#for the bioethics stuff

[ramblingandpie]

HOKAY SO On the "Pie watches DS9 for the first time" tour, tonight I'm going to ramble about something that's been in my head since I watched it, just, stuff percolating.

Major spoilers for season 3 episode 13, "Life Support," under the cut.

So part of the reason I am loving DS9 is Julian Bashir. They really did say like "Ok take some of Pie's favorite tropes and also favorite areas of academia and roll them up into one (1) repressed twink." And I love that for me.

So for those who don't know me IRL or, like, well over the internet, I fucking love bioethics. It is my jam. One of my biggest regrets in life is that I didn't even know that "clinical bioethicist" is a job that some people can do until I was in my mid-30's and I don't have enough formal philosophy training to get into a good bioethics grad program. I am an attorney and I work in healthcare regulation, which is close enough, I guess. I've written huge research projects about the history of the eugenics movement on aspects of modern health law. I'm also an MPH student. If I win the lottery and can then not worry about money but just do what I love, that's probably what I'd go back to school for. So, like, when I say that bioethics is my jam, I also am not just being an armchair philosopher. Am I the level of a clinical bioethicist? No. Have I done full bioethics consult simulations? Yes.

And, yes, I do have some spoilers for Dr. Bashir And Bioethics And Maybe Why He Cares So Much About Patient Autonomy and hot damn they really did take my favorite tropes.

AND HO BOY did this episode give me a lot to chew on.

Basically, there are 4 "pillars" of clicial bioethics. Patient autonomy, beneficience (the benefits of treatment), nonmaleficience (do no harm), and justice (what's right for everyone involved [not just, like, patient family, but also things like medical supply rationing]). Patient autonomy is HUGE and IMPORTANT and the biggest thing is like... allowing patients to make their own choices with as much information as the patient can have, even if that choice is "I don't want to know." Which presents difficulties. BUT here, Bareil was like ok yes doc tell me everything ok yep I'm choosing to take this course of action that means I'll probably die. Because it's important to me and my values. Which. LEGIT.

AND THEN I got worried because my man Bashir was like I have concerns but it's your call, dude. AND THEN HE WAS LIKE HEY WINN I NEED YOU TO LIE TO THE PATIENT????

NO??? Don't lie to the patient, Bashir! I'm so disappointed!

... UNTIL he was like "Because you benefit politically if he dies you're not a neutral informant so fuck you." And then I was like OH SNAP!!!! Because! One of the ultimate goals is to try to distill what the PATIENT wants, not what the folks around them (who might have ulterior motives) want!!!! So ok yes in that case you might be like "Hey I need you to balance what you did by doing this other thing so that the patient can look at the situation as a whole without a third party trying to get something out of THE PATIENT'S DEATH."

So basically that episode was like crack to me THE END.

[chialattea]

NYOOOOOOOOO I HAVENT STUDIED ENOUGH DAMNITFTTT THE EXAM IS IN (checks the time) EIGHT HOURS AAAAAAAGH

[noblemalone]

This is not about DAV this is just about solas and the bio ethics course i took in university and why i disagree with him

And i think it begins with... Acknowledging or at least discussing Solas' skewed self-perception. Solas insists he is not a God, just a Man. He says he is no more important or special than anyone else, and yet... He believes he has the authority to change the fabric of the world, right his wrongs in a way that will prove deadly for many, without their assent or input. And sure you could say that that's true of the inquisitor too, of any Leader of a Movement... But idk for me there's a paternalistic quality there paired with a myopic hypocrisy... And if i were to view him thru a lens appropriate to his context, where so many people's lives are at the whim of rulers and leaders, would i be kinder to him? That's why Sera is such a good foil to him...

But at least the kings claim the Divine Right of Kings as reasoning for their ability to make those kinds of decisions, right? At least Gods acknowledge they are Special and Above and that Gives Them The Right. I have to wonder, if Solas sees himself as typical, average, just a man, how does he justify his plan? Is it just the Utilitarian idea that the Goodness of tearing down the veil will outweigh the death and suffering it causes? It must be it must be that for him to believe he is Just a Man and also In The Right, right?

Like... The narrative my prof used was, imagine you could end all suffering, bring about a utopian world of joy, but to do so, you had to assign all suffering forever to one child. Everyone else gets to live happy fulfilling lives but that child who is whole innocent must, by necessity, suffer and only suffer, forever. I think Solas would unequivocally agree that that child is a necessary sacrifice.

But is tearing down the fade a guaranteed end to suffering? Or just an end to the world Solas finds himself out of step with, one he personally does not find appealing. Was it better then, or just different? Better for who? And after a thousand years of wandering and dreaming and reminiscing, is his judgement not clouded by nostalgia? If he is no god but mere man, does he not suffer from imperfection of memory? And if it was better, what gives him the right?

And there's that thing where like.... I cant for the life of me find it but it's about abortion but i feel it applies here... Like, if we nuked Australia today and killed all Australians, that would be Wrong and Bad... But if we went back in time before anyone ever lived in australia and blew it the fuck up, that would be fine right because there would Be No Australians to deprive of land or life, right? Because they were never born because Australia didn't exist. Like... It's wrong to take a life but there's nothing wrong with removing the possibility of life from some theoretical person who wont have it yk... Like

I think this is a more apt comparison than the trolley problem when it comes to Solas. If we take the Australia thing, flip it twist it... Is it ok to deprive some people of the life they know so that some others may have a life better than they currently know? Like, Solas is the only one who knows what everyone else is missing, hes the only one who knows it could be better does he really owe it to the unaware to bring things back to the way it was? If we could create Australia would we owe it to the potential Australians to do that?

