Equal Rights are not Special Rights

I listened to the entire Supreme Court argument in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health last Wednesday.  You can listen to the recording here – DOBBS RECORDING  or read the transcript here -TRANSCRIPT. 

I have no intention here of going through/evaluating all the arguments or predicting outcomes.  Many commentators have already done that and you also can listen/read the above and make your own judgments and predictions.

After making a few brief comments I simply want to focus on the idea of the woman’s right itself, as it struck me from the arguments of the Respondent and the Solicitor General.

As to the few short observations – I thought the attorney for the Petitioner State of Mississippi was outstanding.  Regardless of one’s biases or feelings about the case, he was a fine example of what should be expected of anyone arguing before the Supreme Court.  He was incredibly well prepared, thoroughly knew and understood the relevant law and facts as well as the policy arguments involved.  He listened to the Justices’ questions and concerns, answered their questions, and presented a persuasive case for his client.

I found the other attorneys, while polished orators, to be less prepared and less able to actually answer the Justice’s concerns.

I was impressed with all but one of the Justices.  Eight seemed to ask fair and important questions that were designed to help them to understand aspects of the case or the arguments so as to better render an appropriate decision.  I was disappointed in Justice Sotomayor who seemed to be unnecessarily biased and argumentative in her questions during this argument.

But one thing that struck me about the arguments of the Respondent Jackson Women’s Health and the U.S. Solicitor General were the seeming reliance on some sort of special equality held by women.   These attorneys were arguing to uphold Roe v. Wade and to strike down the Mississippi law banning abortion after 15 weeks. 

These attorneys argued that women have a fundamental right to abortion.  When asked what this specific right is – where it is or arises from in the Constitution, they repeatedly referred to “liberty.” If one cuts through all the chaff, their argument seems to be that while we all have a right to liberty, women have a special right within that which allows them to terminate the life of another, at least until that life becomes viable outside the womb.

Now last time I read our Constitution, it provides and demands equal rights for all citizens, not different or special rights for one group or another.  Yet what their argument does is to take the liberty right from the unborn child, giving it no rights at all, and then adding that child’s rights to the woman’s liberty right, giving her some sort of super right.

A woman’s right to control her own body is not a special right, but one that exists for all of us (mandates not withstanding).  But when that right includes the right to take another life as abortion does, it becomes a special right.  Giving women the right to take away the right of another in essence gives them a super-equality; an “equality” that is more than the equality of others.  That flies in the face of the demands of our Constitution and our core principles of equality and liberty for all. 

The weakness of this pro-abortion argument exemplifies the underlying weakness of the Roe v. Wade decision and of the assertion that a woman holds the right to choose not only what happens to her life, but to the life of a separate individual in her womb.  If the woman’s right is based on liberty, it is also a denial of liberty to another.

Other arguments were similarly weak:  for some reason it is, in the mind of the respondent and the DOJ, acceptable that a woman’s right to abortion may be curtailed after the point of viability (somewhere around 24 weeks) but 15 weeks is too early.  Their reliance on the difficulties faced in raising a child were cut short when Justice Barrett reminded them that a woman could give up a child for adoption almost immediately after birth, thus avoiding the alleged harm of parenting.

They also had no real answer to why this question of right to abortion,  not set forth in the Constitution, should be decided by 9 Justices rather than by the people or their legislative representatives.  They asserted it was because those 9 had, in Roe v. Wade, said it was a right.  This circular reasoning does not answer or prove why those 9, not the people, should decide whether that right exists and if so to what extent.

The arguments of Respondent and DOJ simply were not convincing.  They asserted a right exists which puts the women’s rights, her equality, above others, but couldn’t explain precisely what this right is or where this right came from other than a Court decision.  They couldn’t explain why it is necessary that women be granted a special right, giving them some sort of greater liberty or super-equality.

And, when it came to the question of whether the Court should re-examine and possibly overturn Roe v. Wade, they argued no, primarily based on nothing more than that the case and its created right to abortion has been around so long. 

Indeed, there was much questioning about whether the court should touch the Roe ruling, especially with the strong political split about a woman’s right to abortion.  Is it some super case that the court cannot touch?

