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A patient nominated her for a prestigious nursing award. One problem: She's a doctor.

A male colleague told her it would be more 'humble' to introduce herself by her first name and not the title she'd earned.

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A female doctor was confused for a nurse after taking a male colleague's advice on how to introduce herself.

Years ago, a story went viral about a school kid asked to fill in a blank word containing the letters "u" and "r." The clue? Hospital lady. The kid wrote "surgeon," which was marked incorrect. The answer sheet was looking for nurse. The resulting kerfuffle showed, clear as day, that gender bias still exists almost everywhere. Worse yet, it's still being unintentionally ingrained in our kids from a very young age.

The worksheet in question was from 1997. The story cropped up in 2017. Surely, things have gotten better by now! We've come a long way when it comes to gender bias, discrimination, and, well, pure sexism, right? Right?!

Abbie Cantwell, a doctor from Portland, Oregon, recently shared a story from her hospital that sadly proves otherwise.

nurse, doctor, female doctor, women in medicine, women, sexism, gender bias, discrimination, equal payAbbie Cantwell wouldn't dream of disrespecting nurses. But she's not one.Giphy

In a TikTok video, Dr. Abbie describes getting some questionable advice from a male mentor and colleague at her hospital. He told her it would be more approachable and humble if she introduced herself by her first name (Abbie) instead of by her full title (Dr. Cantwell). Cantwell was hesitant to take the advice but eventually decided to give it a shot. She was vindicated almost immediately.

"I did that one time with a family. I was like 'Hi, I'm Abbie, I'm the doctor in the ICU.' And they legitimately nominated me for a DAISY Award."

A DAISY award is an honor given to nurses who show exceptional patient care and compassion. Anyone in a hospital or healthcare setting can nominate a nurse for their work, including patients and supervisors. It's a great honor and it means Cantwell did a phenomenal job caring for her patient. But, remember, she's a doctor, not a nurse!

"Love, respect, thank you, it's an honor," Cantwell says. "But an incorrect one."

In an effort to take her mentor's advice and seem more humble and approachable, Cantwell had inadvertently made herself "smaller" and stopped demanding the respect she deserved. Watch her tell the whole story here.


@abbiecantwell

Women in stem baby #fyp #residency #medicine #medicalschool

Over a million viewers tuned in. Cantwell's story resonated with medical professionals, and women, everywhere who've had their achievements overlooked.

Commenters had her back, for certain:

"If I had MD behind my name, even my kids would be referring to me as doctor.

"But he would NEVER say that to a male. Babes you worked hard to earn that Doctor title."

"If I had MD behind my name I’d make my own mother call me doctor."

"A senior male attending pulled me aside my first week of intern year and told me to never introduce myself by my first name. He was looking out for me - looking back, I’m so grateful. I had no idea."

"Never do that again. Women docs aren’t making themselves small, for ppl anymore. You are the doctor. We need need to address you as such."

Some argued that Cantwell should look on the bright side:

"Well at least we know you’re great at your job doctor."

Again, Cantwell's story is no shade to nurses, who deserve all the respect in the world. But no one would ever suggest to a male doctor that he be more "humble" by dropping the title he earned through years of school and rigorous training. And that's the problem.

nurse, doctor, female doctor, women in medicine, women, sexism, gender bias, discrimination, equal payConscious and unconscious biases are keeping women out of doctoring. Photo by TopSphere Media on Unsplash

Men currently account for 62% of doctors, with women at 38%. This is despite women earning college degrees and masters degrees at a higher rate than men. So, what gives? An essay in The Guardian cites high levels of burnout from female medical professionals and argues that "medicine continues to systematically disadvantage women physicians at every stage of their careers, causing many to leave." Patients and colleagues alike may be distrustful of female doctors and may not give them the respect and cooperation they deserve, making their experience and job much more difficult than their male counterparts. "And so women in medicine are given advice to make themselves smaller, more palatable, more humble and approachable. And by doing so they undermine themselves."

This phenomenon reflects broader societal biases about women in healthcare," Cantwell told Newsweek. "Addressing it is essential to breaking down barriers and inspiring future generations of women in STEM."

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Scars don't make you evil: Disability activists are speaking out over outdated movie trope

via MGM

Rami Malek as Lyutsifer Safin in "No Time to Die."

One of the longest-running tropes in popular entertainment is having a villain with a scarred or disfigured face. Try to think of a horror film where the bad guy doesn't suffer from some sort of disfigurement.

Candyman has a hook. Freddy Krueger is severely burned. Jason from "Friday the 13th" is bald, burned and disfigured beneath the hockey mask.

