Considering Unicorns

Queer Bioethics and Intersectionality

Authors

• Tiia Sudenkaarne

DOI: https://doi.org/10.23980/sqs.70785

Abstract

This article discusses queer bioethics, a critical stance for dismantling cis- and heteronormativity in bioethics, together with intersectionality, the investigation of and potential for social justice-oriented change. I discuss the difficulties of navigating plurality with solidarity and ethical sobriety that I call the problems of identity, essentialism and relativism in intersectionality theory. I then proceed to ponder how queer bioethics relates to intersectionality, and close by offering some remarks for further research.

Certain intersectional approaches share key queer bioethical imperatives in exposing how seemingly neutral antidiscrimination discourses rely on bias and privilege. Both powerfully demonstrate how ostensibly objective methodologies are often inadequate for addressing socially sanctioned bias or for unpacking oppressive habits of the mind. Intersectionality interrupts narrative norms and disrupts easy binaries, such as male/female or homo/hetero. Because it is practice-oriented and has a social justice mission, intersectionality approaches analysis and advocacy as necessarily linked, which corresponds to queer bioethics arising from LGBTQI activism. However, establishing intersectional queer bioethics requires further investigation into cases of race, sexual and gender diversity with queer bioethics as the background moral theory, formulation of which I suggest should be inspired by feminist metaphysical advances.