What can be said that hasn't already been said a million times elsewhere in the vastness of the blogosphere? Like the song says: what the world needs now is another contributor mouthing off on the internets like it needs a hole in the head.All I can offer is this: others have not said what needs to be said, and some worse than others, which means piping up a little may be not only warranted, but indeed a civic duty.
***
First, for reasons which will be explained shortly, we interrupt this gratuitous exercise with a brief mash note about Josh Marshall (www.talkingpointsmemo.com): for my money Josh is the most astute political observer going on the internet. More important, Josh is not just a blogger; he is in the best sense a chronicler. He identifies the larger themes often at play that most other bloggers and so-called pundits simply do not see - or at least aren't willing to talk about. No doubt this is the reason a link to Josh is considered by left-to-moderate bloggers as the final word in political analysis.
We now return to our regularly scheduled programming.
***
The reason I mention Josh Marshall is because he posted a note a few years ago that got me thinking about Bigger Things. In this particular thought-provoker Josh proposed an interesting narrative about the then-unbelievable reaction in the Muslim world to the publication of some unfortunate cartoons depicting Mohammed in a Danish newspaper: after setting the stage by describing the obvious conflict between theocratic impulses and classical liberalism in the world at large, Josh honed in on a similar conflict that had also been developing for some time in God's country, my country of origin, the good ol’ freedom-lovin’ U.S. of A. The broader narrative of course was that nationality, religion, supposed levels of education, style-sense – whatever -- none of those are reliable barometers for measuring cultural predispositions toward despotism versus individual liberty: a theocrat is a theocrat is a theocrat, and theocrats over there aren't much different from theocrats over here.
To prove that the U.S. is not immune from this disturbing global trend Josh cited the strident militaristic tendencies that had at the same time arisen in the U.S. under a Bush administration that demanded unquestioning obedience from a frightened populace and a cowed media. He ended with the following:
"It's not the U.S. or the West versus Islam. At least it's not that simple. In any case, the government in this country is too close to illiberalism, militarism and theocracy for that to work as a model. But it is there -- liberalism and authoritarianism, modernity and theocracy."
I couldn't have agreed more. It is something I've been thinking about for some time. My only quibble was not about Josh's diagnosis but rather the symptom he chose to use as his example (militarism) in making the diagnosis.
I think a more obvious symptom is abortion.
Personally, I really can't get too excited about abortion as a moral issue. What is more interesting to me is the very fact that it is a moral issue, perhaps one of the moral issues of our time. Prayer in schools, stone tablets in court houses, sacrificing plastic action figures on stone alters in basements -- all of these might ignite similar heated public policy debates about how the American government should contend with what are fundamentally matters of personal morality, taste and religion. Abortion just happens to be the Big One that gets the most people -- at least in America -- all riled up. [n.b., I don't include issues such as legalisation of certain drugs, or Prohibition, for that matter, in this category, because such issues are also bound up with legitimate concerns about public order, e.g., should a stoner be permitted to drive a school bus?].
How do essentially secular systems of government deal with issues that are difficult to reduce to secular terms? It would seem this is a source of some if not most of the conflicts and tensions of our time. This is what interests me.
So, what is it about abortion? Evidently, according to Supreme Court's reasoning in Roe vs. Wade, there is some magic date at which abortion passes from being legally permissible to becoming impermissible. Whether that date is the commencement of the second or third trimester or somewhere in between hardly matters (at least for purposes of this post). What is interesting is the mere fact the Supreme Court made this determination in the first place. This is (or should be) at the crux of Josh's point about liberalism vs. illiberalism.
The thing about Roe vs. Wade that really chaffs the religious right is the fact the Supreme Court resolved the issue with reference to science, and not to moral values. The constitutional issue -- whether there is a right of privacy -- only has masked the real issue, which was whether the Supreme Court should have respected the moral (really theocratic) impulses of a certain segment of society over the putative interests of others.
That the Supreme Court waded into this morass -- instead of leaving the dirty work to state legislatures -- is mainly useful to the disparaging religious right as a rhetorical trump card to throw in the faces of secularists who give a shit about constitutional law (we who give a shit about such things are always fighting a rear-guard action, aren't we?). In reality, if one follows the logic of the religious right (i.e., all abortion is murder), it doesn't matter whether elected state legislatures or unelected liberals in black robes protect a woman's right to choose. If Roe vs. Wade were overturned but state legislatures effectively enshrined the same outcome in legislation, does anyone really think the religious right would concede the issue on constitutional principles? [The correct answer is: of course not].
Who can say with scientific certainty when life begins? Anyone who does, whether on the left or right, is asserting an opinion or a belief. He or she is professing his or her faith and nothing more. With Roe vs. Wade, the Court effectively threw up its hands by saying the only constitutionally appropriate way they could resolve the question was with reference to viability.
It is this approach American theocrats cannot accept because Roe vs. Wade was in essence an attempt to resolve a morally charged issue while still respecting the establishment clause.
For this reason, Roe vs. Wade is much bigger than "abortion". It is a marker: over-turning Roe would be huge for the religious right because it would signal a triumph over the forces of liberalism that in their opinion weakened the moral fibre of America. The religious right would see overturning Roe much as German generals saw blitzkrieging Panzers punching through enemy lines. From a secular perspective, in a nation professing the primacy of the rule of law, this is nothing more than simple thuggery. However, from a theocratic perspective, it aligns the nation with divine will; and theocrats would only wonder, what's wrong with that?
The bottom line is this: it makes no difference to me whether it's a Mullah dictating morality or a Bishop disqualifying Catholics from communion if they voted for Kerry: while it is true one might more obviously encourage and exhort to violence than the other, both are equally opposed to the classical liberalism and democratic principles I hold dear. From the perspective of a secular humanist, they only differ in terms of the means to which they might resort to achieve their aims.
To the religious right in America, the rule of law, the constitution, etc., are not important. A certain Attorney-General said early on during the Bush administration that such niceties had been rendered "quaint" and "obsolete"; relics of a bygone era. This is the reality of the public policy battle under way in America. Much is at stake.
Which is why I created this blog . . .
No comments:
Post a Comment