I have a feeling that IDAHO is one of those American events that people on the internet take to be international, but anyway, it's spread as far as my university at least. The university did a fairly big publicity campaign, which is positive, and a series of events targeted mainly at students. On the negative side, after making a big deal of it they shoved the whole event into a small classroom, which didn't really have room for the (not particularly startling) numbers who attended, even without the fact that half the space was taken up by stalls for various interest groups and tables of refreshments. It feel a bit of a mixed message: yay we're so inclusive and we love LGBT people, in fact we love you so much that you can have a whole day (during the period when most of the university is preoccupied with exams) and even a whole 10 square metres of space.
Anyway. I attended a really interesting talk by one of the lecturers, Dr Rosenfeld who is a sociologist of ageing who specializes in gay issues. ( summary of a summary )
Some people said on Twitter, perhaps ironically, that people should stop tweeting about IDAHO and actually do something about it. Writing a blog post isn't much of a step up, but it's something. And I made my face known at the events so that colleagues will see me as someone at least friendly to LGBT causes (I did get a couple of "oh, you're one of us?" glances.) I think the most useful thing I can do is advocate for one of our imaginary patients to have their biography slightly altered to include a same-sex partner. At the moment the students do have a module about sexualities and medicine but only in the third year, and at least mentioning a bit earlier on that not everybody is straight might be useful.
Anyway. I'm against homophobia and transphobia and every other type of discrimination based on gender identity or sexual orientation. Just in case anyone was confused in that regard!
Anyway. I attended a really interesting talk by one of the lecturers, Dr Rosenfeld who is a sociologist of ageing who specializes in gay issues. ( summary of a summary )
Some people said on Twitter, perhaps ironically, that people should stop tweeting about IDAHO and actually do something about it. Writing a blog post isn't much of a step up, but it's something. And I made my face known at the events so that colleagues will see me as someone at least friendly to LGBT causes (I did get a couple of "oh, you're one of us?" glances.) I think the most useful thing I can do is advocate for one of our imaginary patients to have their biography slightly altered to include a same-sex partner. At the moment the students do have a module about sexualities and medicine but only in the third year, and at least mentioning a bit earlier on that not everybody is straight might be useful.
Anyway. I'm against homophobia and transphobia and every other type of discrimination based on gender identity or sexual orientation. Just in case anyone was confused in that regard!