And i guess the black box here or the the the missing piece is how the Spirits on the other side of the veil factor into this. My own personal bias is not to value them as highly as the humanoids (dwarf elf human qunari etc) who are our point of view reference characters and most similar to the people i know and think about in my own life. And how does a spirit of mischief or justice or pride or wisdom or whatever, how does it stack up? Are they owed a lifting of the veil because they are as full and sentient as humanoids? Or are they mere elements of ourselves? How do fuckin souls or whatever part of us wlaks the fade when we dream, how do they factor in?

Are the spirits in the fade the children we've condemned to suffering, not for a utopia but just for a status quo? And even if they are, is it fair to make the masses who have no idea or choice pay the price to tear down the veil? Is there no way to slowly thin it, to quell the angry spirits with a slow fade (haha pun get it)?

Like I'm not a dragon age scholar I'm not 100% certain of what exactly the danger of tearing down the veil is other than all the demons that will kill ppl and the general unrest and violence that will happen as things reset to how it was before... And even then how long will it take for that to happen? If no one dies anymore will those who survive have to live for all eternity remembering their own Before, the familiar life they had and how it was upended to fulfill some guy's expectation of what "Better" is? Like is their suffering worth it? Is subjecting them to short term suffering for a future you never asked them if they wanted worth it?

And like... How much can you respect them or care for them or see them as equals if you never asked them? Its condescending, I think, to decide that what you want, the history only you know, is objectively Better for Everyone and I just...

I think it all boils down to... One of the things i value most, the thing that to me is a direct result of respect, is autonomy. And i just cant square how Solas could say he respects people, sees himself as one of them and not above them, if he is willing to impose his will upon them like ... Perhaps it is the trolley problem. Allow people to scrape by, but they are free within their oppressive system, or free them from their oppressive system by forcing them into a new reality that is more familiar, comfortable, and better to you.

I think if Solas really wanted to atone for what he did, putting up the veil, he would find a way to Hurt People Less. He would sacrifice himself. Or maybe instead of of of doing what he thinks is best, he'd give the elves of today the tools and opportunities to make their own decisions and seek their own liberation...

Or maybe he just cares about the spirits more than the people on our side of the veil. After all, maybe he relates to them more...

Anyway... Yeah i just... Solas is a great guy he makes great points i don't doubt his heart is in the right place but i think he's... He's too proud. He's got too much of an ego and it makes him paternalistic and that, for me personally and my morals and values, is something I can't sit with something I dont agree with. Maybe I think the freedom to choose is more important than freedom from suffering.

Yeah i think that's it.

[kaunisbaby]

it makes my blood pressure rise every time i have a fight with my sister bc her piece of shit boyfriend who i loathe and despise radicalized her and now she thinks like a fascist

[antiterf]

Its kind of ridiculous how difficult it is to find critical intersex literature if you don't know where to look.

That said, here are frequently cited things I've found. For the one's that are behind paywalls, I have a Google Drive folder set up to hold them for access. The only things I leave behind a paywall are books by individual authors. They are not organized at all, I'm sorry.

Intersex Variations Glossary by InterACT

Narrative Symposium: Intersex—Narrative Inquiry in Bioethics (NIB) Volume 5, Number 2, Summer 2015.— Trigger warning for intersex genital mutilation (IGM), sexual assault, and medical trauma—it's honestly a lot but incredibly important. (Drive)

A human rights investigation into the medical "normalization" of intersex people - A report of a public hearing by the Human Rights Commission of the City & County of San Francisco

Surgical Progress Is Not the Answer to Intersexuality - Cheryl Chase. - TW for IGM and images of genitalia (Drive)

The Intersex Roadshow, a blog of Dr. Cary Gabriel Costello - Costello is an intersex trans man and tries to bridge the gap between trans and intersex issues

Beyond Binary Sex and Gender Ideology - Cary Grabriel Costello - Chapter 12 of The Oxford Handbook of the Sociology of Body and Embodiment (Drive)

Transgender and intersex: theoretical, practical, and artistic perspectives (book/textbook) (Drive)

Intersex: Stories and Statistics from Australia (Book) (Open Access)

Fixing sex: intersex, medical authority, and lived experience (Book)

The harms of medicalisation: intersex, loneliness and abandonment (Open Access Article)

Intersex: cultural and social perspectives (Open Access Article)

Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) - Technical Note on the Human Rights of Intersex People. Basically, if you want an easy way to say that doctors are going against human rights by performing IGM.

An experimental philosophical bioethical study of how human rights are applied to clitorectomy on infants identified as female and as intersex (Open Access Article) - People were more likely to support the same surgery on infants labeled as intersex than they were on infants labeled as female.

Caught in the Gender Binary Blind Spot: Intersex Erasure in Cisgender Rhetoric by Hida Viloria - About how cisgender often doesn't accurately express the experiences intersex people have. Costello, mentioned earlier with Intersex Roadshow, coined Ipsogender for this reason.

