The Anne Tamar-Mattis Advocacy Award, established in 2017 in honor of interACT’s founder, recognizes and honors outstanding allies of the intersex community for their support and advocacy on behalf of intersex youth. Awards are made in recognition of tremendous contributions to intersex human rights. Dr. Arlene Baratz is exceptionally deserving of this award, as demonstrated by over two decades of trailblazing leadership in medical research and education, commitment to accurate representation of intersex persons in the media, and leadership in peer support to intersex individuals and families. In her roles as a mother of two intersex adults, physician, advocate, and provider of peer support, Dr. Baratz exemplifies outstanding intersex allyship and advocacy.
After two of her children were identified as having intersex traits in 1990, Dr. Baratz struggled to find other families who could offer her support and guidance. When she found a support group, now InterConnect, in the mid-1990s, she entered a community of intersex adults willing to share their wisdom; she also heard countless stories of medical trauma and realized that there were few community-based resources for parents. Since her first InterConnect meeting, in 1996, Dr. Baratz has been a fixture of the support and advocacy communities with a constant focus on supporting families and changing medical practices. She became a board member and medical advisor to the Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome Support Group (now InterConnect), soon thereafter a board member of the Intersex Society of North America (ISNA), the first intersex advocacy organization in North America. In 2006, she became a founding member of InterACT’s board, a role she held until 2020.
Dr. Arlene Baratz
Dr. Baratz’s accomplishments over her career in support and advocacy are innumerable. She was central to the dramatic expansion of programming for adolescents and parents at InterConnect’s annual meeting. When InterConnect primarily served women with Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome, she was a leading advocate for including members of all genders and diagnostic labels. She has financially sponsored the attendance of scores of group members and has facilitated dozens of sessions at the conference, empowering participants with the medical knowledge they had previously been denied. In 2018, InterConnect recognized her by naming a conference scholarship in her honor.
Dr. Baratz has also been a crucial liaison between the intersex and medical communities. She has traveled widely to present at medical schools and national and international medical conferences, where she amplifies the stories of intersex people, critiques medical practice and research, and advocates for professional and peer psychosocial support. She helped to develop the Clinical Guidelines for the Management of DSD in Childhood, one of the first resources developed by families, intersex individuals, advocates, and leaders in medical care. She has since published numerous book chapters and articles on the needs and priorities of intersex communities. As the Coordinator of Medical and Research affairs at InterConnect and the Chair of the Medical Advisory Group at interACT, Dr. Baratz collaborates with researchers to ensure that their work is patient-centered and trauma informed. Her personal experience and advocacy work have been featured on The Oprah Winfrey Show, in Intersexion, and by Scientific American.
Dr. Arlene Baratz
Special Recognition from Katie (Baratz) Dalke, MD, MBE
I am so fortunate to have been raised by – and to have as a role model – a mother who is so devoted to making the world a safer and more nurturing place for people like me, and the people who love us. As proud as I am of her titles, publications, and awards, and as confident as I am that what doctors think about intersex human rights would be hugely different without her, I am most in awe of the impact she’s had on our community. Too many people to count have told me that she has been their surrogate mother, helped them understand their medical care, find a good doctor, or saved their lives. For me and my siblings (biological and spiritual), my mom is a beacon of love, safety, and hope.
Katie Dalke
Special Recognition from Marissa Adams, interACT Program Coordinator
I am deeply grateful for Dr. Baratz and her dedication to intersex human rights. She has profoundly impacted my life and the lives of many other people with variations in their sex characteristics and their families. Dr. Baratz was doing this work when few others were, and she has played a distinguished role in the change that has occurred since I was born in the early 1990s. I had the fortune of first meeting Dr. Baratz at the 2015 InterConnect meeting, although I had known of her for several years prior. I felt comforted and safe talking and thinking about intersex traits which, prior to that, I did not know how to process alone. She has, directly and indirectly, changed my life and the lives of others through her expertise in implementing peer support for intersex individuals and the parents and families of young intersex people. In just the last year, I have witnessed Dr. Baratz volunteer her time to speak at presentations, which is sought after because of her expertise and professionalism. She talks about intersex traits in a distinguished way that models how all providers should talk, and think about intersex traits. I have never felt different or “othered” in Dr. Baratz presence but whole and deserving of love.
Marissa Adams
You can view Dr. Arlene Baratz and all the past awardees of the Anne Tamar-Mattis Advocacy Award for Intersex Allyship here.
