Stuart Taylor Slams Sotomayor
In 2001, Judge Sonia Sotomayor delivered a lecture on diversity at the University of California in which she said she “hopes 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.” Stuart Taylor in National Journal takes a brave stand for whitey:
[U]nless Sotomayor believes that Latina women also make better judges than Latino men, and also better than African-American men and women, her basic proposition seems to be that white males (with some exceptions, she noted) are inferior to all other groups in the qualities that make for a good jurist.
Any prominent white male would be instantly and properly banished from polite society as a racist and a sexist for making an analogous claim of ethnic and gender superiority or inferiority.
Leaving aside the fact that this is an inane commentary on a strained reading of Sotomayor’s remarks, let’s take some time out for a political observation. I had assumed that the way this was going to go was that conservatives would complain that Sotomayor is too liberal, then progressives would try to imply that conservatives were opposing Sotomayor because she’s too Latina, and then conservatives would whine. Instead, though, a large proportion of conservative really do seem to want to more-or-less explicitly hang their hats on the idea that Sotomayor is too Latina for the Supreme Court and that she must be stopped to protect white male privilege.
Meanwhile, glancing at the National Journal masthead I’m able to note that at least one institution in America has resisted the temptation to hire a bunch of unqualified Hispanics.
140 Responses to “Stuart Taylor Slams Sotomayor”
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May 27th, 2009 at 11:00 am
The 2001 speech by Sotomayor: http://abcnews.go.com/images/Politics/Berkeley_La%20Raza_2002.pdf
May 27th, 2009 at 11:01 am
Since modern conservatism is completely based on the premise that “things were so much better before minorities began demanding a place at the table”, why does this really surprise you, Matt?
May 27th, 2009 at 11:01 am
Meanwhile, glancing at the National Journal masthead I’m able to note that at least one institution in America has resisted the temptation to hire a bunch of unqualified Hispanics.
Wow. That is some world-class snark (and not undeserved).
Anyway, I understand what Matt is doing here, but I also think it is important to defend Sotomayor’s statement in context. And I actually think her own words are perfectly adequate to that end, so here they are again:
I have again highlighted what I take to be her core argument, which I view as largely unobjectionable.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:03 am
Apparently Stuart Taylor is concerned that the Supreme Court, which has had over a hundred justices, all but two of which have been male, and all of two of which have been white, might never again include a white male.
Though Taylor is doing a pretty good job of scoring asshole points to impress the right-wing judicial nomination machine, so in theory he’s still got half a chance.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:03 am
Does anyone have a source for that much repeated “wise Latina woman” quotation with some context? It has the sound of a wry joke to me, like something that might draw a chuckle from a room full of white men listening to a lecture on diversity. Or did it refer to making a decision in a certain kind of situation (preparing a quinceañera guest list)? I don’t know the context, but it most certainly doesn’t sound like someone seriously arguing that Latina’s make better judges than everyone else.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:06 am
It’s amazing the way people answer a question while one is still asking it.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:10 am
“a large proportion of conservative really do seem to want to more-or-less explicitly hang their hats on the idea that Sotomayor is too Latina for the Supreme Court”
But it was Sotomayor herself who introduced the Latina question into the mix. And let’s stop the bullshit. If a white male Court nominee had asserted that by virtue of his experiences he could render better decisions that a Latina Matt would fucking explode.
Incidentally, if were going play the identity politics game, maybe Matt can make a few comments on how Jews who make up about 3% of the U.S. population get 22% ( 2 of 9) of the Court seats. The unfairness of this has never been mentioned.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:10 am
Reporting Intern: Eugene Mulero
Apparently, they aren’t above hiring underpaid temps.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:17 am
Kafka, if you read the whole speech, you see that she clearly knocks down the notion that ethnic background/life experiences is either the sole determining factor in a judge’s decision, or even a major factor at all.
Unless someone can point to a decision that she wrote that would prove this “racist” meme correct, then this is all typical conservative mock outrage. (btw, don’t bring up Ricci, because this blog demonstrated that a reasonable person might say that Title VII muddied the waters so much that New Haven had no choice but to invalidate the test).
May 27th, 2009 at 11:20 am
I had assumed that the way this was going to go was that conservatives would complain that Sotomayor is too liberal, then progressives would try to imply that conservatives were opposing Sotomayor because she’s too Latina, and then conservatives would whine.
So let me get this straight. You thought that the Republicans would complain that Sotamayor was too liberal. This seems unassiablible, as every opposition party always complains that every nominee is to extreme. Harry Reid suggested Roberts as a potential moderate choice for Bush, then Bush nominated Roberts, and Reid said he was too conservative. That is just the way it is.
So, the Republicans suggest she is too liberal. They would do this to any nominee regardless of race or gender, making it a textbook case of unbiased behavior. Then you would call them racists based on this claim of too liberal, which we have shown would be a totally untrue, baseless, and frankly outragous and morally disgusing claim. You say they would whine about it.
You have on many occasions said that the problems with the Republicans is that they are to sensitive to the non-problem of false accusations of racism. Then you plot to falsely accuse them of racism and discribe their inevitable reaction to such behavior whining.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:20 am
Yes, their diabolical plan will soon be complete. The Republican Party will now control the levers of political power in all the places that matter in the world. From their seat of power in Tupelo, Mississippi they will look out across a land of fertile plenty, inhabited by a white over-class of trailer-park dwellers who possess all the characteristics that make America strong–paranoia, religious fanaticism, racism, and ignorance. Unfettered by the foolishness of Northeastern pseudo-Republicans, these newly emancipated statesman will command the respect and admiration of every Glenn Beck viewer in the greater Tuscaloosa area. We should all await the creation of this modern-day Athens with eager anticipation.
Oh wait, that vaguely hispanic guy from Dancing with Stars just won his third Indy 500. Perhaps the coming Conservative Eschaton will have to be delayed.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:25 am
Instead, though, a large proportion of conservative really do seem to want to more-or-less explicitly hang their hats on the idea that Sotomayor is too Latina for the Supreme Court and that she must be stopped to protect white male privilege.
I’d say this is twisting his words at least as much as he’s twisting hers.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:29 am
There’s a bunch of articles and blog posts and essays that say the same thing as Sotomayor’s (why do I keep trying to spell it “Sotomayour”?) infamous comment. Google “white privelege” or “male privelege” or “it’s expensive to be poor.” I’d link, but why bother? The conservatives on this blog, at least, as hacks as big as Goldberg without even the excuse of nepotism or getting paid for it.
If a white male Court nominee had asserted that by virtue of his experiences he could render better decisions that a Latina Matt would fucking explode.
Do you disagree with her argument for her position, as quoted upthread? If so, why? It seems valid to me.
In the specific example you made up, if a white male Court nominee had made that assertion by virtue of his experiences growing up poor, or Irish in Britain or Jewish in rural Alabama or some other situation where some type of white men get treated like a minority, then of course Matt wouldn’t explode. (Maybe a sardonic remark or something, and it depends what he means by it, but obviously nothing like Sotomayor’s getting now.) On the other hand if he made that assertion by virtue of his experience as a UMC WASP, then yes, Matt would explode, and so would everyone to the left of Limbaugh, obviously. Why is that so hard to understand?
May 27th, 2009 at 11:31 am
Mike, in the absence of any actual court decisions that “prove” that Sotomayor makes such decisions based on race, the conservatives are indeed walking on a knife’s edge by taking this angle. If one screams “she’s a bigot, she hates white people” over and over, in the absence of any actual evidence of such in her jurisprudence, it has a tendency to crack back on you.
