I’ve been seeing so many articles praising Scalia, now that he’s dead. He was a consistent jurist; he was enthusiastic and lively; he was best friends with Ruth Bader Ginsburg; he was steadfast and sincere in his beliefs.
I don’t give a fuck.
For me, this is what defines Scalia: his dissenting opinion in Edwards v. Aguillard. The man was a confident ignoramus.
The body of scientific evidence supporting creation science is as strong as that supporting evolution. In fact, it may be stronger…. The evidence for evolution is far less compelling than we have been led to believe. Evolution is not a scientific “fact,” since it cannot actually be observed in a laboratory. Rather, evolution is merely a scientific theory or “guess.”… It is a very bad guess at that. The scientific problems with evolution are so serious that it could accurately be termed a “myth.”
The core of his argument was that the creationists said they were teaching the scientific evidence
, and gosh, they sure seem sincere when they insist there is no religious purpose to teaching that the world was created in 6 days and there was a big flood and a boat, so who am I to question them? His originalism and insistence on a strict literal interpretation of what was said was a disingenuous sham that he hypocritically adopted whenever he saw a conclusion he wanted to reach for.
It’s also ironic that he was an affirmative action hire. Maybe he should have been appointed to a lesser court, except that I don’t believe any court in our country would be well-served by a racist dumbass.
What a scholar and serious thinker!
Um….
“Rather, the Sahara is merely a desert or ‘sand pit.'”
Anyway, a certain games-based ragegasm that is still rolling on for some increasingly absurd reason is apparently quite pleased with him – it turns out he was wildly in favour of games… because he didn’t agree with restricting companies’ ability to create violent media or something like that. I’m not quite sure how one follows from the other, although I have to admit that I haven’t currently looked up the exact details of what he said, so maybe there’s something in there about how gaming makes your teeth whiter and your personality brighter?
That quote is out of context. He is paraphrasing the arguments that “creation science” advocates made to the Louisiana Senate.
The offending quotation comes from a series of numbered paragraphs which are prefaced by:
He’s explicitly not endorsing those opinions. Look back a little further, and he says:
His argument is that the lawmakers sincerely believed that creation science was a legitimate science, because that is what had been presented to them by “Senator himself and from scientists and educators he presented, many of whom enjoyed academic credentials that may have been regarded as quite impressive by members of the Louisiana Legislature.” (Italics mine.)
Call his argument tendentious if you will, but he certainly did not mean what you’re accusing him of meaning.
That has to be my favourite Scalia quote. He doesn’t even try to hide the batshit crazy.
It’s pretty much this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pU17zYt6nBQ
#3: That’s my point: when convenient, he’d invoke intent and ignore evidence to support views he wanted to be true. So he recites these idiotic lies of the creationists, and then declares that because Louisiana congressvermin believed these lies, the law was OK.
Somehow, I don’t think if a murderer were on trial, and said they didn’t commit the crime, that Scalia would then give up and say that because he seemed sincere, we ought to ignore the evidence.
I agree with murwillumbah – in context it’s clear that Scalia was paraphrasing the arguments put forth by creationists, not endorsing them.
I also find the sudden love for Scalia pouring forth from liberal outlets tiresome; it’s as if they are so afraid to be seen speaking ill of the dead they’ve had their common sense glands removed. But on the basis of this opinion alone it seems pretty unfair to characterise him as a creationist or a poor thinker.
As if the beatification of Scalia wasn’t bad enough, now the conspiracy theorists are claiming he was murdered.
Jesus.
Here are these arguments. I’m not saying I believe them, I’m just going to leave them lying here. Well, I’m going to repeat them. See, I’ve just distilled down all these words to this core set of ideas, and reiterated them strongly for you. But no, no, no, I don’t really believe them, although I’m not going to say what’s wrong with them, or present any of the arguments against them. It’s just that the lawyers presenting them were so sincere and honest, and gosh they made a good case.
Here you go, a nice pile of quotes. Meanwhile, I’ll just go stand over here in the corner, whistling innocently. It’s not as if I’m expected to judge their veracity.
You realize that’s the argument you guys are making, right?
@#9, PZ:
What, you don’t like the way Scalia did his job? Well, don’t ask for any big changes for his replacement. That kind of head-in-the-clouds, idealistic revolution is totally unrealistic. What we need is a pragmatic, gradual approach. Minor changes. That’s all we can hope for, because asking for anything truly different would be too much. Baby steps.
