Author’s Note: This is a rant. It has coarse language. It discusses taboo things like abortion, politics, and women’s rights. If you’re a fan of religion, you’re especially not going to have a good time here. If you’re someone who is directly responsible for the events below, you can wholeheartedly Go. Fuck. Yourself.
Reader discretion is advised.
Well, if this article by Politico is true, the US Supreme Court is about to roll back the rights of many women in this country. Worse, if the draft opinion in the article is accurate, the Court might be aiming at dialing back some other rights down the line. Any right extended by the Court in the past century is up for grabs. That’s right. People are going to have to re-justify things like rights to attorneys and rights against self-incrimination.
Hell, why stop there? Let’s let states do whatever the fuck they want to people under the guise of medical legislation. After all, there’s no state right to be free from forced sterilization. We could even bring back beating confessions out of suspects before they even see a judge. Everyone in this country can now party like it’s 1879! Better yet – maybe this can usher in a new theocracy! We can ask ISIS and the Taliban for pro tips on mixing religion with public policy!
I’m hoping all of this isn’t real.
Reading the proposed opinion written (of course) by Alito, it’s a nightmare of judicial fantasy. Much weight is given to historical precedent of the writing of the Constitution. Back in the 1700’s, they didn’t give two shits about women and medical care. Ergo, courts now have to keep that in mind when reading newly passed statutes.
It also legitimizes the bad faith (pun intended) arguments from the religious right on this issue. They have been foaming at the goddamn mouth for fifty fucking years over women being able to make decisions that concern them. Jesus didn’t give women those rights, so that counts for something, right? They have manufactured controversy after bullshit claim to overturn one fucking court case. Finally, they had Moscow Mitch McConnell and Donald Jesus Trump to finally squeeze this one through.
It’s hard not to be mad about this.
From the outset, it’s hard to watch allegedly qualified justices on an important judicial body do something so incredibly fucking stupid. It’s not even about abortion. It’s about dialing back a century of jurisprudence because we didn’t consider what slave-owning, tobacco-sniffing, teeth-stealing people had in mind when they put pen to paper. It’s about having to re-litigate every advance in human rights in this country that we haven’t bothered to expressly write an amendment for.
It’s about rewarding a group of people who have had their animosity manufactured for them by pastors and politicians for half a century. Talk to anyone who has voted for the people responsible for this mess, and they’ll tell you about how abortion is evil. What they will not tell you is their own personal reasons for believing that. Instead, you’ll get some line about how it’s wicked or immoral. Nevermind that some of them have probably gone out of state to get an abortion. No, hypocrisy and hallelujah are closer together than even religious proponents realize.
In the meantime, I guess it just sucks to be a woman who needs medical care.
The worst thing right now about all of this is that states have the right to prohibit a medical procedure over the judgment of a woman who might need it. All the state needs is an arguably rational basis for writing such a law (see opinion, p. 65). It doesn’t even have to be completely relevant to the matter at hand. As long as a state can think about something that might rationally be related to abortion restriction, it gets to regulate it.
And the problem has always been this – women being able to make decisions for themselves. It never was about so-called abortion on demand. Women needed to be able to terminate their pregnancies to stay alive or to not be crushed by the tons of social weight placed on them.
I included that last part for a reason. I know of at least some women who have felt they needed to get an abortion because of societal shame. Those same people who scream about the sanctity of life? Yeah, they’re the same people who sanctimoniously bitch about sexual purity. Of that latter crowd, I have known way too many individuals who refuse to practice what they preach. But to them, because they didn’t get caught, it gives them a magical right to tell other women what they should be doing with their lives.
So yeah. Pick a reason. Hypocrisy. Stupidity. Treachery. All three. Bottom line is that the bad guys won this time around. Yes, I said it. The bad guys won.
And I can’t stand it when villains get away with it.
Amusing Nonsense 