Alice Dreger, Ph.D. Profile Banner
Alice Dreger, Ph.D. Profile
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.

@AliceDreger

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Writer, journalist, historian. Bylines NYT, WaPo, WSJ, Boston Globe, WIRED, The Atlantic... More info at

the nearest open water
Joined November 2012
Don't wanna be here? Send us removal request.
@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
4 years
If you need a wake-up call, here it is: My husband was on a large conference call of American med school deans last night. One asked about legal coverage for pulling people off ventilators to give to others more likely to survive. I.e., not being charged with murder. Here we are.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
My mom just said to me, "We're all going to get it now, so why not just give up and go back to normal?" So this is what I explained, in case this explanation helps you: 1/n
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
4 years
Discuss.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
7 years
Yates and all AGs swear to defend the Constitution "against all enemies." That includes POTUS if necessary
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
I'm not asking you to stop your life. I'm asking you to mask-up, avoid the vulnerable, be careful. If you're infected, isolate. SLOW THE SPREAD. Our front-line medical providers need us to do this to save lives, including people with non-covid crises. Thank you. 9/n
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
The National Association of Manufacturers is the largest manufacturing association in the United States, representing small and large manufacturers in every industrial sector and in all 50 states. It's suggesting Pence invoke the 25th Amendment.
@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
The National Association of Manufacturers: "Vice President Pence, who was evacuated from the Capitol, should seriously consider working with the Cabinet to invoke the 25th Amendment to preserve democracy." via @shopfloornam
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
So the reason not to say "screw it, let's just unmask and go back to normal" right now is to try to....flatten the curve. I know that's an expression from way back when, but it applies. We need to slow down infections to keep hospitals from collapsing. 6/n
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
If hospital systems collapse -- and this is already happening in some ERs/ICUs -- then people with survivable medical crises like heart attacks and car accidents are going to die when they didn't need to die. We don't want that scene! 7/n
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
Added to the challenge is that you really DO have to take infected hospital staff out of rotation, even if the staff are not really feeling very ill, because people in the hospital with, say, bad cancers/pregnancy, need to be protected from infection. They are very vulnerable.4/n
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
5 years
People. There are more than two sexes. There are more than two genders. This is not a political statement. It's just reality.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
My kid just told me that at his house (dorm) at Univ Chicago, they randomly assign themselves teams to root for in the Super Bowl because most of them have no idea who the teams are.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
So, weird as it sounds, we have to try to slow the spread if we can, knowing Omicron is crazy infectious. Slowing the spread will slow how many unvaccinated and vaxed-but-vulnerable people end up in the hospitals. Slow the spread. 8/n
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
All this means that hospitals are at the breaking point. Staff are being pulled out. Patients are surging in because a small percentage of a lot of infected people is still a lot of people. This is bad. 5/n
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
I spent a while last night on the phone with someone who is pretty well known and being cancelled in a way that will destroy his life. I hadn't heard of him before he reached out to me with a note that made me worry he was suicidal. 1/n
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
But because Omicron is SO infectious, there is going to be a huge surge in terms of absolute numbers of people who need hospitals. We are already seeing that. 3/n
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
7 years
How women like me are seen in our 20s: spunky 30s: pushy 40s: bitchy 50s: cranky 60s: nasty 70s: uppity 80s: spunky dead: worthy of praise
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
So I tweeted something in which I had the position of JK Rowling wrong, and for that I apologize. I was fooled by something that looked like it was quoting her but wasn't, and I feel stupid for making that mistake. Her position is stated clearly here
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
Yes, Covid will now find almost everyone, and almost everyone vaccinated will be okay. Only a small percentage of us will need hospitals. (More unvaccinated than vaccinated will need hopsitals, but still only a small percentage of all of us.) 2/n
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
Bad-ass and beautiful! "We hacked printers all across Russia and printed this PDF explaining that Putin/Kremlin/Russian media is lying and then we instructed how to install tor and get around their censorship to access real media."
