Week 5 reflection

I found Nelly Oudshoor’s Beyond the Natural Body really intriguing. I had never thought on how the process of inventing a drug would be. So many socio-political factors also affect the process. It is interesting to see how much effort scientists had to take for collecting the research material. Scientists had to make alliances with other relevant social groups like gynecologists and slaughterhouses for the research on sex hormones . Also the three groups, laboratory scientists, pharmaceutical companies and gynecologists were initially operating independently and later they got related and dependent on each other. It is pivotal that the availability of the research material and the different interests of the three groups favored research of female sex hormones over the research on male reproductive functions. The fact that scientific research is affected by social and political climate, interests of organizations as well as the availability of the raw material for research is totally intriguing. There might be so many research topics which were suppressed either because of political restrictions or due to lack of research material.

I resonated with the fact that society directs scientific research and the research shapes the society. The finding that hormones are separate from physiology and you don’t need ovaries to produce estrogen was revolutionary. Men and women both have the male and female sex hormones but in varying degrees. Scientists could define a spectrum of gender according to the levels of hormones present. Instead of looking at gender as binary, gender is considered as a range. This discovery justifies effeminate men. It’s important to note how such research can help in structuring the society. In many cultures effeminate men had to face ridicule, as the cultures had defined standards of how a male should be and how a female should be. But this deeper understanding of what gender is and gender can be anywhere in between of the two standards can definitely change the attitude of society and let people express themselves the way they are. This development in research might have changed society’s outlook towards the queer community as well. Earlier in many cultures and countries homosexuality was considered as an offence. It’s interesting to see that how science helped in proving that prenatal exposure to different levels of hormones can lead to homosexuality. After knowing about the natural causes of the homosexual orientation, many cultures started accepting homosexuality. As it wasn’t something to be blamed on the individual.

The story of how the birth control pill was developed is interesting. From the Birth-control research not being very popular in the 1930s, to many women starting to take the pills by the 1960s; the change in the political and scientific climate can be seen. Earlier research for increasing fertility was only encouraged as a political agenda but then along with the feminist movement the fear of population explosion which could lead to shortage of resources led political agendas to change. It’s interesting to see how changing situations can make a restricted research favorable. The struggle the scientists had to face in developing the pill due to the restrictive political climate reminded me of the scientists during the renaissance period. Copernicus had proposed the heliocentric model of the Universe, where the Sun was considered as the center of the Universe which was against the popular opinion that the Earth was at the center. This discovery made him go against the Church and the society. If the scientists wouldn’t have dared to take the risk, we would be without so many inventions today.

The passage of Vishnu to Vegas showed how invisible chains exist in the present as well. It’s amazing to see how an organization from Chennai supplies hair, wigs, clip-ons to the entire world. The age old south Indian tradition of getting one’s head shaved in the temple as an offering to the lord has lead to development of India as the biggest market in exporting natural hair. I was thinking that we never really think about the raw products from which items of our daily use are manufactured. There exist so many of such global chains. As aware consumers we need to question the brands if the product is manufactured sustainably. Another question which the passage raises is that if the raw materials are procured ethically and in what conditions do the laborers work. Every part of the iPhone comes from one of the many raw materials that are extracted from all over the world. For example, Gold from Peru, copper from Chile, along with many other minerals from many other countries go into its production. However, the mining of these materials has a lasting environmental impact. The mining process has many negative consequences such as destroying animal habitats where the minerals are mined from, contributing to deforestation and pollution of the environment and less than 1% of rare minerals are recycled. Also many times child laborers are used for mining and women in such areas face molestations. If we don’t support it, then we need to start asking questions and find where the source of a particular chain is. I also wondered why these chains are invisible. Capitalist organizations would want the chains to remain invisible as they can keep procuring the raw materials at a cheaper price.