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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   29310 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of December 12, 2022

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Yeah, it's infuriating to me that the legislative and executive can pass and sign a law, spend lots of time and money enforcing it, and then only when someone's rights are actually infringed upon, does someone have to gamble by breaking the law and challenging it. And, this process may take years (all the while the state can often keep enforcing the law) and lots of money, and may result in failure for any number of technicalities, or result in the offending government pulling the rug out to render the exact case moot while keeping all of the substantial infringing provisions (like New York did before Bruen and I think is trying to do again), or result in the court granting relief on some specific case without addressing the big issue (like with one of the original Colorado baker/photography cases, which didn't address whether the law was constitutional, but was resolved based on the outright animus the commission in charge had for religion).

Yes. You can't precedent or procedure or automate your way around the bedrock truth that societies work more smoothly when everyone (1) is approximately on the same page, (2) is willing to act on the spirit of the rules rather than the letter, and (3) trust the other side to do so as well.

Without those things, everything just devolves back into low-trust, cynical, you're-not-winning-if-you're-not-cheating hardball.

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