Introduction for Intersex Activism - A guide for allies

Sex, Science, and Society: Reckonings and Responsibilities for Biologists (Open Access Article)

Contesting Intersex: The Dubious Diagnosis by Georgiann Davis - TW for medical trauma

Spectacles and Scholarship: Caster Semenya, Intersex Studies, and the Problem of Race in Feminist Theory by Zine Magubane (Drive)

Owning Endosex Privilege and Supporting the Intersex Community: WPATH, Intersex Genital Mutilation (IGM), and Sex Variant Bodies by Margo Schulter

The Spectrum of Sex by Hida Viloria and Dr. Maria Nieto

A long way to go for LGBTI equality from the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights - Before the UK left the EU

If anyone wants to add, feel free! This was the non-medicalized stuff I had saved in Zotero, and definitely not all that's out there.

[bedlamsbard]

wait! this can go in the Yonder Disney story

what are the Tumblr girlies who live in the MCU saying about reader-insert and self-insert RPF about the Avengers

[intersex-support]

hello! i newly figured out i am intersex, however i haven't been able to find much content talking about intersex experience, history or community, when i first realized i was queer originally i found a lot of content like that and found it helpful, and i was wondering if there's any recommendations you might be willing to give about any content on being intersex or intersex creators who you think people should know about!

Hey!

This ask honestly made me really happy, because when I was searching for people and resources to share with you, I realized how much stuff has been created in the past 5 years. When I was diagnosed as intersex, I felt like there was so much less stuff than there even is now, so it makes me really happy to know there is more stuff, even if it's still hard to find.

Some of the things I've put on this list are outdated or might include perspectives that I don't completely love, but might include important historical context. It is also a very US centric and English language centric resource, although I have linked to organizations in other countries and would love if people added on recommendations to intersex resources in a variety of languages. As always, take what resonates with you and leave behind the rest!

Books:

Cripping Intersex by Celeste E Orr

Bodies in Doubt: An American History of Intersex by Elizabeth Reis

XOXY: A Memoir by Kimberly Zieselman

Intersex (For Lack of a Better Word) by Thea Hillman

In September, Alicia Weigel is releasing her memoir Inverse Cowgirl.

In August, Pidgeon Pagonis is releasing their memoir, Nobody Needs to Know.

Fiction books:

An Unkindness of Ghosts by Rivers Solomon

Intersex #ownvoices books, collated by Bogi Takács

Films:

Every Body directed by Julie Cohen is in theaters right now, and will eventually be on streaming services.

Ponyboi directed by River Gallo

Intersexion directed by Grant Lahood

Articles + misc:

Hermaphrodites with Attitude newsletter-content note for h slur and some other outdated language. Very important history though <3

Jazz Legend Little Jimmy Scott Is a Cornerstone of Black Intersex History by Sean Saifa Wall

What it's like to be a Black intersex woman by Tatenda Ngwaru

9 Young People on How They Found Out They Are Intersex by Hans Lindhal

Teen Vogue's series of intersex interviews

After years of protest, a top hospital ended intersex surgeries. For activists, it took a deep toll by Kate Sosin

Intersex Awareness Day: A Demonstration that Inspired a Movement

Normalizing intersex: Narrative Inquiry in Bioethics

Music-Ana Roxanne

Youth&I-intersex youth zine

Juliana Huxtable-Visual Art

Youtube channels:

Emilord-videos about AIS and surgery.

Jubilee Intersex video

Hans Lindhal-videos on a wide variety of intersex topics.

What's It Like To Be Intersex? | Minutes With | UNILAD

What It's Like To Be Intersex As/Is

Pass the Mic: Intercepting Injustice with Sean Saifa Wall

Intersex Organizations:

Link to org list

People/orgs to follow:

Sean Saifa Wall

Alicia Weigel

River Gallo

Hans Lindhal

Fàájì/funk

Jahni

Justin Tsang

Intersex Awareness (fabulous direct action organizing in the US-keep an eye out cause we're gonna do more this year!)

Liat Feller

Jubilee

Crystal Hendricks

Mari Wrobi

Intersex people, please feel free to add on more resources, art, writing, and people that you like!!

[galescafe]

outfit detail / snowy day

16 JANUARY 2024 | 01/100 DAYS OF PRODUCTIVITY

welcome to round 2 of 100dop!

second day of classes, but we don't have lab for the first couple of weeks, so i had the whole morning free

went grocery shopping, put up all the new stuff for my wall scrapbook, and started readings for my pchem class

went to my bioethics class! it was just an intro class, but the vibes are good, so i'm pretty excited for it

had an orientation over zoom for a program i'm applying for

heading out to a friend's birthday party tonight!

🎧: something for everybody - sammy rae and the friends 📚: ulysses - james joyce

[floral-ashes]

Trans girl here studying Bioethics in Australia. Just about to start a research thesis but still trying to figure out how to bring trans healthcare into my degree when my teachers know very little about that stuff (my professor hasn't heard of the Cass review, for instance). Any potential advice?

P.S. absolutely love your work, read both of your books and am blown away. Glad to know that there are academics like you out there :)

You don’t need people who know about it to supervise you on it, tbh! Only my doctoral supervisor knew stuff about trans issues and really not to the degree that I did—that’s not what they’re there for. They’re there to guide you into doing your own learning, more so than just impart information about the topic on you. So I wouldn’t worry about that. Just find someone who’s going to be down with gender self-determination, valuing trans voices, and stuff like that. Feminist bioethicist who have worked on abortion rights and fighting medical paternalism is usually an avenue to explore. Also people who do urban bioethics, critical disability bioethics, anti-colonial bioethics, and other justice and autonomy-centred bioethicists.

