The press continues to embarrass themselves in their attempt to defend Ketanji Jackson.
This week has been both amazing and unsurprising in the way journalists have chucked away all manner of objectivity in order to defend and prop up Joe Biden’s Supreme Court nominee, Ketanji Brown Jackson. The charges of racism were inevitable, as items like asking questions about the past and analyzing school test results were deemed racist. Another wave of news outlets claimed that Republicans looking into the KBJ judicial file was the worst behaviour ever witnessed in a confirmation hearing.
However, the media went beyond our expectations. The bulk of the Press Complex was visible on two consecutive days. You can recite the exact words delivered The White HouseConcerning the nomination. When it comes to the fact-checkers, they have been busy – debunking the questions from Republicans, but hardly any interest in Jackson’s record. CNN reported that she had been charged with war crimes for allegedly causing harm to the U.S. Was not anyone’s calling. a war criminal…somehow.
Now it is USA Today’s turn, as the paper arrives to address one of the more embarrassing moments in the hearing. At one point, Senator Marsha Blackburn asked Jackson if Jackson could explain what makes a woman a woman. KBJ declined to answer the question and social media buzzed as a result. The jokes were immediate, the memes cropped up all over, and the phrase “I’m not a biologist” went from being a critique to a punchline, and then to a worn-out gag within a matter of hours. USA Today is here to save the day.
Alia Dastagir, a writer for the newspaper, presents a defense of Jackson. She has gathered experts together to present a document that declares there is no clear definition of femininity. Jackson wasn’t embarrassingly vague, but she was 100% accurate. This headline shows the wonders of opaqueness: Marsha Blackburn asked Ketanji Brown Jackson to define ‘woman.’ Science says there’s no simple answer. Seriously, the paper stipulates that science says there is no clear definition for “woman.”
In the 13th hour of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson’s confirmation hearing, Sen. Marsha Blackburn asked: “Can you provide a definition for the word ‘woman’?” https://t.co/Ikgkqxj83h
— USA TODAY (@USATODAY) March 24, 2022
Here is where the paper goes in order to clear the air and clear Jackson’s name.
Scientists, gender law scholars and philosophers of biology said Jackson’s response was commendable, though perhaps misleading. It’s useful, they say, that Jackson suggested science could help answer Blackburn’s question, but they note that a competent biologist would not be able to offer a definitive answer either.
Dastagir uses a dodge to get around the problem. When she actually spoke to, she used the plural. OneEach discipline. So the claim that “Science”The simple definition of a woman cannot be derived from her talking to one scientist. Dr. Anthony Fauci might be upset that someone has taken his title as the embodiment of science. “Scientists agree,” says the writer, using the old consensus declaration for, again, ONE scientist’s opinion, “there is no sufficient way to clearly define what makes someone a woman, and with billions of women on the planet, there is much variation.”
The scientist she enlisted further pushes the boundaries of what I don’t believe they are interested in exploring. Here is the summation of how science proves…I don’t know, how there is no such thing as a true woman, I suppose?
“I don’t want to see this question punted to biology as if science can offer a simple, definitive answer,” said Rebecca Jordan-Young, a scientist and gender studies scholar at Barnard College whose work explores the relationships between science and the social hierarchies of gender and sexuality. There isn’t one single ‘biological’ answer to the definition of a woman. There’s not even a singular biological answer to the question of ‘what is a female,’” Jordan-Young said.
You just solved a problem, ladies. (Can I even use ThatWhat is the point of using term any more? It is not clear what defines a woman. How can you say that there are millions of them? This is the very thing that undermines all the feminist activism. If we are unable to identify who is male and female, then sexism can’t be firmly established. If women cannot be correctly categorized, it is impossible to tell them they are not being paid enough.
This also undermines the KBJ celebrations for this week. Jackson, the first African-American female nominee today, is Jackson a celebration of a woman who we can’t accurately describe as sex?!
To further muddy the waters, USA Today turns to a “philosopher of biology,” which sounds like a remarkable contradiction while invoking science. It strikes me as someone who studies interpretive mathematics. This describes her as someone. “who focuses on the sciences of sex and gender and their policy dimensions,” Who are the states?, “While U.S. law remains an unsettled arena for the conceptualization and definition of sex, it frequently grounds sex categorization in biological evidence and reasoning.”This word salad is then tossed with some context croutons.
“As is so often the case, science cannot settle what are really social questions,” she said. “In any particular case of sex categorization, whether in law or in science, it is necessary to build a definition of sex particular to context.”
It is not surprising that involving a lawyer makes things even more complicated. Dastagir meets with a lawyer to discuss issues such as the 19th Amendment which allowed only white women to vote and Jim Crow laws that are believed to have discredited the existence of black males. This is ironic because it is an attempt to remove definitions of womenhood, while simultaneously celebrating the nomination of black females.
The ludicrous lengths this goes to exonerate Jackson’s refusal or inability to define the word “woman” is almost impressive. The news item just continues the trend of gender-bending stories that has been going on for the past few weeks. Rachel Levine is dubbed “Woman of the Year,” Michaela Jaé Rodriguez was on Time’s WOY list, Lia Thomas is celebrated for college championships, and now we are debating the science of females.
It’s been a hell of a Women’s History Month.
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