But rather common. After all, we often frame our disagreements with the opposition as if they lack understanding:

http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1129&dat=19871013&id=fN0NAAAAIBAJ&sjid=1W0DAAAAIBAJ&pg=5296,3639907

Should we withhold such hyperbole for women because it intersects with gender based stereotypes? I guess that’s the consensus here, and it makes sense assuming women are more likely to be condescended toward, but two points worth considering:

1. Bending over backwards to be polite and nice to someone is also condescening, especially if that’s not how you treat others. For example, that’s what we do to children usually.

2. Its probably unworkable. I’ve been commenting on progressive blogs a long time now, and as a POC I’m presumably entitled to the higher level of protection which you advocate. But yet I’ve been routinely called an ignorant asshole despite being obviously brilliant, good looking, and humble.

But what to do? Obviously my neo-colonialist free market ideology needs to be called out on a progressive blog for what it is, or at least perceived to be.

The “sacred cow” metaphor passed into English from the India, yes–meaning a religious object that is immune from criticism, generally unreasonably so. Do you also object to “Holy cow!” as an exclamation of surprise, or “Jesus Tapdancing Christ!” as religiously rooted metaphor? What about “the leopard cannot change its spots” or “cherchez la femme”?

We should be aware of where our language comes from, and sensitive to it hurting others, but if we gutted English of every possibly offensive metaphor, there would be very few left.

As for the main argument–It did sound like William was calling her inept, and it did sound condescending. However, I’m not sure that we shouldn’t be able to call our political figures out on their “stupidity” regardless of how much more they know than I. I’m quite certain Bush knows more about professional politics than I (hell, Palin probably does too). I still think they are idiots.

So, yes, you are calling her stupid, and yes, it is oppressive. I said very clearly that it was easily possible to express your dissent/skepticism without heading into graduated-at-the-top-of-her-class-Sotomayor-can’t-understand-basic-legal-issues.

And you’re going to love this next paragraph. When you say “there are no sacred cows,” are you aware of what you’re referencing, that you’re using racist/Orientalist/imperialist ideologies about Hindus to demand that your priorities in the world be the only ones that count?

Anyway, what are you trying to say by saying my critique of your statement–dissent from it, if you will–stinks as if I were saying you were unpatriotic? While I criticized the racist sense of superiority oozing out of your statement, I didn’t tell you not to criticize her, I made that clear–whereas ‘unpatriotic’ assertions are pretty clearly based in “don’t criticize the government,” and you quite explicitly say that no one should criticize political speech on the basis of its being racist and sexist. So, I have to assume that you simply don’t want the politics of your statements to be examined or critiqued… that is, that you want to make sure no one dissents from your position.

Just sayin’.

Saying she has bad politics, fine. You have a difference of opinion. But her competence is beyond repute, and you repeating this right-wing “she’s stupid” meme that Holly was even talking about in this very post is nothing but oppressive bullshit.

Notice how I never said she was stupid. I said I thought there was a problem with the way she interpreted something. Turned out I was wrong there (and you weren’t the first, or even third person to have pointed it out) and I admitted it. I think she’s a bad pick for the same reasons I thought Roberts and Alito were bad picks. She is marginally improved by the fact that she recognizes and life experiences create bias and wants to work with that rather than ignoring it’s existence, but I still think she’s bad news waiting to happen.

Also, there is no such thing as “beyond repute.” There are no sacred cows, no lines which should not be crossed, no objective standards can exist which cannot be questioned and reexamined. Information and human knowledge have never been damaged by asking questions about settled issues or even someone making an ass of themselves by speaking beyond their knowledge. Hell, I learned more than a little about both Sotomayor and the history of the 14th amendment by opening my mouth and being proved wrong. I’d be willing to bet there were other people who learned from my fuck up too.

Calling dissent, even uncivil dissent, oppression has the same stink as calling it unpatriotic.

Whether born from experience or inherent physiological or cultural differences, a possibility I abhor less or discount less than my colleague Judge Cedarbaum, our gender and national origins may and will make a difference in our judging. Justice O’Connor has often been cited as saying that a wise old man and wise old woman will reach the same conclusion in deciding cases. I am not so sure Justice O’Connor is the author of that line since Professor Resnik attributes that line to Supreme Court Justice Coyle. I am also not so sure that I agree with the statement. First, as Professor Martha Minnow has noted, there can never be a universal definition of wise. Second, I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn’t lived that life.

Let us not forget that wise men like Oliver Wendell Holmes and Justice Cardozo voted on cases which upheld both sex and race discrimination in our society. Until 1972, no Supreme Court case ever upheld the claim of a woman in a gender discrimination case. I, like Professor Carter, believe that we should not be so myopic as to believe that others of different experiences or backgrounds are incapable of understanding the values and needs of people from a different group. Many are so capable. As Judge Cedarbaum pointed out to me, nine white men on the Supreme Court in the past have done so on many occasions and on many issues including Brown.

However, to understand takes time and effort, something that not all people are willing to give. For others, their experiences limit their ability to understand the experiences of others. Other simply do not care. Hence, one must accept the proposition that a difference there will be by the presence of women and people of color on the bench. Personal experiences affect the facts that judges choose to see. My hope is that I will take the good from my experiences and extrapolate them further into areas with which I am unfamiliar. I simply do not know exactly what that difference will be in my judging. But I accept there will be some based on my gender and my Latina heritage.

The second comment people are flipping out about, the “courts make policy” one? I watched the video, and it very much seemed like a “look, this is how it is, I”m not advocating it, but this is reality.”

Anyway, I think it is easier to be “objective” when you haven’t seen how un-objective the real world is.

There is no room on the court for anyone who is biased or sympathetic toward certain groups or causes.

Goddess forbid that someone give a shit about other human beings. Or did you miss the idea that the purpose of the courts is to protect the minority from the tyranny of the majority?

Kristen, go easy. Teatime has obviously stumbled into the wormhole linking this dimension and Bizarro Earth.

Holly just wrote a whole long post explaining this distinction, but I really don’t think this is the philosophical principle at issue. People, being people, tend to view the world in light of their own experiences. It’s possible–and professionally necessary for most attorneys and justices–to carefully study circumstances that have never applied to you personally, but it’s not quite the same thing as first-hand experience. We solve this problem by making sure that our deciding pool is diverse. If bias has no place in these decisions, that should happen automatically anyway, right?

Goddess forbid that someone give a shit about other human beings. Or did you miss the idea that the purpose of the courts is to protect the minority from the tyranny of the majority?