SCOTUS Watch

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El Guapo
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by El Guapo »

malchior wrote: Tue Jun 27, 2023 11:25 am
Kurth wrote: Tue Jun 27, 2023 11:19 amDon’t even try. Malchior just wants us all to be miserable all the time! :lol:
True! :)

Though seriously one of my steadfast beliefs is one of the main ways we've been eased into the shadow of autocracy is people accepting all this incrementalism. We're a year out from them rolling back a major human right and the narrative that is forming is...well they learned their lesson and are moderating. It's just insane to me that people don't see the *obvious* pattern.
You know there are middle points between "happy that they didn't end American democracy" and "happy that everything is now great and we don't have to worry about anything anymore". :D
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by Kurth »

El Guapo wrote: Tue Jun 27, 2023 12:28 pm
malchior wrote: Tue Jun 27, 2023 11:25 am
Kurth wrote: Tue Jun 27, 2023 11:19 amDon’t even try. Malchior just wants us all to be miserable all the time! :lol:
True! :)

Though seriously one of my steadfast beliefs is one of the main ways we've been eased into the shadow of autocracy is people accepting all this incrementalism. We're a year out from them rolling back a major human right and the narrative that is forming is...well they learned their lesson and are moderating. It's just insane to me that people don't see the *obvious* pattern.
You know there are middle points between "happy that they didn't end American democracy" and "happy that everything is now great and we don't have to worry about anything anymore". :D
This. 100% this! :)
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

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Isgrimnur wrote: Tue Jun 27, 2023 11:42 am Like a toddler testing their boundaries.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

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Kurth wrote: Tue Jun 27, 2023 1:56 pm
El Guapo wrote: Tue Jun 27, 2023 12:28 pm
malchior wrote: Tue Jun 27, 2023 11:25 am
Kurth wrote: Tue Jun 27, 2023 11:19 amDon’t even try. Malchior just wants us all to be miserable all the time! :lol:
True! :)

Though seriously one of my steadfast beliefs is one of the main ways we've been eased into the shadow of autocracy is people accepting all this incrementalism. We're a year out from them rolling back a major human right and the narrative that is forming is...well they learned their lesson and are moderating. It's just insane to me that people don't see the *obvious* pattern.
You know there are middle points between "happy that they didn't end American democracy" and "happy that everything is now great and we don't have to worry about anything anymore". :D
This. 100% this! :)
The points we're hitting are decidedly much closer to the 'ending American democracy' side of that line, though, which is I think what malchior keeps coming back to. 'Happy that everything is now great and we don't have to worry about anything anymore' isn't even visible from where the darts keep falling.
GreenGoo wrote: Tue Jun 27, 2023 1:59 pm
Isgrimnur wrote: Tue Jun 27, 2023 11:42 am Like a toddler testing their boundaries.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by Blackhawk »

I'm just happy that if they were going to ease off on one thing, it was the one thing that's most likely to allow us to fix the others (potentially, eventually.)
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by malchior »

Zaxxon is picking up what I'm putting down. I'm also talking less about whether people should feel relief versus predicting how *the press will talk about it*. And what I'm hearing today pretty much fell in line with what I thought would happen. For example, we had this bombastic OpEd in the NY Times - The Supreme Court Just Helped Save American Democracy From Trumpism. I mean did it really?

Sure they rejected a radical theory and said that judicial review is still appropriate. However, this same court has still given red states a path to potential one party rule via political gerrymanders *as long as they aren't based solely on race*. Just because they shut down the expressway to autocracy doesn't mean they've "saved American Democracy".

And to be clear I don't even have a problem with the content of the piece but it is the framing where we should cheer adherence to long-standing democratic norms. It sort of reflects the lack of calibration in our politics and political discourse. For example, I was listening to MSNBC coverage earlier and they were talking about this being a "Conservative" legal theory. What are they conserving? They even tipped the hat to the present difficulty of labeling this a "fringe theory" when 3 Supreme Court justices backed it. Which is a fair point. This is actually a mainstream idea in a radicalized right-wing party. And the reality is that those justices are radicals representative of a core group of that party. In that frame, the word Conservative has been distorted well beyond it's dictionary meaning in the press.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by malchior »

I thought this was noteworthy. I'm seeing a hint of triumph from ... Neal Katyal. My read is he is calling out the DOJ for being too risk averse instead of standing up to the challenges we face.

https://twitter.com/neal_katyal/status/ ... 8507551744
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

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Yeah he's earned some triumphalism, since this seems to be a clear win that he delivered. Honestly I don't begrudge the DOJ for taking the position that this was moot, insofar as: (1) legally it probably was; and (2) I was worried about a bad decision in this case (which could've been catastrophic) so it doesn't seem crazy to try to avoid a decision on the merits. But that said, Katyal was proven right here.