So, for example, maybe we could get a far-right weasel who twists words in support of Mormonism. Or we could follow the transhumanist route and somehow upload Scalia’s mind into a female body — all the same prejudices, but better gender diversity! Or into a black man — even better, because it would be a smaller change, and big changes are bad and unrealistic. We need realpolitik — we must defer to the experience of establishment politicians, and there’s nobody more “establishment politician” when it comes to the Supreme Court than Scalia himself.
vicar @10
* fatal eyeroll *
I know you know the difference here in this situation. But sure, go ahead and falsely equivocate in a satirical whine about how your idealism was put in its proper context of the rate of change of political mindsets when there are no revolutions involved. I’m sure you feel better now that your snark put everyone else in their place.
I was surprised to see an overview of cases where Scalia made the right call, namely concerning privacy rights and illegal searches.
OTOH Scalia also said creationist views are scientific, opposed equal rights for same sex couples, was pro-guns and once said, in not so many words, that the US constitution doesn’t give a fuck whether a death row inmate is actually innocent… In the end, I agree his legacy as a Supreme Court justice will be very unflattering.
That said, many people have stated that for all his infuriating conservatism, Scalia was basically a good person. There are many people with whom I strongly disagree but who are good people nonetheless. I have nothing against bashing the man’s opinions, but wouldn’t mind seeing less bashing of the person.
#9: No, not remotely like any argument I’m making. I didn’t think Scalia was endorsing “creation science” at all. He never says they made a good case. He doesn’t even say that the “creation scientists” were being honest. What he does say is that they made their case in ostensibly secular terms.
The dissent you linked to is not an opinion piece about evolution versus “creation science”; it’s a legal opinion about whether a particular law violates the principle that the government can’t make laws to favour or disadvantage particular religious groups. Different questions.
Demanding that people not insult a dead person is a reasonable thing to ask, and I said nothing about Scalia for that reason. Although I wish you good luck getting the sancitmonious and self-righteous to behave the same way (re: the deaths of Kurt Vonnegut and Katherine Hepburn).
But demanding that people not factually talk about a person’s life, not talk about the person’s actions (criminal, unethical or other), not talk about their egregious views and their own words, is beyond insulting. Tim Russert was a war cheerleader, Jerry Falwell was a hateful bigot, Tony Snow was a mouthpiece for rationalizing war crimes. None of them and their actions should have been off limits, and Scalia certainly shouldn’t be either.
Oh my. “Quotes not in context.” Well, looks like Scalia is going to get the Harris treatment. Glad I’ll be going into town today. I’ll leave another Scalia quote here, though, one made last June, at a Catholic school, not a court:
Emphasis mine. I’m sure all the rational context!ers can figure it out.
Just as people always seem to know what God wants (the same things they want, doncha know), Scalia always seemed to know what the writers of the Constitution wanted–why, the same things he wanted. What a coincidence!
But Caine, don’t you see he said “at least some 5,000 years.”
When you have evidence that he supports creationism, post it.
/s
He didn’t just disagree with those people over the superstring theory, he actually harmed innumerable people. Whoever says he was “basically good” just doesn’t think about those harmed as people.
@Caine, 15
Well… that’s definitely not false information – we haven’t been around for less than 5,000 years or so. But, yeah, a rather recent lower bound.
Conservative estimates state that we’ve been here since at least lunch time.
Saad @ 17:
Ah yes, the difference between thousands and millions is so easily confused. Yep.
It’s interesting, how much people will howl over a Catholic priest, bishop, cardinal, whatever, as not being basically good, because all the harm, but are more than willing to skip right over Scalia’s being a seriously devoted Catholic, and upholding Catholic views as often as he could.
Athywren:
:snort: I suppose if someone wanted to twist enough, they could attempt to argue this didn’t imply creationist belief, however, 5,000 years is the mantra of the YEC crowd.
SO. MUCH. THIS.
Everyone who defines him as a strict Constitutional literalist seems unable to parse logical fallacies and see how Scalia consistently interpreted everything through the lens of his ideology.
Being a talented sophist doesn’t make one a deep thinker.
This liberal push to talk nicely about someone who gleefully supported sodomy laws and opposed abortion has definitely hardened my heart since I first heard he died.
The world is better off without him, and I’m glad that he died. Not as any sort of punitive, karmic retribution, but because he’s no longer around to hurt people and further systems of oppression. The odious little goblin did everything in his power to make the world a worse place, and I’m not going to celebrate or respect a life spent hurting people.
Scalia, and all his defenders (including the “don’t talk ill of the dead you meanie” liberals) can get fucked.
A Brief List of Some of the Many Terrible Things Antonin Scalia Said and Wrote
Scalia’s Death May Have Saved the Planet
Really sad that NPR did not have anyone on with a negative opinion of him. Nobody pointed out his bigotry, or the number of people he hurt. And nobody but nobody to question his “originalism”. Sad.