Exhibit A, just how much time did conservatives waste screaming “Reverend Wright, Obama *must* hate white people” before moderates and swing voters began to wonder if the GOP really had an issue with black people in general.
Latinos aren’t going to forget this crap easily. Good luck winning the Southwest in 2012.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:31 am
Yes, DTM, you find it unobjectionable, because you are dishonest as to what the meaning of words are. As is Matthew, when he says that one is objecting to a person being “too Latina”, when one notes a female of latin heritage who states that she would hope that a wise female of latin heritage would produce better conclusions than a white male. Thus, Matthew, in a dim-witted and inane fashion, has concluded that there is something inherently latina about a latina hoping that a latina would produce better conclusions than a white male. The irony of the writer of such a stupid propostion accusing others of being inane is remarkable.
Again, for the record, I don’t oppose Sotomoyer’s nominatiion. For some reason, howver, dimwits like Matthew are compelled to deny the meaning of words, so insecure they are about a latina being nominated. Earth to Matthew; the people you agree with aren’t perfect, and they don’t need to be.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:33 am
The phrase “that’s mighty white of you” exists in American parlance for a reason.
The Village is particularly inbred, and Stuart Taylor is a very good example. Remember, to people like Taylor, people who look like Sotomayor are “the help”.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:35 am
Argh. “As hacks as big” should be “are hacks as big.” “Privelege” should be “privilege.” This blog has conservation of typos.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:35 am
I wonder what the required qualifications are to be the “House Race Hotline Editor.”
May 27th, 2009 at 11:37 am
Yes, DTM, you find it unobjectionable, because you are dishonest as to what the meaning of words are. As is Matthew, when he says that one is objecting to a person being “too Latina”, when one notes a female of latin heritage who states that she would hope that a wise female of latin heritage would produce better conclusions than a white male.
Do you disagree with her argument for her position, as quoted upthread? If so, why? It seems valid to me.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:40 am
Will Allen and the other anti-Sotomayor trolls constantly reference Sotomayor’s quote, but they won’t ever post it.
DTM, on the other hand, likes to paste the whole thing into his comments. So do I:
I wonder why that is?
May 27th, 2009 at 11:45 am
[...] #2: Two more Matt Y posts, one on the Taylor piece and the second on a Michael Goldfarb post that Jason Zengerle also comments [...]
May 27th, 2009 at 11:48 am
I still find Huckabee’s Freudian slip calling Sotomayer “Maria” to be MUCH more telling when discussing the GOP’s decision to go after the nomination solely on race.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:48 am
Yes, I disagree. There is no empirical reason to hope a wise person of one particular sex, from one particular racial heritage, will provide better conclusions, or, for that matter, worse conclusions, than a person of the other sex, from another racial heritage, no matter what past patterns of racial discrimination have existed. They likely will have a different way of reaching conclusions, due to the completely unremarkable fact, so unremarkable that it would not be worth mentioning, that every single person reaches conclusions in a unique way due to their individual experiences. The word “different”, however, is a not a synonym for “better” or “worse”.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:52 am
Yes, DTM, you find it unobjectionable, because you are dishonest as to what the meaning of words are.
As I said above, at this point I am fine with letting Sotomayor’s words speak for themselves. Assuming you are too, then we have nothing more to discuss.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:53 am
Fine, joe…
“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.”
….and yes, yes, to disagree with you and DTM makes one a “troll”. You have thus officially retreated to the last refuge of the intellectually dishonest hack. Congratulations.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:56 am
I think she meant what she said. The context is that white men have made some bad decisions, specifically on sex discrimination. She says it’s not impossible for white men to make good decisions in discrimination cases, but that it’s hard and some white men won’t want to work at it, or won’t care or will lack empathy. Therefore, she disagrees with Justice O’Connor that a wise man and a wise woman will reach the same decision on a discrimination case. She thinks a latina woman will make a “better” decision. Do I disagree? Yes, I think so. I don’t think we should rely on the bias of minority judges to counteract the bias of white male judges. I think we should rely on judges to follow the law, and pass laws to protect minority rights.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:57 am
Oh, look, I shamed him into it.
That’s nice, Will. The problem is, you’re not going to provide the quote the next time you accuse Sotomayor of being a racist, or the time after that, or the time after that. You seem to be quite aware of how devastating her actual words are to your characterization of them.
Don’t worry, buddy. I’ll be there to make sure that everyone can read what she actually said, so they can judge your talking point accordingly.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:59 am
@20: I, however, just like to bold this part:
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.
Anyone who quotes the “wise Latina” part without noting this context for the use of “wise” is seriously misrepresenting the quote. Also, the bit about there being no universal definition of “wise” is well taken and a useful corrective to the O’Connor/Coyle quote.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:59 am
Yes, DTM, and to hope than a person that of one’s own gender and racial background will provide better conclusions than a person of a different gender and racial background, due to the experiences of people of that particular gender and racial background, is the hope of a bigot, because it is a hope completely without empirical basis.
May 27th, 2009 at 12:00 pm
Shorter Will Allen: “The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread.”
I know the “shorter” conceit is overused, but seriously, I think it’s a fair summary of the 11:48 a.m. comment. The idea that it’s not better for a decision to be informed by relevant life experience, just different?
May 27th, 2009 at 12:00 pm
Andy,
How about:
Sound good to you?
Seriously, would you be making this argument if there were 8 Muslim, Indonesian women on the court, and Mike Huckabee said it would be useful to have the perspective a Christian male?
May 27th, 2009 at 12:03 pm
The strongest thing I can say against Sotomayor’s formulation is that it’s goofy, in a 1980s New-Agey “women who run with wolves” way. I don’t think goofiness is disqualifying in the absence of anything else.
May 27th, 2009 at 12:06 pm
Will Allen has written about 40 comments accusing people of being “bigots” because of what they’ve said about Sonia Sotomayor.
Not a single one of them dealt with the insults leveled at her intelligence, or with the charge that she is an “affirmative action pick” who only got where she is because she’s had things handed to her.
Not one. But he’s really, really concerned about bigotry.
May 27th, 2009 at 12:06 pm
Joe, can you write three consecutive posts without lying? I did not write that Sotomoyer is a racist. I wrote that she is a bigot. The words are similar, but not precisely the same.
Anyways, to satisfy your concerns, with apologies to Matthew’s employer…
“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.”
May 27th, 2009 at 12:07 pm
Listen, Sotomayor clearly said that she is hoping for a master race of Latina women to make wiser decisions than white men. Someone told me that if I don’t repeat this another thousand times before my next slumber, then I will die in my sleep and never awaken. So here you go.
May 27th, 2009 at 12:09 pm
You are lying again, joe. I only have stated that Sotomoyer is a bigot. She is.
“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”
May 27th, 2009 at 12:14 pm
HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!
Righty-oh, Will, you sure told me!
Please, whimper some more about how I’m lying. It’s doing you worlds of good.
May 27th, 2009 at 12:20 pm
Seriously, would you be making this argument if there were 8 Muslim, Indonesian women on the court, and Mike Huckabee said it would be useful to have the perspective a Christian male?
May 27th, 2009 at 12:22 pm
. . . is the hope of a bigot, because it is a hope completely without empirical basis.
First, that makes no sense: just because a person believes something for which there is no empirical basis doesn’t mean that person is a bigot (see, e.g., basically every religious person; or, if you believe David Hume, everyone who does not just lie down, curl up, and die).