The State’s attorney analogized to the overturning, after 58 years, of Plessy v. Ferguson, the case that created separate but equal, by Brown vs. Board of Education, the case that ruled racial segregation unconstitutional.  In his rebuttal he stated:

In closing, I would say that in his dissent in Plessy versus Ferguson, Justice Harlan emphasized that there is no caste system here. The humblest in our country is the pure, the most powerful. Our Constitution neither knows nor tolerates distinctions on the basis of race.  It took 58 years for this Court to recognize the truth of those realities in a decision, and that was the greatest decision that this Court ever reached. We're -- we're running on 50 years of Roe. It is an egregiously wrong decision that has inflicted tremendous damage on our country and will continue to do so and take innumerable human lives unless and until this Court overrules it.

Just as Brown v. Board, while focused on race, demanded recognition of true equality, so it is crucial that our current Supreme Court also focus on the equality demanded by the Constitution.   Neither women nor any other group should be granted super-rights or super-equality.  And especially not at the expense of the liberty and life of another human being.

Roe v. Wade is not protected from overrule.  If it is Constitutionally proper to overrule it then that is what should be done.  As Chief Justice Roberts noted, no matter how the Court decides, it will likely be charged with political bias in its decision.  So let us hope that they, like the Justices who decided Brown, have the courage to do what the Constitution demands, no matter what the political fallout may be.

Equity Destroys Humanity As We Know It

Equity is just another way of saying dumbing down.  Like the many other politically correct euphemisms (integration vs. assimilation; containment unit vs. cage; etc.) it may not have the negative connotation of the original, but that does not change the reality of what it refers to.

Supposedly in the new lexicon of the Left, equity means uniformity:  everyone ends up with exactly the same thing.  That is, distribution of both the tangible and intangible is not equal but based on some external factor such as group identity or circumstance.   That unequal distribution intends to create a uniform result for everyone.  The problem is that such vision of equity, of uniformity, does not take into account the uniqueness and diversity of human nature.

Equity may sound nice, but let’s look at the reality.  One example comes from Virginia where schools are removing advanced degrees and eliminating advanced math classes.  The reason is that there are more of certain ethnic groups (primarily Asian and White) than other ethnic groups (primarily Black) in the advanced courses.  This, screams the Left, is not equity. 

Other schools remove the requirement of correct answers in math class because some groups find this standard more difficult.  Therefore, the Left’s equity demands that we must eliminate that which some students strive for or may have more talent for in order that all will be equal.  Essentially the students whose talents may lie with the advanced academics are now punished for having that innate talent or interest. 

Other examples come from hiring requirements that mandate a certain number of people with identifying factors be included in employment roles for specific jobs.  When current hiring criteria do not create that “equity” those criteria are often changed, removing certain competency factors in favor of other “equity” factors. 

So, the best pilot may not be chosen to fly your plane if equity determines factors other than competence to be more important.  For example, United Airlines has announced that 50% of the 5000 new pilots it plans to train in the next decade must be people of color.  What does that do for the aspirations of those with talent and qualifications who are not persons of color?  They can not be fully the person they were perhaps created to be but must dumb themselves down to fit within the equity codes.

The professionals who serve you may have been admitted to their medical or law or engineering or business schools to ensure equity of the class to the detriment of others with perhaps equal or more talent.  Your symphony orchestra may not include the most talented musicians if it has an equity code.  Your plumber or car mechanic, your children’s teachers, anywhere you look you will see “equity” but perhaps not the best and brightest that could be.

Equity is also discriminatory.  When President Biden announced he would select a woman of color for his VP he immediately excluded all men and all women not of color from any consideration.  Apparently, he and the Left determined it was OK to leave those people out of any equity distribution, even though many may have been highly skilled and competent, perhaps even more competent than any of those considered. 

That is, equity denies equality of treatment.  It does not equally consider each individual but rather treatment is based on some identity criteria that awards more or less favorable treatment to certain groups.  That is not the same as the equality that is promised and aspired to in America as she has existed for over 200 years.

Martin Luther King Jr. asked that we look at the quality of one’s character rather than the color of one’s skin – that is equality.  Today in the name of equity we do just the reverse.  We place people into identity groups based on skin color or other superficial characteristics and then we use things like Critical Race Theory, the 1619 project, equity training, etc., to discriminate.

Equity is also demeaning to those it allegedly intends to help.  It assumes that certain categories of people cannot achieve certain things unless they get special advantages.  This implies that without such special treatment they are individually incapable of succeeding.  Equity does not even consider that different individuals may have different interests and aspirations. 

