One of my favorite anecdotes to share in STEM job interviews is how my dad named me and my siblings after DNA. My scientist father named us Carolyn, Tessa, Graham, and Aydin - after the four base pairs of DNA (CTGA). If you want to get all technical about it, I am the cytosine of my family’s double helix.

But there is another, much more personal, part of my name’s origin that I do not typically talk about. While the “C” in my name represents the cytosine of my family chain, the name “Carolyn” has a much deeper meaning to me and my family.

A few years before I was born, my mom’s best friend Carol died suddenly at the age of 30. Her doctors prescribed her a medication that she had a known allergy to. She died of an allergic reaction to this prescription, leaving behind two young children and a grieving husband.

This article was originally published on the Nature Microbiology blog in 2016. However, within the past few weeks, I noticed that Nature deleted my blog post from their website.

In my previous blog article, I noted that the best thing I could hope for as a woman in STEM was to have my work stolen. Well, Nature is no exception to that comment.

They never paid me for this article, and they have used it to earn money on their website for going on a decade now. An article that they did not pay me for, and that they have profited off of for nearly a decade.

An article that they only removed from their website out of fear of legal action on my part.

Here’s what I have to say to Nature Publishing Group:

You should have paid me off and had me sign an NDA while you still had the chance! Too late now, losers!

A few weeks ago, I found out that personal pictures of my car (including my license plate number) and the interior of my apartment had been uploaded to Google Maps without my knowledge or consent. At the time I discovered this, over 2,000 people had already seen these pictures. One of these pictures included the location of my hide-a-key, which I have since removed.

Of course I cannot prove that the Ingrum family and associated cronies are responsible for the harassment I have experienced. It may well be the LaBriola family, or any number of my other haters.

I may never be able to prove who it was that uploaded my personal information to the Internet. But I can prove one thing, which is that Jeffrey Ingrum actually hired an attorney to send me a Cease and Desist letter last month.

Well, technically he sent it in November. But he sent it to the wrong email address. And to an old mailing address of mine from Colorado, even though I now live in California.

Jeffrey Ingrum’s attempts to intimidate me have been (and will always be) unsuccessful. I could never be afraid of someone so stupid.

In 2013, the Cato Institute published a report on police sexual misconduct. According to this report, "sexual misconduct was the second most common form of misconduct reported throughout 2010 with 618 officers involved in sexual misconduct complaints during that period.”

Of sexual assaults perpetrated by police officers in 2010, the majority of these assaults were inflicted on minors.

In June of 2024, The Washington Post published another article that notes, “over the past two decades, hundreds of law enforcement officers in the United States have sexually abused children while officials at every level of the criminal justice system have failed to protect kids.”

Despite the fact that Bob LaBriola’s decades of similar offenses are well known, no formal charges were levied against him. To my knowledge, he was never reported to law enforcement. Or to SafeSport, the adjudicating body that protects amateur athletes in America. 

Around the same time that Bob LaBriola was removed from Fountain Valley, he and a group of other big names in skating created a new skating league – “Artistic American Roller Sports” (AARS).  

Bob LaBriola still actively coaches children and adults through AARS. As recently as November 24 of this year, he delivered a seminar called “Secrets & Success” that was advertised and carried out through the AARS website. 

When I was skating at Skate City, I was fully under the impression that everything was above board. I genuinely believed that the reports I made had been sent to the proper authorities (ie, SafeSport and the police). After all, Jason Ingrum is a retired police officer, so wouldn’t he know and follow the right procedures?

But it turns out that no one ever reported Richard Larghe to SafeSport, or to the police.

What we need to accept is the fact that money is nothing more than a decision. There is no reason for hard-working men and women in this country to go hungry, to struggle to afford Christmas presents this holiday season.

The inequity in this country is a choice. And the inequity within your company is a choice. Once you accept and internalize that, I hope it emboldens you to advocate for yourself at work and in life.

On June 3 of 1968, a woman named Valerie Solanas shot Andy Warhol with a .32 Beretta at his studio in New York City. Allegedly declared dead at the hospital, surgeons eventually managed to save him. Warhol was released from the hospital after two months, but he had to wear a medical-grade corset to keep his organs in place for the remaining 19 years of his pitiful life.

So why did she shoot him?

When Bishop Cauchon demanded to know why Joan had forsaken womanly modesty in assuming men’s clothing, she responded: “While I have been in prison, the English have molested me when I was dressed as a woman. (She weeps.) I have done this to defend my modesty.”

Since 2017, the number of abuse cases reported to SafeSport increased by 2,500%. Their 2023 annual report claims that this reflects increased trust in SafeSport. (Evidence to support this claim remains unseen.) 

In 2023, SafeSport CEO Ju’Rise ColÓn was paid $85,000 in “Bonus & incentive compensation.” That is in addition to her $273,369 base salary. 

In the same year, SafeSport paid only $59,577 for “Professional education” of its staff. But in 2022 and 2023, the center earned $1,341,971 and $1,146,844 (respectively) on the trainings that it requires of coaches and athletes. 

It is possible that increasing numbers of SafeSport reports indicate increasing trust in the organization. But it is also possible that these increasing numbers are the result of financial mismanagement and (consequently) widespread organizational failure. 

In this article, we will take a look at SafeSport’s questionable financial practices. Keep reading to learn about how this organization is funded, how funds are allocated, and more. 

In 2012, Congress reauthorized the 1994 Violence Against Women Act (VAWA). This Act provided additional funding for rape survivors, rape prevention programs, and more. Despite this additional funding, rape remains a growing concern in the U.S. 

Hundreds of thousands of rape kits remain untested across the country. This rape kit “backlog” denies justice to countless survivors. Rape kits may sit in storage for decades before they are tested. In many cases, the kits are lost altogether. 

So why is this happening? About a month ago, I decided to try and find out. 

From 2015 to 2021, there was a 25% increase in the number of sexual assaults on U.S. college campuses. This rate of increase calls for innovation in efforts to prevent sexual assault. 

New organizations like “Men Who Can Stop Rape” are answering this call in programs designed to promote nonviolence. Institutions like MCSR focus on education and advocacy geared to stop sexual assault before it happens. 

The term “Gold Digger” originated in the United States around 100 years ago. Since then, it has evolved into a pervasive and negative female stereotype. 

According to WebMD, “the stereotypical gold digger relationship is of a younger woman who goes after an older, richer man.” The gold digger is selfish, materialistic, and vain. She seduces men for money, which she uses for her own gain. But is this anything more than a myth?

Up to 30% of girls in the United States experience sexual assault during childhood. Research has shown that this experience can affect survivors’ long-term health. In certain cases, the experience of sexual assault in childhood can even increase a woman’s lifetime risk of cancer.