Second, I think you are wrong about there being no empirical basis for Sotomayor’s argument. Her key factual claims are these:
I think there is an empirical basis for all of those claims. Of course Sotomayor does not lay out a scientific study, but I think those claims are sufficiently well-supported by our common experiences to be recognizable as true.
Now as we have discussed before, it is perfectly reasonable to respond with a counterpoint to the effect that sometimes relevant experiences can lead to bias, and not illumination. And there may indeed be no general rule as to whether the benefits of illumination will outweigh the costs of bias in any particular case.
But assuming all that is true, that doesn’t mean Sotomayor is wrong about the potential value of relevant experience–and note she phrases all this in terms of what she hopes would be true, of both a hypothetical wise Latina or in practice herself. Since this is a worthwhile hope, the practical question then becomes how to shift the balance in favor of the value of illumination over the possibility of bias, so as to accomplish Sotomayor’s hopes. And as I have suggested before, probably the best solution is to seek a diversity of experiences on the Court, such that the members of the Court have a decent chance of drawing illuminationg from each other’s experiences while also moderating each other’s biases.
But in any event, raising the potential for bias doesn’t show there was no empirical basis for Sotomayor’s claims. Rather, an open-minded person would realize that raising this issue just advances the discussion a bit beyond what Sotomayor addressed in this brief passage–but of course Will Allen doesn’t really want to advance the discussion, because it ends up leading to a place he doesn’t want to go. Much better, then, for him to retreat into crude caricatures and strawmen arguments.
May 27th, 2009 at 12:24 pm
I only have stated that Sotomoyer is a bigot
Charming, coming from you, Will Allen, Bush and torture supporter extraordinaire. We’ve never seen as much simple minded bigotry and right-wing shillery as we have from you. You’re only flapping your toothless gums about stuff you know nothing about because once again you have chosen to obediently walk in lockstep with the right-wing talking points in order to justify the intellectually immoral life and ideology you have chosen to follow. You’re an unthinking slavish right wing devotee of the highest order, and thus a person in no position to have a worthwhile opinion on this matter.
I can listen to your piece-of-trash ideological mold and filth that make up your cohorts and the people who do your thinking for you if I ever wanted to hear your worthless opininions though with them it would be untempered with a bunch of dishonest defenses at being an “independent.”
May 27th, 2009 at 12:28 pm
I guess Sotomayor’s point is so unobjectionable that it needs to be distorted in order to criticize it.
How telling.
May 27th, 2009 at 12:30 pm
Cyrus, it is inaccurate at best, and dishonest at worst, to assert that Sotomoyer said….
“…it’s better for a decision to be informed by relevant life experience…”.
The above statement is likely wrong, since relevant life experiences are as likely to produce a prejudicial conclusion as a legally principled conclusion, but it is not bigoted, since it does not express the hope that the speaker’s experiences due to their gender or racial heritage will produce “better” conclusions than the conclusions produced by people who don’t have the experiences of that gender or racial heritage. Sotomayor’s statement is of the latter variety.
(here ya’ go, joe)
“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”
May 27th, 2009 at 12:32 pm
I’m not opposed to Sotomayor as a Justice. The Court shouldn’t be all white men. But I think O’Connor stated the right principle. Justice is supposed to be blind.
But what Sotomayor, and many others, are pointing out is that for various reasons, in the real world it is not actually possible for judges to be truly “blind”–we are all going to see the facts of a case through the lens of our prior experiences. Indeed, it is actually impossible for judges to understand the facts of a case without drawing on their experiences: if they were really a tabula rasa, both the world and the law would be incomprehensible to them.
So even assuming that some form of “blindness” is a worthy goal for a system of justice, it can’t be a form of “blindness” which renders the system incapable of understanding the world. Moreover, it may be impossible to expect each individual judge to perfectly embody this ideal form of “blindness”, and instead we may have to think about how to structure the entire Court, indeed the entire judicial system, so as to optimize its performance by this measure.
May 27th, 2009 at 12:33 pm
Tyro, you are lying. I have stated from day one that torture should be prohibited, period, and have supported having a criminal trial as high up the ladder of authority as is possible.
May 27th, 2009 at 12:38 pm
Yes, DTM, and people who state as a matter of Faith that they hope that people with their gender and racial heritage will have experiences that allow them to produce better conclusions, than people who don’t have experiences of that gender and racial heritage, are bigots. Bigotry is frequently religously informed, and it is a bit shocking that you don’t know this.
May 27th, 2009 at 12:43 pm
I am starting to get the gist of what the republicans are saying here with respect to sotomayor.
It goes something along the lines of, “Well, Sotomayor claims to be for equal rights, but she’s clearly a bigot because she’s bigoted against bigotry!”
Justice is supposed to be blind.
Maybe so. But a bunch of SCOTUS rulings have a history for decades and decades of going against equal rights for women and blacks. There’s this strange idea (and granted, it’s inherently conservative) that things like Plessy v. Ferguson and court rulings against plaintiffs in discrimination suits are the “norm” and that that was the “correct law” until people “changed things.” It’s possible — and, indeed, likely — that these were not the “norm” but that these were false rulings made by judges who let their personal biases interfere with their judgment and that judges like Sotomayor are less likely to be hobbled by these biases and misunderstandings that the judicial system for many decades was handicapped by.
I have stated from day one that tortureshould be prohibited, period
Your words say one thing but your voting record and political support says something else.
May 27th, 2009 at 12:44 pm
Cyrus, it is inaccurate at best, and dishonest at worst, to assert that Sotomoyer said….
“…it’s better for a decision to be informed by relevant life experience…”.
From the helpfully-provided text:
May 27th, 2009 at 12:46 pm
Will Allen is so concerned about bigotry, and so utterly principled and uninterested in using it merely as a partisan cudgel, that he has not written a single word about the actually-bigoted accusations that Sotomayor is unintelligent and overemotional, or that she only got where she is because of tokenism.
Not one word. But, really, he’s just terribly concerned about bigotry.
May 27th, 2009 at 12:51 pm
Bigotry is frequently religously informed, and it is a bit shocking that you don’t know this.
Of course I know this. I also know that just having religious faith doesn’t make you a bigot. And yet that is all the logic you offered–if someone believes something without an empirical basis, that is bigotry.
In any event, that is beside the point, because there is an empirical basis for Sotomayor’s claims. Moreover, we both know what is really going on here. What is really going on is that you want to pretend Sotomayor never said this:
That passage negates your claim of bigotry, which is why you have retreated into this “no empirical basis” nonsense.
In fact, you roundaboutly admitted this point, back when I stated:
And you replied:
If you were intellectually honest, once it had been pointed out to you that Sotomayor was in fact just saying that people of one group will only sometimes fail to understand the values and needs of people from a different group, you would have taken your own advice and shut up. But either because of political allegiance or the simple need to protect your fragile ego from admitting you made a mistake, you are unwilling to follow your own advice and are pressing on with your debunked charges of bigotry.
So fine. You aren’t convincing anyone, probably not even yourself. But if you enjoy, or indeed need, such intellectual masturbation, carry on.
May 27th, 2009 at 12:51 pm
Next, DTM, if Sotomoyter had said…
“The potential exists that a woman with a latin hertitage will add a perspective, due to her life experiences, to a court, which will result is superior decisions than such a court absent such perspective.”
…it would have been wholly unremarkable and unobjectionable. For some reason, you wish to put forth the notion that what Sotomoyer actually said was similar to what is written above. This is false.
May 27th, 2009 at 12:56 pm
Will,
After the beatdown DTM just gave you over the issue of “sometimes,” you really need to stop lecturing people on misinterpreting Sotomayor’s statement.
