Legislative drafting
Feb. 24th, 2011 09:47 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ravenMy con law prof, this morning: "You're contradicting yourself. Yesterday I asked you if you thought McKinnon's Indiana anti-pornography ordinance would be upheld by the Supreme Court. You said no. Have you changed your mind?"
"No," I said, "today you asked if I thought the ordinance was constitutional."
"You're a cynic, Ms. [my last name]," he said, thoughtfully. And when I opened my mouth to argue: "I didn't say you're not right."
I heart my con law prof thiiiiiis much.
On the whole, it has been an aggravating day. Apparently I am whatever the opposite of a First-Amendment cheerleader is, for one thing, and after that the Siren and I attempted to go to the pool: she had forgotten shampoo; I had forgotten where my towel was, we couldn't find anywhere to park, couldn't find change, forgot the third person we were supposed to pick up and then it started to snow. Not what one would call an enormous success.
That said I had a very nice dinner and have made a start on some work, so.
My homework for this week: drafing a legislative amendment to a defence appropriations bill authorising funds for dredging a harbour, subject to two points of order: no separate authorisation of funds, and no affirmative substantive legislation. I am having ALL THE FUN IN THE WORLD doing this. I sometimes wonder whether I'm doing the right things with my life. Then I remember I am the only person in the world who actively loves legislative drafting, and then I don't worry so much.
(Okay, but I do love it! I do! It's like some kind of cross between formal logic, writing fanfic and doing cryptic crosswords, and it's a buzz to get it right.)
So, anyway, dredging of harbours. It's fascinating. Oh, and I finished The Merlin Conspiracy. I was sort of disappointed by it, to be honest. It suffers from the handicap of trying to be two books at once: a stand-alone YA novel, and a sequel to Deep Secret. And speaking of Deep Secret, it's completely hilarious how hard the publishers have tried to deny the fact it exists: the blurb doesn't mention it, the inner flap doesn't mention it, the "Also by the author" doesn't mention it! And yet, the plot wouldn't to me make any sense without it: I mean, who the Magids are isn't explained, neither is the fact that Nick is just casually heir to an Empire, and... yeah. I think the book suffers from a whole lot of things happening at once without any real structure, mainly because it doesn't know what it wants to be.
Which isn't to say it's all bad: the world-building's great, the characters are hilarious - I love how this book does confirm that yes, all Magids have completely, completely ridiculous lives; Maxwell Hyde being chased around by salamanders and having to get two-hundred-pounds'-worth of drunk before he can travel between worlds is fabulous - and I do love her refusal to write down to people. But, still.
Oh, and, I knew this, but Diana Wynne Jones is rubbish on race. I've read ten of her books in the last six months, and it annoys me that only one character in all of those is brown. (And Nirupam Singh only appears in the one book!) I know people are going to object and say Tacroy, but, well, Tacroy doesn't come from, say, Asia in our world, or Asia in Chrestomanci's world, or wherever: he comes from the EVIL WORLD OF BROWN PEOPLE. (edit: I forgot Millie, as well - Millie, whose origin story is very indicative of her being brown, to my delight, but then this is never so much as mentioned again.) In Deep Secret, Rupert's list of potential Magids is supposed to cover the whole world - and somehow everyone on it is white. And in The Merlin Conspiracy, Pudmini is quite probably Indian, and she has an Indian name, and she's... an elephant. A talking elephant. But nevertheless. An elephant.
Oh, and Nick (and, presumably, Maree) is dark, but the narrative deals with this by telling us that he keeps being mistaken for Asian, and doesn't like it. And there's this running gag about how some of the other characters talk about his "Oriental mysticism", and I get the spirit of it - it's meant to make fun of the people who do talk about that sort of thing - but at the same time I sort of think, okay, is it that hilarious that the magic-using protagonist of a fantasy novel could be brown?
So much as I have enjoyed her books so far, I think I am setting them down for the moment. I have The Wind's Twelve Quarters from the public library, which is the last Le Guin short-story collection I haven't read. I'm looking forward to that one.
"No," I said, "today you asked if I thought the ordinance was constitutional."
"You're a cynic, Ms. [my last name]," he said, thoughtfully. And when I opened my mouth to argue: "I didn't say you're not right."