Of course, I also heard Katyal talking on the news after the decision came down and he was dropping some of that "there are no liberal or conservative judges" crap. Which I get a bit after you won a 6-3 decision, but still not super helpful.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by malchior »

He is an institutionalist for certain. The very model but he is however more assertive in his way of preserving the institutions than the extremely risk averse DOJ - especially one with Garland at the helm.

Edit: I heard Katyal talk about this and his take was that we can't shrink away from these fights. If they lost, we would have at least learned where we were.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by Octavious »

Well it will be interesting to see the diversity at colleges in a few years. Guess nobody is super shocked on this ruling. Trump has f'd us a for a lifetime and still wants to come back for more.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by El Guapo »

malchior wrote: Wed Jun 28, 2023 10:42 am
Edit: I heard Katyal talk about this and his take was that we can't shrink away from these fights. If they lost, we would have at least learned where we were.
It's moot now, but I have mixed thoughts about this argument. Like, we would unequivocally be in a worse place if Alito had gotten to write some unhinged majority opinion greenlighting the worst version of the GOP theory here than if we did not know. And yes it would be good to know in a sense, but at the same time there would be no plausible mechanism to do anything about it.

Of course, now we're in the best possible outcome for this fight, where we know and the decision is good.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by malchior »

So SCOTUS predictably struck down affirmative action. Apparently Jackson let loose. The decision is 200 pages and while I usually read controversial decisions I'll pass on this one because it's almost certainly going to be some nonsense about how our slaver founders somehow wrote the constitution to be color blind or some bullshit. I've also read leading up to this that most of the schools are going to tacitly ignore or more accurately work around the decision in any case.

https://twitter.com/LeahLitman/status/1 ... 4047084544
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by Grifman »

FWIW, a significant majority of Americans, 74%, including 65% of African Americans and 70% of Hispanics, believe that race should have no role in college admissions:

https://twitter.com/themessenger/status ... NcXCfN8s1g
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by Smoove_B »

FWIW, a significant majority of Americans, 74%, including 65% of African Americans and 70% of Hispanics, believe that race should have no role in college admissions:
Well, now I guess we'll get to see how that works out.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by Alefroth »

I wonder if they feel the same way about lineage.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

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Grifman wrote:FWIW, a significant majority of Americans, 74%, including 65% of African Americans and 70% of Hispanics, believe that race should have no role in college admissions
I also believe that race should have no role in college admissions. The problem is that left to their own devices, race played a pretty goddamn big part in college admissions. That’s what necessitated affirmative action in higher education in the first place.

It’s the same issue I had with them hitting the Voting Rights Act a few years ago.

I too wish that race plays no role in access to a fundamental right like voting. What a wonderful world that would be. Sadly, I don’t live in that world.

What I believe in doesn’t matter if the world doesn’t reflect those beliefs. I would definitely support these decisions if the underlying problems were solved. Does anyone think they are solved?
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by LordMortis »

RunningMn9 wrote: Thu Jun 29, 2023 1:35 pm I would definitely support these decisions if the underlying problems were solved. Does anyone think they are solved?
While I don't have the solution, this is where I sit in the peanut gallery.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

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Grifman wrote: Thu Jun 29, 2023 12:59 pm FWIW, a significant majority of Americans, 74%, including 65% of African Americans and 70% of Hispanics, believe that race should have no role in college admissions:
Slavery polled pretty high in the 1800s too.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

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RunningMn9 wrote: Thu Jun 29, 2023 1:35 pm
Grifman wrote:FWIW, a significant majority of Americans, 74%, including 65% of African Americans and 70% of Hispanics, believe that race should have no role in college admissions
I also believe that race should have no role in college admissions. The problem is that left to their own devices, race played a pretty goddamn big part in college admissions. That’s what necessitated affirmative action in higher education in the first place.

