The previous post discussed the level of hysteria now being attained by the Trump Deranged, with a U.S. Senator yesterday joining in the bonkers conspiracy theory that the Trump administration is a cabal of actual Nazis . Chris Murphy’s echoing the ridiculous Big Lie that Elon Musk gave a deliberate Nazi salute—you know, like Superman when he’s flying—
….managed to surpass even the late campaign claims by the dumbest sub-species among the Axis of Unethical Conduct that Trump was emulating the American Nazi Party when he held a campaign rally in Madison Square Garden. Yes, the Nazi salute smear on Musk is even worse than that, though redolent of the “OK” secret white supremacy hand signal insanity that the Mad Left used to slime everyone from lawyers to baseball fans during Trump’s first term.
Here is Vogue, writing about the cool necklace Ketanji Brown Jackson (above) wore to the inauguration:
“Over her black robes, the Justice wore a collar made of cowrie shells along with a pair of matching earrings …Meanwhile, the National Museum of African American History and Culture notes that, in America, the shell is thought to be a totem used to resist enslavement. Justice Jackson herself is a descendant of enslaved people. The connection feels particularly prescient on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, which happened to coincide with the Inauguration…”
So we are supposed to assume that a learned Justice of the Supreme Court, because she is black, should be presumed to be a believer in African witchcraft based on the kind of seas shells in her necklace, and boldly trying to fight slavery at the Trump Inauguration, because President Trump obviously represents a threat to all blacks.
Has Justice Jackson even hinted that this was what she was trying to communicate. Nah, it’s obvious, isn’t it? Joy Reid, the racist, Trump Deranged MSNBC hack of hacks, announced that this was Jackson’s intent on “X,” posting that “#justicejackson was all of us.” All of us are wearing big shell necklaces? All of us are secretly signalling that Trump is Simon Legree? Has no one on the Clearly Losing It Left heard of Occam’s Razor, the principle that the simplest explanation for any phenomenon tends to be the correct one?
Because I got my degree before colleges devoted most of their time to indoctrinating students into far left cant, I actually learned how to apply Occam’s analytical tool, and thus I assume that Jackson was wearing that necklace because it looks cool and that she attended the Inauguration as a gesture of respect (SCOTUS Justices are not required to go), not to cast a spell to protect blacks from the evil reincarnation of Hitler.
Vogue then goes on to issue a paragraph that should stand as a monument to confirmation bias, the post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy, unethical reporting and civic discourse pollution as well as Trump-Derangement:
Beyond its status as a protective talisman, the cowrie is also associated with womanhood and fertility. During his first term, Trump — who was found liable for sexual abuse in May 2023 — made continuous efforts to erode women’s rights, which included appointing Brett Kavanaugh, who was accused of attempted rape, to the Supreme Court. Even after Trump left office, his insidious, anti-women agenda continued to rear its head when the conservative-leaning Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June 2022.
Wow. At what point will every fair and rational person still willing to associate with the Democratic Party conclude, “You know what? This is too much. I don’t want to be around these people, support them, vote for them, or be regarded as one of them. They are either bonkers or assholes. I’m out”?
For the record, the author of this crap is fashion editor Hannah Jackson, who belongs in the category described by Scott Jennings while commenting on Sen. Murphy’s self-beclowning: “The only good thing about the Elon salute stupidity is that it adds to the list of people in public life who should never, ever, ever be taken seriously ever again by anyone ever.” I can’t imagine why anyone would ever take a Vogue fashion editor seriously anyway, but still: file away for future reference that this one is a blight on American society.
Ethics Alarms 
It is this very sort of line of thought that encourages me to check myself whenever I think I am straying into presuming I understand another person’s thoughts or motivations.
It is a cool necklace. She may have it for no other reason than that it was a gift and has ethnic significance (regardless of what that significance is).
I got my wife a Claddagh ring for her wedding ring, even though neither of us have ancestors from Galway, and she’s over 50% German-Scandinavian. I thought it was a nice design, has ethnic significance for us, and conveys an important message in a marital context. (When we discussed the wedding rings, she said she thought a heart-shaped diamond would be cheesy (or something to that effect); when she saw the ring, she did not complain one bit.)