Equity does not believe in the individual.  It would rather bring everyone down to the lowest common denominator at which everyone can function with equal result.  I like to sing but I cannot carry a tune. I don’t expect to be in a choir but what if I wanted to and equity said I could have a place, taking the place of someone who actually has a voice to sing?  Not only is that plainly not fair, but would you really want to listen to that choir?  And if the real singer is left out because we want choirs to only be at the level that all can achieve, then doesn’t that punish the real singer for having a good voice?

I can write a coherent sentence.  Should I stop doing so because some others cannot?  Should Mark Twain or Frederick Douglass or Maya Angelou or Rudolf Anaya have stopped writing because not everyone could write the sentences they could? The answer is NO.  For if they had stopped excelling at what they could and did excel at just so that there would be equity among them and other less gifted thinkers or writers, we would all have been left without their wisdom from which we continue to learn.

What equity does is demand that no one excel, no one can be too good.  It may protect from failure, but it also guarantees that many individuals will not achieve their full potential. 

Americans used to be able to dream of soaring to and maybe even achieving the greatest heights.  The flight of that soaring eagle that we each could imagine was unique to each of us.  And while some of us dreamed and aspired, and did great things along the way, some even actually achieved their entire dream.  But equity does not allow such dreams or their reality.

Rather, equity demands uniformity.  Instead of letting us soar to heights that only we each can imagine, it forces us all to the ground, like chickens in a coop just waiting for their next meal, all living the same existence but having nowhere to soar.

One of the great promises of America is opportunity – opportunity to be oneself and to aspire to and perhaps achieve one’s dream.  It is the promise to soar (or to choose not to soar) as our spirit takes us.  Its promise is equality – of opportunity but not necessarily of result.

Equity would make us all the same.  It dumbs us all down so that no one shines above the others.  There will be no role models to aspire to.  There will be no point in following one’s unique dreams or talents.  Equity will define us.  We will all have exactly the same and will then be exactly the same.

Equality on the other hand demands that each person will be recognized as an individual entitled to equality of treatment and understanding.  It refers to the uniform distribution to everyone of the tangible and intangible. In other words, each person receives the same amount of whatever is being distributed, rather than having such distribution be based on group identity or circumstance.

Equality does recognize that each individual’s circumstances, both innate and external, are unique and requires individual responses.  But it believes that everyone should get the same opportunity, not more or less of some tangible or intangible distribution based on one’s external identity.  It also recognizes the right of the individual to do as he or she chooses with whatever is being distributed.

Equality acknowledges that every individual has his or her own talents, strengths, and weaknesses and that sometimes these may be amplified or diminished by individual circumstances.  Equal treatment rewards the strengths and perhaps helps to correct the weaknesses.  But it does not try to remake humanity by abolishing the individual in the name of equity.

What equity does is dumb us all down; it demands mediocrity.  It destroys American excellence along with its equality.    In the end, equity joins the Left’s euphemism words of inclusion and diversity; the three together actually mean discrimination, exclusion and conformity. 

Equity is a nice sounding word, but it supports actions that destroy our humanity.  That should not surprise us since destruction of the individual is necessary for the “great new world” that the Left seeks to create. 

 

Is Capitalism the Real Problem?

I think it is a given that our country is clearly split almost exactly in two over how we want to move forward.  But, forward from what?  That is a question that we seem to have skipped examining.

Many argue that we must give up on capitalism because it is a total failure.  But is it? 

While I think most would agree that the mobility both up and down the economic scale that is the promise of capitalism for all has become far less a reality in this country than it once was, I think that we ignore asking and answering why that is or whether it can be corrected.  Instead about half the country would just dump our capitalist system completely and “move forward.”

Let’s just briefly remind ourselves what capitalism is. Capitalism is an economic system where individuals and firms have considerable freedom to decide what to produce and how to produce. It is an economy dominated by free markets, private property and limited government regulation.

In our capitalist democratic republic, which does not have official caste or class systems that prevent upward mobility, true capitalism allows individuals, based on their talents, individual motivations, and a bit of luck to move both up and down.  That mobility includes an amount of risk and uncertainty, but it also includes the hope and promise of a better life for all.

Critics of capitalism will assert that capitalism ignores peoples' needs, results in wealth inequality, and does not promote equal opportunity. They argue that capitalism also encourages mass consumption, is unsustainable, and provides an incentive for business owners to harm the environment or cause other external harm for monetary gain.

