The ongoing controversy surrounding Algerian boxer Imane Khelif’s participation in the 2024 Paris Olympics underscores a disturbing trend with roots stretching back to North Carolina. Khelif is the latest victim of the nationwide and now global panic surrounding trans women in sports. Despite being assigned female at birth, living as a girl and a woman her entire life, and being legally recognized as a woman in her conservative home country, she faces widespread accusations of being transgender. This baseless claim has subjected Khelif to bullying and threats for no reason other than assumptions about her appearance and body.
This story, and the recent spate of anti-transgender sports bills, originated in part at Duke Law School’s Center for Sports Law and Policy, which is directed by Professor Doriane Coleman. During the Paris Olympics, Coleman published an article on the right-wing, phrenology-defending website Quillette that specifically targeted Imane Khelif and Taiwanese boxer Lin Yu-ting. It suggests—without concrete evidence other than speculation about the IOC’s language—that the two boxers have XY chromosomes. In her article, Coleman directly advocates banning transgender women and women with DSD from participating in women’s sports, and implies that Khelif should be banned from women’s sports.
Coleman wrote a follow-up op-ed for the Washington Post on August 16. In this article, she again suggests that Imane Khelief has XY chromosomes.
Coleman’s advocacy of discrimination poses a significant threat to transgender rights, women’s rights, and human rights in general.
Coleman began advocating for anti-trans legislation in 2019. As a guest of Senator Marco Rubio, she testified before the U.S. House of Representatives, calling on Congress to remove protections for transgender women from the Equality Act – specifically, removing “women with testicles” from “Title IX and Opportunities for Girls and Women in Sports.”
In her testimony, she laid out the benefits of participating in sports for girls and women beyond the physical, pointing out that those who play sports have better social and economic opportunities. She stated, “Girls who play sports stay in school longer, have fewer health problems, are more likely to be employed, and have better chances of getting better jobs… Our numbers in the executive suites are remarkable, as is our contribution to public service.” Coleman never claims that it is athletic prowess or physical speed that has put these women more frequently in the boardrooms and elected office, only that the experience of participating in sports is beneficial. In her recent article for the Washington Post, she claims that elite sports exist “to produce economic, political, developmental and health benefits for stakeholders and society.”
While Coleman pays lip service to alternative “pathways to transgender inclusion,” she never lays out a concrete path for what that might look like. In reality, trans girls and women would be denied these economic and social benefits. For example, she suggests pushing trans students into their own “open” or “nonbinary” category, an unworkable idea given the small number of trans athletes. In the summer of 2023, when North Carolina passed its own trans sports ban, there were about fifteen trans student-athletes in the state, certainly not enough for a “category.”
And by Coleman’s own logic and evidence, trans women who undergo gender reassignment surgery are also disadvantaged compared to cis men, limiting their participation in men’s sports. She writes: “The evidence also shows that trans women who are competitive athletes and have taken feminizing hormones experience a decline in performance—more in endurance sports and less in power and strength sports—but the decline in performance does not eliminate their male advantage.”
In her words, “I encourage you to consider amendments to HR 5 that provide protections for LGBTQ people, do not jeopardize these invaluable assets, and otherwise take into account the circumstances in which sex still matters.” That may sound more polite than Donald Trump’s comments on transgender people and sports, but it’s the same message. Polite-sounding calls for laws targeting minority groups are often even more dangerous.
Since 2019, Coleman’s work has been cited in both proposed and passed anti-transgender legislation in at least 13 states, in addition to a policy response letter calling for advocacy for similar restrictions signed by attorneys general from 18 states. According to the Washington Post, states that have passed restrictive anti-LGBTQ+ legislation, including anti-trans sports bans, have seen a wave of hate crimes against trans children in schools. Her work is contributing to a nationwide wave of legislation that not only bans transgender athletes, but also restricts transgender medical care and enacts bathroom laws.
Before Coleman’s involvement, the number of anti-gay and anti-trans bills introduced in state and federal legislatures had been declining. However, since 2019, the number of bills has skyrocketed. While there are many factors that contributed to the significant increase in anti-trans bills starting in 2019, Coleman’s testimony marks a clear turning point. Before she testified before the U.S. House of Representatives in April 2019 in favor of legal bans on trans people in sports, there were no anti-trans laws in sports, and since her testimony, many have been added, and she is often quoted by name.
In the past, Coleman has claimed not to support three of the bills that cite her work by name because they did not include exemptions for trans girls who “never experienced male puberty.” However, in her recent article for the Washington Post, she now claims that “even a trans girl who does not experience male puberty will have athletic advantages if she experiences male sexual development in childhood,” suggesting a change in her original position. Even if Coleman’s objections to the anti-trans bills that cite her work years ago were not dishonest, she has now reneged on her own previous, theoretically semi-inclusive statements. Ultimately, she endorses the kind of discrimination that leads to anti-trans laws and violence, both against trans people and against people accused of being trans.
Coleman has not condemned the more recent anti-trans bills that mention her by name, such as Virginia’s 2024 SB 723 – even after being contacted by the local activist group I’m part of. And as is clear from her comments in Quillette and the Washington Post, she hasn’t stopped advocating for these sports bans and other forms of discrimination. The lawmakers citing Coleman in these trans ban bills certainly have no doubt about the importance of her work.
Finally, a peer-reviewed scientific article she cites in the Washington Post to prove that trans women continue to enjoy a “biological advantage” from hormone replacement therapy includes the following caveat, which shows the scientific accuracy of its claims after discussing trans women’s bodies: “Important questions remain and opportunities for high-quality, well-controlled, and high-impact longitudinal studies of the trajectory of performance changes in transgender athletes and the physiological and anatomical mechanisms involved.” Given that not even the scientists Coleman herself cited are entirely convinced by these findings, how can that be enough to support laws that have been proven to lead to violence against a small group of vulnerable children?
Despite Duke University’s stated commitment to inclusivity, it continues to support and honor Coleman. That support has a global impact on transgender people and women who do not conform to traditional feminine norms. It’s easy to sell a rainbow flag and host drag queen fashion shows, but what does it mean when that same institution promotes laws and policies that harm transgender people and people accused of being transgender? What does it mean when faculty at that institution feel free to publicly attack transgender people? What does it mean when that institution promotes policies that lead to violence against children in schools?
Vivian Taylor graduated from Duke University’s public policy and theology programs in 2020. She is part of the leadership team for Stand up for trans womena group of Durham locals and Duke alumni calling on Duke University to stop promoting anti-gay and anti-transgender legislation. If you would like to get involved, please contact [email protected]
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