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
7 years
I feel, like no matter what else I do, my obit headline will never be this good
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
7 years
Oh yes I did
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
You know why I like wearing a mask? Men unknown to me no longer tell me I should smile.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
6 years
I am a woman. I am not interested in "being believed." I am interested in being taken seriously.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
6 years
What are you supposed to do when a hundred students show up to protest someone you're pretty sure isn't you? (A blog about my visit to @WellesleyFP last week)
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
7 years
You can stick with your tribe or you can have intellectual integrity.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
7 years
"When I got my bachelor degree, I thought I knew everything. My masters, realized I knew nothing. My PhD, I realized nobody knows anything."
@Lazystocktrader
Kewl Dude
7 years
@AliceDreger You know the thing about being less certain the more you know and being 100% confident and dogmatic, the less you know.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
5 years
This bathroom sign FTW
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
Everyone deserves due process. Title IX at many universities has been broken a very long time. I had a horrific experience in the early 2000s when a colleague was falsely accused. Have seen much ridiculousness since. This is NOT a partisan issue. Justice matters for everybody.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
I feel so old because feminism has apparently become biological essentialism and it lost me there
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
And I said to myself, as I pictured myself throwing another beached starfish into the sea, walking along a shore filled with beached starfish as far as the eye can see, "Well, maybe I saved that one." /fin
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
7 years
Omg my whole life since my PhD would have been a lot easier if they'd GIVEN ME THE SWORD
@SariRautiainen
Sari Rautiainen
7 years
In Finland, PhDs are awarded sword as a symbol to defend what's right and true. My sword stays at home today, but I #marchforscience
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
7 years
I would like more academic women to join me in vocally supporting academic freedom and free speech on campus. 1/n
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
7 years
Academia spends a remarkable amount of energy making good, hardworking people feel inadequate every day.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
5 years
Apparently last night there was "counterprogramming" for students who found my reappearance at @WellesleyFP traumatic. Candles, coloring books, and chill music were offered. Had I known in advance, I would have sent them a couple of pans of brownies, to help out.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
I feel like someone should remind the Republican party that, when you have to break up with someone with narcissistic personality disorder, they will try to destroy you on the way out.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
Ed Wilson was not just a scientific great, he was a moral great. Here are a few pages from "Galileo's Middle Finger," excerpting the conversation I had with him about being attacked.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
8 years
I think this @nytimes reader is right. Same reason GOP guys mention daughters in denunciations; we are valuable cows.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
1 year
Please, someone, invite me to a debate with Colin.
@SwipeWright
Colin Wright
1 year
Biological sex is real, immutable, and binary.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
The National Association of Manufacturers: "Vice President Pence, who was evacuated from the Capitol, should seriously consider working with the Cabinet to invoke the 25th Amendment to preserve democracy." via @shopfloornam
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
6 years
Maybe they cut your hair. Maybe you pay them.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
7 years
I'm thinking we need to start sending our used menstrual products to the IN, OH, and TX legislatures and tell them to arrange proper burial.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
9 years
The mate nailed it when I told him: "Ambush kinda implies weaponry. Data is not weaponry unless you are dealing with fools."
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
5 years
I want to divorce Jeff Bezos
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
4 years
My mother: "Do what they do in Poland -- have 3 cloves of garlic for breakfast. It doesn't do a damn thing for the virus but it keeps people away from you."
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
I find the messaging of AOC's dress bizarre. She participates in what is basically an obscene display of wealth but tries to be cute about it? Reminds me of a snobby bourgeois Harvard professor who visited my grad program and kept yelling at the waiter while espousing Marxism.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
5 years
PSA: You can regret a sexual encounter without concluding that the other person did something very wrong.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
7 years
but it all makes total sense if you think about it
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
Do not erase intersex people Do not erase feminine gay men Do not erase butch lesbians Do not erase trans people Do not erase gender nonbinary people Do not erase bigendered people Stop insisting sex is simply dimorphic in humans because these realities make you uncomfortable.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
6 years
Every single fellow progressive academic I have referred to @TheFIREorg for help, FIRE has helped. For free. Effectively. No other organization helps on free speech as fast, as effectively, or as blindly towards political orientation.
@TheFIREorg
FIRE
6 years
Within just the last year, FIRE used the First Amendment to successfully vindicate the rights of college students in Iowa to advocate for marijuana legalization, and in Illinois to pass out flyers attacking capitalism. /6
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
6 years
I was walking through the Minneapolis airport when my Irony Alert suddenly sounded
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
9 years
They were like: SEX->BAD. POT->BAD. You understand it took all my strength not to raise my hand and say, "Try them together then!"
