Quotes by Alice Dreger - Page 1

I am led by what I find to be true, not what I find to be popular.
Alice Dreger /
Be True
Led
Copy Quote
To be perfectly honest, I follow football the way I follow television. I read about it.
Alice Dreger /
Perfectly
Copy Quote
Being gay is not a terrible, tragic disease that requires prevention or treatment chosen for you by your parents.
Alice Dreger /
Chosen
Disease
Prevention
Tragic
Treatment
Requires
Copy Quote
Having a child is not like taking a spouse; there is no mutual agreement entered into. It is up the parent to make the commitment.
Alice Dreger /
Mutual
Parent
Spouse
Entered
Copy Quote
You can't go into new life experiences without the understanding that yeah, you may fail, but knowing you might fail can't stop you from trying.
Alice Dreger /
New Life
Understanding
Yeah
Experiences
Fail
Life Experiences
Copy Quote
A hospital may spend several million dollars separating a pair of conjoined twins even though that separation is likely to leave them worse off.
Alice Dreger /
Dollars
Million Dollars
Separating
Twins
Hospital
Pair
Several
Copy Quote
When all is said and done, science actually takes hard work and a willingness to sometimes find out that your most cherished hypothesis is wrong.
Alice Dreger /
Hard Work
Hypothesis
Willingness
Work Science Hard Work
Cherished
Copy Quote
Surely, sport is not fundamentally about the safety of athletes. If it were, we'd probably have to ban professional football, right after boxing.
Alice Dreger /
Boxing
Safety
Athletes
Ban
Fundamentally
Professional Football
Surely
Copy Quote
After I dropped out of college at the age of 19, I became a mortgage broker, and when I went back to school I thought about going into real estate law.
Alice Dreger /
Mortgage
Back To School
Broker
Dropped
Estate
Real Estate
Copy Quote
I do work half time as a historian of medicine at Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine, and I started my career with work in the 19th century.
Alice Dreger /
Historian
Medicine
Northwestern
University
Work Time School
Copy Quote
Fact-checking doesn't exist primarily because some of us are liars and cheats. It exists because writers will be writers, much as they may mean to be historians.
Alice Dreger /
Liars
Cheats
Exists
Historians
Primarily
Copy Quote
Perhaps it is because I'm a writer trained in history that I've always assumed I would make mistakes in my drafts. Historians know how faulty human memory can be.
Alice Dreger /
Assumed
Drafts
Faulty
Historians
Memory
Trained
Copy Quote
A democratic medical establishment does not alter people's bodies to fit regressive social norms; it advocates for patients by demanding the social body get its act together.
Alice Dreger /
Democratic
Establishment
Advocate
Alter
Bodies
Demanding
Norms
Patients
Copy Quote
Ok, here goes: I'm going to see how many people I can offend by suggesting that maybe many little gay boys, like many little girls, are made up of sugar and spice and everything nice.
Alice Dreger /
Sugar
Offend
How Many People
Little Girls
Spice
Copy Quote
Conjoined twins simply may not need sex-romance partners as much as the rest of us do. Throughout time and space, they have described their condition as something like being attached to a soul mate.
Alice Dreger /
Partners
Soul Mate
Time And Space
Twins
Condition
Attached
Time Space May
Mate
Throughout
Copy Quote
As a kid, I did some running but especially loved biking and swimming. I grew up on Long Island, and our mom took us all the time to the ocean, so I grew up doing open-water swimming in the Atlantic.
Alice Dreger /
Ocean
Running
Biking
Long Island
Swimming
Atlantic
Time Mom Long
Loved
Island
Took
Copy Quote
Doctors are human animals. They want to be loved, they are tribal, they instinctually favor stories over scientific evidence, they make mistakes, and even small gifts make them susceptible to being biased.
Alice Dreger /
Biased
Doctors
Scientific Evidence
Susceptible
Favor
Gifts
Scientific
Tribal
Copy Quote
My mother has told so many times the unbelievable story of how, as a toddler, I would demand raw onions and eat them like apples, I think that, at this juncture, it is a story that just has to be believed.
Alice Dreger /
Apples
Demand
Juncture
Onions
Toddler
Unbelievable
Believed
Raw
Copy Quote
Instead of constantly enhancing the norm - forever upping the ante of the 'normal' with new technologies - we should work on enhancing the concept of normal by broadening appreciation of anatomical variation.
Alice Dreger /
Appreciation
Norm
Variation
Broadening
Concept
Enhancing
New Technologies
Technologies
Copy Quote
Being a parent of a boy who wants to wear sparkles and grow his hair long - especially when you don't know where it's all going to go - it's hard stuff. I'm not being politically incorrect in acknowledging that, am I?
Alice Dreger /
Parent
Acknowledging
Long Grow Hair
Incorrect
Politically Incorrect
Copy Quote
We now know that sex is complicated enough that we have to admit nature doesn't draw the line for us between male and female, or between male and intersex and female and intersex; we actually draw that line on nature.
Alice Dreger /
Complicated
Female
Sex
Admit
Male
Draw
Line
Copy Quote
