Boxing champion reportedly names Elon Musk, J.K. Rowling in online harassment complaint

The boxing champion at the centre of a worldwide clash over sex and gender identity in sports has reportedly named Elon Musk and author J.K. Rowling in an online harassment complaint being investigated by French prosecutors.

Algerian boxer Imane Khelif, who won a gold medal in the women’s welterweight division in the 2024 Paris Olympics, filed a legal complaint in France for online harassment after false claims erupted online that Khelif was transgender or a “biological man.” 

In a statement posted Saturday to Instagram, Khelif’s lawyer, Nabil Boudi, alleged “aggravated cyber-harassment” targeting Khelif. He described it as a “misogynist, racist and sexist campaign” against the boxer.

On Wednesday, the Paris prosecutor’s office confirmed it had received the complaint and its Office for the Fight against Crimes against Humanity and Hate Crime had opened an investigation on charges of “cyber harassment based on gender, public insults based on gender, public incitement to discrimination and public insults on the basis of origin.”

Khelif’s legal complaint was filed against social media platforms, including X, instead of a specific perpetrator. This is a common formulation under French law that leaves it up to investigators to determine which person or organization may have been at fault, notes the Associated Press.

That “ensures that the prosecution has all the latitude to be able to investigate against all people,” including those who may have used pseudonyms, Boudi told the news outlet Variety in an interview.

He reportedly told Variety that “J.K. Rowling and Elon Musk are named in the lawsuit, among others.”

CBC News reached out to Boudi for further confirmation but has not heard back.

Worldwide clash

Khelif was thrust into a worldwide clash over gender identity and regulation in sports after her first fight of the Games, when Italian opponent Angela Carini pulled out just 46 seconds into the match after taking a hit to the face.

Online claims about Khelif’s gender were amplified by celebrities including Elon Musk, author J.K. Rowling, brothers Logan and Jake Paul — former YouTube stars who have become involved in wrestling and boxing, respectively — and Caitlyn Jenner, a retired Olympic gold-medallist and transgender woman.

“Could any picture sum up our new men’s rights movement better? The smirk of a male who knows he’s protected by a misogynist sporting establishment enjoying the distress of a woman he’s just punched in the head, and whose life’s ambition he’s just shattered,” Rowling said on X, formerly known as Twitter. 

The Harry Potter author has become known for her controversial comments about the transgender community.

Musk didn’t make a direct comment online, but shared a post by U.S. swimmer Riley Gaines that said “Men don’t belong in women’s sports.” Above the post, Musk wrote, “Absolutely.”

Whether or not Khelif’s online harassment case has legal consequences for those named in it, the fact that a case has been brought forward at all makes an “absolutely vital” public statement about our acceptance of the harmful things people say online, said Shana MacDonald, the O’Donovan Chair in communication at the University of Waterloo.

“At the moment with Twitter, all the guard rails are off. And there’s no way to have accountability,” MacDonald, who studies digital media and disinformation, told CBC News.

‘Transphobic witch hunt’

The International Olympic Committee has defended Khelif, saying in an Aug. 1 statement that “every person has the right to practise sport without discrimination.” It also decried the “misleading information” circulating about Khelif.

Several of the false accusations on social media cited an incident in March 2023, when the International Boxing Association (IBA), the sport’s governing body, disqualified Khelif and fellow boxer Lin Yu-ting of Taiwan from the world championships in New Delhi.

The IBA said they had failed eligibility tests for the women’s competition, without specifying what those tests were. 

“The current aggression against these two athletes is based entirely on this arbitrary decision, which was taken without any proper procedure — especially considering that these athletes had been competing in top-level competition for many years,” the IOC’s Aug. 1 statement read.

The disinformation campaign against Khelif is especially troubling because it uses her as a vehicle to ramp up the “transphobic witch hunt” that’s been happening within sports, said MacDonald. 

“It becomes a vector for spreading this really egregious, I would say, hateful, disinformation that’s purposely intending to be harmful,” she said.

But the associate professor says she’s starting to see a shift in tone, with more harmful rhetoric being called out. She notes that the Kamala Harris presidential campaign in the U.S., for instance, is leading by example. 

“I’m feeling hopeful for public discourse that all of the sudden this nasty version of being in the world is kind of being called out.”