I heart my con law prof thiiiiiis much.
On the whole, it has been an aggravating day. Apparently I am whatever the opposite of a First-Amendment cheerleader is, for one thing, and after that the Siren and I attempted to go to the pool: she had forgotten shampoo; I had forgotten where my towel was, we couldn't find anywhere to park, couldn't find change, forgot the third person we were supposed to pick up and then it started to snow. Not what one would call an enormous success.
That said I had a very nice dinner and have made a start on some work, so.
My homework for this week: drafing a legislative amendment to a defence appropriations bill authorising funds for dredging a harbour, subject to two points of order: no separate authorisation of funds, and no affirmative substantive legislation. I am having ALL THE FUN IN THE WORLD doing this. I sometimes wonder whether I'm doing the right things with my life. Then I remember I am the only person in the world who actively loves legislative drafting, and then I don't worry so much.
(Okay, but I do love it! I do! It's like some kind of cross between formal logic, writing fanfic and doing cryptic crosswords, and it's a buzz to get it right.)
So, anyway, dredging of harbours. It's fascinating. Oh, and I finished The Merlin Conspiracy. I was sort of disappointed by it, to be honest. It suffers from the handicap of trying to be two books at once: a stand-alone YA novel, and a sequel to Deep Secret. And speaking of Deep Secret, it's completely hilarious how hard the publishers have tried to deny the fact it exists: the blurb doesn't mention it, the inner flap doesn't mention it, the "Also by the author" doesn't mention it! And yet, the plot wouldn't to me make any sense without it: I mean, who the Magids are isn't explained, neither is the fact that Nick is just casually heir to an Empire, and... yeah. I think the book suffers from a whole lot of things happening at once without any real structure, mainly because it doesn't know what it wants to be.
Which isn't to say it's all bad: the world-building's great, the characters are hilarious - I love how this book does confirm that yes, all Magids have completely, completely ridiculous lives; Maxwell Hyde being chased around by salamanders and having to get two-hundred-pounds'-worth of drunk before he can travel between worlds is fabulous - and I do love her refusal to write down to people. But, still.
Oh, and, I knew this, but Diana Wynne Jones is rubbish on race. I've read ten of her books in the last six months, and it annoys me that only one character in all of those is brown. (And Nirupam Singh only appears in the one book!) I know people are going to object and say Tacroy, but, well, Tacroy doesn't come from, say, Asia in our world, or Asia in Chrestomanci's world, or wherever: he comes from the EVIL WORLD OF BROWN PEOPLE. (edit: I forgot Millie, as well - Millie, whose origin story is very indicative of her being brown, to my delight, but then this is never so much as mentioned again.) In Deep Secret, Rupert's list of potential Magids is supposed to cover the whole world - and somehow everyone on it is white. And in The Merlin Conspiracy, Pudmini is quite probably Indian, and she has an Indian name, and she's... an elephant. A talking elephant. But nevertheless. An elephant.
Oh, and Nick (and, presumably, Maree) is dark, but the narrative deals with this by telling us that he keeps being mistaken for Asian, and doesn't like it. And there's this running gag about how some of the other characters talk about his "Oriental mysticism", and I get the spirit of it - it's meant to make fun of the people who do talk about that sort of thing - but at the same time I sort of think, okay, is it that hilarious that the magic-using protagonist of a fantasy novel could be brown?
So much as I have enjoyed her books so far, I think I am setting them down for the moment. I have The Wind's Twelve Quarters from the public library, which is the last Le Guin short-story collection I haven't read. I'm looking forward to that one.
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no subject
on 2011-02-25 07:11 pm (UTC)You are both made of AWESOME.
no subject
on 2011-02-26 12:44 am (UTC)no subject
on 2011-02-25 03:30 am (UTC)no subject
on 2011-02-25 03:34 am (UTC)no subject
on 2011-02-25 03:36 am (UTC)no subject
on 2011-02-25 04:10 am (UTC)no subject
on 2011-02-25 04:29 am (UTC)I'm also intrigued by how this relates to the faux-Victorian/faux-Edwardian setting. Much as I consider her a very clever author in many respects, I don't think she's doing anything clever-in-a-praiseworthy way here about, you know, Empire, power, and so on. But I suspect that that context is inflecting the writing in some fashion, even if I can't unpick it offhand. Is Chrestomanci, as a role, something like being a colonial official, perhaps? Governing the virtual 'province' of magic.