It’s the same issue I had with them hitting the Voting Rights Act a few years ago.

I too wish that race plays no role in access to a fundamental right like voting. What a wonderful world that would be. Sadly, I don’t live in that world.

What I believe in doesn’t matter if the world doesn’t reflect those beliefs. I would definitely support these decisions if the underlying problems were solved. Does anyone think they are solved?
+1
This.


Ask those same people : “Left to their own whims, do you feel colleges would let race play a role in admissions?”
Last edited by Unagi on Thu Jun 29, 2023 2:13 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by malchior »

Another thing to consider is that I'm reading that Roberts re-read previous rulings and precedents in a different, much stricter way that essentially makes it impossible for Harvard or UNC to meet their goal - a more diverse campus. They also trample all over what Congress has done with regards to policy there. Sotomayor calls him out on this because it isn't about law it about the majority legislating. Their job isn't to be some super legislature changing the meanings of words to reflect what policy they want. That is a job for Congress. Also, he essentially puts their admissions process under continual judicial review which is...sort of tyrannical...but this is what jurisprudence looks like in the Roberts' court.

Edit: What's crazy is that he essentially makes any future race-based formula impossible but specifically allows for legacies, financial contributions, and other mechanisms to play. Who are going to be legacies at these institutions? I'll give you a hint. Rich, white people. This is what I mean when I say the United States is tacitly a white supremacist nation. They don't say it outright but folks like Roberts often tilt the table to make sure white people have an advantage.
Last edited by malchior on Thu Jun 29, 2023 2:18 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by Octavious »

It will be fun in 4 years when asians quickly pass white people in attendance to the schools. I'm sure they will totally be fine with being a minority. :lol:
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

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I think what some people miss about affirmative action programs is that it's not necessarily about combating proactive racism. It's more an attempt to level the playing field. Is it a crude attempt that is "unfair" in some circumstances? Sure. But if you start with a baseline understanding that whites as a whole are beginning the process at a higher starting point than non-whites, you can better understand why AA programs can be helpful. Of course, this is what the anti-CRT folks want to keep everyone in the dark about. If there's no institutional racism, then you don't need any institutional programs to combat it.

Again, it's not perfect. There are certainly some whites from poor households with less than ideal family support who will suffer. There are certainly some Blacks from wealthy families who may not require the "boost" from an AA program. But focusing on trees instead of the forest permits the problem to perpetuate.

So, if I focus on myself, I see where maybe I lost out on the chance to go to one of the Ivies I applied to because the school wanted to boost its diversity numbers. Maybe they accepted a Black student instead of me despite my grades being better and my test scores being higher. It's not fair! I would have been going to Princeton if I were only Black! Except . . . .

If I were Black, I'd be more likely to have grown up poorer. I'd be less likely to have attended a good high school with academic supports. I'd likely have had more obstacles in my way on the path to college in the first place. Just focusing on what I'm missing out and the unfairness of that fails to understand the unfairness built into the system for others.

I used to be staunchly anti-AA. My journey to supporting it started in law school with conversations with my Black classmates and friends. It wasn't overnight - it's hard to drop long held beliefs quickly - but having those conversations with those people was the start of a transformation for me.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

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Start admitting by zip code.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by Zaxxon »

stessier wrote: Thu Jun 29, 2023 1:52 pm
Grifman wrote: Thu Jun 29, 2023 12:59 pm FWIW, a significant majority of Americans, 74%, including 65% of African Americans and 70% of Hispanics, believe that race should have no role in college admissions:
Slavery polled pretty high in the 1800s too.
See also: US public wants climate change dealt with but doesn't like the options.
Comparing the percentages across different questions, it's clear that there's a substantial population within the US that is either confused or hasn't paid the topic careful attention. They're generally in favor of <solving the problem>, but haven't recognized they have to participate in that process.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

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I do have some sympathy for the logic of the recent anti-AA SCOTUS decisions. I think Roberts write in one of them (I think the Michigan Law one?) that "the way to stop discriminating on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race", which has some compelling simplicity to it.

BUT, as KBJ says, ignoring the importance of race in society doesn't make its effects go away. Treating everyone on a facially race-neutral basis will (on average) tend to benefit white people more than minorities.

