My Take | The beginning of the end of the American Union as we know it
- Two decisions by the United States’ highest court will erode women’s rights and undermine the separation of church and state, two enlightenment principles that have inspired progressive governance the world over
Forget George Orwell’s 1984. The novel that will tell you something about what’s happening in the world’s self-styled greatest democracy actually came out in 1985. It’s The Handmaid’s Tale, by revered Canadian poet and novelist Margaret Atwood.
All that was long ago forewarned by Atwood. At the time, some critics blasted the novel’s implausible takes on sexual repression, religious dominance, denial of women’s reproductive rights and the rise of Christian fundamentalism as wrong-headed, a regressive look to the past rather than a guide to the future.
Well, now we know better! In the novel, the Republic of Gilead replaces much of the continental United States. Women have no reproductive rights; their sexuality is completely controlled and supervised by the state.
The US is not there yet, but the latest decision by its highest court has taken a giant step in that direction by erasing the constitutional right of women’s reproductive autonomy that the same court had recognised for half a century.
In another equally important if less-reported case, it has just ended the centuries-old constitutional ban on direct state aid to the teaching of religion. Bear in mind that this is a republic that was founded on the fundamental principle of the separation of church and state.