Would a REM by any other name smell as sweet?

        Adriana Petryna covers a wide range of material in the first two chapters of Life Exposed: Biological Citizens after Chernobyl, but I would like to focus on her discussions of what it meant to be a Chernobyl "sufferer" vs. a "disabled" person, and how such statuses were conferred. Petryna writes, "In the political economy of Chernobyl related illnesses... a person categorized as "disabled" was far better compensated than a mere "sufferer"" (p18). To achieve this "disabled" status, people had to undergo evaluation by a committee of scientists, clinicians, and administrators who would either confirm or deny that their disability was the result of exposure to Chernobyl radiation. The rewards were substantial - "disabled" individuals earned a monthly pension benefit five to eight times the national average, and three to five times that of a mere "sufferer". It's telling that achieving this status was referred to as 'oformyty hrupu', 'to make the group' (p19).

      Petryna's description of Ivan Nimenko, a militiaman who received his exposure after he was ordered to evacuate the citizens of nearby Prypiat' (Pripyat) shortly after Chernobyl, shows us that these two classifications aren't set in stone. Nimenko tries for, and eventually achieves (through various familial connections and exchange networks), an upgrade from "sufferer" to "disabled" status, gaining all the benefits of the latter. This was interesting to me, because when you think about it, these statuses are meant to reflect biological reality. When Nimenko changed statuses, though, this wasn't a reflection of any change in biology that happened. He just managed to finally negotiate his way up the 'hierarchy of sufferers', as Petryna calls it, through the application of science. Was he, then, a "disabled" all along, and was just initially mislabeled due to a lack of evidence? 

       In keeping with my obsession with words and labels (I should have been an English major! Except I like money too much*), I'm similarly interested in how a change the simple classification of maximum radiation lifetime exposure from 35 REMs to 7 REMs had far-reaching effects. People that lived in previously "clean" areas were now eligible for "disabled" status. Petryna writes, "People got entangled in the category of victim, by law. They had unpredictable futures and they all wanted to know their dose." (p24). It reminded me of the recent astrological shakeup (or something) in which they rearranged the dates that determined what your sign was. I've always been at the edge of Leo, and this change moved me into Cancer territory. Had I been reading the wrong horoscopes my WHOLE LIFE? What about plans I had laid down when I was still a Leo? Or was I never a Leo? These were questions that I did not ask, because astrology is fun but it's a pseudoscience at best, and that's being generous. But still, my point about classification reflecting reality stands.

*this is a joke

Petryna, Adriana. Life Exposed: Biological Citizens after Chernobyl. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton UP, 2002. Print.