I.e. they said they were sincere, so they must be sincere. Because courts are unable to discern willful fraud. Even though courts do so on a routine basis.
In the Second Amendment case, Heller, Scalia was certainly wrong, and certainly justifying the conclusion that he wanted to reach. The dissent puts forth the scholarly arguments against his view. The man was a hunter – he was out shooting things on his last day – and he knew what he wanted the Second Amendment to mean.
The Supreme Court had no business getting involved in Bush v Gore, and no justification for the conclusion it reached. Scalia was deep in that, and deserves blame for everything W Bush did to this world. Scalia carried out a coup, and every fan seems to think he loved this country and followed the law.
All the praise of Scalia makes him sound like a used-car salesman. Jolly sincerity and fast talk are not what I look for in a Constitutional scholar.
And good golly. He was a Catholic – a few decades back that would have kept him from political office, but now it matters not a whit? How can people think he wasn’t pushing that religion’s viewpoint?
This reminds me of a chap I met once who claimed that his church was the only one that didn’t “interpret” the Bible… Reading is a fundamentally interpretive act – and I don’t mean that in some fine-parsing “what is the meaning of ‘is’?” kind of way, I mean that it is literally impossible to read or hear anything at all without filtering it through your own mental schema.
However, that’s not the argument I would usually employ against “constitutional originalism”, since it’s a bit post-modern for a lot of people… No, the argument I normally prefer to opt for is that it’s fucking stupid. It’s the sort of idea that you have to dress up in a lot of fancy talk and ten-dollar words in order for people not realise how obviously ridiculous it is. Times have changed, and interpretations need to change with them.
#13 You seem to be completely ignoring the paragraph following the quotation.
“The core of his argument was that the creationists said they were teaching the “scientific evidence”, and gosh, they sure seem sincere when they insist there is no religious purpose to teaching that the world was created in 6 days and there was a big flood and a boat, so who am I to question them? His originalism and insistence on a strict literal interpretation of what was said was a disingenuous sham that he hypocritically adopted whenever he saw a conclusion he wanted to reach for.”
This don’t speak ill of the dead meme is useless.
I had nothing good to say about Scalia when he was alive. Why should his death make any difference?
In fact, I don’t make a practice of cheering when someone dies. There are exceptions though. I cheered when Jerry Falwell died and smiled when I heard about Scalia.
Of course Scalia was a good man. A good man does God’s work here on earth. He was appointed to a high government position, proving that he was selected by God to do God’s work through government. This was difficult for others to see, as democracy obscures the will of the almighty, which in previous times was directly evident, as in the selection of a king through war and personal combat. Government and its courts wield the power of God, and this must be made clear to the people, who must be protected from the excesses of democracy.
Scalia clearly believed all of the above. He said so in an article defending his position on capital punishment (“God’s Justice and Ours”). The dissent that PZ posted just shows Scalia doing what he was always careful to do, protecting the people, to the best of his ability, from the tendency of such democratic and humanistic institutions as science to diminish the importance of God in human affairs. He was a good man, if you mean by that a man who identifies his own opinions so closely with those of an imagined unevolved cosmic intelligence that it is simply unthinkable to ever question them. if an uncritical acceptance of a gross misrepresentation of science helps to keep God in the public schools, then that’s all good, too.
Scalia’s dissent in Edwards was just plain cuckoo.
Since when is sincerity of belief a criterium for what is right and true? ISIS is sincere. Osama bin Laden was sincere. It is just irrelevant We don’t determine scientific theories and facts by the sincerity of scientists. We use data.
Scalia was a religious bigot, and it showed in his work. He simply could not have his or or any other True Believer’s sincere beliefs topped or diminished by secular arguments. You see this bigotry in his “ceremonial deism”, a way to bring his imaginary deity into public events. You see it in his abortion arguments, where he was unable to question RCC mythology on abortion. You see it in his opposition to gays having the same rights as straight people, and the ability to have consensual sex with anybody in the privacy of their bedroom. It shows up in the arguments that a CEO’s sincere belief trumps government employment policies.
In all these areas he wasn’t a true constitutional scholar. The constitution was second to religious fuckwittery.
I’m not glad he’s dead.
I’m glad he’s off the supreme court.
I can’t tell for sure but when he died it sounds like he was enjoying an all-expenses paid hunting junket at the Cibolo Creek lodge – which is one of those “hunting” lodges that offers oligarchs an opportunity to blast birds that are released from cages for their convenience. It’s not the same one where brave hero Dick Cheney had his quail hunting accident, but it’s the same idea: a bunch of oligarchs waddling around with guns blasting birds that are chased toward them. Kaiser Wilhelm and Hitler were into it too, as was Napoleon Bonaparte — in a funny little historical quirk, Bonaparte shot Marshal Massena’s eye out with pellet. So Cheney was merely making a historical nod to another over-important asshole who invaded too many places. Not that Hitler or the Kaiser were slouches in that department, but at least they didn’t shoot their hunting buddies.
