Quote of the Week: MAiD, Bioethics, and the Culture of Eugenics in Canada

In a host of posts at BIOPOLITCAL PHILOSOPHY (for e.g., here, here, and here), in my monograph Foucault and Feminist Philosophy of Disability, in “Disaster Ableism, Epistemologies of Crisis, and the Mystique of Bioethics” (my chapter in The Bloomsbury Guide to Philosophy of Disability), and in my forthcoming article in Feminist Philosophy Quarterly, I have […]

(My Presentation to) Philosophy, Disability, and Social Change 6

The sixth edition of the Philosophy, Disability, and Social Change conference series that took place this week was outstanding, exceeding the expectations of the organizing team in every aspect. The presentations were amazing, fascinating, provocative, engaging, creative, insightful, mischievous, daring, insurgent. The Q and As were lively, respectful, committed, and concerned. The Chat conversations were […]

Gattaca and the Impossibility of Eliminating Disability

Pictured above is the Gattaca movie poster, featuring three characters in a triangular arrangement. In the foreground is Ethan Hawke (playing Vincent), a white man with short, dark brown hair. To the left is Uma Thurman (Irene), a white woman with straight blonde hair in a ponytail. To the right is Jude Law (Jerome), a […]

Prefiguration and the Abolition of Bioethics

Foucault’s genealogical method is the best approach with which to examine how the subfield of bioethics (1) contributes to the production of the problem of disability (and its naturalized foundation)–that is, contributes to the production of disability as a problem; and (2) is designed to hasten its elimination, that is, to resolve the problem that […]

Disabling Bioethics: Notes Toward An Abolitionist Genealogy

I am putting the finishing touches on “Disabling Bioethics: Notes Toward An Abolitionist Genealogy,” my contribution to Genealogy: A Genealogy, edited by Verena Erlenbusch-Anderson and Daniele Lorenzini. (Columbia University Press, 2025). I have copied below the pre-copyedited version of the first section of the chapter which appears under the heading “Conceptual Needs of the Argument […]

Philosophy, Bioethics, and Dirty Hands

In my previous post, I noted that one philosopher in attendance at my Syracuse presentation claimed that I had confused the causal relation between bioethics (and bioethicists) and the popularity and normalization of prenatal testing and screening. As I noted, furthermore, my interlocutor pointed out to me (in a somewhat patronizing fashion) that prospective parents […]

Bioethics and the Reproduction of Power

During the question period following my presentation at Syracuse University, one interlocutor asserted that I had confused the direction of causation between prenatal testing and bioethics. Prospective parents, he said, do not, as he understood me to suggest, avail themselves of prenatal testing because bioethicists tell them to do so. Rather, the technology has developed, […]

Disabling Bioethics: An Abolitionist Genealogy

Two weeks from today, that is, January 14, I leave for the Eastern APA in New York. I will present in an APA symposium on my work in philosophy of disability on Tuesday, January 16, and then travel to Syracuse on Thursday, January 18, to present at the Central New York Humanities Corridor on Friday, […]

A Philosophical Defense of Youth Suffrage

The following is an edited translation of an interview that I gave to Die Tageszeitung, a cooperative-owned German daily newspaper. The interviewer was Valérie Catil.  A philosopher on children’s right to vote For the philosopher Mich Ciurria, not letting children vote is a form of discrimination. She demands voting rights from birth. Wochentaz: Dr. Ciurria, the governing parties […]