[australet789]

"learning all the fucked up stuff done in the name of science is super interesting" care to share any examples?

ok, just to clarify, that in my bioethics class we (obviously) revisited cases of my own country, apart from learning all the rules and how very much the majotiy of experiments related to science lack a lot of informed consent, the latter being the one we focused on the most, learning how to do a proper document and to explain it to people, from kids to older adults.

Cases were mostly just mentioned (the Standford Experiment, for example), everything that happened in WW2

But the one we studied and i cried in rage when learning about it?

The Tuskegee Syphilis Study

We watched a movie about it, Miss Ever's Boys and had to make a essay about it.

I dont remember feeing so much disgust towards the USA as much as i felt reading everything about that "study" after i watched the movie.

I recommend anyone in the science field to read or watch about that study. It's a slap on the face, and a way to show how much bioethics matter in a field that keeps teaching that we should disengage from the living beings, even when we have "bio" in our names

[microwavedmetal]

ooc for house to ever ask for permission for anything, but imagine him storming in Wilson's office like 'can i go [insert stuff that would make a bioethic board shudder]' and be told 'idk go ask your mom Cuddy' and then he'd seek Cuddy at her office asking the same thing and she'd answer 'I have no idea, House, ask your dad Wilson'

[teetotalitarianism]

I'm very curious about the thesis! I've been trying to look into posthumanism/transhumanist ideas more, especially from multiple perspectives. There's stuff I see never talked about irt it, for example, you see a lot of people idealizing robot bodies or whatever, but this sometimes gets weaponized into negative views towards disabled bodies. Meanwhile, the idea in your thesis is a complete blind spot for me and I would LOVE to see what it's about.

Hi anon, thank you so so much for the question! I agree, there are so many areas in this topic that are underexplored and under researched, and I intend to change that. I will be posting more and more research alongside my artwork, but I will probably also make the entirety of my academic thesis available considering how little research there is in the area altogether.... Would that be something you'd like access to? Enough of that though lets get into what the thesis is about:

Broadly speaking before we even get into the posthumanism/transhumanism aspect of bioethics, we have to contend with the increased access in, and the proliferation of biotechnologies. Biotechnology has come to include a lot of medical interventions that could be viewed as falling in line with the positions, goals and aims espoused in posthumanism and transhumanism.

This increase in access has challenged the way that we think about existing within our physical bodies because it changes the limitations of our human bodies that we are bound to. In order to consider the potential impact of biotechnology, bioethics has grappled with issues of the correct ways of “being” or existing within our bodies including but not limited to the emergence of identity, performance of identity, body modification as escapism, and movements such as posthumanism and transhumanism.

However, like much of philosophy as a broader field, bioethics is plagued by the exclusion of ways of thought that are nonwhite, nonmale, non-Western and non-working class and that has been a glaring problem. The above issues that bioethics deals with are arguably all related to the right to bodily integrity which can be defined in this context as the right to protect one’s body from the interference of other people.

In the philosophical space, the right to bodily integrity typically involves but is not limited to reproductive rights and general autonomy. This has made bioethics a space that requires philosophical feminist thought to confront the uneven ideologies about identity formation and the correct ways of existing in one’s body.

Given that Black African women have been greatly impacted by the issue of the right to bodily integrity, it is especially important that there is an African feminist framework that deals with the power dynamics that determine how people are allowed to exist and identify with themselves. The absence of African feminist thought in Bioethics is an epistemic injustice, that has weakened the overall process of collective knowledge building in the field. As a result, the practical application of ethics and morals in biotechnology is skewed into a cisheteronormative and masculinised colonial gaze.

The cisheteronormative gaze or cisheteronormativity refers to the oppressive institutions of socialisation such as the media and structural systems in general that use cisgender and heterosexual behaviours or norms as the prevailing or dominant status quo. By doing this, the lived experiences of queer and transgender people are excluded. This is compounded by the ways that social institutions reinforce white supremacist and patriarchal ideas, creating communities whereby groups that do not belong to the dominant status quo perform their identities in a way that oppressive institutions deem acceptable, similar to the panopticon view presented by Foucault.

The cisheteronormative and masculinised colonial gaze is a socialised way of thinking that favours the assumed moral and ethical values of cisgender, straight and white men, who form the majority of both the biotechnological and the bioethical fields. This gaze imagines existing in one’s body as a stagnant and neutral form of identity whereby decisions that we make regarding our bodies exist in a vacuum away from the impact of colonisation, white supremacist thought, the patriarchy and classism amongst other issues of marginalisation such as homophobia.

The scholar Pumla Gqola refers to the overlap of white supremacy, classism and the patriarchy as the “triple threat of violence”. In this conceptual framework, she suggests that when we consider ways of being, we have an emergence of new identities based on the need to navigate this triple threat of violence. This triple threat of violence has, according to Gqola, led to the treatment of Black African women’s bodies as public property which must be wielded in ways that people who are not Black African women deem appropriate.

The issue of treating Black African women’s bodies as public property is echoed by Gabon Baderoon who uses the case of Sarah Baartman as a means of understanding private and public performances of identity. In doing so, Baderoon highlights the specific ways that Black African women have historically not been treated as having ownership over their own bodies and instead have been made into a spectacle for the consumption of other people who act as voyeurs when it comes to Black African women.