I don't have the panic I used to have, meeting people who are androgynous, but when you meet someone whose identity is unclear, that throws your own identity into flux because the way we treat each other is very gendered.
Alice Dreger /
Androgynous
Flux
Identity
Panic
Unclear
Your Identity People
Treat People Way
Meeting
Throws
Copy Quote
So many times I've heard people say that the right to marry for gay and lesbian couples won't really change anything other than some legal and financial stuff. It's a dumb argument: those legal and financial effects matter.
Alice Dreger /
Legal
Dumb
Effects
Couples
Marry
Lesbian
People Say
Copy Quote
After I dropped out of college at the age of 19, I became a mortgage broker, and when I went back to school I thought about going into real estate law. I probably would have made a lot more money and died of boredom by now.
Alice Dreger /
Boredom
Died
Mortgage
Back To School
Broker
Dropped
Estate
Real Estate
Copy Quote
Purposefully exposing young people to increased risks of major brain problems - even death - for sport is surely even more ethically complicated than sending young people into this same neurological danger zone as soldiers.
Alice Dreger /
Brain
Complicated
Danger
Exposing
Zone
Ethically
Sport
Increased
Major
Neurological
Sending
Soldiers
Surely
Young People
Copy Quote
Regardless of the cultural system, social pressure to appear straight seems to be fairly intense cross-culturally. Indeed, one is inclined to wonder, if being straight is just natural, why does it require quite so much policing?
Alice Dreger /
Intense
Natural
Pressure
Seems
Wonder
Fairly
Quite
Appear
Cultural
Inclined
Indeed
Straight
Policing
Regardless
Require
System
Copy Quote
Using medicine in the service of cosmesis is generally bad for patients, bad for doctors, and bad for democracy. The only exceptions are when we know the intervention will actually reduce suffering, as with a primary cleft lip repair.
Alice Dreger /
Democracy
Doctors
Intervention
Medicine
Actually
Bad
Exceptions
Generally
Patients
Primary
Reduce
Repair
Service
Copy Quote
I could make a martyrly claim to having been the victim of childhood enslavement when I report that I started regularly cooking with my mother at a hot stove when I was five. But the truth is I wanted to cook. Cooking meant being near food.
Alice Dreger /
Cooking
Enslavement
Truth Is
Report
Claim
Near
Regularly
Stove
Copy Quote
You know what Oprah taught me? Unless you count as changing your life having a neighborhood dad say to you every morning at the school bus stop, 'You sure don't look as good as you did on 'Oprah!', being on 'Oprah' doesn't change your life.
Alice Dreger /
Neighborhood
Life Change Good
Count
Oprah
Copy Quote
Many medical students, like most American patients, confuse science and technology. They think that what it means to be a scientific doctor is to bring to bear the maximum amount of technology on any given patient. And this makes them dangerous.
Alice Dreger /
Medical
Maximum
Patient
Science And Technology
Bear
Doctor
Confuse
Copy Quote
We don't really know where human sexual orientations come from yet. What we do know is that the evidence we have that sexual orientation includes an innate component doesn't seem to point to the existence of simple 'gay genes' and 'straight genes.'
Alice Dreger /
Genes
Innate
Orientation
Component
Sexual
Copy Quote
If we are going to have to worry all the time that we might offend some students' sensibilities, we are not going to be able to teach in a way that actually matters. We're not going to be able to teach about sex, gender, race, religion, or violence.
Alice Dreger /
Offend
Sensibilities
Copy Quote
Ironically, when I've asked my straight friends to join me in hanging a rainbow flag, they answer, 'But someone might think we're gay,' not realizing that is exactly the point. To be mistaken for the oppressed is to momentarily become the oppressed.
Alice Dreger /
Mistaken
Oppressed
Rainbow
Realizing
Asked
Exactly
Flag
Ironically
Join
Momentarily
Copy Quote
The safety argument against steroids may be a good one, but let's be honest. It isn't the one that motivates most officials and fans to frown on steroids. Steroid use does not just seem risky or unnatural, it seems to disrupt the level playing field.
Alice Dreger /
Level Playing Field
Officials
Safety
Steroid
Unnatural
Disrupt
Frown
Motivates
Playing Field
Risky
Copy Quote
I think it is fine to have sports divided into men's and women's, just as it is fine to say a fifteen-year-old is incapable of consenting to sex. But we should recognize these are social distinctions based on biology, and not categories foisted upon us by nature.
Alice Dreger /
Biology
Categories
Divided
Incapable
Nature Men Women
Consenting
Distinctions
Nature Women Men
Recognize
Copy Quote
Want to be a well-paid bioethicist, with one, two, or even three university appointments? Just get yourself a two-piece navy polyester suit and follow these three simple rules: (1) Never name names. (2) Screw principles; just follow procedures. (3) Bury the money.
Alice Dreger /
Appointments
Navy
Principles
Procedures
Bury
Polyester
Screw
Suit
Copy Quote
No matter how little we think anatomy should matter to one's social and political rights, surely we can't pretend biology doesn't matter in sports. Surely there's a reason we don't let adults play in the t-ball leagues, and a reason most women athletes want their own leagues.
