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malthaussen

(17,065 posts)
Sat Jun 27, 2015, 11:06 AM Jun 2015

Dignity, like rights, cannot be taken away, only denied.

Mr Justice Thomas, in his dissent on the ruling in Obergefell et al v. Hodges, Director, Ohio Department of Health et al, has created a minor firestorm by comparing slavery and gay marriage and arguing that the former did not take away dignity.

The offending paragraph:

The corollary of that principle is that human dignity cannot be taken away by the government. Slaves did not lose their dignity (any more than they lost their humanity) because the government allowed them to be enslaved. Those held in internment camps did not lose their dignity because the government confined them. And those denied governmental benefits certainly do not lose their dignity because the government denies them those benefits. The government cannot bestow dignity, and it cannot take it away.

To be an advocatus diaboli for the present, Mr Justice Thomas actually has a good point here, but he appears to be confused by the possession of dignity, and the exercise of it. And this is quite a material point, since the advocates of gay marriage are really arguing about the exercise of their dignity, of being treated with dignity, rather than about possession of it. And it is a significant point. Rights (and dignity) are not gifts in the power of a government to give or withhold, they inhere in the individual by virtue of his humanity. But the exercise of such rights, the acknowledgment of them, is in the power of government, and has hitherto been denied to great swathes of the populace from time to time by act of government. Mr Justice Thomas appears to be ignoring this truth, which is at the root of the suit by Obergefell et al against government discrimination. And it would appear that Mr Justice Thomas is not alone in this confusion, since the majority opinion by Mr Justice Kennedy states that the "Constitution grants this right." (ie, due process and equal protection)

That is, at best, sloppy terminology. The Constitution does not grant rights, it confirms them. It defends them. Rights are not trinkets to be handed out by a benevolent ruler at pleasure, they stem from the very humanity of the citizen. By acknowledging the rights of LGBT citizens to marry, we do them no favor, we erase an injustice. In my opinion, this is a significant distinction.

-- Mal

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Dignity, like rights, cannot be taken away, only denied. (Original Post) malthaussen Jun 2015 OP
Well stated. +1. n/t 1StrongBlackMan Jun 2015 #1
And it continues to be sloppy. Igel Jun 2015 #2
The law, however, is concerned with how people are treated. malthaussen Jun 2015 #3

Igel

(35,191 posts)
2. And it continues to be sloppy.
Sat Jun 27, 2015, 12:40 PM
Jun 2015

Semanticists use Trubetzkoy's terms "privative" and "equipollent."

A privative opposition is like "competent" and "incompetent." "Full" and "empty" can be privative. One term denotes A; the other term denotes "not A."

An equipollent opposition involves terms where both have a positive meaning. The traditional example is "male" and "female." "Blue" and "green" are sort of equipollent.

You confuse two kinds of honor (or "dignity&quot . These two are in equipollent opposition and result from a survey of cultural systems. The only place they really overlap is when you have two cultural systems mixing and they haven't sorted themselves out yet, because to have both is unstable and leads to great misunderstanding and frustration. One kind is inherent--it's what you exercise regardless of what's around you; it depends entirely upon you and not upon others. The other kind is external; it depends entirely upon what others do and is entirely dependent on externalities. Most people, unless they've looked at this issue, can only see one kind of dignity and have to find some spurious way of making sure that they have an explanation that says they're right and justified in their use. But since the word has two completely different meanings, that's always going to be post hoc or specious.

You confuse the exercise of rights and denial of rights with "dignity" or lack thereof. You need to contrast political systems and views of rights to get at what the exercise and denial of rights are. These exercise and denial of rights are, of course, in a kind of crude privative opposition. (We say "right to X" but in some cases we think of that right as obligatory; in others, just opportunity dependent.) But rights and dignity are in strong equipollent opposition.

And you confuse dignity with civility, which contrasts with "dignity" but in no consistent way. Its definition varies by culture. It's usually the lowest degree of honor you can show a person by caste and by context. That may be very low indeed ("I show civility by not killing you now&quot or very high.

These are different things.

Making things a bit messier is where dignity applies--only at the personal level, or does personal dignity result from group honor? One definition of "dignity" says it's entirely individual; nothing the group you're in can possibly affect your dignity. The other allows for personal offense to be taken at a group insult.

Thomas used one definition of "dignity." His derives from one strain of Xianity, picked up by the Enlightenment. If you lose your dignity, you get it back by self-humiliation or forgiveness. The only object of coercion is you, and the only coercer is you. The Jew, spit on, stripped, smeared in mud that holds his head up and knows he's done as well as he could could still walk to his death with dignity.

Most here use the other definition most of the time. And few can see that even though there's a word in common that the definitions are very, very different. If there's a loss of dignity, you get it back by punishing or humiliating others, with some form of public forgiveness being dishing out negative face. The only object of coercion is the others, and you or some agent acting on your behalf is the coercer. What matters is what's said about you, so if nobody says you're a goat-humping horse-thief but instead says you're a swell guy, you have your dignity.

Mixing them says, "Treat me as though I only cared about external dignity. Dignity is what you show me. However, as soon as you show me external dignity, you mean that you agree with the morality of my actions and think I'm an intrinsically good person." That kind of bait and switch isn't something that goes over well with most people.

External dignity is fine with tolerance. Mixing the two results in a drive for "appreciation." If you look at the rhetoric for the last 30 years in most civil rights narratives there's been a shift from one to the other. We don't just seek free exercise; we seek personal validation. And when we get one, we assert that the other's been granted.

You see it the other way, too. Many here can't be civil to those that they disagree with; some openly call for denial of rights and liberties in the "free exercise" of their dignity. Because to be civil or grant dignity to somebody you disagree with is to say that you agree with their morals and values. This licenses incivility. We often approve of this when it's their "exercise of dignity" at stake; but never when it's our own. Again, because we confuse civility and dignity, inherent and external dignity, and denial and exercise of rights.

They are different things and to confuse them, en masse, esp. when those confused have some sort of power, is inherently unstable.

malthaussen

(17,065 posts)
3. The law, however, is concerned with how people are treated.
Sat Jun 27, 2015, 01:11 PM
Jun 2015

Arguably, it is only competent to deal with how people are treated. As the old saw goes, you can't legislate morality. You can only legislate actions.

Francis Hutchison gave as an "imperfect right" the "right to a good name," which before the libel laws were changed meant that you couldn't call someone a goat-humping horse-thief even if he was.

-- Mal

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