It's also popular in science fiction and adventure films. Darth Vader has to wear a mask to hide his deformity. In Tim Burton's 1989 "Batman," Jack Napier becomes The Joker after having an acid bath that leaves him with a bizarre grin. The bad guy in "The Lion King" is named Scar after a mark on his face.

One film franchise that has relied on the disfigurement trope for far too long is James Bond: Raoul Silva with a deformed jaw in "Skyfall," Le Chiffre's disfigured eye in "Casino Royale," and Alec Trevelyan's scars in "GoldenEye."

Now, in the latest Bond adventure, "No Time to Die," 007 faces two villains with facial differences, Rami Malek's Safin and Christoph Waltz's Blofeld.

Author and disability advocate Jen Campbell called out the Bond franchise in a recent viral tweet thread:


"[The face is] the #1 part of the body we use for socializing and is strongly tied to our sense of personal identity, so in essence, destroying a person's face is the equivalent to destroying his or her life," TV Tropes writes. "This trope can include those who die from the disfigurement, but it's more effective (and more horrifying) to have the victim live with it," the site continues.

The problem is that after being bombarded with countless bad guys who have facial irregularities, we begin to associate facial scarring and disfigurement with evil. This leads to discrimination against people with facial differences.



Actor and presenter Adam Pearson, who has neurofibromatosis, says it's not just about banning villains with scars from TV and film but showing that there can be protagonists and love interests with facial differences, too.

"When the only character with a scar or disfigurement is shown on screen as the villain, it's perpetuating the use of an old-fashioned and outdated trope," he told ITV News. 

"This isn't about banning baddies from having scars or telling people not to enjoy a trip to the cinema, it's about putting a line in the sand and saying now is the time to ensure other characters can be seen on screen with a visible difference too," he said.

The film was also criticized by Phyllida Swift, the CEO of Face Equality International, an alliance of groups working to promote face equality.

"'This is not simply an outdated stereotype, or a poor creative choice, this is indicative of a society that doesn't see facial difference as an equality issue worthy of respect and consideration," she said in a statement.

"No Time to Die" marks the final performance of Daniel Craig as James Bond. In a few years, there will no doubt be a new 007 and some new villains for us to root against. Maybe a new era will bring fresh ideas and villains who are threatening for more reasons than their appearance.

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Black teens experience racial discrimination five times a day on average, study finds

Photo by IFEOLUWADAYO OGUNDERU on Unsplash

If you think racism in America is dead, or perhaps not as prevalent as some people claim, you may want to rethink that stance.

A new study from Rutgers University has found that black teenagers in the United States experience racial discrimination more than five times a day on average. Five times. Every day.

The study authors asked 101 black adolescents between 13 and 17 years old, who live in predominantly black neighborhoods in and attend predominantly black schools in the Washington D.C. area, to log their race-based experiences each day for two weeks. The teens reported a total of 5,600 incidents of racial discrimination in that time period, or 5.2 incidents per day, per person.

RELATED: Racism still exists no matter what people think

Discrimination was defined in various ways, from overt racism to microaggressions to teasing to harassment, and included both online and offline experiences. Vicarious discrimination was also included in the study, meaning teens reported witnessing racial discrimination of other people who share their racial background.

"This research reflects what researchers and activists have asserted for years: Black adolescents are forced to face antiblack microaggressions on a daily basis. Importantly, this study expands the research on the many ways that discrimination happens, whether it is being teased by peers, asked to speak for their racial group in class or seeing a racist post on social media," said lead author Devin English, assistant professor at Rutgers School of Public Health.

The authors point out that two forms of discrimination, teasing and vicarious discrimination, are particularly important to study in young people.

"Racial teasing is important because it is one of the most common ways adolescents communicate about race," English said. "Critically, young people and adults, such as teachers, often see this teasing as harmless and choose not to address it. Our results, however, show several types of racial teasing are harmful for black adolescents."

The study also found that racial discrimination occurs more often online than off, and that the daily exposure to racial discrimination may be contributing to depressive symptoms in black youth. With the exception of online vicarious discrimination, every form of discrimination reported was associated with higher depressive symptoms.

The overall negative health effects of racial discrimination have been studied, and we know that the findings aren't good. As Harvard professor David Williams told NPR:

"The research indicates it is not just the big experiences of discrimination, like being passed over for a job or not getting a promotion that someone felt they might have been entitled to. But the day-to-day little indignities affect health: being treated with less courtesy than others, being treated with less respect than others, receiving poorer service at restaurants or stores. Research finds that persons who score high on those kinds of experiences, if you follow them over time, you see more rapid development of coronary heart disease. Research finds that pregnant women who report high levels of discrimination give birth to babies who are lower in birth weight."

Experiencing racism is stressful, especially when it happens all the time, and chronic stress is a health risk.

