At just 20 years old, Julia Szeremeta has already secured her place in Polish boxing history. By defeating Nesthy Petecio of the Philippines in the semi-finals, she became the first Polish woman to win an Olympic medal in boxing. On 10 August, the colour of that medal—silver or gold—will be decided as Szeremeta faces Yu-Ting Lin of Taiwan in the final. Lin is one of two boxers who was controversially disqualified by the International Boxing Federation (IBF) in 2023.

Both Yu-Ting Lin and Imane Khelif of Afghanistan were subjected to hate speech from far-right groups during the Olympics, with some falsely labelling them as men. On 9 August, Szeremeta appeared to echo these sentiments by sharing two memes on her Instagram. In one of the now-deleted posts, a photo of Szeremeta was captioned: "To get the gold, I still have to beat a guy."

The second meme posted by Julia Szeremeta features a fictional dialogue between herself and her trainer, Tomasz Dylak. In the exchange, Dylak says, "I have two pieces of news, one good and one bad." Szeremeta responds, "Start with the good one." Dylak then says, "The final is on Saturday, so you'll have time to rest." When Szeremeta asks, "And the bad news?" Dylak replies, "You’re the last woman standing in the fight for gold." Although these memes were quickly deleted, they spread widely online, triggering significant backlash.

It’s the first time a Polish female boxer has made comments of such nature. After winning her semi-final, Szeremeta expressed confidence, saying, "I'm not afraid of anyone. I didn’t look into my potential rivals later in the tournament; I learned who I’d be fighting next, match by match. All I know is that she’s taller and fights in a normal stance."

Yu-Ting Lin, who was born and raised as a woman, began training in boxing at the age of 13 to protect her mother and siblings from violence at home. She achieved considerable success in boxing until the Russian-run IBF subjected her and fellow fighter Imane Khelif to 'gender testing' under controversial circumstances during the world championships in 2023. The IBF has refused to disclose the method used in the procedure.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) cut ties with the IBF over financial and ethical irregularities and defended Lin and Khelif by deeming the tests conducted "illegitimate and unreliable." IOC president Thomas Bach stated that both boxers were born and raised as women and that their gender should not be questioned. He described the attacks on the female athletes as hate speech.

Regarding 28-year-old Yu-Ting's physical advantage, she is 10 cm taller than Szeremeta, granting her a greater arm reach. However, it is challenging to automatically attribute an advantage to Lin over other women, as she finished only ninth at the Tokyo Olympic Games. Szeremeta's strengths lie in her age (being younger) and an unorthodox fighting style (being more "jumpy"), possibly due to her previous seven years of judo training before starting boxing at the age of 13.

Source: eurosport.tvn24.pl, bbc.com