by Ursula Curiousa
When I was learning to read and write, my teacher gave me homework to devise my very first survey to deploy with three people. Question 1 for all of us in the class: “What is your name?” Question 2 was of my own design: “What is your favorite animal?” I was six years old. I had already written down the answer to Question 1 for my second respondent, a small-town attorney who usually humored me, when he refused to participate in my survey. “No, I’m not going to answer your questions.” I was so shocked that I remember the scene 29 years later. He smiled wryly and touched his long eyebrows.
“So you’re reading and writing now?” he asked me rhetorically. “Be careful with that. Don’t write everything down.” As a kid, I thought this behavior was bizarre. As I get older and bare-bones privacy protections get stripped away (like the recent over-turn of Roe v. Wade-based abortion protections with the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision), I think I am starting to understand.