This creation of spectacle has turned Black African women into hypersexualised beings whose bodily integrity has been inherently compromised through colonial violence and violation. These issues are relevant to the philosophical conception of identity, as it highlights the relationship between certain identities and shame or humiliation. Over time, Black African women’s identities have transformed. In part this is because identity evolves with societal, cultural and philosophical developments that challenge our assumptions about correct ways of being. However, this is also in part due to an effort on the part of Black African women to escape the violence and violation of identity, and fantasise about existing anew, in a body that is not subject to public spectacle.

The notion of fantasy is central to biotechnology and by extension bioethics because it imagines the human body and identity beyond biological limitation. The human body and identity beyond biological limitation is a general way of understanding posthumanism and transhumanism as movements.

In my academic thesis, I argued that African feminisms in the space of bioethics would assess whether or not posthumanist and transhumanist technologies compromise their bodily integrity by looking at the extent to which it bodily integrity may push them to either violate their bodies or free them to reimagine their identities, and by extension their bodies anew. I also explained the notion of a “cisheteronormative and masculinised colonial gaze” using Foucault’s panopticon, explained what posthumanism and transhumanism is (and how we tend to differentiate the two), discussed how identities emerge, showing how violation and violence relate to decisions about our bodies, the fantasy about ways of being versus socialised identity and responding to potential objections.

The reason I included Foucault in this is because I wanted to convey the ways that in posthumanism and transhumanism there can be an element of performing specific ways of "being" that are akin to the idea of the panopticon. More specifically, posthumanism and transhumanism force us to contend with what we think "humanness" is, and to what extent it should be preserved, and what that preservation looks like. This has a domino effect of sorts, because when we concern ourselves with what humanness looks like in the posthumanist and transhumanist sense, we also then deal with the idea that our idealised bodies are a performance of some kind of standard.

Overall for the most part, I used the works of feminist scholars from Southern Africa to build up my thesis, most notably Pumla Gqola's notion of triple violence. This is because posthumanism and transhumanism in the philosophical space is also about the way that human bodies can encounter violence, or violation. When we speak of bodily integrity and bodily autonomy, in part we are talking about protecting people from violence, and from violation. What this then means, is that the philosophy and the ethical and moral conceptualisations need to explicitly contend with the history of the human body, and of violence and violation, this also extends into how posthumanism and transhumanism then engages with disabilities, dignity in the difference between bodies and so on and so forth.

I needed examples for this so I opted for the field of biogerontology, an area of biotechnology that can involve things like facial reconstruction which has a use outside of cosmetics, but is also an area with a lot of technology that is strictly cosmetic related to concerns around things like aging which comes up in a lot of posthumanist and transhumanist literature.

Interestingly, as I studied this, I was also tutoring the ethics of artificial intelligence to second year students at my university so I actually noted a lot of overlap in some of the concerns regarding posthumanism and transhumanism, and the way we discuss the positives and negatives of technology with regards to humans as a whole. This was not the focus of my paper, but if you would like to know more about that, I would be happy to explain farther.

I think one of the key elements of bioethics as it pertains to posthumanism and transhumanism is to ensure that the ideas are not treated as though they exist in a vacuum, separate from history, societies and so on and so forth. Rather, bioethics is at its most robust when we confront the relationship between the philosophies and their histories. It is that grey area, between imagination and history, where philosophers who concern themselves with bioethics must reside and it means seeking a balance between the more idealised and fantastical side of biotechnologies, and goes into the realities of what manifests in real life, and what that means for our ethical and moral standards.

That is the basic primer for the thesis that I wrote. Let me know if you have any questions! I really loved answering this, my thesis really truly is my baby you know haha, and I am proud of my firstborn.

[halfagonyandhope]

ignite the stars │ch. 6

first chapter (x); previous chapter (x)

Satine Kryze is an internationally-recognized scholar in genocide studies who recently resigned from the Department of State over her concerns regarding the agency's ethics. Ben Kenobi is a tenured professor at Georgetown University studying the use of religion to justify military conflicts. Once high school sweethearts, the two haven't spoken since parting ways for university. That is, until Satine accepts a research fellowship - at Georgetown.

---

On Monday morning, Satine heads to the Bioethics Research Library rather than her office at the Intercultural Center building. She’s in need of a particularly old text, one that hasn’t yet been digitized, and it’ll be faster to check the book out herself than to request it be delivered to her inbox.

The sun is rising as she approaches Healy Hall. Satine has to stop for a moment to take in the way the light hits the neomedieval building, particularly its signature towering spire: normally a cold gray, the stone of the Gothic hall practically glows with warmth. Though she’s lived in the District for years, Satine never tires of sights like this. Not for the first time, she wonders if others become immune or inured to such landmarks on their daily commutes. 

She hopes she never does.

Inside, she unwraps her scarf, wishing she could stop by the flagship Riggs Library. While she’d love to spend time there among the cast iron stacks, Riggs is mostly ceremonial these days, reserved for events of high importance. Satine rolls her eyes. The events are mostly fundraisers. She knows part of academia is playing the game, and the game involves funding. But it still feels…slimy, somehow, to convert a library, a place she considers as sacred as any spiritual site, to a location primarily used for rubbing shoulders with the ultra-wealthy.

She stuffs her scarf, hat, and mittens into her bag and continues down the hall’s first floor.

When she steps inside the Bioethics Research Library, she immediately decides she is going to work from there for the day. A change of scenery is in order - and it has nothing to do with how distracting the man in the office next to hers has proven to be.

