I’ve been struggling to describe how I am feeling since I heard of Hon. Ginsburg’s passing Friday evening. It’s hard to explain to someone feeling a heavy sense of grief over the passing of a person I have never met. This person, however, has had a direct effect on my life and how I live it.
The first thing that I felt after the initial shock, was fear; and a loss of hope. RBG was a symbol of strength, and a last vestige of what felt good and right in the world in this fucked up country. I knew in my bones that her seat would immediately become another acrimonious display of the morally bankrupt nature of our political system and government. Within mere minutes of notice of her passing, the GOP is stepping over her still cooling body to grasp whatever last vestiges of power they can before the election. The hypocrisy and bullshit spindoctoring of their reasons for why they can do this despite how they treated Merrick Garland are so nonsensical and asinine that I will not even address them.
Ruth knew this was going to happen too. Reportedly, she told her granddaughter that her dying wish was that her replacement not be considered/confirmed until after the election. Let me repeat that, SOME OF HER LAST WORDS WERE ABOUT WHO SHOULD TAKE HER FUCKING JOB. It makes me incredibly angry that she even had to think about these things in the last moments of her life. RUTH SHOULD NOT HAVE HAD THE WEIGHT OF OUR DEMOCRACY AND OF A FUNCTIONING CIVIL SOCIETY ON HER SHOULDERS.
SHAME. ON. ALL. OF. US.
I’m grieving because I owe this woman a lot for the life that I am able to live. I am a practicing female attorney who also has (some, possibly dwindling) rights to manage my own body, and a continuing shot at equal pay. If Ruth had never lived and done the things that she did in her life. I would not have much of what I see around me at this very moment. This very moment right fucking now. Right after the news of her death came out, a friend of mine contacted me, sobbing. You see, this friend was raped as a young adult. She told me her terrifying story of having to wait for weeks before a valid pregnancy test could be done, and how, without Roe, she would also have had to carry to term a baby that was the product of that violence. She spoke of her pure terror at losing control over her own BODY if GOP efforts to pack the court are successful. Have you ever had a court case tell you whether you have the same rights as straight, cis-het white men? Have you?
How about the fact that women are, on the average, better educated than men, and better managers of money, yet we still aren’t paid as well? Women are the primary earners in at least 50% of families, and this is based on 2017 data. This will continue to rise. Ruth knew this, and fought to change it. We still have work to do. Have you ever been told that your work was less valuable, just because of your genitals? Have you?
And now the GOP wants to name another old white man to take away rights of women, immigrants and PoC, and basically everyone who isn’t a white billionaire. Isn’t that nice. More of the same from this fading world power. Its our own damn fault, and we deserve it.
Res Ipsa Loco 