One question, not having read the opinion. If a college has a policy giving priority to students who came from poor backgrounds, is that ok, even if someone can show that that policy helps minority students on average more than white students?
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by malchior »

El Guapo wrote: Thu Jun 29, 2023 2:59 pm I do have some sympathy for the logic of the recent anti-AA SCOTUS decisions. I think Roberts write in one of them (I think the Michigan Law one?) that "the way to stop discriminating on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race", which has some compelling simplicity to it.

BUT, as KBJ says, ignoring the importance of race in society doesn't make its effects go away. Treating everyone on a facially race-neutral basis will (on average) tend to benefit white people more than minorities.
Right it's simplicity is the point. It's populist in it sounds right but when you understand all the ways white people get advantaged it is sort of obvious that a learned person such as Roberts is essentially choosing to ignore all the consequences.
One question, not having read the opinion. If a college has a policy giving priority to students who came from poor backgrounds, is that ok, even if someone can show that that policy helps minority students on average more than white students?
This is the question. It is essentially the way folks who predicted this outcome would work around it. However, there are a lot of underprivileged white people too. From what I've gleaned so far it seems the court is aware of the workarounds and is watching for this approach. It isn't hard to imagine that efforts to differentiate blacks out via other methods will be labeled a race-based test in arrears and run afoul of the superlegislature.
Last edited by malchior on Thu Jun 29, 2023 3:08 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

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ImLawBoy wrote: Thu Jun 29, 2023 2:37 pm I think what some people miss about affirmative action programs is that it's not necessarily about combating proactive racism. It's more an attempt to level the playing field. Is it a crude attempt that is "unfair" in some circumstances? Sure. But if you start with a baseline understanding that whites as a whole are beginning the process at a higher starting point than non-whites, you can better understand why AA programs can be helpful. Of course, this is what the anti-CRT folks want to keep everyone in the dark about. If there's no institutional racism, then you don't need any institutional programs to combat it.

Again, it's not perfect. There are certainly some whites from poor households with less than ideal family support who will suffer. There are certainly some Blacks from wealthy families who may not require the "boost" from an AA program. But focusing on trees instead of the forest permits the problem to perpetuate.

So, if I focus on myself, I see where maybe I lost out on the chance to go to one of the Ivies I applied to because the school wanted to boost its diversity numbers. Maybe they accepted a Black student instead of me despite my grades being better and my test scores being higher. It's not fair! I would have been going to Princeton if I were only Black! Except . . . .

If I were Black, I'd be more likely to have grown up poorer. I'd be less likely to have attended a good high school with academic supports. I'd likely have had more obstacles in my way on the path to college in the first place. Just focusing on what I'm missing out and the unfairness of that fails to understand the unfairness built into the system for others.

I used to be staunchly anti-AA. My journey to supporting it started in law school with conversations with my Black classmates and friends. It wasn't overnight - it's hard to drop long held beliefs quickly - but having those conversations with those people was the start of a transformation for me.
Yep.

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Re: SCOTUS Watch

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Roberts puts an exception to this ruling for military academies in a footnote, saying:

"this opinion also does not address the issue, in light of the potentially distinct interests that military academies may present."

Justice Jackson in her dissent responded:

"The court has come to rest on the bottom line conclusion that racial diversity in higher education is only worth potentially preserving insofar as it might be needed to prepare Black Americans and other underrepresented minorities for success in the bunker, not the boardroom"

Hell yes, get that on the record.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by malchior »

Elie Mystal says it better here but I recommend you to read it -- even if you don't agree -- because his reaction and experiences are so powerful.
It has been a long goodbye. The Supreme Court declared race consciousness in college admissions, also known as affirmative action, unconstitutional today. The vote was predictable, 6-3, with all the justices appointed by Republican presidents standing together to revoke the policy. The majority opinion was written by Chief Justice John Roberts himself, who ruled that affirmative action violates the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment. The 14th Amendment was, of course, written explicitly to revoke the racism practiced by whites against Blacks through their slaver’s Constitution, but Roberts doesn’t care about all that. His opinion attempts to capture the 14th Amendment and redeploy it to justify a white version of “color blindness” that just so happens to lock in a status quo that benefits whites.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