As for the Justice, I heard those shells were also used as currency in Africa because of their rarity and difficulty in counterfeiting. Thus, for all we know, this is a hidden suggestion to Trump that she stands with the plutocratic oligarchs Joe Biden warned us about.
I am sure Trump got the message.
-Jut
Insofar as Justice Jackson graduated from your alma mater in 1992, I wouldn’t be surprised if the necklace was in fact intended as a protest. Was it Justice Ginsberg or Justice O’Connor who used to wear sort of a Belgian lace piece over her robe?
I always thought those were called “pukka” shells worn in a single strand and favored by blond, white, surfer dudes from Southern California.
Additionally, insofar as Justice Jackson is not African but was raised, as was I, in Miami, Florida, isn’t wearing that necklace cultural appropriation which should be vociferously condemned?
Pukka shells are smaller and round, like buttons; and yes, usually stacked and strung together into a bracelet. They were all the rage when I was growing up. Brings back memories.
“They were all the rage when I was growing up. Brings back memories.”
Do tell! I still have a Pukka Shell chain (WESconsin Y-Chromosomal Units don’t wear “necklaces”) which hangs ’round the neck of a Rodin’s The Thinker statue in my WC.
Got it in a swap for a drink in Ft. Lauderdale in early ’76; it’s pert’ ‘near a gosh darn Heirloom.
PWS
which hangs ’round the neck of a Rodin’s The Thinker statue in my WC.
I love this! I have a concrete bust of some unnamed woman, who has a pot of African violets growing out the top of her head, and a string of Bourbon St. beads around her neck.
Several former gal pals had…um…interesting, and similar, stories about acquiring “Bourbon St. beads”
PWS
Ginsberg was the serial lace wearer and attached significance to when and what she wore. She was the only recent jurist (that I’m aware of) who actually flat-out admitted she was biased against the administration she served with. She also wore her “dissenting” jabot the day after Trump was elected.
Much more egregious that the fake issues that have arisen over Alito’s (or his wife’s) conduct, but, hey, without double standards…
All of which replies support my suspicion that Justice Jackson was in fact making a Black Power like statement. The editors at Vogue may have even been tipped beforehand.
I would suggest the maximum amount of ink used to respond would be that used in the phrase “Bless their heart”. We all know what that means.
Giving them attention just rewards them.
When I saw the photo of Justice Jackson, I though the collar might vaguely be a tribute to Bader-Ginsburg (reminiscent of her regular collar, and NOT even her “dissent” collar).
Imagine the mental gymnastics to claim the Justice is using a symbol of fertility to protest restrictions on abortion.
Rich, to modern woman, having an abortion is indicative of fertility. Being able to control when you have a baby, separate and apart from when and with whom you have sex, IS empowerment, which equals fertility.
I am woman. Hear me roar.
War is Peace.
Freedom is Slavery.
Abortion is Reproductive Healthcare.
Love is love.
These non-sequiturs sound like code words recited to get past a person guarding a gate in some science fiction or Berlin Wall era thriller.
Everyone who has ever even heard of the idea that seashells are an anti-slavery talisman, raise your right hand.
Grace had a necklace with those same shells. I never suspected she was a witch.
Jack wrote:
At what point will every fair and rational person still willing to associate with the Democratic Party conclude, “You know what? This is too much. I don’t want to be around these people, support them, vote for them, or be regarded as one of them. They are either bonkers or assholes. I’m out”?
They should embrace the healing power of “and.”
Are there any fair and rational people associated with the Democratic Party? All the Trump Deranged individuals and entities seem to be simply doubling down as if it’s 2017. Thank God they’re not able to appoint congressional committees. It should be interesting to see whether the Deep State can be uprooted. I love Trump’s having taken away security clearances for the infamous fifty-one security experts. Be gone!
Old Bill wrote:
Are there any fair and rational people associated with the Democratic Party?
I’m sure there are. My theory is that they are simply afraid to make themselves heard. Who wants to be shouted down by the rabid Left, who are far louder and more poisonous in their rhetoric than the rational folks you wonder about. For example, Jonathan Turley is a Democrat such as you describe, and he has written a book that, in part, deals with the self-censorship I suspect is at the root of the dearth of in-party opposition.
