They tried. That's why they are mad we found out early. They certainly didn't want this to happen.
There has been outrage that protesters turned up outside the home of supreme court judges. But what is more shocking – peaceful demonstrations or forcing women to give birth?
There has been outrage that protesters turned up outside the home of supreme court judges. But what is more shocking – peaceful demonstrations or forcing women to give birth, writes Arwa Mahdawi
www.theguardian.com
While some people were upset that
five out of nine unelected judges (
two of whomhave been accused of sexual misconduct) have the power to take away women’s bodily autonomy, CNN’s legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin (who reportedly
exposed himself on Zoom) had a meltdown over the impropriety of the leak itself. “The idea that a decision of this magnitude could leak is really a shattering experience for the justices and the court,”
he told viewers, breathlessly. “I really don’t know how or if the institution is going to recover.” Shattering for the
justices? He doesn’t know if the
institution is going to recover? Talk about missing the damn point.
Fuck the institution!!!
Naughty me: it seems I haven’t absorbed one of the big lessons of the past week. Which is this: when your civil rights are in danger, the most important thing you can do in response is Be Civil. If five unelected judges decide that you have no control over your uterus and no right to privacy, that’s just democracy in action, my friends. If, on the other hand, you decide you want to respond to the dismantling of your civil rights by protesting outside the houses of the judges responsible, then shame on you! How dare you violate these people’s privacy!
The Washington Post’s editorial board, for example,
preached that everyoneshould “leave the justices alone at home”. Prominent conservatives,
such as Bill Kristol, tweeted things such as: “Please don’t protest at people’s homes … Organize politically, be civil civically.” And the White House
issued a statement about how judges must “be able to do their jobs without concern for their personal safety” that was interpreted by many as a condemnation of the protests.
It’s reasonable to argue that protests outside officials’ houses aren’t appropriate. What I object to is the cynical way in which “civility” is constantly weaponised, the way it has become a sneaky byword for “servility” – a way to tell people to shut up and accept the status quo. Arguments for “civility” certainly aren’t used with much consistency: many of the people clutching their pearls about the protests making judges’
personal lives “miserable” (as the Washington Post put it) don’t seem to be quite so bothered about how miserable it might be for a woman to be forced to give birth. And I don’t think there was much discussion of “civility” when, in 2014, the supreme court
struck down a Massachusetts law that mandated a 35-foot buffer zone around clinics that provide abortion services. The court found that it was unconstitutional for protesters not to have to the right to get in the faces of vulnerable people who were just trying to access healthcare. If protesters want to protest in front of a judge’s house though? Uncivil!
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www.timesunion.com
