Opinion - This Caster Semenya case encapsulates so much of what is wrong with sport.
South African middle distance runner Caster Semenya. Photo: Photosport
Switzerland's supreme court has dismissed Semenya's appeal against a 2019 decision by the Court of Arbitration for Sport, which effectively prohibits her from continuing her career as a middle-distance runner.
Semenya, a winner of two Olympic gold medals and multiple world championship titles, would need to take drugs to compete anymore. That or have surgery.
Just let that sink in for a minute.
Yes, World Athletics intend to make an athlete take drugs. Never mind all the other athletes on them already.
The 29-year-old Semenya has lived her entire life as female, but has been subjected to sex verification tests by athletics' governing body because of the quality of her performances and the fact she naturally produces more testosterone than other athletes.
World Athletics eventually announced new 'differences in sex development' rules in 2018, which form the basis of the ban on Semenya now running in events of between 400m and a mile in distance.
Semenya said she won't take drugs, nor undergo surgery, to reduce her testosterone levels.
"Excluding female athletes or endangering our health solely because of our natural abilities puts World Athletics on the wrong side of history,'' Semenya said.
We have convicted dopers competing at Olympic Games' and winning medals. Not to mention others who have failed tests overturned, having proven they ate 'contaminated' meat or could produce evidence they were asthmatic - for instance - and needed the banned substance found in their system.
Then there's those whose missed drug tests exceed the limit for random testing and are still allowed to carry on.
This year's Tour de France is rattling along at a cracking pace, with record times being produced for various mountain ascents.
Records that were - until the last few days - held by convicted dopers Iban Mayo, Alexandre Vinokourov and Lance Armstrong.
But, hey, let's ban Caster Semenya.
She's not a cheat or anything. In fact, she's just a great athlete.
So what is it, then? Is it that she's too good? Is it because she appears more masculine than other runners? Is it because she's black and - at least by some measures - from a third-world country?
I'd argue that far from being banned, Semenya ought to be celebrated.
Certainly not subjected to the various indignities she's suffered in order to prove her sexuality and to compete on the world stage.
It would be sad and ironic if Semenya was one day disqualified for not having enough drugs in her system, because testosterone-prohibiting agents appear her only option should she wish to keep competing.
That or drop down from her specialist 800m and try the 200m and 100m instead.
Again, it seems strange that her levels of testosterone would be acceptable at those distances - or in the 5000m and beyond - just not in the event at which she excels.
We are fed so much nonsense by the Olympic movement and forever encouraged to forgo our faculties and marvel at these magnificent athletes and their unbelievable deeds.
To admire those 'good' nations, whose competitors simply work harder and want it more, while looking suspiciously at the other supposedly shady ones.
Here we have - in Caster Semenya - an athlete who actually is elite in their field thanks to hard work and genetics and is, for now at least, not welcome at next year's Olympic Games.
You can argue about whether the already-postponed Olympiad should still go ahead. I don't believe it should, but assume that it will.
Not for the "glory of sport'' or to spread international brotherhood and tolerance or any of the other alleged Olympic ideals, but for money. Just like all high-performance sport.
You assume that's where Semenya has fallen foul of World Athletics and their ilk.
Swimmers such as Michael Phelps and Ian Thorpe were said to have enormous feet, which helped to propel them up and down the pool faster than everyone else.
Can't say I remember any governing body suggesting the pair underwent surgery to reduce that natural advantage.
Maybe they were just more marketable than Semenya is.
Women were done a disservice by the decision of the Swiss supreme court, as was sport.
Not for the first time Semenya has been made to feel embarrassed or ashamed and to have her very worth as a person questioned.
To be told she doesn't belong unless she has surgery or takes drugs to change who she is.
Caster Semenya is a champion and a braver and stronger person than I'll ever be.
Braver, too, than the people determined to exclude her from elite sport.