The Rutgers study authors wrote, "The present study highlights the urgent, continual, and multidimensional nature of racial discrimination for contemporary Black adolescents and highlights its ostensible role in persistent racial health inequities. We believe the high frequency and impact of racial discrimination shown in our results necessitates concomitant policy and practice that fights to institutionally prevent and treat the negative effects of racial discrimination for Black youth."

RELATED: Black medical students from Tulane take powerful photo in front of former slave quarters

For black Americans in particular, it's clear that racial discrimination is alive and well. As this study shows, anti-black discrimination rears its head in myriad ways, and it's not uncommon or even occasional. It's also worth noting that this was a study of black teens in predominantly black neighborhoods, which leads one to wonder how many incidents teens in more predominantly white areas may experience.

If we want to end racism for good, we all need to be more aware of how it plays out in front of us on a daily basis, and do what we can to mitigate it when we see it.

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The Trump administration is bullying trans kids, and it's up to us to stop it.

There's this idea that transgender students pose a danger to other students in restrooms.

It comes up a lot — a lot — in politics. Supposedly, bathroom laws and debates and conversations are happening in the name of privacy and student safety.

Yet the outcomes often don't feel very safe for trans people like me.

In 2016, after then-President Barack Obama's administration issued a letter to school districts urging them to allow trans students to use restrooms that match their gender, conservative lawmakers went into meltdown. Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) accused Obama of not taking action "to protect kids against dangerous situations that could arise from mixed-gender restrooms and locker rooms in schools."

Photo by Alex Edelman/Getty Images.

There's a bit of irony in that last example as Rep. Jordan is currently the subject of a class action lawsuit alleging that, during his time as a wrestling coach at Ohio State University, he helped cover up for a team doctor accused of sexually assaulting more than 100 students.

One might even say that he failed "to protect kids against dangerous situations ... in locker rooms in schools."

Are these fears of trans students legitimate? In a word: No.

In 2015, Media Matters, a left-leaning media watchdog organization, reached out to 17 school districts in areas with explicit local- or state-level protections for trans students. These districts accounted for more than 600,000 students, yet not a single district had had any trans-related issues.

No, cisgender (non-trans) students aren't pretending to be trans just to access locker rooms. No, trans students haven't been using their access to assault or ogle other students.

This fearmongering over the supposed threat trans students pose to their classmates has become so pervasive that the National Task Force to End Sexual and Domestic Violence Against Women, a coalition of more than 300 anti-violence organizations, issued a statement in support of trans students and criticizing people who use a faux concern for women's safety to push their anti-trans political agenda.

Its statement reads, in part:

"As rape crisis centers, shelters, and other service providers who work each and every day to meet the needs of all survivors and reduce sexual assault and domestic violence throughout society, we speak from experience and expertise when we state that these claims are false."

It's become clear that this isn't about concern for anybody's safety, but simply a hatred of trans students — and trans people in general.

And in certain conservative political circles, running on anti-trans policies remains a winning tactic. Anti-LGBTQ groups that had previously devoted resources to fighting against marriage equality have pivoted to what they see as an easier target: transgender people.

Then-candidate Donald Trump claimed he would support LGBTQ people. As president, it's been a nonstop attack on our rights. Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images.

For better or for worse, they've embraced this new foray into the culture wars. During the waning days of the 2016 Republican primary, candidate Ted Cruz (R-Texas) made a final appeal to voters with one last message: Donald Trump would be too accommodating to trans people.

While Cruz lost and Trump feigned support for LGBTQ people, the latter took office and began feeding his base the red meat they so desperately craved. His administration rolled back Department of Education policies, removed non-discrimination language from Housing and Urban Development rules, did a 180 on the federal government's position on whether or not trans people are protected under existing civil rights laws, deleted language stipulating that medical providers and health insurers couldn't discriminate against someone on the basis of their gender identity from the Department of Health and Human Services' website, and worked to implement a ban on trans service members in the military.

Furthermore, in the decade leading up to Trump's presidency, courts had begun to make clear that existing civil rights laws do protect trans employees — and trans students — from discrimination. But Trump's judges are hard-right ideologues and social conservatives.

No, trans students are not a danger to others. Others are a danger to trans students.

The arguments against trans students aren't based in fact. They're little more than a fever dream made up of every tactic and stereotype that's been employed in the past to stop civil rights progress.

Gavin Grimm is a trans boy who sued his school district after they refused to let him use the boys bathrooms. Photo by Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images for Time.

Efforts to attack trans students should be seen for what they are: politically opportunistic bullying. All these students want is to live their lives in peace, not to be political pawns, especially of the right.

Trans people need support. I have faith that people will see through the lies of those who attack us, of those who try to use our children for political gain. If you're ready to take action, there are real things you can do to help trans students and trans people.

We need your help to fight back against the bullies.

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