{"id":18953,"date":"2023-07-16T05:19:28","date_gmt":"2023-07-16T15:19:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/?p=18953"},"modified":"2023-07-16T05:19:29","modified_gmt":"2023-07-16T15:19:29","slug":"the-u-s-supreme-court-loves-you-if-youre-white-rich-and-straight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/2023\/07\/16\/the-u-s-supreme-court-loves-you-if-youre-white-rich-and-straight\/","title":{"rendered":"The U.S. Supreme Court Loves You If You\u2019re White, Rich, And Straight"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

by Emil Guillermo<\/em>

<\/strong>As it closed out its most recent term, the U.S. Supreme Court showed how far it will go to protect a dwindling white majority. In the final three rulings, it announced the law works especially well for you if you are straight, rich, and white.

<\/strong>Want a website for gay weddings? No business open to the public has to do one for you. It can now legally discriminate and exclude you. \u00a0That doesn\u2019t sound very American.

Help on student loan debt? Sorry, you have to pay up. Unless you\u2019re a bank that passes out bad mortgages, no one\u2019s bailing you out. Biden tried to help, but the conservative court won\u2019t let him.

Or how about a hand-up for being the first in your barkada<\/em> qualified to go to an Ivy League school? The laws that might have helped last week, no longer apply. And don\u2019t tell us what color you are. The court is indifferent to race.

As I said, justice got a little harder to achieve if you aren\u2019t white, straight, and rich.

That\u2019s the takeaway after the high court\u2019s grand finale. With all the news it\u2019s been making on its lack of ethics, the unpopular court has proven to be more venal, human, and very political at its core.

It\u2019s not acting as the elevated dispassionate body that has ruled historically based on legal scholarship and a healthy respect for precedent.

It\u2019s right there in the swamp with everything else in DC, a SCOTUS forged by politics and bias. And if you don\u2019t vote, it\u2019s the court we deserve. Want a better SCOTUS? No legal education is necessary. You\u2019ve just got to register and vote.

After 50 years of moving toward a more just society, we\u2019ve got ourselves a 6-3 rollback court. Abortion, roll it back. Affirmative Action, roll it back. Gay rights, roll it back.

It\u2019s like we\u2019re starting over. And there is now so much more to overcome.

Affirmative Filipino
<\/strong>I\u2019ve always been willing to talk about being Filipino, American Filipino, Asian American Filipino by all my preferred designations for which there are no boxes.

I\u2019ve just always talked about race. Because to not talk about it is to be invisible. And now, I\u2019m upping the volume.

The Supreme Court made me do it. The six conservatives may have on their race blindfolds (the ones they want everyone to wear).

<\/strong>But they don\u2019t have earplugs.

If you were bashful before, don\u2019t be. It\u2019s time for all of us to tell our stories. Cebuano. Ilocano. Tagalog. Tell it. Loudly. Race impacts your life, but you don\u2019t say so? Say it now.

Especially on college applications.

<\/strong>I had told a friend, a female Harvard classmate, that I thought I would cry when, as expected, the Supreme Court finally ruled against the use of race in college admissions. It would be like Dodd and Rowe. A roll back nearly 50 years. She understood.

<\/strong>And then the court ruled. But I didn\u2019t cry.

Maybe it\u2019s because I had a dental procedure scheduled that morning. Nothing like a double dose of Lidocaine to numb me while absorbing the opinion.

It helped me deal with the pain. I didn\u2019t feel it. I just got mad.

First, I felt a little guilty. Could I have done something to save affirmative action\u2014more than 50 years ago?

<\/strong>Chief Justice John Roberts was at Harvard at the same time I was there. And realized I had failed in my original race mission back in the \u201870s. My mere presence at \u201cthat school in Boston\u201d did not persuade young Roberts of the merits of diversity.

What about the mutual benefits of having an underprivileged Filipino kid as part of the student body at Harvard? Because I was not just there to take. I was there to give America\u2019s future leaders, like Roberts, a real-world understanding beyond white preppiedom, and to help him build the kind of empathy he\u2019d need to have as a chief justice of the United States.

Had I succeeded\u2013had our paths crossed\u2013maybe Roberts would not have written such a\u00a0 terrible opinion that set back civil rights progress in higher education nearly 50 years.

