This is not really related the content, but I do want to mention that as someone with ADHD (among other things), I have trouble processing dense language like this, even if I look up all the words I don't know. I know that words like "eugenics" can't be replaced, since they're central to the message and very complicated (and explained in depth earlier on), but I think plain language can be really important when writing about disability history, as it allows for more disabled people to engage with our own stories.

The imaginary here is painted to be much more frightening than what our reality may actually look like. This is effective in catching the attention of the reader, though it does not seem aware of its impact in other ways.

These kinds of messages both reinforce the existing, damaging rhetoric around disability as well as create one. It is actively contributing to a negative association betweenn alcohol, disability, and lifelong suffering.

We see throughout the text that Antebi has given readers the original quotations in Spanish followed by a bracketed English translation. What is the effect of this particular writing choice?

The cyclical quality of the Prometheus myth also speaks to the cyclical, generational effects of alcoholism put forth by public health authorities. The hygiene campaigns posit that alcoholism impacts the next generation through contamination and disability, which then in turn affects the next generation, and so forth.

This is antithetical to the capitalist disdain for substance use as a means of seeking pleasure. Here, alcohol is described as a tool of capitalist exploitation. Yet, alcoholism can also be viewed as obstructing capitalistic exploitation through restricting an individual’s ability to effectively participate in productive activities.

This meditation on heredity makes me think about carrier screening and prenatal genetic testing as utilized in reproductive medicine today. These technologies are promoted as empowering reproductive freedom, but to what extent could eugenic forces underlie the push to make carrier screening and prenatal genetic screening/testing standard of care?

In the previous section, poverty is described as a disabling force through structural violence. The 1927 Pan-American Child Congress acknowledged that "'The causes of poverty can in general be defeated through a concerted attack by society.'" Although this statement is rather vague, it essentially suggests that poverty should be addressed through a top-down approach. Yet Dr. Santamarina's "solutions" to "treat" developmentally delayed children all center on an individualistic approach rather than addressing systemic issues.

Institutions construct disabled children's identities out of assessment, diagnosis, documentation, and interventions--reducing disabled children to impersonal, generalized labels and functions. This objective and disembodied institutional documentation erases the humanity and personhood of these children.

This warning invokes the story of Prometheus--his punishment from Zeus for giving man the gift of fire was to be eternally chained to a rock and have his liver eaten every day by an eagle. It is interesting that this myth is referenced here wherein an authority figure (the public health department) seeks to punish "social deviants" (alcoholics). However, in this version, the authority figure does not take culpability for the punishment; instead, the alcohol users are framed as punishing themselves.

This is interesting in that it seems pretty defeatist. The "race" will degenerate, but we can at least slow it down! I wonder if there's a sense in which "soft" eugenicists, in addition to blaming different factors and using different methods to combat them, are also "soft" in their aspirations. This is dramatically different from the "hard" eugenicists but also reform eugenicists--who did take environment into account--who were intent on creating supermen.

Really interesting. I wonder to what degree the celebration of mestizaje was about the whitening of the population, away from Indigeneity, and to what degree it was really about celebrating racial mixtures. This reminds me of questions within Black eugenic thought of the early 20th century, with authors such as Pauline Hopkins celebrating racially mixed people/characters as the "highest" types (though she does have some non-mixed eugenically superior Black characters as well).

The wording of this passage is such that it's not entirely clear who feel no rays of intelligence penetrate their spirit--mad people or blind people. "Rays" suggest light and link intelligence to vision, but the clause could also refer to mad people who cause such "repugnance." Either way, Dios Peza is justifying medical ableism by agreeing with its supposed causes.

After the acute phase of the Covid-19 crisis, when routine procedures and rules are restored, the previous exceptional provisions can leave long-lasting effects, especially regarding transparency and accountability. In Spain, the Interterritorial Council of the National Health System (CISNS) held dozens of extraordinary meetings during 2020 and 2021, when regional governments and the Ministry of Health discussed and adopted important health measures to respond to Covid-19. However, the minutes' meetings had not been published. When the government was first questioned about the minutes, the immediate response was that the meetings were summoned as extraordinary, which exempt the MoH from publishing its records. After criticism, in December 2021, the MoH put 116 minutes drafts for voting in the CISNS, which is now leading to more disagreement between central and regional government, as the regions governed by the opposition party are claiming they were not submitted and approved as required by law. Hence, people who are now in charge of approving these minutes were not members of the central and regional governments at that time. They also claim the minutes are incomplete as they don't report regional government's suggestions, only the agreed measures. The controversy over the minute's transparency challenges accountability. When these minutes are finally published, who are the citizens going to believe? Will they believe in what is written by the MoH or in those who claim the minutes are not complete? One can say some level of controversy would probably happen anyway, despite the previous emergency measures. Still, the time gap between the meetings and its publicity increased the chances of revisionism (from both sides), as science and experience evolved, and now we know which measures are actually successful, and which are not.