Wait, a post that's written words? That can still happen?
So, in case you've been living under a rock, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia died last week of a heart attack. In case you've been living under several hundred feet of rocks, deep within the earth's crust and sheltered from the goings-on of the surface world, Scalia was one of the five conservative judges on the bench, and the most outspoken about his views.
He was a racist, homophobic, misogynistic, hypocritical piece of shit, who took a disgusting amount of satisfaction from pressing the boot of the state harder on the necks of those most in need, and took his defeats with the maturity of a toddler who'd dropped an ice cream cone. While I'm sorry for his family and friends, the world is a measurably better place with his passing for several reasons, not the least of which being the possibility of a new Supreme Court that isn't dead-set on returning the country to the 1800s. Senate Republicans have already vowed to block anyone President Obama appoints. Some might view this as outrageous, unconstitutional, and a new low in partisan obstructionism, but in a certain light, it represents improvement. If we assume that the eleven months of Obama's term don't count, the Republicans are suggesting that the president deserves about 4/5ths the power and worth of his white predecessors, which is a big improvement from the 3/5ths you might expect from such staunch constitutional originalists.
If I seem a little salty, it's because I am. Just all the time. My doctor is very worried about me. But it's probably because, compared to most pieces about Scalia, mine seems especially bitter. Right now, most pieces concerning Scalia engage in the typical procedure for the recently dead: he had cool people for friends and interesting hobbies, he was a man of principle, he did good things every once in a while. There were similar pieces written when Margaret Thatcher passed away, and similar exclamations that it's important to have respect for the dead, to put politics aside.
I feel the same way now as I did then: to ignore the actions and views of public figures after their death is not only cowardly, but dangerous. When Ronald Reagan died, the media didn't talk about how he encouraged racism and contempt to promote his regressive economic policies. They didn't talk about how he illegally sold weapons to an enemy of the United States, and funneled the profits towards death squads in Nicaragua. They didn't talk about his administration's utter callousness towards the AIDS crisis sweeping through the gay community. They didn't talk about how his militaristic foreign policy actually caused many of the problems we're dealing with now. Instead, they mourned his loss, recalled his charming, grandfatherly demeanor, and admired his tragic struggle with Alzheimer's. Now, Reagan is a broadly admired figure, and his ideology and actions have never faced the broad scrutiny that they deserve.
It would be a terrible mistake to let this happen again. Antonin Scalia was not a hero. He was a bully, who relished the suffering of the poor and downtrodden with an almost cartoonish glee. He was not an Originalist. He was a Conservative, who cited originalism when it suited his political agenda but was more than willing to destroy legal precedent if it didn't. He was a disgrace to the court whose eloquence utterly failed to mask his repugnance and cruelty, and I refuse to let his odious devotion to bigotry die with him.
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