(Not very relatedly: I think I'd read Oneir as non-white until you drew my attention more keenly to the near-total dominance of white characters - but that seems to be me reading him rather than DWJ writing him.)
What do you think of Nirupam? It's ages and ages since I read WW. (Obviously don't answer this if you're out of race-and-lit-crit spoons.)
no subject
on 2011-02-25 04:46 am (UTC)no subject
on 2011-02-25 02:09 pm (UTC)I really like your reading of Chrestomanci as a colonial official! That fits perfectly within the setting - and it would be lovely to know more about how magic works in the universe. Is it a white-people thing? Or do people have all their own different types of it? Does Chrestomanci-in-training have to learn about how Indian people and Chinese people and South African people and people everywhere do magic?
Re: Oneir. The thing that makes me not read him as brown is actually his daughter, who is such a pink 'n' white with pigtails archetype.
no subject
on 2011-02-25 04:43 am (UTC)I mean, I totally see your point. When Christopher gives him back his soul, and the thing he says is "Now I really am your man," if that's not Unfortunate Implications, I don't know what is. And yet, I love that line. I'm a sucker for feudal relationships. See also, Vorkosigans.
So yeah, it would be a lot less problematic if Mordecai were white.
And yet. He's brown, and he's awesome. This is a bad thing now? We need fewer awesome brown characters, now? Here is, as you point out, the only brown character in the series (besides Nirupam, who is also awesome and less problematic, but really, two is not too many); it doesn't seem right to me to want to make him white.
As far as brown!Millie goes . . . I think this is a casualty of the out-of-chronological order in which the books were written; I am fairly certain DWJ did not yet know Millie's origins when she wrote Charmed Life. But when Cat first encounters Millie in Charmed Life, he describes her as extremely ordinary-looking, which, given that he seems to live in a world with no brown people, would indicate that she isn't, either. Also Roger and Julia are described as resembling Millie, and they're explicitly described as pale. So, while I like the idea of brown!Millie, I can't quite buy it as canon.
Also, I kind of have to grit my teeth through the bits in Conrad's Fate with the Travellers.
So, yeah. Kind of rubbish on race. What can you do.
no subject
on 2011-02-25 02:30 pm (UTC)Well, of course not. My dispute is over whether Tacroy actually is what we'd understand as brown, and if he is, if he's that awesome given his backstory. I'd rather he were white than brown with implications that being brown is undesirable.
So, while I like the idea of brown!Millie, I can't quite buy it as canon
The place to fix this would be Conrad's Fate, I think. Because, I think, the same problem exists as with Tacroy... if Millie isn't brown, then why give her this origin story that so heavily implies she is? It's at worst appropriative and at best rather odd.
So, yeah. Kind of rubbish on race. What can you do.
At the moment, stopping reading. I'll go back to her, I'm sure, because I really do enjoy her books, but I've had enough for the moment.
no subject
on 2011-02-26 07:08 pm (UTC)Well, he's not white. Not only that, but he's not green with pink polka dots, either--on a purely physical level, he's pretty unambiguously brown.
And while I'm willing to acknowledge that there are problematic aspects to his character, nothing will convince me that he's not awesome. I'm not sure that I'm really up to rational discussion on this point; it's more the way I swoon whenever he comes onto the page.
As far as Millie goes, you're right, of course; DWJ isn't one of those authors who refuses to ever retcon anything. If she had wanted to explicitly retcon Millie's skin color she certainly could have.
At the moment, stopping reading. I'll go back to her, I'm sure, because I really do enjoy her books, but I've had enough for the moment.
Fair enough. I can shut up now, if you'd like.
no subject
on 2011-02-25 07:46 am (UTC)no subject
on 2011-02-25 02:36 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2011-02-25 08:22 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2011-02-25 09:24 pm (UTC)I just bought The Birthday of the World in Oxfam, and am looking forward to reading it.
no subject
on 2011-02-25 09:45 am (UTC)During my first year of my Publishing MA we got her editor in to give a talk to us, and I sort of got to chatting to him, and I told him that Deep Secret was the one book that got me through my first year of uni (in 2000/'01) -- because it's true, it did. I don't know how I would have survived if it wasn't for that book, I must have re-read it about thirty times over that year. He almost got all teary about it -- apparently it was hugely important to Ms Jones, and they were both disappointed that the publisher didn't do more with it. So yeah. Kinda strange that this does happen even to one of the bestselling authors in the UK (and possibly the world, am not too familiar with her fanbase).