May 27th, 2009 at 12:59 pm
“The potential exists that a woman with a latin hertitage will add a perspective, due to her life experiences, to a court, which will result is superior decisions than such a court absent such perspective.”
Sotomayor actually said soemthing less assertive than this — she said she “would hope” that was the case. So why are you complaining?
May 27th, 2009 at 12:59 pm
I guess Sotomayor’s point is so unobjectionable that it needs to be distorted in order to criticize it.
How telling.
I’m honestly not sure what I distorted. I didn’t intent to distort anything.
But what Sotomayor, and many others, are pointing out is that for various reasons, in the real world it is not actually possible for judges to be truly “blind”–we are all going to see the facts of a case through the lens of our prior experiences.
First, that is not the objectionable part to me. The objectionable part is that she said a wise latina women would make a better decision. Second, I don’t think the reason you put a latina woman on the Court is because you want the special perspective she has from her experiences as a latina woman. I think the reason is because it is wrong to exclude women or latinas or blacks or whoever from the Court. Third, if you want different perspectives and experiences, I think you could find someone more diverse from the current Court than Sotomayor, who is the 3rd New Yorker, the 6th Catholic, the 8th from either Harvard or Yale, and the 9th former Circuit Judge.
But again, I’m not opposed to her nomination. I just don’t like that quote.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:02 pm
Stop lying, DTM. I did not write that “if someone believes something without an empirical basis, that is bigotry.” I wrote that to hope, without empirical basis, that one’s experiences, due to one’s gender and racial heritage, will lead to one producing better conclusions than people who do not have the experiences of that gender and racial heritage, is bigoted. The two statements are not remotely similar. Why are you lying in such a ridiculous fashion?
May 27th, 2009 at 1:11 pm
No, Led, she said did not say that she hoped that….
“The potential exists that a woman with a latin hertitage will add a perspective, due to her life experiences, to a court, which will result in (sp) superior decisions than such a court absent such perspective.”
….rather, she said that she hoped 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”.
The two hopes are not remotely similar. The first refers to the output of a court made up of individuals, who collaborate to produce decisions. The second refers to the relative value of individual conclusions, based upon experiences due to individual gender and racial characteristics.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:12 pm
to hope … that one’s experiences … will lead to one producing better conclusions than people who do not have the experiences … is bigoted.
No, actually, it isn’t.
And, to take it further, you mentioend, “without empirical basis.” In fact we do have empirical basis, given that the traditional makeup of the court until comparatively recently in our history did make extraorindarily poor decisions regarding race and gender discrimination and didn’t change until people with quite rare talents and mindsets ended up on the court, who just happened themselves to be white men, but offering fairly clear evidence that in keeping with Sotomayor’s statement, it was hard for them to overcome the past century of a tradition blinkered in bias.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:15 pm
From Wikipedia:
A bigot is a person who is intolerant of or takes offense to the opinions, lifestyles or identities differing from his or her own…
Where is Sotomayor displaying intolerance or taking offense in the endlessly quoted passage? If you’re going to abuse words why don’t you just go all the way and call her a fascist?
May 27th, 2009 at 1:23 pm
Indeed, it is actually impossible for judges to understand the facts of a case without drawing on their experiences: if they were really a tabula rasa, both the world and the law would be incomprehensible to them.
To pick up what I said in an earlier thread, until SCOTUS is replaced by a giant AI, judging will be done by people, and people have lives.
Basic hermeneutics, really. It means that Will Allen reads that passage one way, and others read it another. I think his reading is much more strained, and rather than just copy and paste ad nauseam, I’d like him to offer a full exegesis. Y’know, like a judge would. Or a freshman lit student, if that’s too much of a reach.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:30 pm
Good thing that’s not even remotely what she said.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:31 pm
Stop lying, DTM. I did not write that “if someone believes something without an empirical basis, that is bigotry.”
Here is exactly what you wrote:
What I noted is that this last phrase is nonsensical: a belief or hope is not bigotry just because it is without
empirical basis.
In any event, I gather you have dropped this line of argument, so I consider my work on this point done.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:32 pm
… by virtue of actually knowing something about that type of case, yes.
Why is ignorance so precious to you?
May 27th, 2009 at 1:35 pm
DTM, you are lying when you write that the statement…
“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.”
…makes the statement….
“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.”
…non-bigoted in nature. One may as well write…
“I 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. Many Arab people have done so. I would hope, however, that a wise Jewish person, with their rich Jewish history, would more often than not reach a better conclusion than an Arab who hasn’t lived that life.”
…and then claim the statement is not bigoted.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:36 pm
Meanwhile, glancing at the National Journal masthead I’m able to note that at least one institution in America has resisted the temptation to hire a bunch of unqualified Hispanics.
Wow, 60+ comments and no one thinks of Kathryn Jean Lopez?
May 27th, 2009 at 1:40 pm
The two hopes are not remotely similar. The first refers to the output of a court made up of individuals, who collaborate to produce decisions. The second refers to the relative value of individual conclusions, based upon experiences due to individual gender and racial characteristics.
This just shows that you don’t understand how appellate panels reach decisions. Individual judges on appellate panels reach individual conclusions, and to the extent one judge is persuaded by another judge to change his or her initial view it is because the second judge concluded that the first judge’s individual conclusion was better. There is no judicial hive mind in which all of the experiences of the individual judges are mashed together to spit out an answer. In other words, the only way a judge can promote or contribute to superior decisions by the court is by reaching superior individual conclusions and persuading her colleagues.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:41 pm
[...] love this Yglesias line: I had assumed that the way this was going to go was that conservatives would complain that [...]
May 27th, 2009 at 1:41 pm
Wow, 60+ comments and no one thinks of Kathryn Jean Lopez?
Wow, you completely mixed up National Review and National Journal.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:42 pm
The two hopes are not remotely similar. The first refers to the output of a court made up of individuals, who collaborate to produce decisions. The second refers to the relative value of individual conclusions, based upon experiences due to individual gender and racial characteristics.
I think if you read the entire passage, the most logical interpretation of Sotomayor’s point is that she is in fact talking about the move from the historic standard of nine white men on the Court to a Court which includes people with other backgrounds, and in that sense she is actually making the collaborative version of this point. Indeed, it seems quite obvious to me that the only reason she is talking in purely individualistic terms in that particular line about “a wise Latina woman” is that she is riffing off the line, attributed (perhaps falsely) to Justice O’Connor, the one about “a wise old man” and “a wise old woman” reaching the same conclusion in deciding cases.
That said, I certainly think this is a legitimate topic for her confirmation hearings. Of course, I don’t think it is plausible she meant there should nine Latina women on the Court instead of nine white men, but I would be interested to hear her elaborate on how she would propose to incorporate these notions on a systematic basis.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:49 pm
Yes, DTM, and it is plainly a lie to write that the statement…
“To hope than a person that of one’s own gender and racial background will provide better conclusions than a person of a different gender and racial background, due to the experiences of people of that particular gender and racial background, is the hope of a bigot, because it is a hope completely without empirical basis.”
…is the same as writing….
“if someone believes something without an empirical basis, that is bigotry.”
If your point is that the first statement would be more clear, if it was written,
“… because it is a hope, without empirical basis, pertaining to the speaker’s gender and race heritage providing experiences which will produce better conclusions by the speaker, compared to conclusions by individuals that do not have those gender or race charateristics.”