(Cibolo Creek website)
I actively hoped he would die, and I am glad it has happened.
As for “friends and loved ones”, if I have a friend or loved one who establishes they are a vile bigot, they are no longer a “friend or loved one”. And if that “friend or loved one” was in a position to do incredible harm to others, and, for fucks sake, put the god damn world’s population at further risk – are you kidding me?
Fuck his “friends”, too.
About Justice Scalia’s “originalist” approach to the Constitution:
http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/postscript-antonin-scalia-1936-2016
There are many reasons to deplore the approach taken by Scalia to his responsibilities, but the passage PZ quoted from Edwards is not one of them. It is common, and indeed very useful, for jurists to summarize the competing evidence and legal theories advanced in a case, before or as part of the discussion of the legal principles that the jurist will apply.
Doing so is not evidence that the jurist shares the opinions he or she has just summarized, especially when, as here, he prefaces his summary with an explicit disclaimer. It may well be relevant, to an understanding of his dissent to recognize that he appeared to think that the challenge was premature because the Act had not been implemented and there was no trial on the basic issue of whether Creation Science was science or religion: merely opinions voiced in the context of argument, and not judicially tested, as happened in Dover.
It may be that his ignorant religious beliefs corresponded with the outcome, but bear in mind that he was a strong Catholic and as such might well accept the church’s position that evolution does have scientific validity (altho the church can’t bring itself to eliminate a supernatural role on some important issues). Catholic doctrine does not, as far as I am aware, accept YEC.
As for the 5,000 year comment, he may (and I am guessing) have been thinking about recorded history of humans rather than the creation of all life. Then again, he might simply have been batshit crazy. In short, we do ourselves no favours with those who do not share our views when we engage in the sort of quote-mining that we deplore in others
Daemonios @12 “I have nothing against bashing the man’s opinions, but wouldn’t mind seeing less bashing of the person.”
Could you please explain how you separate the person from that person’s opinions? Scalia held odious opinions, and was able to enshrine many of those into law, causing measurable harm to millions of people. That makes Scalia as odious as the opinions he forced upon us. I, for one, cheered when I heard of his demise, and there were enthusiastic high-fives all around among my friends. Fuck that slimy rat-bastard, and good riddance!
He was a racist homophobic bigot, and his death doesn’t change that.
Moar from Saint Scalia:
(Source is his wikipedia page)
And more: http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/OTUS/supreme-court-justice-antonin-scalias-political-outbursts/story?id=16694778
And some good reads on a terrible man:
https://newrepublic.com/article/106441/scalia-garner-reading-the-law-textual-originalism
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/08/the-twilight-of-antonin-scalia/378884/
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2014/06/scalia-v-scalia/361621/
stillacrazycanuck @38:
On the other hand, we know that he did not accept the position of the Catholic Church on the death penalty. The man was convinced that he, not the Church, spoke for God, and that he, being appointed to the court by God, had the divine right and duty to work God’s will through his court opinions. He was a thoroughgoing theocrat who believed that the expressions of his own bigotries, hatreds and ignorance were God’s will, not his, so why should he ever re-examine them or consider the plight of the mere humans whose lives he blighted.
I’ve been mentally singing “Ding Dong, the Witch is Dead” since Saturday; but that’s not fair. The Wicked Witch of the West at least took ownership of her own evil.
@Scientismist
Unless you accept the Truth of Wicked into your heart and recognise The Wizard of Oz as the blatant anti-witch propaganda that it is, in which case the worst that can be said of her is that she was an ornery SJW!
(#endwitchshaming)
He was a smug, arrogant authoritarian who had an exalted opinion of himself and his ability to think and write. Who thought his opinions were always the correct ones. He would have found a fine place for himself in service to a King. He is dead and no apologetics, no glowing eulogies are going to change that nor bring him back
uncle frogy
#38 Crazycanuck
You are misrepresenting what PZ is saying in his post. Read the paragraph after the quote and PZ’s responses in this thread.
In my mind Scalia would look in much better light if he indeed was saying these things himself. Because that would just show that he was an ignoramus scientifically. This decision does not show this but it also does not show he did not believe in YEC. There are other comments out there that show he very might well have been an adherent of YEC. You and I have no idea what he actually meant but his religious views certainly hint that he was not talking about any sort of recorded history. Scalia was always very careful and prepared with his words.