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malchior wrote: Thu Jun 29, 2023 3:18 pm Elie Mystal says it better here but I recommend you to read it -- even if you don't agree -- because his reaction and experiences are so powerful.
It has been a long goodbye. The Supreme Court declared race consciousness in college admissions, also known as affirmative action, unconstitutional today. The vote was predictable, 6-3, with all the justices appointed by Republican presidents standing together to revoke the policy. The majority opinion was written by Chief Justice John Roberts himself, who ruled that affirmative action violates the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment. The 14th Amendment was, of course, written explicitly to revoke the racism practiced by whites against Blacks through their slaver’s Constitution, but Roberts doesn’t care about all that. His opinion attempts to capture the 14th Amendment and redeploy it to justify a white version of “color blindness” that just so happens to lock in a status quo that benefits whites.
Well worth the read. I also liked what Michael Harriot said,
Before you begin your thinkpiece, the Supreme Court DID NOT strike down Affirmative Action

Admission preferences for legacies, donors, employee families and special recommendations are still allowed

The Court struck down Affirmative Action For everyone except WHITE PEOPLE
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by Enough »

And in other SCOTUS news,

In filings in the 303 Creative v. Elenis case is a supposed request for a gay wedding website—but the man named in the request says he never filed it. Worth a quick read, but here's some highlights,
Yes, that was his name, phone number, email address, and website on the inquiry form. But he never sent this form, he said, and at the time it was sent, he was married to a woman. “If somebody’s pulled my information, as some kind of supporting information or documentation, somebody’s falsified that,” Stewart explained. (Stewart’s last name is not included in the filing, so we will be referring to him by his first name throughout this story.)

“I wouldn’t want anybody to … make me a wedding website?” he continued, sounding a bit puzzled but good-natured about the whole thing. “I’m married, I have a child—I’m not really sure where that came from? But somebody’s using false information in a Supreme Court filing document.”

Here is what we know—though, to be frank, I do not know what we have learned from this yearslong mystery, other than it looks like Smith and her attorneys have, perhaps unwittingly, invented a gay couple in need of a wedding website in a case in which they argue that same-sex marriages are “false.”
ADF leapt on this. In response to its defeat, the group put out a press release claiming that “a federal judge ruled that Smith and her studio can’t sue to challenge a portion of Colorado’s Anti-Discrimination Act because a request sent to Smith by a couple, self-identified as ‘Stewart’ and ‘Mike,’ isn’t formal enough to prove that a same-sex couple has asked her to help them celebrate their wedding.” Their later appeal continued the theme, arguing that “according to Social Security Administration (SSA) data, only a nanoscopic number of women have been named Stewart or Mike since 1880. Lorie faces a 16 times greater chance of being struck by lightning than either name being female.”

All that may be true. But speedier, perhaps, than consulting SSA data would have been picking up the phone. According to Stewart, no one did until 2023, when I reached him.

“I’m not really sure where that came from,” he told me of the mysterious 2016 inquiry that used his name, email address, and cell phone number to request a wedding website for a same-sex marriage nearly a decade after he married a woman. He is a designer himself, something of a known quantity in design circles—he’s spoken at conferences and on podcasts, and has a “decent Twitter following,” he said. The design world is small. But not small enough, he said, that he had heard of Lorie Smith—not until her case was already before the Supreme Court, and the design community began discussing its potential fallout.
Rotten, Denmark and all that...
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by Kurth »

With a nod to malchior's note above about schools pretty much ignoring this, won't they be able to achieve the desires result - diversity on campus - through means other than race-based admissions?

There's no way an admissions office can't focus on other factors that will produce a similar - if not better - result.

As already alluded to in the dissent, focus on the essays and personal statements. Focus on kids who have overcome adversity, especially those from disadvantaged backgrounds who've experienced discrimination.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by stessier »

Kurth wrote: Thu Jun 29, 2023 4:08 pm With a nod to malchior's note above about schools pretty much ignoring this, won't they be able to achieve the desires result - diversity on campus - through means other than race-based admissions?

There's no way an admissions office can't focus on other factors that will produce a similar - if not better - result.

As already alluded to in the dissent, focus on the essays and personal statements. Focus on kids who have overcome adversity, especially those from disadvantaged backgrounds who've experienced discrimination.
My kid wants to be a writer. I look forward to reading her essay about the disadvantaged background she was raised in when in reality she had an upper middle class experience.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by stessier »

Kurth wrote: Thu Jun 29, 2023 4:08 pm With a nod to malchior's note above about schools pretty much ignoring this, won't they be able to achieve the desires result - diversity on campus - through means other than race-based admissions?

