By Mary C. Rawlinson
Journal of Medicine and Philosophy
(2001), Vol. 26, No. 4, pp 405-416.
Abstract
Feminist bioethics poses a challenge to bioethics by exposing the masculine marking of its
supposedly generic human subject, as well as the fact that the tradition does not view women's
rights as human rights. This essay traces the way in which this invisible gendering of the
universal renders the other gender invisible and silent. It shows how this attenuation of the
human in `man' is a source of sickness, both cultural and individual. Finally, it suggests several
ways in which images drawn from women's experience and women's bodies might contribute
to a constructive rethinking of basic ethical concepts.
The entire paper is here.