These are to some extent legitimate criticisms.  Capitalism will never result in everyone being in the same position – the equity that is all the rage on the Left these days.  Let’s remind ourselves, however, that equity is not equality; to achieve equity requires taking away equality from those individuals who are in a position that is considered superior.  Equity, along with its colleague “fairness,” actually requires a lack of fairness – a lack of equal treatment – to achieve certain state mandated results.  Demanding equity belies one of our core values that all people are created equal and deserve equal treatment. 

Instead of equity, ideally capitalism provides everyone with the opportunity to use their own skills and desires to get to where they want to be.  That is the ideal and, like any ideal, it will never be achieved.  And, at times, even when the opportunities are entirely equal,  the outcomes may appear or actually be unfair. 

But capitalism creates possibilities, the taking of which vary in risk-factor as well as perhaps the need for luck.  It does not guarantee that any particular actions or inactions will or will not result in a particular end.  And, when results are not guaranteed, there is uncertainty.  Uncertainty is often uncomfortable.

Today it does seem that too many individuals are not finding the desired and sometimes even necessary results.  One cannot ignore that we have far too many people with food or home insecurity despite working two and three jobs.  But the reaction to this seems to be the singular:  Capitalism doesn’t work, dump it and move to a different system with socialism being that system of choice.

I ask that we step back.  Let us ask why is it that capitalism is not working.  Is it truly a failed system, or is it just flawed in its current practice?  What does capitalism need to succeed and is that the environment of our capitalism today?  Is it the fault of capitalism or is it the fact that we actually now have a significant number of socialistic regulations and programs interwoven with our capitalism?  I suggest these are things worth examining before simply perhaps throwing out the baby with the bathwater.

Let’s look at our first major socialist program – social security.  We have all become dependent on it, we expect to receive it when we retire.  It is a clear piece of certainty (security) in our otherwise uncertain lives.  And it is a socialistic government (social) program that is paid for by the taxes of others.  Overall, it is probably a decent program successfully providing everyone who worked at least a minimal income upon retirement. 

But imagine if instead of government collecting the social security tax from your paycheck each month you had that money to yourself determine how to spend.  You could develop your own retirement plan that might net you far better retirement income.   But that does not have the certainty that social security does.  You might just as easily spend that money on frivolities and have nothing for retirement.  You might make a risky investment and end up with far less.  So, to make sure that everyone has something, we give up our personal freedom and decision-making and allow the government to provide us the secure and certain amount that it determines is appropriate for us.

Government regulations which become more and more inclusive have a huge effect on the free market and hence on the capitalist system.  Remember, capitalism needs limited government intervention to thrive.  When the government, its taxes and regulations, encourages businesses and their jobs to go overseas, when excessively high minimum wages force small businesses to collapse, when government programs deflate individual initiative and encourage a hopelessness of existence dependent upon government help, then it becomes very difficult for capitalism to survive. 

When, due to big government, individuals relinquish their belief in the mobility of capitalism and trade it for the certainty of position, no matter how less than or hopeless that certainty may be, then we really do not have a true capitalist system to evaluate or to throw out.

The more the government provides certainty, the more that we become less willing to take the risks of innovation and self-determination that capitalism requires.  We become accustomed to certainty – to security, to social security not just for retirement, but for life itself.  And when the government does not provide enough, we ask for (demand) more.  That is not really the way capitalism works and so perhaps we should not be blaming capitalism for the inequity that we see around us today.

So, rather than jump ahead to the solution of throwing out capitalism, I suggest that we pause and really examine why capitalism is not working particularly well currently.  Is it the fault of capitalism itself, or is it that it has been infused with too many socialist elements that are the direct antithesis of capitalism and which work to prevent the effectiveness of the capitalist system?  Is there something we can do to put capitalism back on track, or is the only possible solution to completely give it up? These are serious and crucial questions that need to be answered before deciding on the best path forward.

I think that many of the problems with our society are concerns to both sides of our warring populace.  The catch is that half of that populace has already made the decision to move forward with socialism without a full examination and understanding of what is actually causing the problems.

I believe we owe it to ourselves, our country, and our future generations to consider whether we can make corrections to our capitalist system that will address many of the problems with which we are faced.  I think it is at the very least worth a try.

Socialism on the other hand is usually a snake-oil cure.  If we are as a nation to decide to take the path of socialism I would like to see that decision made with a full understanding of what socialism really is and where it leads.  I do not think that many of those leading or following the charge away from capitalism and toward socialism have taken a complete and honest look at either the problems or their proposed solution.