The Pain of Partisan Gerrymandering

Like many Americans, I remain astonished, but not surprised, by the SCOTUS weakening section 2 of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. The ruling represents a major shift in the legal landscape of voting rights fundamentally changing how racial gerrymandering is evaluated. Majority Black districts can now be diluted by redistricting them into larger White districts making it challenging for Black communities to elect their preferred candidates. In other words, they allowed partisan mapmaking to disguise racial gerrymandering.

The 6–3 decision by the conservative activist Justices was based on a belief that racism no longer exists (who knew?) and that remedial efforts of the Voting Rights Act are no longer justified in the same way. Partisan gerrymandering is justified because both parties can and have done it.

Racial gerrymandering remains unconstitutional, and, as in other cases of racial discrimination, is determined by proving INTENT. In other words, it is only unconstitutional if you can prove that redistricting is being done to discriminate against Blacks. However, it is constitutional, if the redistricting is based on partisan voting patterns — in this case, taking all Blacks, the majority of whom vote Democrat and distributing Black voters into largely majority Republican districts.

These maps resemble inkblots in Rorschach tests. According to the SCOTUS partisan gerrymandering is ok. Despite a high percentage of Blacks in a state, Blacks, as a race, still have a chance to be represented in congress; however, in Louisiana and most Southern states, only if that Black person is Republican.

In the Jim Crow era, voting rights were suppressed by poll taxes, literacy tests, guessing the number of marbles in the jar, reciting the constitution, and all-White primaries. By stating that racism no longer exists in the same way it did in the 1960s, the SCOTUS found a new way to bury the intent to discriminate and suppress Black votes by redistricting maps, even after voting had started, potentially eliminating Democratic seats and boosting Republican control.

Jaw drop.

PAY MORE ATTENTION TO IMPACT THAN INTENTION. If I wrestle you to the ground and put my foot on your neck and then lovingly look down at you and express my desire to be friends, you might be willing to discuss…but only on the condition that I take my foot off your neck.

Impact matters.

Conservative Republicans are putting their feet on our necks. They assume they still hold the votes of the majority of Whites and that most White Americans want to maintain White political dominance no matter how incompetent and destructive to the quality of their lives that White candidate may be. I don’t agree with their assessment.

Recognizing the demographic changes and past history that Obama was elected twice (!!!), SCOTUS dismantled the Voting Rights Act to dilute or eliminate the impact of the votes of Black Americans. And yes, Blacks, especially Clarence Thomas, can be racist. Institutional racism lives in our policies, practices and procedures and does not have an individual identifiable perpetrator. If you forward racists policies, you are complicit.

The Voting Rights Acts remain one of the hardest-fought safeguards for Black Americans as it relates to voting. We cannot wait another 95 years to have those rights fully restored. Gerrymandering doesn’t serve either party well and should be eliminated. In the meantime…

I want to live in that world where racism doesn’t exist, but there’s just too much data that racism is alive and thriving. Louisiana’s governor stated in defense of redistricting, “everyone deserves equal rights but not extra rights.” Hhmm…not sure what “extra rights” are, but I do know that when you are used to social privilege, equality can seem like oppression.

So, I am counting on, actually demanding that those of us, especially those who are White, who believe in a healthy democracy for ALL, move out of whatever comfortable indifference, unconscious or conscious bias, vincible, blithe, or willful ignorance that we may have about this issue and continue the fight for voting rights and racial justice.

We are the guardrails and have to hold each other accountable. Those of us without racial social privilege have a foot on our necks.

IIntent vs Impact: The Foot on Our Necks was originally published in An Injustice! on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Over the past year, we witnessed a number of notable turning points in U.S. politics, global relationships and public life. These shifts showed up in escalating immigration actions and enforcement, rising threats and violence targeting Jewish, Muslim, LGBTQ+ people, women and communities of color, ongoing tensions centered on race and belonging, debates over the role of science, intensifying climate and natural disaster responses and the rapidly evolving role of technology.

It was a turning point for me as well. As a psychologist and DEIB professional, I became more deeply aware that the work of “turning us and them into we” was not simply a “nice to have” but a non-negotiable for how we meaningfully interact with each other in places where we live, work, serve, socialize, and worship.

