LEFTOVERS

We are rapidly approaching the end of the year and there are still a few things I’d like to get off my chest. Matters that have surfaced or resurfaced this year and deserve more than a casual tweet but are not worked out enough for a full column. Here are three of them:

1.)    Consumerism

The media have for weeks, if not months, been buzzing about the supply chain problems and the tragedy that our Christmas presents might not make it from China in time to be put under the Christmas tree. I look at this a little differently. Year after year I’ve been aghast at the degeneration of a religious holiday into a celebration of American consumerism. “Are you ready for the Holiday? Oh, no, I have still to find something for my aunt Betsy and my twin cousins Jesse and Josh.” Really? What happens if you just treat them to a warm welcome at your house, for a great meal, fine spirits, and some meaningful conversation? Or maybe just go to church together or take them caroling in your neighborhood?

I have no problem with exchanging some gifts of things that, otherwise, would have been bought anyway, like clothing and other life essentials; nor do I begrudge those who want to add luster to the Holidays with special treats, delicacies or gift cards for a great restaurant, spa-service, a bookstore, or entertainment. But who needs any of the crap from China that is now still locked up in a container in one of our congested ports?

I see a challenge in the fact that our economy has become excessively dependent on consumption and our consumption disproportionally dependent on China. This is bad for America’s contest with China and, implicitly, bad for the struggle between democracy and authoritarianism, and very bad for the environment. I shudder to think of the mounds of, mostly plastic, trash that will be the visual leftover from Christmas and will add to our already overflowing garbage dumps, where ultimately all these Chinese presents will end up as well.

America is much better at meeting it ‘wants’ than at meeting its ‘needs’. Our economic health is far too dependent on consumptive spending. We can put heaps of presents, wanted or not wanted, under our Christmas trees, but we can’t offer our immigrant population a stable outlook, we can’t offer our aging population affordable, quality eldercare, we can’t offer our children of all ages the best affordable education, we can’t make insulin affordably available to all of our diabetics, and we can’t even guarantee all of our citizens that they will be fairly represented in Congress, that they can vote on these matters, and that their votes will be counted.

2.)    Abortion

It now looks likely that the Supreme Court will change the law of the land with respect to abortion and give States’ legislatures further leeway in restricting a woman’s right to an abortion than allowed under its 50 years old ‘Roe vs Wade’ ruling. On this subject, that has disproportionally and undeservedly influenced American politics, I have a few thoughts.

In the first place, it is a shame that an existential matter like abortion should be decided by the courts rather than by federal legislation. The way it is going, we will end up with widely diverging abortion rights and prohibitions between individual States. To me that looks like a very undesirable outcome.

Second, when I think about the topic of abortion, the first thing that comes to mind is the need to make sure that, if an abortion is needed and warranted, it will be performed by licensed professionals in a safe medical facility. History shows that abortions will be sought and performed, whether they are allowed by local rules or not. In a civilized world abortion should not be pushed back into the dark back alleys of a black market. Abortion, like prostitution, drugs, or alcohol, can’t be wished away or outlawed, it can and should be regulated.

Third, I look at abortion as a ‘last resort’ resolution of an unwanted situation, after the options of carrying the pregnancy to term and/or adoption have been carefully considered and turned down. That choice can ultimately only be made by the woman, but it should not be made without input from the father-to-be and professional guidance from social services.

Fourth, in the case of rape or incest the woman should have the right to terminate the pregnancy without interference from anyone.

Fifth, in Roe vs Wade, the Supreme Court established a woman’s right to an abortion up to the time of ‘viability’ of the fetus, defined as being able to survive outside of the womb. Generally, it is assumed that this occurs after 22 weeks of pregnancy. In the Dobbs vs Jackson Women’s Health case, now before the Supreme Court, a Mississippi law banning abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy is at stake. And from the oral arguments in that case and the current composition of the Supreme Court we can expect the court to let that Mississippi law stand and, in effect, reduce the time for a legal abortion from 22 to 15 weeks (a more recent Texas law, which may also come before the Supreme Court reduces the time for a legal abortion to only six weeks). The ‘viability’ threshold seems to me to make more sense than an arbitrary number of weeks. After all, the moral argument is about whether by an abortion we are snuffing out a life. My view is that, in case of an unwanted pregnancy, the law should give a woman the time to assert her pregnancy and come to grips with it and a reasonable time to determine how to deal with it. I have difficulty thinking of any situation in which these determinations could not be made before the fetus becomes viable but imposing an arbitrary time limit of six to fifteen weeks seems hard to justify if a woman’s right to an abortion is recognized at all. 

The law should also protect the woman’s physical and mental health going through this process and assure that, if it comes to abortion, it is performed by medical personnel in a safe place. If the pregnancy puts the life of the mother at risk, the law should allow the woman’s gynecological team to order an abortion at any time during her pregnancy, unless the mother has unambiguously expressed different wishes.

3.)    Melting pot.

The theory of America’s exceptional power and viability is based on the belief that the United States of America is this huge melting pot of people from all different origins, native and imported from all corners of the world. It is true that the US population consists of all these different elements, but a melting pot it is not. It is more like a layer cake. Just like oil and water don’t really mix: you can infuse one in the other, but they will layer out, if not immediately then over time. Together with American Exceptionalism we can move the construct of the melting pot to the land of fantasies. If America was a veritable melting pot, there would not be a ‘Black Caucus’ in Congress, there would be no Native American Reservations, there would be no Slavic Village in Cleveland, no Little Kabul in Fremont nor a concentration of Somalians in Minnesota, and there would be no China Town in any of the major cities. Maybe it just takes time and a hundred years from now we see a lot more assimilation, much like what happened in the 19^th and 20^th century with immigrant waves from Ireland, Italy, Germany, Scandinavia, Armenia, and Russia.

Does it matter? There is definite value in maintaining one’s ethnic identity, as long as it does not result into pitting one group of Americans against another. We already do too much of that between Democrats and Republicans. However, the layer cake model suggests that there is a ranking of inhabitants by ethnicity, which is exactly how the many white supremacists amongst us like to see it. Therein lies the danger. We are barely a United States of America, much less a United Peoples of America. What do we need to do to get to the point that being American supersedes all other identities we harbor?