…fine. I suspect that was not your point, because if it was, that is what you have written. Instead, you chose to lie.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:57 pm
I’ve long suspected Will Allen is a high-functioning autistic, and his performance here makes me think that more than ever. The extreme intellectual rigidity, the inability to understand life as it’s actually lived by humans, the instant recourse to furious anger at any frustration — all will ring a bell with anyone with experience with autism.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:59 pm
How come whenever points out a distortion or falsehood on Will Allen’s part he calls them a liar? Does he think the rest of us can’t read? That prior posts are erased when he contradicts himself? Really Will, this whole thread is largely a shithole of your inability to read with the slightest context. But don’t let that stop you digging.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:59 pm
One may as well write . . .
If we were living in a country with an Arab majority and Jewish minority, and we were discussing a constitutional court considering religious discrimination cases, and there was a history of anti-Jewish discrimination by the Arab majority in this country, I’d find nothing in particular objectionable about her argument as applied to such a situation.
Indeed, let’s keep going. After acknowledging that Arab judges can and have sometimes made good decisions involving religious discrimination, her argument would nonetheless be:
Again, this seems unobjectionable to me.
May 27th, 2009 at 2:01 pm
To quote Adam Serwar:
The premise here — and perhaps it’s a reason why the right has latched onto “empathy”, ideally with a screwed-up face — is that the SCOTUS is simultaneously an institutional authority and the adjudicator of cases that often pit institutional authority against individuals or marginalized groups. That’s always been the tension in the court’s history, not least because the executive has the monopoly of violence in the matter of its execution.
One can posit an inherent institutional bias simply by its being the fricking Supreme Court, based out of a big fucking building in the National Mall, as opposed to nine people picked out from the phone book who meet every Tuesday night in the Applebee’s parking lot.
(Stop whining, Will, and do some actual exegesis.)
May 27th, 2009 at 2:02 pm
If your point is that the first statement would be more clear, if it was written . . .
By changing the order of the terms in your argument, you change its meaning–you are not just “clarifying” it.
But like I said, you seem to have dropped your original argument (or, if you prefer, “clarified” it out of existence), which means I accomplished my goal.
May 27th, 2009 at 2:03 pm
… by virtue of actually knowing something about that type of case, yes.
In what kind of case would a latina woman make a better decision than a white male by virtue of her being a latina woman?
That said, I certainly think this is a legitimate topic for her confirmation hearings. Of course, I don’t think it is plausible she meant there should nine Latina women on the Court instead of nine white men, but I would be interested to hear her elaborate on how she would propose to incorporate these notions on a systematic basis.
I agree with that.
May 27th, 2009 at 2:04 pm
Let me put it this way, to understand Sotomayor’s comment, you must accept that she is speaking within the context of a system of political and judicial power that is and always been subject to the influence of bigotry. It’s fine to find the bigotry inherent within her selectively chosen pull-quote, but to ignore the context that made 98 out of 100 prior justices White, and the same proportion male, (which is that of overwhelming bigotry against non-whites and women prevailed and prevails today, if less strongly) is simply argue that the cut on your toe is the only wound in the history of mankind that matters.
May 27th, 2009 at 2:12 pm
Oops. I’ll read closer next time.
May 27th, 2009 at 2:12 pm
Listen, DTM, I have already stated several times that I don’t oppose her nomination. My guess is that she will suck, but no more so than the other eight, and it is just about impossible that a President of the United States would nominate someone who the President thinks would not seek to promote that President’s ideology, to the detriment of applying legal principles in an objective fashion.
She made a bigoted statment, and I, perhaps in a inflammatory fashion, then said she was a bigot. Well, among the human race, being a bigot is not in the least unusual, and may even be the default condition. It is indicative of the hysteria surrounding the topic that saying a person is a bigot is looked upon as the near equivalent of calling someone a Nazi or a Stalinist. She is fine for the Court, her warts likely being no worse than the vast majority of Supreme Court nominees.
May 27th, 2009 at 2:14 pm
Will, you’ve turned into a parody of yourself.
No, not similar at all. Perish the thought.
And still with the whimpering about lying every time someone disputes your argument.
May 27th, 2009 at 2:20 pm
It is indicative of the hysteria surrounding the topic that saying a person is a bigot is looked upon as the near equivalent of calling someone a Nazi or a Stalinist.
Talk about hysteria! I never said you were calling her a Nazi or Stalinist–I have just argued that you were clearly wrong in the way you were originally characterizing her argument. But I have also made it clear that I see no threat in what you are doing, because as I keep saying, by doing so you are just removing yourself from the real conversation on these issues.
May 27th, 2009 at 2:22 pm
Yes, rty, and people like you convince me of the pathetic ideological blinkers so often employ. In this thread alone, all manner of ad hominem insults have been directed at me. My insults have mostly been restricted to noting that people have written falsehoods. You state that it is I who have indulged in furious anger. How odd.
May 27th, 2009 at 2:43 pm
No, DTM, you have not been hysterical. However, here are some of the terms have been tossed in my direction, for stating that Sotomoyer was a bigot, because she made a bigoted statement….
torture supporter extraordinaire
fuckwit
autistic
….this is hysterical.
Joe, when you stop writing things which are not true, like saying I accused sevral people of being bigots, I will stop writing that you are a liar. Fair enough? Or is noting that you have a habit of writing things that aren’t true “whimpering”?
May 27th, 2009 at 2:51 pm
Also, Joe, to aid you with basic logic and literacy, if I had written what DTM said I wrote, that would mean, for instance, that I was asserting that children who believed in Santa Claus were bigots. I made no such assertion. It must be asked again; is it necessary that absolutely everything be explained to you in the most minute detail?
May 27th, 2009 at 2:52 pm
Will Allen:
Will Allen:
Hello, Asberger’s!
May 27th, 2009 at 2:52 pm
Also, Joe, to aid you with basic logic and literacy, if I had written what DTM said I wrote, that would mean, for instance, that I was asserting that children who believed in Santa Claus were bigots. I made no such assertion. It must be asked again; is it necessary that absolutely everything be explained to you in the most minute detail?
May 27th, 2009 at 2:54 pm
Bullsmith, as I noted above, I would not be surprised to see it confirmed that bigotry is the default human condition.
May 27th, 2009 at 2:54 pm
I wrote that to hope, without empirical basis, that one’s experiences, due to one’s gender and racial heritage, will lead to one producing better conclusions than people who do not have the experiences of that gender and racial heritage, is bigoted. The two statements are not remotely similar. Why are you lying in such a ridiculous fashion?
Speaking of ridiculous…
May 27th, 2009 at 3:10 pm
Hilarious!
Stop? Why in God’s name would I want you to stop? Beyond the hilarity of watching you tie yourself in knots, your constant whimpering and self-contradictions do a very effective job undermining your credibility, and by extension, that of your argument.
Stop? Good heavens, no!
Also hilarious.
May 27th, 2009 at 3:25 pm
Bullsmith, as I noted above, I would not be surprised to see it confirmed that bigotry is the default human condition.
Now I understand! To make a statement is, by default, to make a bigoted statement! “Bigotry” is such a useful word because it refers to all of human existence! And here I’d been narrowly thinking that a bigot was “a person obstinately or intolerantly devoted to his or her own opinions and prejudices; especially one who regards or treats the members of a group (as a racial or ethnic group) with hatred and intolerance“. Silly me! Now I understand that Sotomayor, being a person, is clearly a bigot. No obstinate intolerance required! What an incredibly useful insight!
Here’s hoping Will Allen can help me figure out what the meaning of “is” is! This “meaning of words” stuff is so hard!
