Tagged: white

“They manipulate our history books. The history books are not true, it’s a lie. The history books are lying, you need to know that. You must know that.” — Michael Jackson

“Today, the Supreme Court continued that tradition in a pair of five-to-four decisions narrowly construing the scope of Title VII’s retaliation and employer liability rules. In University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center v. Nassar, the Court strictly interpreted a statute that Congress enacted to overrule a prior Supreme Court decision, holding retaliation claims to a stricter standard of proof than other forms of discrimination claims. In Vance v. Ball State University, the same majority narrowly defined who counts as a “supervisor” whose discrimination is automatically attributed to an employer. Justice Ginsburg, writing for the Court’s four more liberal Justices, invoked the history of congressional overruling of the Court’s employment discrimination decisions to call upon Congress to once again reverse both decisions issued today.”

There goes that word (“narrowed”) again! Smh! I’m curious to know since 2000, how many employment discrimination and civil rights cases has the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the employee? Given that majority of the justices on the Supreme Court were appointed by Republican Presidents, this  5-4 outcome in favor of employers and corporations will continue to persist in employment discrimination and civil rights related cases until the ideological makeup of the court changes. No matter what the Civil Rights Act of 1964 states or what one argues, the majority white justices always find a way to narrowly apply the statute to the facts of the case —  to the point that over time, the case law becomes ineffective in combating more institutional, systemic and insidious forms of racism and discrimination in the workplace. This is not accidental. Ultimately, the SCOTUS’s decisions in these cases are predetermined due to their overall ignorance and hostility to the civil rights laws of this country. How can this problem be corrected?

Source: Kevin Russell. Court Rules For Employers in Two Employment Discrimination Cases. June 24, 2013. http://www.scotusblog.com/2013/06/court-rules-for-employers-in-two-employment-discrimination-cases/.

“True to the key tenets of the conservative judicial agenda, these judges tend to construe laws as narrowly as possible…”

Source: Neil A. Lewis. “The 1992 Campaign; Selection of Conservative Judges Insures a President’s Legacy.” New York Times. July 1, 1992.  http://www.nytimes.com/1992/07/01/us/the-1992-campaign-selection-of-conservative-judges-insures-a-president-s-legacy.html.

Jane Elliot discusses racism on Oprah (1992)