South Africa's Warm Welcome for Caster Semenya Masks the Reality of "Corrective Rapes"

Caster Semenya shows off her gold medal during a parade in Pretoria. Photograph: Karel Prinsloo/Associated PressSouth Africa’s star runner and 800m world champion Caster Semenya returned to a hero’s welcome in Pretoria yesterday. Semenya did undergo a “sex test”, revealing higher than average levels of testosterone in her body. An analysis and evaluation of her findings will take weeks.

Some doctors have already advised that there’s a wide spread in levels of testosterone in women, and Semenya’s results should not be reviewed in an automatically adverse light.

David Smith gives us an inciteful review of sexual politics in South Africa, one of the most govermentally progressive governments in the world, in terms of women leaders. He cites a shocking statistic of 10 cases of “corrective rape”, every week in South Africa. “Corrective rape” targets butch-looking gay womem.