RichmondPhilsFan wrote:Doc, come on. You're better than this. What do you think "deprived of life" means if it's not referring to death?
you didn't get the memo. Strict textualism is in; interpretation is out.
I'm not a lawyer. I'm reading the words that are there in the text of the amendment. If a lawyer wants to tell me they're relying on what the words in the document literally say, then when they insist on a meaning that is not literally in those words, they have demonstrated that they believe what the words say, "ACTUALLY" mean something other than what the FUCKING words say.
And that, of course, requires a sane human being to recognise that what the words actually say can, and indeed must often, be interpreted by the reader - relying, I hope, on what they can glean from resources the author(s) of the words consulted in choosing the words they actually wrote down.
But then of course we're NOT being strictly textual. Which is good, because it means we're sane human beings living in the actual, dynamic, real world. That we're essentially, actively, fitting what we understand the guidance of our government's foundational documents to be telling us, to our circumstances in the world as it exists now.
But it also means we understand that interpretations of the words of those documents can and will justifiably differ. That there IS no single interpretation that is sacred, inviolable, undeniable. That insisting that there is, is a lie. A lie that no reasoning human being even pretends is true.