There's no way an admissions office can't focus on other factors that will produce a similar - if not better - result.

As already alluded to in the dissent, focus on the essays and personal statements. Focus on kids who have overcome adversity, especially those from disadvantaged backgrounds who've experienced discrimination.
My kid wants to be a writer. I look forward to reading her essay about the disadvantaged background she was raised in when in reality she had an upper middle class experience (and not just because I've raised her to be a Patriots fan...so much winning!).
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by Enough »

Kurth wrote: Thu Jun 29, 2023 4:08 pm With a nod to malchior's note above about schools pretty much ignoring this, won't they be able to achieve the desires result - diversity on campus - through means other than race-based admissions?

There's no way an admissions office can't focus on other factors that will produce a similar - if not better - result.

As already alluded to in the dissent, focus on the essays and personal statements. Focus on kids who have overcome adversity, especially those from disadvantaged backgrounds who've experienced discrimination.
There's no way admissions offices don't already do all the above right? So net result, is the most historically successful tool in the belt just got decommissioned for a net loss, right? And for those schools not already doing the above, what makes you think they will start now when they are no longer on the hook for affirmative action?
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by Kraken »

I've long been conflicted about affirmative action, or reverse discrimination as we called it when it was new and radical. I was in college then and had friends who were passed over by their preferred schools because they were white (or so they thought). Fighting discrimination with more discrimination just felt wrong.

'Course, I didn't understand the extent of white privilege/systemic racism back then. My thinking evolved as I awoke. As several of you have already said, I wish we lived in a color-blind meritocracy, but we don't.

Perhaps schools can focus more on socioeconomic background, which is frequently a proxy for race anyway.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by GreenGoo »

I would like to believe that any affirmative action acceptances were at least qualified to attend the program they applied for. Right? I mean, it's not like they are scooping up random strangers from the street and giving them a slot. I hope.

Out of 100 new students, I've always assumed the top 75 were standard acceptances, and the last 25 were considered for affirmative action. If any of the top 75 are already from a diverse background (likely), all the better, and 1 less needed for "quota".

Being personally bitter about affirmative action seems asinine. There are a myriad of reasons you get rejected. Somehow you just know that someone less qualified got in instead of you because of the colour of their skin? Give me a break. It certainly can't be your own personal failings. That's impossible. And failings is too harsh a word anyway.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by Octavious »

If you are failing to get into Harvard chances are you probably got into a million other schools. (Unless you are insane and apply when you have no shot.) So they blew up the whole thing because people got rejected from a school where most people get rejected anyway. I look forward to dealing with college applications this year. The whole thing is insane. Pay to do the SATs. Pay to SEND the SATs. Pay to apply. The amount of money you have to outlay is nuts. This year is going to be rough until my wife finds another job.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by Grifman »

stessier wrote: Thu Jun 29, 2023 1:52 pm
Grifman wrote: Thu Jun 29, 2023 12:59 pm FWIW, a significant majority of Americans, 74%, including 65% of African Americans and 70% of Hispanics, believe that race should have no role in college admissions:
Slavery polled pretty high in the 1800s too.
This is a pretty dumb comparison. Did slaves poll in support of slavery?

FWIW, I never said I supported the SC decision - I merely reported what the majority of Americans believed, including minorities that would be negativity impacted by the decision.
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Re: SCOTUS Watch

Post by Grifman »

Kurth wrote: Thu Jun 29, 2023 4:08 pm With a nod to malchior's note above about schools pretty much ignoring this, won't they be able to achieve the desires result - diversity on campus - through means other than race-based admissions?

There's no way an admissions office can't focus on other factors that will produce a similar - if not better - result.

As already alluded to in the dissent, focus on the essays and personal statements. Focus on kids who have overcome adversity, especially those from disadvantaged backgrounds who've experienced discrimination.
They could go with class/income as a surrogate. Sure some poor whites might get in, but who’s to say they aren’t significantly disadvantaged also? The only ones then who lose out are middle to upper class African Americans, some of whom may have gotten in due to racial preferences.
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