(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . The Patriarchal, Religious and Political Motivation Behind the Supreme Court Ruling [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.', 'Backgroundurl Avatar_Large', 'Nickname', 'Joined', 'Created_At', 'Story Count', 'N_Stories', 'Comment Count', 'N_Comments', 'Popular Tags'] Date: 2023-04-10 Our fearless leader can do no wrong in the eyes of his followers. The unholy six. The text of the Supreme Court ruling striking down abortion rights does not contain the religious motivations that were surely behind it. It meanders seemingly forever talking about historic precedent and stare decisis being the primary determinators of whether abortion is a right that should be protected by the Constitution. In never mentions that their ruling, in effect, allows states to control every term of pregnancy and development by referring to a fetus as an “unborn human being” and allows the state to exercise any definition of control, including making it a crime if a pregnancy is terminated at any stage. A Ruling Which Will go Down in Infamy The Court ruling also “councils” us with this twisted statement: “In interpreting what is meant by “liberty,” the Court must guard against the natural human tendency to confuse what the Fourteenth Amendment protects with the Court’s own ardent views about the liberty that Americans should enjoy.” As is liberty is a poisoned word and does not apply to pregnant women. They then proceed to offer attitudes held centuries BEFORE safe medical abortions were available, attitudes and beliefs that were almost as old as the Constitution itself to, in effect, overrule current public attitudes towards abortion, which a majority of Americans today believe should remain legal. Violating stare decisis themselves in their decision by choosing hundred-year-old public attitudes over current ones in the age of safe abortions. A Challenge to Federal Authority While it gives the states this right, it takes away the federal government’s and women’s right to do so, thus voiding Rose v. Wade. It’s flawed state’s rights rationale is justified because at one time, as Alito said in his ruling, the majority of states considered abortion a crime, making it a valid way for the SC to rule today, ignoring that views have changed over the years. He failed to mention that the majority of current states allowed for abortions under various conditions before their ruling. Thus, we have a 21st century ruling in keeping with the same 19th Century rationale the treasonous Southern States employed when they formed the Confederacy, i.e. states' rights. A cover for reactionary politics. It used blatantly biased arguments as to why previous practices and beliefs going back to colonial times and before were a primary part of the basis for their current ruling. Correctly mentioning the purely subjective nature of when a fetus should be legally considered a human life and afforded protections, it nonetheless ruled that state governments but not the federal government had the right to determine if and when a woman could terminate pregnancy and gave no criteria or guidelines of its own for how states should make such rulings legal according to weight of law. Thus, failing to advance any criteria to be used by the states regarding abortion, it effectively declares their intention to make it illegal everywhere. And gives the states the go ahead to come up with any restrictions they choose, including religiously extreme beliefs that conception itself should qualify as the earliest time at which states can outlaw abortion, but not religious beliefs that a human life begins at birth. Women are now to the Court little more than fetus delivery vessels with no right to terminate a pregnancy. A State’s Rights Ruling? Only for Republicans Biden cannot afford to be passive on these Texas developments. The ruling actually masquerades as a state’s rights ruling. The Court’s likely intention is to erase the right to an abortion in all 51 states, regardless of how a state decides the issue. It telegraphed this when, as already mentioned, it did not define the Courts position on when a fetus becomes a protected human life, opening the door to cut down abortion rights in states where it is still legal. The SC ruling will most certainly be also applied to morning after pills, and indeed this has just occurred in a Texas ruling by an extremist Trump appointed federal judge. I’m hoping Biden has the conviction to ignore the ruling, since the judge apparently issued a factually unsupported decision that the drug was dangerous and seems out of his authority to over-rule the FDA in this matter. A Judge’s job is to rule on the law, not use of an FDA approved medical drug. Accepting this ruling on top of Gov. Abbott’s threats to pardon convicted murderer Daniel Perry ASAP for killing Garrett Foster, a Black Life Matters protestor in 2020, will lead to even greater political atrocities by the fascists. So we see that even states in which abortions are legal are affected and under attack. Next on the hit list will be contraception in my opinion if I read this court correctly. As will outlawing a women’s right to leave their home state for an abortion in another, which while completely unconstitutional is unlikely to be appealed to the currently backward court. Challenging the Historic Role of Authoritarian Patriarchy Revoking it is on the Republican, religious right-wing agenda. Patriarchal religions have historically promoted sexually repressive doctrine along with the special repression of women to cement their control and hold over members. Anti-fascist psychiatrist Wilhelm Reich wrote in his seminal work, The Mass Psychology of Fascism, about this nearly 100 years ago. A primary goal of these religions, according to Reich, were to make sure young boys are saddled with guilt about their