<\/strong>Robert\u2019s opinion was just wrong, beginning with his application of the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment to strike down the use of race in admissions.\u201cThe Harvard and UNC admissions programs cannot be reconciled with the guarantees of the Equal Protection Clause,\u201d wrote Roberts. \u201cBoth programs lack sufficiently focused and measurable objectives warranting the use of race, unavoidably employ race in a negative manner, involve racial stereotyping, and lack meaningful endpoints.\u201dEndpoints? Do you mean the meter\u2019s running on justice and fairness and at some point, racists just need to run out the clock?

The use of the Equal Protection Clause got the attention of Neal Katyal, former acting Solicitor General of the United States, who said that the Equal Protection Clause only binds state actors.

<\/strong>So can Harvard, a private institution, violate the Equal Protection Clause?

<\/strong>\u201cLegally, that\u2019s just impossible,\u201d said Katyal, a law school professor of more than 20 years in an interview on MSNBC. Katyal pointed out that by virtue of taking federal funds, Harvard\u00a0could<\/em>\u00a0be in violation of Title VI, a federal statute. \u201cBut Harvard certainly didn\u2019t violate the Constitution.\u201dBut you can\u2019t overturn nearly 50 years of civil rights precedent on a violation of a statute. It looks better if you can say our venerable Constitution\u2019s been violated.

And that exposes the subjective political nature of the decision, legal precedents be damned.

<\/strong>If you feel bad about this decision, you\u2019re in good company. Even the brightest legal minds in the nation were shaking their heads at this one.

(I read from Justice Sotomayor\u2019s opinion, which includes excerpts from the AALDEF amicus brief, on my Emil Amok\u2019s Takeout, E.548. I read from Judge Brown-Jackson\u2019s scathing opinion. And a bit from Clarence Thomas\u2019 opinion which includes his interpretation of Asian American history. See\/hear the recordings on www.amok.com).

The Loophole
<\/strong>At least Roberts didn\u2019t formally overturn existing laws. That would have been too difficult. He just removed a key single piece\u2014race.

By ruling that race could not be used in admissions, even in the narrow way it\u2019s used today, was enough to neuter any law promoting affirmative action.

But Roberts did allow for a loophole:

<\/strong>\u201cNothing in this opinion should be construed as prohibiting universities from considering an applicant\u2019s discussion of how race affected his or her life, be it through discrimination, inspiration or otherwise,\u201d Roberts wrote. \u201cIn other words, the student must be treated based on his or her experiences as an individual\u2014not on the basis of race.\u201dWell of course, for one, that would be a First Amendment issue and Roberts didn\u2019t want to get entangled with that.

So you want to go to Harvard? Tell your story. That hasn\u2019t changed in 50 years.

That\u2019s how I got in.

There\u2019s no time limit on the legacy of experienced racism that\u2019s handed down if you can still be your own witness.

My story
<\/strong>My grades were above average, and my test scores suggested I was born into a family and culture that didn\u2019t relate to test scores. If I was going to get in, it was always going to be the essay.I remember writing it by hand with an old plastic Bic pen. I pressed down so hard on the paper that it looked like a Dead Sea scroll.

<\/strong>The story was about my dad, who was 50 years older than me. He came in 1928 from the Philippines as a colonized American national, not a slave. Just a different variety of subservient.

He wasn\u2019t one of the students from well-heeled Filipino families. He was a Philippine farm boy in the U.S., where he couldn\u2019t vote, become a citizen, own property, or intermarry. His asthma prevented him from working the fields in the Central Valley of California, where Filipinos were lynched. So, he stayed in San Francisco and worked in restaurants as a cook.

Nearly 30 years passed before he was able to find a Filipino wife in the U.S. And then, I was born.

<\/strong>We never owned a car, were always renters, and moved every three years. But we ate chicken wings before they were cool.

<\/strong>In other words, I was born into Filipino American history. And still got good grades.

<\/strong>Harvard material? My father\u2019s story was. It\u2019s what I overcame.

The Harvard opinion makes it clear. On college applications, don\u2019t say race; tell your race story.

That has always been the best shot.

