Quick Updates 2 (4/14/2023) - "Sunlight."
Between the Tennessee Three/Two, Ron DeSantis signing an insane abortion bill into law, or continued attacks against Trans people, "sunlight is the best disinfectant" has work to do!
Greetings, friends,
It has been a busy couple of weeks, of that there is no doubt, and not all in good ways. Last week on The Progressive Cafe, we discussed the idea of canceling and/or forgiving debt and how it can usually turn out to benefit everyone.
This week, I want to talk about a few different issues. I will be wrapping up with the Tennessee Three/Two, for the sake of closing with a negative-turned-positive one. With that said, we’ll be mostly focused on the Abortion/Trans Rights actions, because Regressives have chosen to fight the culture war and because there are national implications for the 2024 election contained in some of them.
Let’s rock and roll.
Oh. And I want you to reflect on the term, “Sunlight is the best disinfectant” for these three tales, and we’ll tie that together at the end.
Ron DeSantis Cowardly Signing Of A Six-Week Abortion Ban
I mean, need I say more than the subheading? Well, maybe there’s a little bit to analyze in here.
As you might have already heard, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed a draconian six-week ban in Florida (Matt Dixon; NBC News). The ban starts at six weeks, long before many people know that they’re pregnant, though it extends that deadline to fifteen weeks in the case of rape, incest, or a danger to the person’s life.
Of course, as Romy Ellenbogen of the Tampa Bay Times points out, to invoke those extensions for rape and incest, victims must provide documentation that they were violated. That means they have to report the crime, a crime that ultimately endangers them because in a lot of cases those people are close contacts that might retaliate against them.
Bans are bad enough that they don’t need to be swam in for too long, but I want to also talk about how DeSantis signed this ban.
DeSantis delayed reporting that he’d signed the ban until 11:00 PM. He kept the signing ceremony small. He was, if ever this word might apply to this situation, bashful. He was anything but the proud “anti-woke” culture war crusader he claims to be. “Florida is where woke goes to die,” he boasts! But a near–midnight notification of a tiny signing? That’s not a brave culture hero.
That’s a coward.
That won’t get him nearly the Republican primary boost that he would have gotten were he to have made a spectacle out of it. I mean, if there’s anything to learn about Trump’s example it’s that people like a spectacle.
Let’s take Joe Biden marching out to speak to a crowd on his Ireland trip to the tune of “Shipping Up to Boston” by the Dropkick Murphys as an example. That video warms even my not-a-Joe-fan heart, even though it’s pure fanfare. Maybe it’s just because my family has roots in Ireland too, and I identify with it? Maybe it’s just that the Dropkick Murphys are stridently anti-Fascist that I’m so amused? (Young, Tamagawa, & Muhammad; WBUR) I mean, you named your album “This Machine Still Kills Fascists.” I doubt Biden, or at least his team, were ignorant to this fact. I love it.
DeSantis, by contrast, hid in his equivalent of a bunker, just like his main presumptive-rival in the Republican primary. And, why? It’s not like nobody heard about it and got pissed off that their rights, or the rights of someone they cared about, were just significantly cut back. It’s not like he didn’t change what health care people had access to! So why be such a coward?
I guess because he’s a coward.
Moving on.
Missouri AG Severely Restricts Rights Of Trans Adults
Two weeks ago, we talked about how anti-Trans legislation is bad enough, but when applied it often has unintended consequences. This week, we’re not facing legislation so much as we’re facing an ‘emergency order’ proclaimed by Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey that severely restricts the rights of Trans people to access healthcare. (Panella & Griffiths; Business Insider)
We’re not talking about Trans kids, but rather we’re talking about Trans adults. Adults who should, by virtue of Human Rights, have the right to control their own bodies. It’s not technically illegal to do so, but there are a myriad of new conditions that have to be met to make a health care provider safe in treating their own patients.
