The sentence: “There is one word that Antonin Scalia seems desperate to use but can’t: bullshit.” would have never been written by the Indian media. And neither would the rest of the story that appeared in New Republic, an American media house.
Antonin Scalia is a judge of the Supreme Court of the United States of America. There are a lot of things that the mainstream American media may NEVER do (such as REALLY criticize the American government’s foreign policy and some domestic ones too), but poking fun at the judges of their courts is not one of them.
In a thoroughly enjoyable read titled “Just How Angry is Justice Scalia Over the Obamacare Ruling?”, Elspeth Reeve dissects the dissenting note of Justice Antonin Scalia on the Supreme Court’s ruling on a legislation that has been hailed as a revolutionary law that makes health care affordable for poor and middle-class Americans.
Justice Scalia was apparently unhappy that the Court had upheld the President Barack Obama’s Affordable Care Act, allowing the US government to continue subsidizing health insurance for around six million Americans.
In his note, Scalia criticized his fellow colleagues on the bench in numerous ways. New Republic said that Scalia would probably have loved to call the ruling bull shit.
Reeve wrote: “But Scalia is restricted by the norms of the Court. He can't outright accuse his colleagues of bullshittery. He must say so in softer, yet more creative language.”
Reeve then lists all of the words and phrases that she thinks Scalia used as substitute. The story is accompanied by an image that would have definitely landed the writer in jail on contempt charges had it been done in India.
Reminiscent of Times Now’s fiery screens, Scalia’s eyes had been replaced with fireballs in an edited photograph. To fully appreciate the website’s – and by extension American culture’s –irreverence, one needs to understand the nature of the case before the court, and its ruling, which can be found on Vox.
Other news reports, and indeed a large chunk of the American media has, irreverently, punned on the language used by Scalia in his judgment.
The Indian media and public in general have been lambasting the Madras High Court for its recent direction asking a woman who had been raped as a minor to participate in mediation with her rapist. But we still have a long way to go.
For instance, in January 2014, an advocate filed a PIL with the Supreme Court of India, asking the court to prohibit the usage of “your lordship”, “my lord” etc when addressing judges, as it was a colonial inheritance. Refusing to entertain the petition, the Court said: “To address the court what do we want. Only a respectable way of addressing. You call (judges) sir, it is accepted. You call it your honour, it is accepted. You call lordship it is accepted. These are some of the appropriate way of expression which are accepted.”
Respect is one thing, but literally making way for a High Court judge – ambulance-style (stopping and waiting for them to pass) – is perhaps something that we should learn to give up. The list of things we should learn to give up is very, very, long, and crowd-sourcing will make it a democratic exercise.
Giving up some things need not be a sacrifice, but can lead to newer freedom.