BTW I just want to say, I know I mostly lurk on your journal, but I love reading about how enthusiastic you are about your course, and the bits of Law you enjoy. <3
no subject
on 2011-02-26 12:44 am (UTC)(that's really nice to say! thank you.)
no subject
on 2011-02-25 11:06 am (UTC)OK, clearly I should have looked it up or something. But ... I just picked it up randomly and cheaply in Barter Books or something, read it, thought it was intriguing but sort of off-balance, left it for a bit, re-read, thought the same thing, didn't really think about it much again. Clearly I need to read Deep Secret and try again ...
(Also, I keep reading that first section as about your Corn Law prof, which entertains me enormously. That would be one specific course! Anyway. Relieved to hear he's cynical too, tbh, I think I'd be pretty sorry if someone in his academic field wasn't, rather ...)
no subject
on 2011-02-25 02:41 pm (UTC)boyfriendNEMESISsomething, and ridiculous and clever and delightful.My con law prof has been teaching for fifty years and getting more liberal with each passing one. :) He has this habit of saying, "Oh, so, I wrote an article about it in the eighties... I was much more right-wing then, I'm much better now."
no subject
on 2011-02-25 04:52 pm (UTC)I really hope you end up drafting legislation on this side of the Atlantic.
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on 2011-02-25 05:12 pm (UTC)I really hope you end up drafting legislation on this side of the Atlantic.
Me too. :)
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on 2011-02-25 06:42 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2011-02-25 06:45 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2011-02-25 06:55 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2011-02-25 07:02 pm (UTC)As for why I thought it was constitutional, okay. The jurisprudence of the First Amendment contains a lot of unprotected categories of speech: advocacy of illegal action isn't protected (Schenk, the infamous "fire in a crowded theater" case; neither are "fighting words" (Chaplinsky v New Hampshire); nor is obscenity (Paris Adult Theatre v Slaton). In New York v Ferber, the court created a new category for depictions of child porn on the grounds that a) the constitutional value of allowing these depictions was de minimis; b) they had been shown to exacerbate abuse of children and thus cause harm.
McKinnon, in her ordinance, cited studies showing that exposure to violent pornography did increase the propensity of those exposed to commit rapes, and tailored it to prohibiting porn that sexualises violence against women, not porn generally. Thus, my argument is: if Ferber is constitutional (because of limited constitutional value, and harm caused) then the McKinnon audience should be, too.
no subject
on 2011-02-25 07:08 pm (UTC)Tangentially, this raises a question that I've been meaning to ask you: am I right that the judiciary has had a far greater role in shaping the US, than it has in the UK? I mean, obviously neither body actually makes law, but it seems to me that parliamentary sovereignty has limited greatly what the judiciary can do, and thus I can't imagine the UK ever having had an equivalent of Roe V Wade or Brown V the Board of Education.
no subject
on 2011-02-25 07:13 pm (UTC)That is not an easy question to answer! On a fairly superficial level, you can argue straightaway that the British lack of American-style judicial review does have that effect, yes. In the UK, parliamentary sovereignty engenders a tradition of major social change through legislation, so there's much less interplay between branches. Some people have even argued that the US doesn't need judicial review at all, because the UK manages without it just fine.
[I wrote a paper about this last semester! It was.... long.]
no subject
on 2011-02-25 07:19 pm (UTC)I'd like to read that paper some time.
Thanks, this has been enlightening.
no subject
on 2011-02-25 07:22 pm (UTC)You're welcome. :) I can send you the paper if you really want it!
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on 2011-02-25 07:24 pm (UTC)Oh, and one final question. How did the Supreme Court justify ruling it unconstitutional?
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on 2011-02-25 07:27 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2011-02-25 07:57 pm (UTC)Thanks for the paper. I look forward to reading it.