We know that mistrust and fear limit human development for everyone. Currently, fear is the main driver for how we share resources and interact in public spaces. Fear is clearly evident on all points of the political and social continuum driving unproductive patterns that leave us more divided than ever. On the far right, it looks like restriction and exclusion of what isn’t understood, perceived desirable or as evident within their lived experience. On the far left, fear looks like rigid adherence to a set ideology, where disagreement is met with cancellation and aggressive advocating rather than effective strategizing.

Even within our extreme polarization, we still have a bell curve distribution with most individuals clustering somewhere in the middle… living and managing their fears and anxieties with moral clarity and principled-centered behavior, just trying to be better humans for each other. That describes those working, consciously or unconsciously, to turn us and them into we.

Learning how to live effectively and inclusively with uncertainty, nuances, ambiguity, within our multiple and layered realities is the next level of evaluation in the field of diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging.

Turning us and them into we is not about knowing how to compromise, as compromising and centrism are never the solution in periods like the one we are experiencing now, characterized by extreme ideological polarization, anti-democratic forces, and moral and ethical conflicts.

Rather, living in the messy middle is a deep exploration of what is actually effective and what truly works best for the benefit of all. It is not a popular stance as fear, as a political tool, activates the fight, flight, freeze response that limits our human potential and puts us in competition with each other, playing a zero sum game and fixed pie bargaining over resources.

It is much easier to choose that right or left side, or to lean in one direction or another without commitment to the middle. Choosing right or left is an easy fix to that need for certainty and desire for belonging in this wobbly world.

It’s messy being in the middle because, as humans we are more comfortable with certainty and yet, we are also motivated and inspired by possibility.

Inclusive and justice-making people live in the middle where possibilities and hope flourish. It is not easy, but the only space where we can create a pathway toward a healthier society that works for everyone.

Living in the messy middle requires a Me to We Mindset. The Me to We Mindset resides on the side of possibilities and hope. It’s the belief that as fellow human beings we are linked in community. Because we are linked by our common humanity, we have an obligation to treat everyone with dignity and respect. We are compelled to share the planet’s resources in the wisest and most effective manner, and we make daily choices to interact inclusively in public spaces toward the benefit of all.

Developing a Me to We Mindset is a deep exploration for what is effective and works best for the benefit of all. It requires co-creating that reality of a society that works for everyone.

A Me to Me Mindset allows us to fully achieve healthy workplaces where diversity is valued, honest ideas are welcomed, and knowledge is expanded. Educational institutions become environments that foster an inclusive experience for all learners. Communities progress from apathy and insensitivity to understanding and inclusivity resulting in increased social capital. Neighborhoods thrive with strong community engagement and a shared responsibility for their fellow neighbors. A society exists where all people feel empowered to contribute to the greater good and social discourse is productive, solutions oriented, and future focused.

That’s a whole lot of measurable benefits.

On Thanksgiving, his Mimi, my sister, gave his parents a well-deserved break (my niece cooked a fabulous Thanksgiving meal hosted as my sister’s) and planned a sleepover for her grandkids. While his parents were preparing their getaway, I went downstairs to check on Chunky. He was happily amusing himself in the large playhouse ringing the doorbell (yes, it really rings) and going in and out the door. On a reentry he turned around and noticed me, scanned the room and quickly assessed that Mommy and Daddy were not there. Although I look a bit like Mimi, I wasn’t her either. He quickly waddled up the stairs just in time to cling to Mommy’s leg as they were about to exit. Responding to his fake cries, my niece picked him up. Fake crying immediately stopped. He then looked over his mom’s shoulder directly at me, smirked and fake spat at me.

I am still laughing.

For months now, maybe years for some of us, Trump has lived rent free in our minds robbing us of sleep and our mental health. His use of violent language threatens the emotional and psychological safety of millions of Americans who are the target of his words. His language is uniquely simplistic and divisive among U.S. presidents.

For all of us who exercised the right to vote for our candidate of choice other than him, Trump is acting like my 19-month old grandnephew glued to his MAGA supporters and to only those who voted for him, falsely claiming a landslide victory and a mandate by his Americans.