For example, it is now illegal for healthcare providers to write prescriptions for hormone therapies to people who suffer from depression. Yes, that’s italics and bold. People who are effectively born in the wrong bodies are probably unhappy due to the fact that they were, you know, born into the wrong bodies.
Moreover, doctors are required to demonstrate documentation that a patient has suffered a minimum of a three year “intense pattern of gender dysphoria,” something that many current patients might not have.
For the “party of small government,” we’ve just covered two stories where the fuckers are abusing their authority to control citizens’ medical choices. It’s almost like they’re just Christo-Fascist bigots, eh?
The Tennessee Three/Two Reunite.
It’s time to explain why I use the term “The Tennessee Three/Two,” isn’t it? Here we go.
First off, the “Tennessee Three” was Johnny Cash’s backing band. Years later, that term got appropriated on social media to refer to a trio of Tennessee legislators who were accused of violating House rules (Darah Gregorian, NBC). The three are Rep. Justin Jones, Rep, Gloria Johnson, and Rep. Justin Pearson. These three were accused of breaking rules related to orderly conduct when they joined in a protest against gun violence in the wake of the Covenant School Shooting (Hassan & Cochrane; New York Times).
All three were threatened with expulsion, but ultimately only Jones and Pearson were kicked out (Andone, Young, Simonson & Almasy; CNN). What did Jones and Pearson have in common? They were Black, while Johnson was white. Oh, look, more racism!
That’s why I call them the Tennessee Three/Two: Three were threatened, but only two were removed, creating a sort of asymmetrical set of terminology. They shared a common crucible, but they had different trajectories based on their skin tone.
Well, guess what? Both of them were almost immediately reinstated by their relevant local authorities. (Liz Crampton; Politico)
That, my friends, is cause to celebrate, if only to spite the malaise that living in a world which enables this behavior can bring. It’s a smack in the face to authoritarians who, not content with controlling their state legislature, kicked out those who tried to challenge them on it. They’ve brought extra scrutiny to their state: Like, now it’s public knowledge that, as reported by fellow Substack author Judd Legum, Tennessee House Speaker Cameron Sexton went ahead and sneakily bought a $600,000 dollar home in Nashville when he’s supposed to live in and represent Crossville?
Yeah, that information started coming out in large part because the public eye centered on them in the naked, burning-hot light of day.
And That’s Today’s Moral!
So, there’s a proverb in journalism and politics that goes, “Sunlight is the best disinfectant.” Quote Investigator claims it originates in an 1879 journal, The Laws Of Health by Robert Walter, wherein he’s talking about actual disinfectants.
It began to transform from a medical saying into a political one. It started in 1898 in the Buffalo Daily Times quote that “The great value of the sun’s service lies in showing how effective would be the publication by the Government…It would subject the list to the great disinfectant…”
Its meaning is fairly self-explanatory: Sunlight kills germs. Sunlight also exposes darkness. It’s kind of a double-metaphor for journalism.
Anyway, the point is: By committing egregiously wrong deeds like these, the Tennessee House Republicans have brought the sunlight in on themselves.
Ron Desantis tried to avoid sunlight, but in doing so may have missed his chance to step up and seize the headwind in the Republican Presidential Primary, even though what he did will probably cost him any chance in a General should he get through it. Hell, the last time he tried an anti-Trans back-door into getting menstruation data on student athletes, the sunlight (including from The Progressive Cafe) he got destroyed that project.
Finally, Andrew Bailey invited the attention of civil rights groups ranging from the Queer legal group Lambda Legal to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). Rather than individually-funded and disorganized lawsuits with limited strength, multiple legal entities will be stepping in to try to shut these new rules down as quickly as possible.
Sunlight might be a great disinfectant, but some things do grow in the sun. We always have to remember that no modality is an absolute, universal solution. You need to be careful with your application of disinfectants.
Thank you for reading The Progressive Cafe. If this article has helped you, please consider signing up for our mailing list. This article is by Jesse Pohlman, a sci-fi/fantasy author from Long Island, New York, whose website you can check out here.