own sexuality and compelled to "pray" for forgiveness for their sexual thoughts and deeds from their patriarchal god/father figure, with such damage surviving in various forms into adulthood. Girls and young women are similarly made to feel guilty about their sexuality and encouraged to remain virgins until marriage and be submissive to men, and to only have sex when married. Sex as Sin? Many Christian depictions of original sin are suggestive of sexual relations forbidden by god, possibly outside of marriage and the father’s permission. Reich was quoted in Mass Psychology of Fascism as saying “Originally and naturally, sexual pleasure was the good, the beautiful, the happy, that which united man with nature in general. When sexual feelings and religious feelings became separated from one another, that which is sexual was forced to become the bad, the internal, the diabolical.” Original “sin” in the Christian/Catholic religion is the disobedience exercised between biblical characters Adam and Eve after being tempted by a demonic serpent figure to eat forbidden fruit in the Garden of Eden. Many believe it is symbolic of “sinful” sexual relations. It is typically denied today as they can no longer be so direct and brazen about the biblical fable. When describing the story religion teachers in my 1950s Catholic School would mention that they disobeyed, ate the forbidden fruit, and lied together with fig leaves to cover their nakedness (symbolizing sexual guilt). We all got their message. Sexual Freedom: Enemy of Most Patriarchal Religions Sexual freedom from guilt for both men and women are the twin enemies of anti-sexual religious institutions, with the latter directly connected to the inability of many under their influence to think critically. Although not stated as such in the SC ruling, the reactionary religious and political motivation for striking down abortion rights were obvious. Alito’s majority ruling also failed to mention that patriarchal religious pressures and the very dangerous procedures available over 100 years ago were the primary reasons that states in the distant past enacted laws making an abortion criminal. A Natural Ally to Fascism Right-wing religion is a natural ally of fascism. Religious patriarchy also goes hand to hand with right wing authoritarianism and tends to produce passive aggressive followers that lose their ability over time to think critically and become capable of blindly following political or religious leaders. It’s a training ground of sorts that produces significant numbers of people, given the right conditions, that drift towards “all powerful” god-like appearing male leaders, which they follow without question or criticism. It’s a natural ally to fascist movements. Trump quickly learned how important it was to align himself with the religious right. Let us be Reminded why Abortion was Made Legal Demonstration before the Supreme Court. The cruel SC ruling also fails to mention the untold millions of women in the past who were forced to get dangerous, back-alley abortion procedures when they could not gain access to legal and safe ones. Many resulted in fatalities, a major reason for changes in public opinion and the Roe v. Wade ruling. The voiding of reproductive rights to abortion must be considered for what it is, a major step backward for an entire class of people and country. One that effects poor women and women of color the most grievously. Republicans appear to have gone “all in” in maximum cruelty mode, consistent with their move to fascism. The consequences when women are forced to birth an unwanted or unaffordable pregnancy will be devastating, resulting in all kinds of social and economic problems for both mother and child. I don’t expect anything to change now with the Rose v. Wade decision until women put together a national movement that can pull women out of work on selected days as well as onto the streets, the only leverage Republicans and many men respond to. A Cautionary Note Nixon, dismissed as a loser, won a landslide presidential election in 1968 To the Democratic leadership, I’d also issue a cautionary note, that 2024 may or may not play out as it did in 2020. I’ve given up political predictions this far in advance, it’s like playing the ponies or stock market. Going all in on Biden (who has rarely seen popularity ratings that are even close to 50%) against Trump again may not be the walkover they think it will be, although that appears to be their strategy. Republicans are now fascists dedicated to the destruction of our Constitutional democracy, and we can expect the absolute worst they have to offer in 2024. Trump is even capable of the very worst, which is to declare the election fixed in advance and seek to block voting in Republican states, launching another coup attempt and trying to make the election itself short of the required 270 electoral votes. Nixon, Trump of the 60s I recall in the past a man by the name of Richard Nixon, who lost both the presidency in 1960 and later the California governorship and was written off by pundits as a born loser only to prevail in a landslide for president in 1968. The media will also guarantee Biden gets plenty of bad publicity and that Trump gets all the publicity he wants, both good and bad, the latter not of much concern to those that will vote for him regardless of the smell. I recall this quote once attributed to WWII General George Patton, used in the 1970 movie: “America loves a winner, and will not tolerate a loser . . .” Trump and Biden will test the veracity of this quote as that is a version of one of Trump’s favorite accusations, that those he seeks to destroy are "losers.” [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/4/10/2162661/-The-Patriarchal-Religious-and-Political-Motivation-Behind-the-Supreme-Court-Ruling Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/