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
Me: So, @petersagal says I have to stop running until my runner's toe heals itself. The mate: Didn't I tell you the same thing? Me: Yeah, but you're just a doctor, and he's Peter Sagal.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
4 years
Why do people think you must EITHER believe sex is real OR honor transgender people and their rights? I believe sex is real. (That's why surgery on sexed parts can hurt.) I also believe in honoring people's gender identities and expressions. (I support consented surgeries.)
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
I asked him to tell me his story. I know the importance of getting people who are traumatized to turn their chaos into a narrative as it helps with healing. (Thanks, Art Frank, "The Wounded Storyteller," and @JonathanMAdler for that insight.) 2/n
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
4 years
I'm going to admit I've been so buried in a bond analysis I completely missed the attempts to burn @sapinker at the stake. I thought when I joined academia, I would be free of the church, free of the requirement to adhere to the dogma of those with power. I was wrong.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
I told him, "Don't listen to that voice that says, 'If I kill myself, THEN they will be sorry.'" Because they won't be, and you'll be dead. And he said he had thought about just that. (We all have.) 5/n
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
Every M.D. I know: "I don't see why people turn to 'alternative medicine'!" Me: "Um, because they can get an appointment?"
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
9 years
"You have to have a baby!" There are apparently no scissors in the room for paper abortions.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
There's no shame in changing your mind and deciding now to get a vaccine
@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
Unvaccinated people are FOURTEEN TIMES more likely to die of Covid-19 than vaccinated people
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
Why is this tweet still up?
@maddow
Rachel Maddow MSNBC
3 years
"Patients overdosing on ivermectin backing up rural Oklahoma hospitals, ambulances" "'The scariest one I’ve heard of and seen is people coming in with vision loss,' he said."
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
5 years
Just got rejected for another thing I applied for. Lodging this not for sympathy -- just so folks know something I learned from E.O. Wilson -- it never does get easier. Good work is worth doing even when you keep getting rejected.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
Oh. My. God.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
7 years
People say "marry someone compatible on issues of money, sex, and children," but I would add snooze alarms and dishwasher-loading technique.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
I remember one time I asked a colleague to walk me back to my hotel at a conference and he expressed skepticism that the city we were in was unsafe. So, as we walked I narrated for him how I saw the walk back, as a woman. Pointed out the creepy stuff. The dark alleys. The stares.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
6 years
Good morning! Here is your list of sexually-active popes.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
7 years
When I think about a U.S. border agent asking about a person's religion, I imagine all of the Founders rising from their graves at once.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
4 years
@S_h_e_e_n_a_ I got them from a photojournalist friend. He explains: "I was taking photos and video during recovery efforts in NJ following Hurricane Sandy (2012). A shuttered Catholic high school gym was serving as a meal station for first responders. These were hanging on the wall."
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
8 years
Barbara Bush: "I don’t know how women can vote" for Trump. Me neither.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
Just your daily reminder, if you find yourself wanting to be angry at the unvaccinated who are getting really sick, that there are many forces of disinformation and misinformation that are extremely persuasive. Try to understand that, and try to maintain compassion.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
This article made my skin crawl. We aren't going to end up with good doctors by letting undergrad pre-meds pass organic chem because universities want to protect their US News rankings. Gah!
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
9 years
Paper babies are being handed out to EVERYONE. They have ALL HAD CONDOM FAILURE AND THE WHOLE CLASS IS PREGNANT.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
ADULTS STORM WHITE HOUSE
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
So I bought a friend a large @DoorDash gift card b/c her family is dealing with a hospitalization that is complex and exhausting, and they took my money but didn't give her the card. I've been DM'ing with @DoorDash_Help and they've now disappeared. Do me a favor and "like" this.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
6 years
I don't acquiesce, but I do get frustrated, exhausted, depressed, and lonely standing up sometimes. So this award means a *lot* to me. Thank you, @HdxAcademy and see you all tonight!
