Can Supreme Court help us to heal?
Recent Supreme Court rulings may signal a path forward for a nation that is angry and torn by violence. Rulings overturning racial preference in college admissions and student debt dismissal represent a move toward "re-centering" the country and rebalancing the various preferences given to protected groups in recent decades.
The anger is palpable. I am not talking about gangbangers, mass shooters and Jan 6. This is a much broader problem. The fistfights on airplanes, road-rage, public foul language and snarky political rhetoric (at the very top) are all indications of this anger. Social media is now the gasoline on this fire.
Why the anger? There are probably many reasons, but among them is the sense of unfairness. Some groups are "protected" and benefit from affirmative action, ADA accommodations and guaranteed access based on "identifying" as protected. Then there is the rest of us "unprotected": the everyperson who works a job (sometimes two), pays for college out of his/her own pocket and pays lots of taxes to subsidize all this protection.
If all of these preferences and entitlements really worked, we would have a more peaceful and accepting society by now. We are in exactly the opposite situation.
The excesses of these preferences have created a Them vs. Us mentality, the Protected versus the Unprotected. The imbalances have generated a sense of unfairness, that hard-work and achievement no longer matter as much as your chosen pronoun or skin color.
We are all in this together. We need balance. If the Supreme Court can help steer us toward the middle of the road, it can also help us to heal.
Maureen McAllister
Wayne