I Forgot that Men are Always Right

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Once in a while, I forget that women are an aberration since we are not men, who are the norm. Fortunately, the media is there to screw me head back on straight! Just last week, the New York Times ran a story titled, "Debate on Whether Female Judges Decide Different Arises Anew." Huh. What could that mean?

The first paragraph quotes our esteemed first female Supreme Court Justice, Sandra Day O'Connor, opining that "a wise female judge will come to the same conclusion as a wise male judge." Hmmmm... this leads to "the question of how female judges may see and decide some cases differently" which "is again being weighed." Yes, here are the things I forgot: 1. if a woman sees and decides something differently, it is wrong because male perspective is the default, and hence the representation of justice and all that is good in the world; 2. all men think alike, and all women think alike; and 3. shenanigans in boys' locker rooms are totally hilarious.

The interesting news, actually, is that I am not the only one whose sensitive feathers were ruffled by the underlying assumption in the article. Several letters to the editor articulately pointed out the folly of this type of thinking:

Your article seems to assume that the gold standard of judicial decisions is those made by men. The issue is not whether women may bring a particular bias to the bench. It is that all individuals, male or female, bring their own experiences and worldview to bear as they consider how to interpret the law in a manner that results in a just and reasonable outcome... This is not to say that men are incapable of considering a woman’s point of view or vice versa, but it does make sense to have a diversified court, with a balance of men and women and a good racial and ethnic mix. The gold standard comes when all points of view have been heard.

Jean Southard
Mansfield, Mass., June 4, 2009

...When Justice Stephen G. Breyer brings his youthful locker-room recollections into discussion of a case about strip-searching a young woman, who among his male colleagues (or those men who confirmed him) is disturbed that he is calling upon a gender-based experience?...

Vicki W. Kramer
Philadelphia, June 5, 2009

Of course, these two letters were written by women, so what do they know? Except that there were also letters - raising the same points, but in different ways - from men:

...If the law were a matter of mathematical logic, all justices would reach the same conclusion. That they do not do so renders debate over whether personal experience influences judgments silly...

Robert C. Madden
Tarrytown, N.Y., June 4, 2009

You write that “the question of how female judges may see and decide some cases differently is again being weighed.” This implies that female judges are, and should be, subjected to greater scrutiny than male judges to determine if emotion or personal experience are improperly influencing their decisions.

But while personal experiences undoubtedly color some judicial decisions, there is no reason to think that female judges are more (or more improperly) influenced by personal experiences or emotions than male judges.

Would you have titled a news article “Debate on Whether Male Judges Decide Differently Arises Anew”?

Tom Litwack
New York, June 4, 2009

The writer is a professor of psychology at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in Manhattan.

Yeah, guys, you tell it to them! Because, according to Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, that is the only way anyone is going to hear it. The original article reported that "as a woman [Ginsburg] had sometimes found her comments ignored in the justices’ private conferences until someone else made the same point. She said the experience recalled her early years as a female lawyer whose comments in group discussions were not properly valued." Hmmmm... Sounds like some people don't think that women have anything useful to add unless their views are the same, and hence "male."

I think the letter writers did an excellent job pointing out that it is ridiculous to assume that all male judges will reach the same conclusion, so I'll move on to the idea that locker room pranks are universally hilarious. See, in deciding that a school did not overreact when they strip searched a 13 year old girl - asking her to pull out her bra and underpants for them to peer into - because she was suspected of having ibuprofen without permission, Justice