Instead of confirming he was an ignoramous scientifically this dissent shows him in even worse light. As others have shown his criteria is reaching a decision is horribly skewed. Sincerity of belief is a terrible criteria to determine anything in the legal realm. That this was his criteria shows what a flawed, vile Justice he was. Actually, using the name Justice for him would be a misnomer.
All this arguing and Penny hasn’t even commented yet…
It’s in bad taste I know. If I didn’t have bad taste I’d have none at all.
click HERE
Following up on this as well:
Daemonios @12 “I have nothing against bashing the man’s opinions, but wouldn’t mind seeing less bashing of the person.”
Yes, it’s quite easy to take this sort of high ground when the man’s opinions didn’t affect you personally. But I don’t blame people for wanting to bash his person, when he made a living out of bashing theirs. He was particularly nasty to homosexuals and he was in favor of the death penalty even if some of the people put to death were actually innocent. More than 150 people have been exonerated from death row and he wrote all those people off as an acceptable loss. He was okay with legal bigotry as long as a majority of people in a state were sufficiently bigoted. That does not fit my definition of a good person and I think someone who didn’t hesitate to get personal in his Supreme Court decisions should be spared from personal criticisms in life or death. I also think that if the man explicitly didn’t care if a person died unnecessarily, or if a person was made criminal for being born a certain way, then said people are perfectly justified in bashing his person.
I have to agree.
To quote one of his most famous dissents “This Court has never held that the Constitution forbids the execution of a convicted defendant who has had a full and fair trial but is later able to convince a habeas court that he is “actually” innocent. Quite to the contrary, we have repeatedly left that question unresolved, while expressing considerable doubt that any claim based on alleged “actual innocence” is constitutionally cognizable.”
In my opinion, the man was a sociopath. How else can one account for such a casual attitude toward justice?
So we hope.
No matter what, don’t pull that wooden stake out of his heart!!! Just in case.
To get a good idea of just how bad and biased a judge Scalia was, read any of Richard Posner’s scathing critiques.
The Incoherence of Antonin Scalia
https://newrepublic.com/article/106441/scalia-garner-reading-the-law-textual-originalism
To those defending Scalia’s reference to the creation scientists — I suggest reading his dissent again. What’s he’s done is sprinkle a thick layer of legal bullshit over it to make it look like he’s just quoting them. It’s the equivalent of a journalist saying “I’m not calling the President a goat-sucking alien, I’m just reporting on the rumour that he’s a goat-sucking alien.” How do I know this?
1. He says that it should not matter what the judges themselves believe about the scientific integrity of the creation scientist position.
2. Despite the fact that it should not matter, he then quotes/paraphrases the creation scientists position at length detailing exactly the kind of information he claims is not relevant to the case.
3. He later refers to these beliefs as “statements of fact”.
4. For a man happy to quote the creationists at length (even though he says it does not matter) he does not quote or paraphrase one single paragraph from the opposing side, even going so far as to ignore all the evidence they provided that creation science is a religious, not a scientific belief.
That alone should be enough to convince you that Scalia was buttering up for the creationists, but then let’s add…
5. Scalia argues that the Lemon test should be abandoned…
6. Scalia argues that the First Amendment means that the government “must advance religion”…
7. Scalia argues that any even remotely secular side-benefit means that any legislation is OK by the 1st Amendment — in his view, a law that mandated wearing of a large cross in public schools would be acceptable provided the legislators mentioned the secular economic benefits to cross makers in a meeting some time.
In short, he was not just quoting the creationists, he was cheerleading for them.
Raven @49
Personally, I’d go with “salt and burn”, make sure nobody can bring him back.
@#11, throwaway, butcher of tongues, mauler of metaphor
Considering that Hillary Clinton’s criticisms of Sanders’ call for a “revolution” involve deliberately ignoring the fact that he was using it as a metaphor, which he explained when he used it, you can go pound sand.
Besides, how do you know that replacing Scalia with a more liberal judge isn’t “outside the rate of change of political mindsets”? The Republican Party, who Hillary Clinton apparently believes she can work with (which, in practice, will translate into “whose bills Hillary Clinton is apparently willing to pass”) certainly thinks we ought to have a replacement who is as far-right as he was. If we’re going to permit them to dictate what is and isn’t possible on other matters of policy, why is the Supreme Court exempt? Clinton’s claim, like so much else she has said in this campaign, doesn’t bear scrutiny.
The fundamental problem with Scalia as a Jurist: He was trying to interpret a classic document of the enlightenment (the constitution) with a pre-enlightenment mind.
Thought for the day.