Science's White Supremacist Reckoning

December 8th, 2024

Currently listening to: Doechii's tiny desk concert

Currently feeling: ready to be done with the year

I am officially graduating this semester with one (1) master of science, and burning down the lab as I leave.

Ok, that may be a little overdramatic. But it's about what I'm feeling.

I am glad to be almost on the other side. The only thing left in my way is to sit one single final exam this Friday (which I am not looking forward to). I've worked in my lab for five and a half years now. I didn't get a PhD, I never really wanted a PhD in the lab that I worked in. I'm not necessarily opposed to getting a PhD, but let's just say I'll have much more reservations about that commitment in the future. No, I'm not on the 'traditional' academic track. But I do have some opinions about the whole thing.

I think the best thing to start with is my thesis. I wrote a single-chapter thesis, which is not at all uncommon for a master's thesis. Now, it is not expected of a master's thesis to be published, especially more so if you exit the academic track and head over to industry or government, where publications basically don't matter. I wanted my work to be published, but I didn't need it to be.

My advisor and I initially talked about submitting the manuscript to the Journal of Experimental Biology, which is by no means a 'high impact factor' journal. These days, High IF basically means Cell, Nature or Science (referred to in the field as a 'CNS' paper). Anything less than that is basically useless (wrong and false). Now, writing a Nature paper is no joke. Nature papers essentially are three mid-tier journals stapled together, only everything is in the supplemental materials because Nature has a 6 page limit, but wants extensively researched articles. You see the contradiction. I bring this up because my advisor is a Stanford boy. Of the opinion that if a paper is not a CNS paper, it is basically worthless.

I obviously do not share this opinion, but his say is the final say as it is his lab. And, at the last minute (I have two weeks left to my graduation) I ask about submitting the paper. And he waffles. 'Oh, we can do more experiments' he says. Pray tell, who shall do these experiments? We have our data submitted to another lab for a potential collaboration (I was under the impression that collab would be a follow-up paper, but that would require my advisor to communicate his publication goals like. At all.) that he wants to include in the paper.

Now, I wouldn't be that miffed about this (remember--I'm leaving academia for now, open to the idea of returning...maybe lol...) except there were two other papers the lab published I could have been an author on had any sort of lab-wide discussion taken place and not one behind closed doors. And, the work that I had completed as a tech, contributions to a collaboration with another lab, still has not gotten published. The PhD student who worked on it got an excellent job as a software developer. The principal investigator (PI) of that lab left academia.

So what do I have to show for those 5.5 years? A single review paper, of which I am not the first author. No original research, not even contributing work. Thanks a lot.

Unfortunately, this story is not a unique one, and nor is it one that is even looked upon like this is a shame. Again, on the whole I'm not really that pressed. I'd sure like to have my work out there, but my experience in my field is the important thing for me. And...a really swell reference. So, I can't be messing up my relationship at this point.

A few days ago I wanted to do some investigating, so I turned to my most hated website reddit (throwing up in my mouth). Over my time on reddit I have found a few singular spaces that are generally ok, but on the whole that website is rather wretched and rancid. Unsurprising to no one, especially here on neocities. But, it is widely popular, and I can find people in my field. I sometimes hit up r/Labrats in an attempt to see if indeed it is more normal that people graduate PhDs without submitting a single publication. I actually found a much more interesting post. 'Why do we perpetuate a culture of vindictiveness? And almost immediately, the third rated comment told me everything I needed to know about the pervasive attitude in science: Don't think it's limited to us . Well my friend. What are you going to do about the world directly around you , praytell?

Academia was born as a hobby for rich white men, and as much as the academy wants to pretend otherwise, that is how it remains. In addition to the demoralizing barriers of having your work time after time get pushed off for the future for that slight increase in IF and the singificant financial barrier of a graduate stipend (of which typically ranges from 20-30k annually) , my former roomate brought up an additional point when I ranted to him about this. The microaggressions.

The people who can take on that financial stress often are the people who have the safety net to whether that stress. I am no exception to this, as someone carrying white middle-class privilege. And the longer you continue into academia, the more you must put up with being increasingly surrounded by white men. Some people do make it through that. The people that do make it through that do tend to be... white guys. And thus the cycle perpetuates itself.

So, no thank you to that. I believe in science, and I believe that this 'anti-science' wave is one that is beyond idiotic, though those strains of thought are being born (at least I think) from a combination of the politicization of science and the elitism of the institution/most people just not being believed in their lived experience. I want to believe that the system can be better. But with the incoming administration's threats of defunding the NIH, NOAA, the NSF and more, those grants are going to be increasingly more competitive, which means that the most over represented group will continue to get them.

However, academia is not the only place science occurs. There are plenty of citizen science initiatives, government facilities that slowly gather long-term datasets, nonprofit organizations and (of course, this is capitalism), private investors. I hope that when I still move forward with my scientific values, I can find those no matter where I go, even if it isn't the primary purpose of the place I work.

And there are some scientific traits that are universal: critical thought, multiple sources, careful observations of the world around us, healthy discussion and dissemination of ideas, and well-thought out and designed statistics. At least, these are the things I want to move forward with. Not the racism/classism/sexism, elitism and competition.

This will probably (maybe?) be my last blog of the year. If you haven't already, check out my other non-blog stuff I posted: a torrenting tutorial, as well as some (sexy!! 18+!!) original fiction in the form of my 'vampire lesiban smutfest' as I've been referring to it to my partner.

Take it easy, friends. And remember, in the words of one of my favorite podcasts, Game Study Study Buddies, the social is predicated on its exclusions.

XOXO -- Storm