But I admit there are few willing to engage their more radical fellows, and understandably so.
The Prof’s commentariat is awful. I wonder if the Democratic party hasn’t left him. Frankly, I don’t think of him as a Democrat, any more than I think of Alan Dershowitz as a Democrat. Or Mark Penn. Wasn’t he the Clinton’s pollster?
And in theory I can see Democrats just keeping their heads down, but they all seem to be vocally showing their bona fides.
Just the noisy ones. Which is to say, the rabid Left. It’s easy to figure that there are only radicals, but experience shows that’s not true.
The quiet ones are the ones that could resurrect the Democrat party. That’s why I want them to stay quiet and in fear of the noisy ones. The longer, the better.
Occam’s Razor might apply, but methinks that the good Justice was, in fact, making a statement with the beads/shells. Fromthe National Museum of African American History & Culture,
“Knowing that Africans used cowries as charms for protection, historians speculate the cowries may have been brought to America as talismans to resist enslavement.”
https://nmaahc.si.edu/cowrie-shells-and-trade-power
jvb
“Historians speculate”? That vague plural, like “experts say.” Why assume that an A-A judge is up on her African superstitions? If Clarence Thomas wore cowry cuff links, should we assume the same thing?
Sometimes a necklace is just a necklace.
This is the same Justice who, as a nominee for SCOTUS, couldn’t define what a woman is. Oh, by the way, I am not offended that she appeared in the Broadway show a few weeks ago. According to her bio, she has been involved in theater for most of her life, and she might even be a talented performer.
jvb
Based on her B-way debut, she’d definitely not.
Jack,
If Cowries were used as currency and symbolized wealth in west African countries. The use of them to avoid enslavement would be more likely to be used in Africa not in the Americas. Those sent to the Americas were already in chains. Symbols of wealth such as cowries or Kinte cloths like those worn by Schumer, Pelosi and others as virtue symbols also represent to which class or tribe the individual belongs. Wealthy Ghanaians, and others on the Ivory Coast who profited by selling humans to Europeans, did not sell their own people they captured people from other tribes for sale. Those without wealth could not raise armies to protect themselves from the Ghanaian slavers.
More to the point, though, the Vogue article celebrates Brown Jackson’s woke bona fides and African American heritage. I would suggest that if the Left is making the assertion that these shells are political, then they probably are.
jvb
Second.
I agree, sometimes a necklace is only a “Authentic African Statement Ethnic Cowrie Sea Shell Beaded Tassels Collar Necklace” off of Etsy for $6.7
https://www.etsy.com/listing/1363342718/authentic-african-statement-ethnic?ga_order=most_relevant&ga_search_type=all&ga_view_type=gallery&ga_search_query=cowrie+cufflinks&ref=sr_gallery-1-21&content_source=e2c89f0070faf13dc61fa78342434090d19544f6%253A1363342718&organic_search_click=1
I’d say that’s relevant evidence…that Justice Jackson is a jerk, among other things.
I guess two things….
First, I remember very vividly a cowrie swag lamp my parents had in their living room, with orange corduroy couches and green shag carpet. It all makes so much sense now: They weren’t hippies! They were African witches!
Sorry.
Second, despite how ridiculous some of the examples are, I think it pays to take a step back and remember the absolute fucking dumpsterfire meltdown that was 2016/2017. This feels more, I don’t know, reasonable. At least comparatively.
Oh, absolutely, HT. I wouldn’t use reasonable, though. Less intense? Less confident maybe. More desperate?
My first glance at Justice Brown Jackson’s necklace caused me great excitement, because I thought, “Here’s a woman that loves Super Sugar Crisp cereal and isn’t afraid to tell the world, loud and proud!”
So imagine my disappointment when I began reading…
Sugar Crisp was a traditional African symbol of fertility and for summoning the protection of a beneficent bear spirit carrying a giant spoon and who talked like Bing Crosby…
I like Josh Blackman’s take on this, which compared it to the claimed ethics violations of Alito’s wife’s flags. I await the demands for her to recuse herself from any cases involving Trump… 😉
I really doubt she was intending any particular message by wearing it.