Satine weaves through the stacks of books, heading to the call number she’d memorized. It takes her up a flight of iron stairs and onto a mezzanine floor overlooking the first floor of the library. Finding an unused study station tucked into a secluded corner, she drops her bag and coat onto a chair and heads to the shelf, cold hands running over the spines of the dusty volumes.

There.

She finds the text immediately and pulls it, turning around to return to the desk. She stops cold.

On the other side of the study station, previously hidden to her by a wooden privacy divide, is Ben, sitting at the desk across from hers and leaning over a book, his auburn hair even more vibrantly red as it catches rays from the sunrise.

Satine fumbles, nearly losing grip of the book, and Ben looks up.

His eyes sparkle behind his glasses as he notices her. “Hello there,” he says softly.

Satine can only look helpless. “Hi,” she responds, telling herself she’s still breathless from the walk across campus, from climbing the stairs.

But she’s a goddamn liar.

Ben’s gaze flickers down to the title of the text she’s carrying. “Seems we’re on the same page today,” he says. “Literally.” Then he grabs another book from his desk and moves it to the empty desk next to him. “If you’re interested in that,” he says, nodding at her book, “you’ll probably want this one, too.” He pulls back the empty chair. “You’re most welcome to join me, if you’d like.”

Satine hesitates. She’d ventured to the library in part to escape him. But her IQ is north of brilliant, and one skill she’s honed is being able to rationalize nearly anything with strong logic - even and especially those things she should avoid - so the words that tumble out instead are: “There is actually something I’d like to run past you now that the opportunity presents itself. A thought experiment, if you will.”

Ben closes his book. “I’m all yours,” he says. “Until approximately 3:15, at which time I am the sole property of the unfortunate souls who are enrolled in my course.”

Satine grabs her coat and bag from the desk across from him and moves them to the desk beside him, where no privacy screen interrupts. 

As she settles into the chair next to him, he says, “This is about the manuscript you’re writing?”

She nods, turning to face him, and he shifts to face her, too. “I’m still outlining it, of course, but I’m nearly set to begin writing.”

“Similar vein to your first book?” Ben asks. “I know the first was an edited volume, but…”

Satine throws him a look. “You read that one, too?”

He chuckles softly, as though not to disturb anyone - even though their section of the library is empty at this hour. “Your work is essentially required reading in my field, my dear. And even if it weren’t, I would have read it because you wrote it.”

Satine is suddenly very interested in examining the way her knee almost touches his, and she can’t bring herself to meet his eyes for a moment.

But she manages to steel herself, and she raises her gaze. “I’m expanding upon the work I did for my dissertation,” she begins. “Adapting it for publication. This book will be sole authored, fleshing out the qualitative methodology I’ve proposed to predict - and essentially diagnose - cases of ongoing genocide.”

Ben nods. “A worthy use of your time. Your dissertation was a solid pilot study. And a book would, ideally, garner a larger audience, especially if published by someone who can actually market it.”

Satine leans one arm against the desk and rests the other on the back of the chair. “I’m concerned about critiques of my model solely based on it being qualitative in nature.”

Ben crosses one arm over his chest, and his other hand reaches up to touch his chin. Seemingly without thinking about it, he scratches his beard. Satine has the strangest urge to ghost her fingertips over his chin, his jaw, his beard, like she’d done on Friday evening. 

Her hand still aches from that touch.

“There will inevitably be critiques based on that,” says Ben, pulling no punches as he interrupts her thoughts. “We are, and forever will be, seen as softer scientists than most others.”

Satine sighs. “Not all of nature can be quantified,” she laments. “And sometimes, quantifying phenomena that are not meant to be quantified just introduces more error rather than eliminating it. Numbers are just proxies of reality, at their core. They are our way of simplifying the complexity of that reality so that our mere mortal brains can understand it.”

Ben’s gaze never wavers from her as she continues.

“But qualitative data - the nuance we can represent! The perspectives we can highlight! I’m convinced we’re ignoring half the story if we ignore qual data, however soft that may make us seem.”

Ben smiles. “You’ve already defended your dissertation, Satine. You don’t need to do so with me,” he says gently.

“Right,” she says, breathing out deeply and trying to slow her racing heart. “Of course. And clearly you think similarly, or we wouldn’t be here.”

His knee bumps reassuringly against hers. “It’s difficult to turn that defensiveness off,” he acknowledges. “The entirety of our graduate careers, we’re trained - literally apprenticed - for a defense. For a fight. And once we succeed, we move on to other fights. To prove ourselves worthy of landing a job, to prove ourselves worthy of tenure, to prove our work worthy of publication. That makes it difficult to recognize an ally - because all we know are opponents. We’re not used to collaboration in academia.”

“I’m not really used to collaboration at all, in academia or outside it, if I’m being honest.”

Ben smiles. “I had a feeling.” He leans forward, touching her elbow with a finger. “But you know, Satine, we’ve just stumbled upon a solution to your dilemma about the inevitable critique of the nature of qualitative work.”

She shoots him a quizzical look.

“Add another qualitative researcher to your methodology. Make sure your model includes an analysis of interobserver variability. Either have two interviewers conducting key informant interviews, or ensure that each transcript is analyzed and coded by two researchers. See where the findings overlap. Triangulate them. If they do overlap, you’ll know the findings aren’t just the imagination of one person. If they don’t overlap, then that’s an interesting finding in and of itself.”

Satine sits back slightly, taking this in.

Ben, however, leans forward another inch. “You don’t have to do everything alone, Satine. And that, too, can take time to learn how to recognize.”