@HdxAcademy
Heterodox Academy
6 years
Institutional pressure and potential career damage will intimidate most people into acquiescence. But not @AliceDreger , which is why we are awarding her the first-ever HxA Open Mind Award for Courage.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
6 years
Why do attempts by the left to shut down free speech bother me more than attempts by the right? Because the left should really get it.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
At the end he said a deep thank you. I said, "Dude, one of us is going to bed tonight NOT actively being destroyed AND with the great feeling of having helped someone. That would be me. So thank you." 8/n
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
I don't usually recommend defamation suits but I would recommend one for this bullshit about @jessesingal
@kittypurrzog
Katie Herzog
3 years
I really hope Sady Doyle has some evidence to back up these very serious claims
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
Then I told him the survival strategies. I told him his world will become and MUST become much smaller, for example. I told him how to draw on the person he was - the strong one - to take care of himself. That he DESERVED that care. And to read the Tao (Mitchell's esp. #9 ). 4/n
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
Then I pushed him with questions designed to make him cry (to crack), but we both ended up weeping, as often happens for me in these conversations. To hear someone who is realizing their identity is being destroyed -- it is brutal. 3/n
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
This is what I want to reiterate: Sex is not gender. Do not judge people by the color, shape, or history of their skin. Please judge them by their acts, but: Try to see elements of yourself in others before declaring anyone an enemy. Be kind. Have compassion. Please.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
"The fucking librarians came for me with pitchforks and torches, man!" I said. I told him I thought I would NEVER laugh about that, but now I laugh about that. I suggested he get a new career as an archivist and let me in, cause no one else will. 7/n
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
It's interesting that now that I'm older, and men look at me differently, I feel safer. Sleeping in hotels feels a lot easier to me. No wonder so much social progress happens through the actions of women who hit middle age.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
6 years
Okay, here's why I asked to not be in that NYT article about the "intellectual dark web":
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
2 years
THIS
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
4 years
So I'm going to throw this out there and then go on a twitter vacation for obvious reasons. I don't see how using "their" as the default pronoun for everyone (singular) respects everyone. It seems as troubling to me as when we were supposed to use "his" for "everyone."
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
6 years
I wish I looked this good when I choke
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
Then he asked me how long it had been since my experience and I burst out laughing and told him I'm constantly being cancelled. I told him about the archivists and we were laugh-crying together. 6/n
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
6 years
Well, you guys, my kid graduated from high school today. This is the high school where, in his freshman year, I live-tweeted his abstinence sex ed class and everything went crazy. Today he's an investigative reporter with me @eastlansinginfo . In Sept. he starts physics @UChicago .
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
Has the Pentagon decided Trump is useless/dangerous?
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
9 years
I need to get the kid a t-shirt that says "I reject your authority and substitute actual data." @donttrythis @fakedansavage
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
I get why people don't want horrid stereotypes in the books read to children. But I always thought part of my job as a parent was to navigate that and actually talk about it with my kid as he grew up - the stereotypes of mothers, and of children, for example.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
9 years
"You'll find a good girl. If you find one that says 'no,' that's the one you want." HE ACTUALLY JUST SAID THAT.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
6 years
Cop: Do you know why I stopped you? Me: I was speeding.. Cop: That's refreshingly honest. Me: Well, it's my first ticket, and I've definitely deserved many more. Cop: You're kind of odd. Me: Yeah, I have a problem with honesty. I over-use it.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
I can't believe how disoriented I feel by the idea that we're about to have a president who is going to acknowledge the 400,000 who have died. The absence of national grieving has been eerie and emotionally confusing.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
6 years
Still grateful to Arnold Lobel, author of "Frog and Toad," who taught me to start every to-do list with "Make list." Because when you're done making the list, you immediately get to cross the first thing out. And you feel productive.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
7 years
I'm realizing zoos are pretty organized compared to hospitals. The expression should be "This place is a hospital."
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
24 days
People think because I criticize progressives I'm not one. I wish they'd get the most important work we can do is questioning and critiquing the people we generally agree with. Loyalty is intellectual death.
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@AliceDreger
Alice Dreger, Ph.D.
3 years
I am so very pleased to announce the publication of the first issue of The Journal of Controversial Ideas, on whose editorial board I have the honor to sit.
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