May 27th, 2009 at 3:25 pm
Also, Joe, to aid you with basic logic and literacy, if I had written what DTM said I wrote, that would mean, for instance, that I was asserting that children who believed in Santa Claus were bigots. I made no such assertion. It must be asked again; is it necessary that absolutely everything be explained to you in the most minute detail?
What you are referring to here is basically what philosophers call “the principle of charity”, or sometimes “the principle of rational accommodation”, the idea being you should interpret the arguments of others to be as rational and otherwise strong as possible (not that you have to agree entirely, but to the extent possible you should try to interpret people as saying as much that is true or at least interesting as possible). You can argue for this principle on the basis of ethics, but also you can argue that it tends to be a good interpretative guide, thereby helping people avoid pointless disputes about the meaning of prior statements.
Now I wonder if we can find another argument at hand to which we could apply this principle . . .
May 27th, 2009 at 3:27 pm
Tell me, rty, as just an example, why is my use of the term “dimwit” and “stupid” directed at Matthew, after Matthew used the terms “dimwitted” and “inane” to describe people he disagreed with, evidence of me having Asperger’s, and not of Matthew being similarly afflicted?
Thanks for proving my point, you poor, ‘ol, mentally ill person, you.
May 27th, 2009 at 3:40 pm
Well, let me see, DTM…..the incidence of people who think that it can be logically concluded that children who believe in Santa Claus are bigots may be, oh, I dunno, say, 7 out of a 1000, if we were to make the overestimation of saying every person afflicted with schizophrenia has that belief. In contrast, race or sex-based bigotry may be possessed by a majority of the population at some point in their life.
Yeah, the situations are really similar.
May 27th, 2009 at 3:45 pm
Tell me, rty, as just an example, why is my use of the term “dimwit” and “stupid” directed at Matthew, after Matthew used the terms “dimwitted” and “inane” to describe people he disagreed with, evidence of me having Asperger’s, and not of Matthew being similarly afflicted?
I’m not rty, but if you’re genuinely interested you may want to refer to the first quote in comment 83.
This recurring tendency to fixate on single quotes coupled with the inability to follow the larger argument is starting to become troubling. Has your condition gotten worse over time, or have you always been this stupid?
May 27th, 2009 at 3:52 pm
Joe, do you really know a lot of people who state as a matter of Faith that their gender and racial heritage gives them experiences which will allow them to provide better conclusions than people who don’t have those experiences?
May 27th, 2009 at 3:56 pm
Careful, Barbar, rty might seek to have you committed!
May 27th, 2009 at 3:57 pm
Man this is just Will-ful stupidity.
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
Who said this, Will Allen? What does it mean?
May 27th, 2009 at 3:59 pm
While it’s true it’s tempting to laugh at Will Allen or call him stupid, in all seriousness I don’t think it’s appropriate. He does genuinely show many of the classic signs of Asberger’s — a “recurring tendency to fixate on single quotes coupled with the inability to follow the larger argument” is quite common — and people with it often do suffer a great deal from their difficulty adjusting to regular society.
May 27th, 2009 at 3:59 pm
Uh, no, Bullsmith, to say that bigotry may be the default human condition is not to say that all statements made by humans are bigoted, Let me know if I can help you with anything else.
May 27th, 2009 at 4:03 pm
Yeah, the situations are really similar.
You really think it matters whether there is a 10% chance, instead of a 1/10% chance, that your interpretation is correct? Either way, you are still far more likely than not obstructing, rather than advancing, the discussion.
By the way, it is true that one can tend to prove a lot of absurd things if one excepts a logical fallacy as true. But that doesn’t actually demonstrate that is unlikely a logical fallacy has been written. Rather, the writer could simply have been careless, and not thought through the absurd implications of what they were writing.
So that is the actual hypothesis that you have to deal with: not that you were knowingly being absurd, but just that you were being careless, and that you stopped being careless only when I pointed out the absurdity of what you had written. I’ll be polite and not suggest what I think the odds are of that.
May 27th, 2009 at 4:08 pm
It means a lot of different things, Barbar. It does not mean, however, that a person who clings to the irrational hope that her experiences due to her sex and race will render her conclusions superior to those who don’t have those experiences, due to their differing sex and race, is not bigoted.
May 27th, 2009 at 4:10 pm
I would hope that a firefighter, with the richness of his/her experiences fighting fires, would more often than not reach a better conclusion about combating a fire than a person who has never been a firefighter. I do believe that we should not be so myopic as to believe that others of different experiences or backgrounds are incapable of understanding the principles of fire extinguishing. Many are so capable. As someone once pointed out to me, fires have been put out by ordinary citizens on many occasions. However, to master firefighting skills takes time and effort, something that not all people are willing to give. Hence, one must accept the proposition that fire fighting effectiveness will be enhanced by the presence of firefighters when extinguishing fires.
Clearly I am a bigot. You can see my obstinate intolerance of non-firefighter lifestyles right there.
Will Allen’s position must be taken seriously!
May 27th, 2009 at 4:19 pm
Will Allen:
People with Asberger’s are rarely committed, nor should they be. They can often function well, particularly with various therapies.
It’s not anything to be ashamed of. But it is a very real and serious condition. People familiar with Will Allen’s behavior can judge for themselves how congruent these symptoms are with it:
May 27th, 2009 at 4:27 pm
Yes, DTM, when condition A is 100 times more likely to be true than condition B, it is reasonable to have differing estimations as to the likelihood of the conditions. In any case, you have understated the odds of the more likely condition.
May 27th, 2009 at 4:35 pm
Yes, DTM, when condition A is 100 times more likely to be true than condition B, it is reasonable to have differing estimations as to the likelihood of the conditions.
But not to conclude condition B is true, if the odds are still only 10%. Which, as you recall, was the point: your various interpretations of Sotomayor’s statement have never approached being more likely than not.
In any case, you have understated the odds of the more likely condition.
Actually, I probably overstated it. Even in isolation, and even considering just your latest interpretation, the odds are clearly less than 50%. But when you put the statement in context, I’d say the odds drop to negligible.
But on some level, I think you know that. You just cannot admit you were wrong at the beginning.
May 27th, 2009 at 4:37 pm
Yeah, rty, it is a shame that Matthew is so lacking in social skills that he uses terms like “dim-witted” and “inane” when discussing others’ views. Hello Asperger’s!
What do you call the disorder involved in attributing mental illness to those one disagrees with, when they mirror the social skills of those one agrees with? Seek help, rty!
May 27th, 2009 at 4:41 pm
DTM, there is considerable evidence to suggest that far more than 10% of the population engages in bigotry.
May 27th, 2009 at 4:44 pm
Wow, you completely mixed up National Review and National Journal.
I dunno. All those white conservative magazines look the same to me…
May 27th, 2009 at 4:45 pm
Dmonteith, you appear to be ignorant of what it means to have empirical evidence that condition A makes outcome B more likely. Either that, or you are a really, really, really crappy firefighter.
May 27th, 2009 at 4:57 pm
[...] of her supposed racism, Gingrich posted an out-of-context quote from a lecture that Sotomayor gave in 2001 on diversity. Gingrich wrote,
May 27th, 2009 at 5:01 pm
People familiar with Will Allen’s behavior can judge for themselves how congruent these symptoms are with it:
FWIW, I think you are being pretty insulting to people with Asperger’s by calling Will one. It’s more complicated than just being trollish.
