrillo is welcome in Paris under the current guidelines" - but also added that the sports world needs to come to an agreement on transgender athletes.

"The reason is the participation of the man Fabrizio 'Valentina' Petrillo ..."
In Spain in particular, there is currently a great deal of resentment about Petrillo, as she finished ahead of the Spaniard Melani Bergés in the qualification for the Paris Paralympics, who now has to watch. Lawyer and sports law expert Irene Aguiar was outraged immediately after the qualifying competitions a year ago: "Our Spanish athlete Melani Bergés has lost the chance to qualify for the Paralympics. The reason is the participation of the man Fabrizio 'Valentina' Petrillo, who made it to the final instead of her. That is unfair."

"Inclusion over fairness!"
Mariuccia Quilleri, another Spanish lawyer representing Petrillo's "victims", believes that "in the Petrillo case, inclusion was put before fairness". For information: Transgender athletes who have undergone a sex change after (male) puberty - as in the case of Petrillo - are prohibited from participating in women's competitions organized by the International Cycling Union (UCI) or in international athletics. But regardless of this, the protests of Aguiar, Quilleri and apparently more than 40 feminist organizations are of course in vain: Petrillo will be allowed to compete at the Paralympics in Paris ...