We cannot give him the luxury of a ‘wait and see approach.” As Maya Angelou says, “when someone shows you who they are, believe them…the first time.” We have plenty of data about his toddler behavior and spitting on Americans he doesn’t like with his words. We saw what his rhetoric did on January 6th and how his extremist message continues to divide us.

We must continually remind Trump and his administration that we are ALL Americans, and that our voices matter as well. Not any less than those who voted for Trump. Votes determine the direction for policies and are not permission to bully, disrespect, and threaten other Americans. A simple truth that unfortunately is necessary to reinforce with Trump, just as we would toddlers when they need to be disciplined.

On matters of civility, respect, justice, equity, inclusion, and integrity, we can’t afford to wait this one out. Policies change with every administration, but we will lose the very soul of this country if we aren’t grounded in these values that are the bedrock of our democracy. We must be vigilant and fight for accountability especially during this administration. There is no way we can negotiate the moral incompatibility that most Americans, including some of those who voted for him, have with his rhetoric. Those who voted for Trump, and claim only to buy into his policies and not condone his behaviors, have a special obligation to hold him accountable for a civil society.

When my adorable grandnephew fake spits at me and clings to his parents, I laugh and look forward to the day when he is older and maturity and virtue lead his actions, and we can talk about this precious time and laugh together.

Sadly, with Trump, it is not a laughing matter.

It will be much harder during this second term to hold Trump accountable for the tone and impact of his words. But we must do it. We also must expose enablers of his disrespectful and often vile rhetoric and work to vote them out of office. We cannot give up on demanding respect from him and each other.

Never.

Words create worlds.

I am working for the day when, as adults, our precious toddlers will know that we didn’t condone, approve of, or dismiss Trump’s rhetoric and, as a result, they experience the full benefits of a civil, safe, humane and healthy society.

When it comes to matters of equity and justice, I prefer to call people in rather than call them out. But sometimes you need to call out in order to call in, and that is what needs to happen in response to the Cleveland Catholic Diocese’s official policy barring LGBTQ+ expression. As a former nun in this diocese and a psychologist who practiced in one of their consultation centers, my calling out is grounded in lived experience. As a psychologist and DEIB professional, my calling out is rooted in a data-informed base of knowledge on gender and gender expression and the dynamics of human differences. As a human being who professes Gospel values, my calling out is necessary.

Although there are numerous ways in which this policy is wrong, I will focus on just one of them — its hypocrisy. For decades, Catholic leadership has worked to silence voices who publicly unveiled the significant numbers of LGBTQ+ bishops, priests, and nuns, some of whom are sexually active. For decades they have shamed LGBTQ+ priests and nuns by framing sexual orientation, gender and gender expression in Victorian thinking and morality. For decades, they have caused great psychological discomfort to those clergy and nuns who are LGBTQ+ resulting in dysfunctional behaviors that ooze out in their ministry, and in some cases, illicit and illegal behaviors that have been covered up. This policy continues down that path and it is simply psychologically abusive not only to those in their ministry but to all LGBTQ+ individuals by its message.

Let me be clear. There is absolutely nothing disordered, sinful or shameful about LGBTQ+ individuals who are wonderfully created human beings, no different from any human being that walks this earth. However, there is something disordered, sinful, and shameful about hypocrisy.

Hypocrisy is a result of pride rather than humility. Hypocrisy is based in fear rather than love. Hypocrisy shames and ridicules because it is rooted in low self-esteem rather than a healthy self-confidence rooted in respect and acknowlegment of others as fellow human beings.

So, today and every day until my dying day, I will encourage the Catholic Church, especailly those in leadership and those who are faithful followers, to call out this hypocrisy. I also encourage you to call them in and invite them to alleviate hypocrisy by transparency, to foster love rather than misplaced and wrongful judgment, to have the courage to admit that they are attempting to “clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside are full of greed and self-indulgence.”

There is plenty of evidence that Jesus despised hypocrisy and a lot more evidence that God loves LGBTQ+ individuals. Choose to act in love.