May 27th, 2009 at 5:11 pm
Really — Yglesias has repeatedly demonstrated extreme intellectual rigidity, the inability to understand life as it’s actually lived by humans, and instant recourse to furious anger at any frustration, leading him to do little but call others dishonest stupid dimwitted insecure intellectually dishonest pathetic hysterical hacks, and then state “My insults have mostly been restricted to noting that people have written falsehoods”?
Or has he just used the terms “dim-witted” and “inane”?
Because it’s the former that suggests Asberger’s, not the latter. However, confusing the two different things in this way is itself quite suggestive of Asberger’s.
May 27th, 2009 at 5:23 pm
I think you are being pretty insulting to people with Asperger’s by calling Will one. It’s more complicated than just being trollish.
I don’t think he’s just being trollish. Indeed, I wouldn’t really call him trollish at all. He’s a different type.
I’m also trying — though perhaps not completely succeeding — not to insult him. I wouldn’t insult people with Asberger’s, because there’s someone in my family with it. That’s why I’m familiar with how it presents itself.
May 27th, 2009 at 5:29 pm
Actually, RTY Yglesias frequently calls people he differs with that and worse, demonstrating extremely poor social skills, extreme intellectual rigidity, the inability to understand life as it’s actually lived by humans, and instant recourse to furious anger at any frustration. You seem to be afflicted with a mental illness which prevents you from recognizing this, and lending you the delusion as being able to detect relative anger levels in this forum. You may be schizophrenic.
May 27th, 2009 at 5:42 pm
Uh huh. Tell me — does the rest of society look at things like this, are is it just you?
May 27th, 2009 at 5:50 pm
Dmonteith, you appear to be ignorant of what it means to have empirical evidence that condition A makes outcome B more likely.
I’m sorry! I didn’t realize that you had made a compelling case (complete with empirical evidence, natch!) that having relevant experience (condition A) makes better decision making (condition B) less likely! It’s sooo counter-intuitive, you big brained brainiac you! I’m sorry to have missed your bedazzling display of ratiocination the first time around, so how ’bout you lay it on silly ol’ ignorant me so that I can be properly chastened?
May 27th, 2009 at 6:22 pm
rty, you may lack the requisite skills for understanding life as humans actually live it to understand that I am not serious.
May 27th, 2009 at 6:23 pm
Eventually, Will Allen might engage with the idea that SCOTUS is simultaneously an institutional authority and a check on institutional authority. Or address Adam Serwar’s contention that Plessey or Dred Scott would never have been upheld by black justices who brought their experience of slavery to the bench. Perhaps.
Eventually, he might want to read a bit about hermeneutics. Perhaps.
May 27th, 2009 at 6:26 pm
Dmonteith, I never supplied such evidence because I never made that claim. People normally do not supply evidence for claims that they have not made. Happy to help you through these issues.
May 27th, 2009 at 6:38 pm
Yes, people with Asberger’s often stumble when attempting to be funny. It requires a sensitivity to the shadings of human emotion that they have a hard time grasping.
May 27th, 2009 at 6:48 pm
Actually, pseudo, I wrote in previous threads, and perhaps this one as well (I’m too lazy to check), that it is possible that a person with a particular racial background will gain experiences from that background that will lead to them to a better conclusion, in a particular case, than a person lacking such experiences. I also said, accurately, that there is no reason to hope that this will more often than not happen. Again, experiences relating to race can be helpful, harmful, or neutral to the task of being a judge who applies the law in a legally principled way, and there is no way to accurately predict how this dynamic will play out in future cases. That isn’t the same thing as saying that one cannot look back at particular cases in the past and say a court likely would have benefitted from a justice with a particular racial backgorund.
May 27th, 2009 at 6:49 pm
Ah, rty finally explains Jay Leno!
(oops, I did it gain! Damned aspergers!)
May 27th, 2009 at 7:41 pm
What you don’t understand, Dmonteith, is that having experience putting out fires might make lead them to have a better understanding of how to put out fires, but it might also be neutral, or even harmful. Why, having experience putting out fires is just as likely to cause a firefighter to make the fire worse. Did I mention that this is accurate?
You, sir, are a bigot.
May 27th, 2009 at 8:07 pm
joe apparently is also unaware of the difference between being able to observe and measure the physical actions of a human being, over and over and over again, after requisite training and a career in firefighting, and being unable to measure the mental processes, filtered through a lifetime of experiences, of a human being in an extremely limited number of examples.
Would you feel better if you said again that I called a lot of people bigots, joe?
May 27th, 2009 at 8:21 pm
By the way, for a discussion of Sotomoyor’s remarks in which the belief that her comments were wrong, if not, as I stated in an admittedly inflammatory way, bigoted, does not result in attributions of autism, torture support, being a fuckwit, etc., etc., check out the noted white supremecist Coates’ blog….
http://ta-nehisicoates.theatlantic.com/archives/2009/05/about_that_wise_latina_statement.php
May 27th, 2009 at 9:29 pm
Interesting. Does Coates describe everyone else as dishonest stupid dimwitted insecure intellectually dishonest pathetic hysterical hacks, and also have a bizarre fixation with Social Security and obsessively attack people who are concerned when the U.S. tortures foreigners?
May 27th, 2009 at 10:04 pm
No, rty, on this topic, Coates does not, unlike Matthew, start with an assertion that those who disagree with him are dimwitted and inane. Not surprisingly, no person then chooses to mirror his tone by calling him dimsitted and stupid. No one on the thread accuses another person of being a “troll”, so there is no response which accurately notes that the attribution of troll is reliably employed by dishonest hacks. No pereson in that thread plainly misstates what the meaning of a sentence is, so that sort of dishoneasty does not get noted. Finally there aren’t any passive/agressive whack-jobs in that thread who state that those who disagree with the whack job are autistic, and cite as proof the mirroring of the host’s tone, while saying that they only are expressing concern for the alledgedly autistic.
Finally, no, there are no persons on the thread who lie about other person’s position on torture, and express an obsession pertaining to some other person’s alledged obsession with social security. The threads are quite different.
May 27th, 2009 at 10:15 pm
I don’t think it would be possible for me to feel better than I do right now, knowing how deeply committed you wankers are to pursuing this line of attack on Sotomayor.
It’s 2009. Barack Obama was just elected president. And the Republican blast faxes are pushing white backlash politics.
Life is good.
May 27th, 2009 at 10:29 pm
joe, I’ve been killing time while fielding phone calls today. If this is the stuff that can make you feel as good as you can possibly feel, youy really do need to get out more. I don’t oppose Sotomayor’s appointment. You live in some sort of a world in which to note that someone said something objectionable is to be opposed to that person. That is weird, as is having one’s view of life in any way dependent on who is President.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:04 pm
Wow.
The GOP and their much ado about what should be nothing.
“Thanks” GOP …
Clinically – a reasonable interpretation of the speech would point to a simple comparison of a “wise” Latina vs. a simply average white male. To me, the “simply average” is very much implied by the absence of “wise” before the “white male” example used in the speech.
Second, it could reasonably be interpreted as a comparison between a person ( in this case Latina ) who has lived a life rich with “experiences” ( which could include a variety of “mainstream” or so-called traditionally “white” experiences – in addition to “ethnic,” “multicultural” and international experiences ) vs. a person ( in this case a white male ) who has led a life that would be described as sheltered or “provincial.” She used the word “myopic.”
In discussing the other justices, the point being made was even a person generally regarded as ‘wise’ could benefit from meeting another ‘wise’ person with a different background / perspective. The two could become incrementally wiser through their interaction compared to vying for incremental wisdom in relative isolation.
Re: Justice Holmes – he is reported to strongly believe that the court look at the facts in a changing society, instead of clinging to worn-out slogans and formulas.