Alice Dreger /
Anatomy
Biology
Political Rights
Athletes
Pretend
Leagues
Surely
Copy Quote
I actually completely suck at being a bioethicist. What I do is history of medicine and patient advocacy. Patient advocacy is actually the opposite of bioethics, because bioethicists are the people who increasingly set up and justify the systems we patient advocates have to fight.
Alice Dreger /
Advocacy
Justify
Medicine
Patient
Opposite
Fight
Set
Increasingly
Systems
Copy Quote
When I ask my medical students to describe their image of a woman who elects to birth with a midwife rather than with an obstetrician, they generally describe a woman who wears long cotton skirts, braids her hair, eats only organic vegan food, does yoga, and maybe drives a VW microbus.
Alice Dreger /
Birth
Cotton
Midwife
Skirts
Describe
Drives
Eats
Organic
Wears
Copy Quote
What we should care about is health - reduction of morbidity and mortality. Too often, we instead pay attention to whether something is 'normal.' A hospital may spend several million dollars separating a pair of conjoined twins, even though that separation is likely to leave them worse off.
Alice Dreger /
Health
Attention
Care
Dollars
Million Dollars
Mortality
Normal
Pay
Pay Attention
Reduction
Separating
Twins
Leave
Spend
Hospital
Instead
Likely
Million
Pair
Several
Though
Worse
Copy Quote
We say, 'You may drink at the age of 21 but not at the age of 20.' Why? Because humans like to create terribly neat categories out of nature because it allows us a nice, tight social organization. The truth is, nature doesn't care that we like nice, neat social organizations. Nature likes variety.
Alice Dreger /
Categories
Humans
Likes
Neat
Organization
Social Organization
Truth Is
Variety
Terribly
Tight
Copy Quote
The funny thing is, when I ask people with dark skin if they would change their color, they tell me no, and when I ask women if they would rather be men, they tell me no, and I get the same response when I ask people with unusual anatomies if they would take a magic pill to erase their unusual features.
Alice Dreger /
Color
Dark
Erase
Features
Magic
Response
Unusual
Skin
Funny Thing
Pill
Copy Quote
When I talk about intersex, people ask me, 'But what about the locker room?' Yes, what about the locker room? If so many people feel trepidation around it, why don't we fix the locker room? There are ways to signal to children that they are not the problem, and normalization technologies are not the way.
Alice Dreger /
Locker Room
Trepidation
Fix
Me Children People
Locker
Signal
So Many People
Technologies
Yes
Copy Quote
Doctors are human animals. They want to be loved, they are tribal, they instinctually favor stories over scientific evidence, they make mistakes, and even small gifts make them susceptible to being biased. If we took doctors seriously as human animals, we might hurt them - and they might hurt us - a lot less.
Alice Dreger /
Biased
Scientific Evidence
Susceptible
Favor
Gifts
Scientific
Tribal
Copy Quote
Doctors and scientists, being part of that two-sex culture, have done everything they can to try to force people who are in-between into one of the two clear types. Intersex people themselves have also generally wanted to fit into one of the two clear categories; most are not interested in being in a 'third' type.
Alice Dreger /
Categories
Not Interested
In-Between
Scientists
Third
Types
Copy Quote
According to my mother, there pretty much wasn't anything I wouldn't eat as a child. Not just try, but eat. I was even inclined to dig into stuff about which she expressed open disgust - lobster and other shellfish, and cheap Chinese food with pepper so hot it made your gums feel like a medieval dentist had been at them.
Alice Dreger /
Chinese
Chinese Food
Dentist
Lobster
Medieval
According
Cheap
Dig
Disgust
Expressed
Inclined
Pepper
Copy Quote
I don't know what has caused this reawakening in academia. Obama? The GOP's assaults on science and on patients? Jon Stewart? I'm not at all sure. I just know I don't feel nearly as alone in academia as I used to. I'm feeling increasingly surrounded by fellow Ph.D.'s and by M.D.'s who seem to be taking a lot of things personally.
Alice Dreger /
Academia
Gop
Caused
Obama
Jon
Nearly
Fellow
Increasingly
Jon Stewart
Patients
Personally
Seem
Surrounded
Taking
Copy Quote
You want a child who never makes you anything but proud? Please. Don't bother taking on parenthood if you can't handle the fact that sometimes your child's identity won't be what you would have chosen. And if you want to prevent a child from ever suffering? Well, then don't have a child. No one is born into the world never to suffer.
Alice Dreger /
Bother
Chosen
Handle
Identity
Parenthood
Please
Prevent
Suffer
Copy Quote
If we have a situation where a man is particularly graceful in a sport that rewards grace - say, for example, figure skating - why is it that we don't say to the man, 'Well, you're too feminine to compete?'... I don't understand why we don't find it offensive also to say to a women who's very strong, 'You're too masculine to compete.'
Alice Dreger /
Feminine
Figure Skating
Grace
Masculine
Offensive
Rewards
Skating
Compete
For Example
Copy Quote