She doesn’t miss a beat. “Ah, I see,” she says, feigning an air of dawning realization. “You’re just hoping to earn co-authorship.” She tries to keep an unreadable face, but she fails miserably, breaking out into laughter.

He joins her, the harmony to her melody. “I would never presume - ” he begins, but she cuts him off.

“Oh, I know,” Satine says. “You’re too magnanimous to even ask, even if it would be deserved.” She narrows her eyes, thinking. “But I do think some acknowledgement would be in order; you’ve solved a fairly major concern of mine, after all. How would you like to write the foreword?”

Ben’s spine straightens, and he removes his glasses, as though wanting to see her without the lenses in the way. “You’re not being facetious?”

“About such a topic as this? Never.”

For a moment, she thinks she sees his eyes glisten, but then she blinks and he’s composed himself again. “I’d be honored,” he says. “Truly.”

Satine nods. “Then it’s settled.” She reaches into her bag to grab her laptop. “I’ll send you the outline so you can take a look.”

They fall into a warm silence, Ben returning to his book, occasionally scribbling notes, and Satine logging into her computer. He slides his notebook over to her, and his university email is written in his distinctive scrawl. Satine smiles and sends the email, and then she takes the notebook, adding her email on the bottom half of the page. She pushes the notebook back to him, and he grins, immediately ripping the page out, tearing it in half, and then scribbling something else below his email.

His phone number.

She’d had his number way back when, of course, but she’d been tempted to call it too many times after they’d parted, and she’d ended up deleting it. But she’s not who she was eighteen years ago - and she’s not who she was at eighteen - so while her heart twists at the sight, it’s not a painful feeling any longer.

Satine takes the other half of the paper, the one with her email address, and adds her cell number below it. Then she folds the paper in half, and folds it twice more before leaning over to Ben and tucking the paper into the breast pocket of his dress shirt. Blood flushes her face as he watches her.

“Networking rarely is this pleasurable,” whispers Ben, equal hints of suggestion and humor in his voice, and Satine has to cover her mouth with her hand to keep from erupting in laughter.

“Is that what you call this?” she asks, still shaking with silent laughter. “‘Networking’?”

Ben folds the paper with his contact info. For the first time, his eyes venture below her face, taking in her tailored suit jacket and the burgundy vest beneath it. Satine is suddenly extremely aware of how low the V neck cuts across her chest, but - ever the gentleman - Ben’s eyes don’t linger, instead focusing on the pocket of the vest near her hip. 

He slips the paper into that pocket, and his warmth lingers.

She remains by his side throughout the day, through lunch and early afternoon, occasionally showing him the screen of her laptop when she reads through an article that never should have made it through peer review or when she receives an email accidentally sent to the entire faculty by the Graduate Studies Committee Chair containing a spreadsheet of the applicants to the department’s PhD program - and their undergraduate grades. They share a look of astonishment at the major gaffe of such reckless stewardship of personal information, but then they double over with laughter when another email is sent less than a minute after the first, retracting the previous one. The underlying panic of the sender is palpable.

Before Satine can click inside the spreadsheet, though, Ben reaches over to the email to delete it. 

“Straightest arrow I’ve ever met,” Satine repeats.

“Guilty,” says Ben, but he’s still laughing.

His laughter trails off when he catches sight of the next email in her queue. “Forgive me,” he says. “I didn’t mean to look, but…” he gestures at the email. “You’re applying for citizenship? You intend to stay?”

Permanently? he seems to add silently.

Satine gives him a hopeful smile. “It hardly feels real,” she admits. “I was on a student visa for what seems like a lifetime. And now that I’ve been back stateside long enough with a green card in a non-student role, I’m eligible.”

“Congratulations, Satine.” His words are said with such warmth that it’s impossible for her hope not to grow. “One step closer to being eligible to lead the Department of State.”

“I still need to pass the test,” she says quickly.

Ben rolls his eyes. “You could pass it in your sleep.”

“Tell that to my nerves,” she murmurs. 

He nods in understanding. “Well, if you need someone to quiz you, let me know.”

Satine is immediately reminded of their study sessions in high school. She laughs. “Just like old times, hmm?” she says. 

Something flashes in his eyes, and Satine remembers that their study sessions in high school had in turn frequently become rather…heated, in more ways than one, and one of those such sessions had taken place in a library not unlike the one they occupy currently.

“You’re a terrible influence on me,” says Ben, as Satine pulls him behind a stack of books.

“No one is ever on this floor, never mind this particular section,” says Satine, looking at him out of the corner of her eye.

“I don’t want to risk getting us in trouble,” he protests, but the protest is weak, and she knows she’s chipping away at his resolve. “Especially so close to graduation.”

Satine spins on the spot. “If you think the risk is too high, perhaps I should up the reward?” And she takes a step back, hands going to her collarbone. Her fingers undo the first three buttons on her button-up blouse.

Ben moans, trying to stifle the sound at the last second to limit their chances of being overheard. But he’s already lost, and he steps forward, cupping her head in his hands and walking her back so her spine is pressed against the spines of the books on the shelves.

His lips descend on hers.

Ben’s thoughts seem to mirror her own, if his dilated pupils are any indication. But then he glances at the time on her laptop and swears. He jumps out of his seat and throws on his peacoat.

“I’m running late for lecture,” he says, clearly flummoxed.

“I’ll check the books out for you and bring them to your office,” offers Satine.