Given this – one would think that, between the years of 1902 and 1932, a wise African American, a wise Woman and a wise Immigrant would have had many valuable insights to contribute re: the “changing society” of the United States during this time …
May 28th, 2009 at 2:30 am
Dmonteith, I never supplied such evidence because I never made that claim.
So, you absolutely don’t think condition A makes condition B less likely and you think that people who think A makes B more likely are not just wrong but are bigots?
You really aren’t making much sense. Are you really into militant neutrality on the question of relevant experience and decision making, or have you simply lost track of what your arguments are? Maybe you’re just a big fan of randomly calling people bigots? Fill me in.
People normally do not supply evidence for claims that they have not made.
And this is why Sotomayor presents no empirical evidence for her hope (note: hope≠claim) that condition A makes condition B more likely. But if it’s good enough for you to deliberately misconstrue Sotomayor’s statements, it’s good enough for me to return the favor, right? Glass houses, rocks, etc. See also: heat intolerance, kitchens, etc.
May 28th, 2009 at 9:41 am
Yes, DMonteith, I think people are being bigoted when they believe or hope that the outcome, of having experiences related to their particular sex and racial heritage, will be that their conclusions will more often than not be superior, to those without the experiences of that sex and racial heritage, unless they have substantial empirical proof that lends to such hope or belief. Bigots tend to have evidence-free hopes that their racial heritage, or some other innate quality, will lead to the bigot producing superior results than peole without that innate quality. This is how Northeastern WASP bigots traditionally have come to hope that their “better breeding” will result in their doing things in a superior fashion to that of some Appalachian hick who manages to get to the Ivy League.
I don’t make sense to you because you aren’t especially bright, or because you are determined to look at evidence in the manner that is most favorable to someone you feel political affiliation with.
May 28th, 2009 at 10:55 am
[...] President Obama’s nominee to the Supreme Court: claiming that Judge Sotomayor is a racist. Conservative columnist Stuart Taylor accused Judge Sotomayor of claiming that “white males . . . are inferior to all other groups in [...]
May 28th, 2009 at 11:39 am
Bigots tend to have evidence-free hopes that their racial heritage, or some other innate quality, will lead to the bigot producing superior results than peole without that innate quality.
Ummm…no. Bigots tend to have those beliefs (and once again, note that hopes≠beliefs–try to utilize your finely tuned sense of umbrage when others read more than is justified into your words here) despite evidence that unequivocally contradicts their position. The word “obstinate” is right in the definition I linked to upthread. If you’re going to toss the word “bigot” around, then the burden of proof here lies on you to conclusively show that relevant life experience does not ever lead to better decisions and further, to show that countervailing evidence that it does sometimes help is invalid.
If you insist on using the term “bigot” without even putting forward a case along these lines then you might just as well call her a “fascist” or a “poopyhead” or a “pumpkin”. If you choose this route, I promise not to ask you to prove that her head actually is poopy.
May 28th, 2009 at 12:09 pm
Uh, no, bigots have those hopes, without any proof that it is the case, because their sense of self worth depends on people who cannot have their innate qualities, or the experiences derived from those innate qualities, more often than not producing inferior outcomes, compared to the bigot. This is also why Sotomayor puts forth the inane notion that the category “white” means anything, when it comprises dozens and dozens of millions of people, from somebody who grew up in a trailer in Appalachia, to a member of the Bush family.
Look, I know you are going to obstinantely cling to your position that people who cling to the hope, without evidence, that their sex and racial heritage will lead to them more often than not producing better outcomes, than people who don’t share their sex and racial heritage, aren’t engaged in bigotry. You may as well say start saying, over and over, “Judge Sotomayor is the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful human being I’ve ever known in my life.” Maybe play some solitaire, too.
May 28th, 2009 at 1:12 pm
Merriam-Webster:
bigot: a person obstinately or intolerantly devoted to his or her own opinions and prejudices; especially one who regards or treats the members of a group (as a racial or ethnic group) with hatred and intolerance.
Wikipedia:
A bigot is a person who is intolerant of or takes offense to the opinions, lifestyles or identities differing from his or her own…
Please demonstrate how someone who states the bolded parts of the quote at comment #3 meets these definitions of the word bigot. Simple as that. No points for showing how they meet your private definition of “bigot”: the goal is to communicate in English.
Extra credit: Demonstrate how the fact that “Until 1972, no Supreme Court case ever upheld the claim of a woman in a gender discrimination case” does not qualify as empirical evidence that lack of relevant experience leads to worse outcomes.
May 28th, 2009 at 1:55 pm
From the American Heritage Dictionary…
Bigot: One who is strongly partial to one’s own group, religion, race, or politics and is intolerant of those who differ.
Now, if you want to argue that having the hope, absent any evidence, that one’s sex group and race will provide experiences that will produce conclusions that are more often than not superior to those of people who are not of that sex group or race, does not mean that one is strongly partial to one’s own sex group or to one’s race, well, golly, you just go right ahead. If you want to argue that having the hope, absent any evidence, that the people who are not in your sex group or of your race will more often than not produce inferior conclusions, compared to your conclusions, is not a form of intolerance, well, gee whiz, you just go right ahead.
Your extra credit question has exactly nothing to do with Sotamayor’s comments. She did not say “There are cases where a Court being comprised of people of extremely similar backgrounds might provide an inferior decision by said Court”.
May 28th, 2009 at 2:16 pm
Extra credit: Demonstrate how the fact that “Until 1972, no Supreme Court case ever upheld the claim of a woman in a gender discrimination case” does not qualify as empirical evidence that lack of relevant experience leads to worse outcomes.
I don’t know the history of gender discrimination cases well enough to answer. What pre-1972 gender discrimination cases do you consider to be wrongly decided? One of the primary gender discrimination laws, the the Civil Rights Act, wasn’t passed until 1964. Also, the first female Justice didn’t come along until 1981, so it appears that the Court changed on its own. Further, the presence of minorities on the Court doesn’t mean the Court won’t make bad decisions on minority rights. Bowers v. Hardwick was decided in 1986, with two minority justices. My point is that I’m not sure that you can conclude that the racial/sex makeup of the Court is a primary consideration in how the Court rules on discrimination cases.
May 28th, 2009 at 2:30 pm
Andy, your post raises the issue, which I did not address, since the question has nothing to do with Sotamayer’s remarks, of how pitifully low the bar is frequently placed in the area of what it means to have non-trivial empirical proof. People commonly use ridiculously tiny sample sizes, when engaging in political debate, to “prove” that their beliefs are true. In the subset of political debates pertaining to economics, it is even more true, even when the participants to the debate are Nobel Laureates. If it didn’t often entail very serious matters, the habit woud be laughably silly.
Go to a tavern, and start a discussion with the guy at the end of the bar about baseball. and one is more likely to hear assertions based in empirically sound observation.
May 28th, 2009 at 4:17 pm
[...] http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org/archives/2009/05/stuart-taylor-slams-sotomayor.php [...]
May 28th, 2009 at 4:40 pm
Bigot: One who is strongly partial to one’s own group, religion, race, or politics and is intolerant of those who differ.
Fail. Nothing you’ve said addresses how the part in bold applies to Sotomayor. Bigot, pumpkin, whatever.
May 28th, 2009 at 8:50 pm
Like I said DMonteith, if you want to argue that having the hope, absent any evidence, that the people who are not in your sex group or of your race will more often than not produce inferior conclusions, compared to your conclusions, is not a form of intolerance, well, gee whiz, you just go right ahead.