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Notes -
It might be zero-sum, but with an obvious Schelling point. The Schelling point is proportional representation (PR), where you basically just round the vote to the reciprocal of the number of representatives. If your state has five representatives and with a vote of R: 63%, D: 37%, you would end up with three seats for the GOP and two for the Dems. Anyone who prefers another distribution (2-3, 4-1 and 5-0 could all be gerrymandered) will have a hell of a time arguing that their system is actually fairer.
This is similar to how 'one man (or adult citizen of whatever gender identity, these days), one vote' is an obvious Schelling point. Sure, you can argue that instead voting power should be weighted according to some characteristic, perhaps income tax or education attainment or score on a civics test or the voters ability to fight in a civil war or number of children not dependent on social security, but the chance of convincing most of the others that any of these is actually a fairer way to assign voting power is basically nil.
I would be surprised if the VRA had actually lead to red states being gerrymandered in a way which favored the Dems beyond PR, though it certainly led to limits on how much the state could be gerrymandered in favor of the GOP. The obvious move would be to say 'okay, the VRA says the Blacks get two majority districts, so we will make districts where the majority is Black and the rest is university towns full of pinko liberals'.
Personally, I see gerrymandering as an injustice, and there is no right to equality in injustice. If the VRA limits gerrymandering all of your ethnic minorities into a single district, the GOP could push for federal legislation prohibiting putting all of your religious minorities (e.g. Evangelicals) into a single district.
Even if this is true, this means blue states could be gerrymandered in a way which favored the Democrats (as with Massachusetts, 9 Democratic representatives to 0 GOP in a state that's about 30% Republican) while red states could not be gerrymandered in a way which favored the GOP.
Equality in injustice is better than inequality in injustice favoring one side... from the viewpoint of the other side.
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