Related Authors

Saint Augustine
Saint
Saturday, Nov 13, 0354
Wednesday, Aug 28, 0430
Maya Angelou
Author
Wednesday, Apr 04, 1928
Wednesday, May 28, 2014
Walt Disney
Animator
Thursday, Dec 05, 1901
Thursday, Dec 15, 1966
Alfred Lord Tennyson
Poet
Saturday, Aug 05, 1809
Thursday, Oct 06, 1892
H. L. Mencken
Journalist
Sunday, Sep 12, 1880
Sunday, Jan 29, 1956
Stephen Hawking
Physicist
Thursday, Jan 08, 1942
Groucho Marx
Comedian
Thursday, Oct 02, 1890
Friday, Aug 19, 1977
John Lewis
U.s. Representative
Wednesday, Feb 21, 1940
Aldous Huxley
Writer
Thursday, Jul 26, 1894
Friday, Nov 22, 1963
George Orwell
Novelist
Thursday, Jun 25, 1903
Saturday, Jan 21, 1950
Stephen Covey
Author
Monday, Oct 24, 1932
Monday, Jul 16, 2012
Albert Camus
Author
Friday, Nov 07, 1913
Monday, Jan 04, 1960
Pope Francis
Thursday, Dec 17, 1936
Soren Kierkegaard
Philosopher
Wednesday, May 05, 1813
Sunday, Nov 11, 1855
Michael Jordan
Basketball Player
Sunday, Feb 17, 1963

View All Quotes

Top Authors

George Bernard Shaw
Playwright
Saturday, Jul 26, 1856
Thursday, Nov 02, 1950
Deepak Chopra
Author
Wednesday, Oct 22, 1947
Mae West
Actress
Thursday, Aug 17, 1893
Saturday, Nov 22, 1980
H. L. Mencken
Journalist
Sunday, Sep 12, 1880
Sunday, Jan 29, 1956
Carrie Fisher
Actress
Sunday, Oct 21, 1956
Tuesday, Dec 27, 2016
Jordan Peterson
Psychologist
Stephen Hawking
Physicist
Thursday, Jan 08, 1942
Jean De La Bruyere
Wednesday, Aug 16, 1645
Thursday, May 10, 1696
Michael Jordan
Basketball Player
Sunday, Feb 17, 1963
Plato
Philosopher
Thursday, Jan 01, 1970
Thursday, Jan 01, 1970
Vince Lombardi
Football Player
Wednesday, Jun 11, 1913
Thursday, Sep 03, 1970
Niccolo Machiavelli
Historian
Monday, May 03, 1469
Tuesday, Jun 21, 1527
Mahatma Gandhi
Civil Rights Leader
Saturday, Oct 02, 1869
Friday, Jan 30, 1948
Martin Luther
Monk
Saturday, Nov 10, 1483
Monday, Feb 18, 1546
Groucho Marx
Comedian
Thursday, Oct 02, 1890
Friday, Aug 19, 1977

View All Authors

Alice Dreger Quotes - Page 1

Picture Quotes Maker

Related Authors

Popular Topic Tags

Top Authors

Share This Page

Stay Connected

Picture Quotes Maker

Related Authors

Popular Topic Tags

Top Authors

Share This Page