The corner of his mouth curls up. “Least you could do, seeing as you’re the reason I’m late.”

“I didn’t mean - ” begins Satine, but she sees his smile turn into a grin, and she knows he’s messing with her.

“You’re still a terrible influence on me,” says Ben. “It really is just like old times.”

And then he’s gone, and her gaze lingers on the iron staircase for an embarrassingly long time after the echoes of his footsteps fade.

[junebugwriter]

Transition I

I had my first consult for HRT yesterday, and it went super well. I really like this doc; she knows exactly what she's doing, she has helped tons of trans folks like me before, and is able to talk through all the stuff that I simply don't know about. I'm going in for blood tests this morning, which I'm actually REALLY excited to find out the results of, because that's just the kind of person I am. I'm doing my PhD in disability ethics, I've written about bioethics before, and my mom has nurse training, so all the medical stuff is actually quite fascinating for me, even though I am NOT cut out to be a medical doctor or nurse in any way. Because of how my body is built, I'm curious to see how my hormones actually are, if I have high or low T or E, and what it all means.

Doc recommended finasteride alongside estrogen, to help with hair regrowth for the bald spot on the back of my head (one of the biggest focuses of my dysphoria) and the limiting of body hair growth. I honestly thought that it took several years to see the full effects of HRT, but she said that I'd most likely see all the bodily effects within a year, which blew my mind a bit. Part of me is like, "That's it?" But another part of me is also reeling at the fact that "Oh. I'm going to go through a STUPID amount of puberty in like, the span of a couple months. I already did that once, with the wrong equipment--what the hell is the new hormone stuff going to actually DO to me?"

Part of all this makes me nostalgic for how I got here. I only really had my gender epiphany recently, but when she asked "when was the first time I felt like I identified with a different gender," I had to answer... like, all my life. I've operated at varying levels of gender dysphoria since, well, forever. Everything kind of makes sense knowing that I was simply assigned the wrong gender at birth.

It makes sense that I wasn't any good at performing the "masculine" gender, but then again I'd argue, who is? The goalposts of gender are CONSTANTLY SHIFTING. Gender isn't a physical object, it's a role, a performance, a persona. My mom is probably more "butch" than any other straight woman I've met--short hair, wears more non-gendered clothing (polos and jeans, all day every day)--but also, does the feminine-coded stuff that she likes. She loves cooking, knitting, gardening, and generally tending to the home. She is literally a hobbit, a platonic ideal of a Tolkien-esque halfling. She loves things that grow, she loves teaching, she loves reading, learning, and making things. She rarely did anything more than the most basic makeup and jewelry, and seldom wore a dress or a skirt except for on special occasions.

In all honesty, I'm probably going to be more femme than her. I like my hair longer, and want to grow it out. I don't know how to do makeup yet, but I have a feeling once I get good at it I'll never want to take it off. I got my ears pierce, and absolutely LOVE how it makes me look, just a bit of personal sparkle to shine outwards. These are all such small things, in the end. Mentally, I'm still the same. I've always been this way. But I'm so much happier when I'm seen as a woman. My partner says I'm a completely different person, one who's happy, exuberant and vibrant. And she likes seeing me happy.

I'm not looking forward to the more turbulent aspects of puberty, but I think it will be worth it, in the end. I'm excited to transition. Now, I gotta think about changing my legal name, coming out at work... but that can wait for now. Right now, I'm excited about the future.

[momentsbeforemass]

Afraid

(this seems to happen again and again, which is wonderful!)

One of the joys of being Catholic is helping others return to their faith.

I’d been talking for several months with someone who drifted away. Discussing her problems with the Church. Mostly, it’s been related to her divorce. Not relationship issues but dry, technical stuff. Centered on annulments, etc. (the last time this happened, it was bioethics).

Important. But, at least in the way she seemed to approach them, also kind of impersonal.

Which was why it surprised me when she started asking about Reconciliation. Most of it was pretty basic. Stuff she already knew.

After a few minutes, I realized that her questions weren’t really the questions.  

I know, call me slow. So, I started listening to her. Not just her questions. 

She was afraid.

Of what would happen in Reconciliation. Of what the priest would think of her. Of what he would say. 

She knew all the technical stuff. How to prepare for it. What to do. What to say. 

But what she didn’t know? What was waiting for her in the confessional. And she was scared.

If you want Reconciliation to do all the good it can do for you. To deal with the things that are coming between you and God. Then you have to be honest.

Open. Vulnerable. 

Anyone would be worried about something like that. Even more so if you don’t know what’s going to happen. Or haven’t been in a long time. 

Exactly what is waiting for you in the confessional? Just a moment when a priest is most like Christ. 

Listening in love. While it all comes tumbling out.

Just like Christ.

Offering gentle guidance back to God.

Just like Christ. 

With nothing but God’s love and forgiveness.

With the heart of last Sunday’s Gospel (“Neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more.”). 

Just like Christ. 

Reunion with the One who loves you unconditionally.

That’s what’s waiting for you in the confessional.

Last Sunday’s Readings

[erismourn]

i just remembered a time in my advanced bioethics lecture where we were talking about physician assisted suicide and at the time I was Very Much trying not to end my own life every day so I had to walk out of the lecture. it was fine, I had a good rapport with the professor and just emailed him about what I missed. however, while I was leaving the class. I tripped and fell. in a silent room that was watching an informative video. like. full on SPLAT, my stuff went everywhere. mortifying