Medical Ethics

Musing on binary essentialism

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There’s definitely something stirring in the ether. Claire Ainsworth was first out of the traps with their article in Nature, openly stating that science has known for years that sex is a spectrum, and nothing like the immutable binary that everyone is told about in class, all the way from primary school thru to med….
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Dr Mika Venhola talks about Intersex

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Mika Venhola is the Deputy Chief of the Oulu University Hospital, Department of Paediatrics and Adolescence. In this short piece to camera, Mika Venhola explains the current approach to treating intersex infants and adolescents, why it needs to change, and how to help parents understand an issue they have never heard of before the birth…
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A Nomenclatura of Life

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Or, How we learn about ourselves from the names we are given by others “All my life, my heart has yearned for a thing I cannot name” ~ Andre Breton Words fascinate me. Well, that’s not quite accurate. Language fascinates me, which isn’t quite the same thing. I was born in Oxford, that city of…
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Statement of the European Intersex Meeting, Riga, 2014

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Statement of the European Intersex Meeting, Riga, 2014

On Wednesday, the 8th of October 2014 the European Intersex Meeting took place in Riga. Under the umbrella of OII Europe and facilitated by ILGA Europe, this meeting gathered European intersex organisations working for intersex human rights. The goal of the meeting was to identify objectives and strategies to advocate for the full implementation of…
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Mutilations or non-consensual normalization treatments?

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In April 2008, Curtis explained why we did not use the term ‘mutilation’ in OII’s official position on health care; this was still in place upon closure of original website (April 2012). Curtis E. Hinkle, 2008.   We have been asked why OII’s Official Position on Health Care does not mention mutilations.  There are many reasons for…
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