Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia recently stated in an interview something to the effect that the US Constitution does not protect women from discrimination. That's not a direct quote, but that's the jist of what was said. If you don't believe me, look it up.
This sent an uproar through the media, the government, and many of my friends. I am fortunate to be surrounded by mostly well-educated and/or highly intelligent women. And having been raised by a working mother, female equality as a concept is ingrained in my belief system, so much so that it bleeds through my automated behaviors and thoughts. I've never known it any other way.
So imagine my shock when I realized that this guy is...right. Wait...really? Yes, as a matter of fact, he is. He may be crazy, irrational, and a little scary, but I can't add the above quote-summary to my already too-long-list of reasons to believe such.
Exploring the "why" behind this realization began the internal debate on the great contradiction that is equality.
Let's start (and end) at the Preamble to what is possibly the most eloquent summation of the human condition, and the very nature of freedom, that has ever existed. A document that forever changed the world and the course of human events: The Declaration of Independence. I'm not a lawyer, so I'll keep this short(ish). I only want to discuss one line. The second sentence, to be exact. This one, right here, yeah...that one...the one in quotation marks: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."
That's heavy. Jefferson was good at heavy. He was also good to his slaves.
Now calm down. Wait just a darn-tooting minute and let me explain. I'm not going to attack Jefferson. I see no call for that. Difficult times, difficult culture, difficult situation, and on and on and on. And on. We've heard it all before. Just for the record, I'm damn glad he existed. Now let's go back to exploring that sentence.
All I want to point out is that sentence - #2 in the D of I - the one up there in quotes...see it? Yeah, that one. It's not true. Yes. I'm serious. It is. Is too. Is too. Is too times 10. Not only do I believe it's a lie, I can prove my heretical claim. With one word. One word is all I need. Ready? Here it comes...
Glasses.
What? Really? Glasses? That's your big proof, Mr. Thoughts on Thoughts?
Yes. Yes it is. I wear glasses. Have since the age of 9. I was not created equal to a person my same age, race, and gender who has 20/20 vision. Now that little voice in your head, the one that's trying to codify this...tell it to shut up for just one second. I may be smarter than that perfect-eyed bastard. Maybe I grew up in a more loving home. Maybe I'm faster, or thinner, or funnier. That's what that little voice in your head said, right? Those traits where I may be superior, they make me equal, right?
Wrong. Think it over. That concept is flawed. Why? Because at the core of the word, what smarter people would call the 'denotation', equal means 'the same'. Feel free to fact check me: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/equal .
Mr. I-can-read-that-street-sign-over-there and I are not, by definition, equal. And I get to carry around a visible handicap everywhere I go, just to prove it. What handicap is that, you may ask? Glasses. Remember? Where have you been this whole time? You see, reader, everyone that meets me, everyone that passes me in the street, everyone that sees me knows that I am not equal. Without these crutches, I mean...glasses, I couldn't get a job, operate a motor vehicle, I couldn't have been successful in school as a child!
Therefore, I am not equal. Therefore a vagina and a penis are not equal. They are not equal because they are not the same. They may be equal on some philosophical level, but out here, in the real world, they are not. One is no better than the other (though preference does depend on sexual orientation), but that doesn't make them equal. It makes them similar, symbiotic, even complementary, but equal they are not.
Then why do we fight so hard for equality when we are not equal, Mr. ToTs? Why do we have to fight for equality if we are equal? Ahh...there it is...we fight for equality because we are not equal. And we know it. So to make up for this, we ask people to discriminate on our behalf. See, herein lies that contradiction that disqualifies equality as an actionable possibility. Ready for it? I think you are. Wheelchair ramps are an open admittance that those robbed of the gift to walk are not equal. They are not equally able to walk up stairs, so we discriminate on their behalf by forcing contractors to build every space in our society so that it is accessible to the ambulatorilly-challenged. Don't spell check that word, I made it up. But do you get where I'm going? Picking up what I'm putting down? Good.
We force companies to interview candidates for employment based on race and gender, rather than ability and qualifications. Even NFL teams have to interview at least one African-American candidate before they can fill a head coaching job. Someone just wasted a few thousand dollars flying first-class to Dallas so that Jerry Jones could give the job to the coach he already had. That's what I call progress.
Now you can go about your internal monologuing regarding EEOE, Affirmative Action, etc, later. Just let me say a few more things, then we'll close this up.
I have met perhaps a dozen people in my life that have equal skin color to mine. I have an olivey-brownish-pale perma-tan thing going on. The result of 16 different ethnicities running through my DNA strands. The typical American mutt. Those 16 ethnicities are almost all simple variances on white. I am fortunate to be white. I admit that. I also admit that its ridiculous that this statement is true, and socially acceptable. One thing we've never come to terms with, as a human race, is that the three non-equalities that really don't matter - the ones that don't actually impact shit about how we can interact with one another, perform our duties to our communities, and further the cause of our humanity - gender, sexual preference, and skin color - are the three things that we have historically focused on the most. Sounds pretty stupid, doesn't it? Well that's because it is. Ask residents of Hiroshima if they think it was smart for Hitler to expel Jewish scientists to America in the late 1930's...
The Constitution does not provide protection against discrimination for women. He's right. But when that document was written, women were property. I hope we've moved far enough beyond that, philosophically, culturally, and emotionally, for it not to matter. If we don't discriminate for or against the things that don't actually matter, we'll all be happier. Regardless of what any document says. We'll all be a little closer to that elusive adjective.
But let's continue to discriminate when it matters. Handicap-accessible is a damn good discrimination. So is forcing me to wear glasses to drive. Why? The fact that Joe Wheelchair can't walk affects his abilities for real, and will do so every day of his life. If I drive without glasses, people die. So let's be good neighbors and discriminate in a way that forces us all to help each other out. It still won't be equal, but it will be a much nicer world. But telling someone they can't do a job because they have a vagina is just as dumb as assuming someone can do a job just because they have a penis.
Not equal, not separate, and not pretending that we are. We're stuck on this rock here on the edge of this galaxy that's on the edge of the known universe. Can we at least do our best to make it fun for everyone, regardless of how equal they are?
Thanks for reading. Agree or disagree, I hope it made you think.
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