<\/strong>This past February, I was in New York City when I realized I\u2019m still telling my father\u2019s story, which includes Harvard, in my one-man show, \u201cEmil Amok: Lost NPR Host.\u201d\u00a0 (I\u2018m doing it again at the San Francisco Fringe, 277 Taylor Street, Sat. Aug. 12, 7pm; Thurs. Aug. 17, 8:30pm; Sat. Aug. 19, 1pm).

<\/strong>I invited several classmates from decades ago to come watch me perform and most of them showed up.

<\/strong>After the show, one friend said he was ashamed that he wasn\u2019t curious enough to get to know more about me and my circumstances back then.\u201cI just assumed you were like me,\u201d said the white Harvard legacy who then commented on the show. \u201cIt was incredibly moving and meaningful to be let in now and to have a better sense of who you are.\u201dI hadn\u2019t seen him in more than forty years.

But there was some bond that we formed long ago that crossed all differences and still could be culled up all these years later.

<\/strong>And that is the magic of race in admissions, and why it\u2019s still worth preserving given the new Roberts loophole.

When the magic works, our best notions of America are affirmed.

<\/strong>We must not let the court get in the way of that.

<\/strong>NOTE: I will talk about this column and other matters on \u201cEmil Amok\u2019s Takeout,\u201d my AAPI micro-talk show. Live @2p Pacific. Livestream on\u00a0<\/em>Facebook<\/em><\/a>; my\u00a0<\/em>YouTube<\/em><\/a>\u00a0channel; and\u00a0<\/em>Twitter<\/em><\/a>. Catch the recordings on\u00a0<\/em>www.amok.com<\/em><\/a>.<\/em>

EMIL GUILLERMO<\/strong> is a journalist and commentator. He was a columnist and editorial board member for the Advertiser and the Star-Bulletin. In Washington, he hosted NPR\u2019s \u201cAll Things Considered.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Emil Guillermo As it closed out its most recent term, the U.S. Supreme Court…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":18913,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[29,20,12],"tags":[],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/CP-SCOTUS-07152023.jpg?fit=467%2C480&ssl=1",467,480,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/CP-SCOTUS-07152023.jpg?resize=150%2C150&ssl=1",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/CP-SCOTUS-07152023.jpg?fit=292%2C300&ssl=1",292,300,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/CP-SCOTUS-07152023.jpg?fit=467%2C480&ssl=1",467,480,true],"large":["https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/CP-SCOTUS-07152023.jpg?fit=467%2C480&ssl=1",467,480,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/CP-SCOTUS-07152023.jpg?fit=467%2C480&ssl=1",467,480,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/CP-SCOTUS-07152023.jpg?fit=467%2C480&ssl=1",467,480,true],"ultp_layout_landscape_large":["https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/CP-SCOTUS-07152023.jpg?resize=467%2C480&ssl=1",467,480,true],"ultp_layout_landscape":["https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/CP-SCOTUS-07152023.jpg?resize=467%2C480&ssl=1",467,480,true],"ultp_layout_portrait":["https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/CP-SCOTUS-07152023.jpg?resize=467%2C480&ssl=1",467,480,true],"ultp_layout_square":["https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/CP-SCOTUS-07152023.jpg?resize=467%2C480&ssl=1",467,480,true],"covernews-slider-full":["https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/CP-SCOTUS-07152023.jpg?resize=467%2C480&ssl=1",467,480,true],"covernews-slider-center":["https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/CP-SCOTUS-07152023.jpg?resize=467%2C480&ssl=1",467,480,true],"covernews-featured":["https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/CP-SCOTUS-07152023.jpg?fit=467%2C480&ssl=1",467,480,true],"covernews-medium":["https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/CP-SCOTUS-07152023.jpg?resize=418%2C340&ssl=1",418,340,true],"covernews-medium-square":["https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/CP-SCOTUS-07152023.jpg?resize=259%2C250&ssl=1",259,250,true]},"author_info":{"info":["admin"]},"category_info":"Candid Perspectives<\/a> Featured<\/a> Mainland<\/a>","tag_info":"Mainland","comment_count":"0","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/CP-SCOTUS-07152023.jpg?fit=467%2C480&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18953"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18953"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18953\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18954,"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18953\/revisions\/18954"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18913"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18953"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18953"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18953"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}