I like this conclusion to your discussion about expanding standing. You should include it in your original blogpost as well as the story you gave about Fattah and Nutter. :)

I’ll give a local example. In Philadelphia, it used to be the case that any taxpayer could bring a suit against anyone who’d violated zoning or building law. So if a developer decided to add an extra story to a building, or erect giant billboards in neighborhoods, there were clear ways for citizens to force them to comply with the law. A series of decisions pushed back standing to the point where if you can’t show that you materially suffer from a building violation — even if you’re on an adjacent property — you can’t bring a suit, even to enforce a clear violation of the law.

So, it’s not really the inability of non-humans to speak in court that bothers me. It’s the very limited ability of humans to speak on their behalf.

For instance, a landmark may be saved before the local historical rights board depending on citizens who lodge some sort of application to give the landmark protected status.

Or in the case of the environment, oftentimes, a municipality or state will go after a corporate entity that has polluted its territory. The problem is what happens when the state’s elected officials do not take advantage of their standing because of lobbying, political contributions, etc.

Standing should not be confused with the inability of non-humans to speak in court.

Keep in mind that as Bell uses it, it’s descriptive, not prescriptive. (Obviously, Bell wishes that the rules of racial standing were different.) Determination of standing happens, whether it ought to or not, both in court, on the air/in print, and in everyday discussion.

This is a major source of frustration in debates about race. Sometimes, it’s ludicrous, like when white people complain that they don’t get to say “the n-word.” (Please follow this link.)

But I remember during Philly’s last mayoral primary, there was a debate where one candidate (a black guy, Chaka Fattah) got in trouble for saying that another candidate (also black, Michael Nutter) needed to remind everybody that he was black. Basically, Nutter was asked something about civil rights violations with his proposal to bring NYC-style stop-and-frisk to Philly, and he started his answer with, something like “Look, I’m a black man; of course, I’d be concerned. But…” and defended it. Then Fattah said something like “I’m sorry you need to remind everyone you’re black.”

Now Nutter’s a kind of nerdy, pro-business guy who represented a multiracial council district, and was the preferred candidate of most of the white professionals in the city. Fattah is also a brainy guy, US Congressman, but was based in West Philly and (at least then) was drawing most of his support from rank-and-file black Philadelphia. So it wasn’t clear whether he was calling Nutter an Oreo sellout, or (and this is how they spun it later) trying to call Nutter out for using the “I’m black, I can’t be racist” defense.

Anyways, as it happened, Fattah’s staff went on the local politics blogs and tried to shut this discussion down. Basically, their position was, this is just one black man talking to another black man, calling him out the way black folks do — for the love of god, white people, stop talking about it. The most vocal proponents of this position were Fattah’s white staffers, some of whom helped run the main blog. “White people have no right to talk about this.” I thought this was bullshit, and said so, loudly and repeatedly.

Trying to cut off standing is always a rhetorical move. It’s a lawyer’s move. It’s a power move. Sometimes it’s legitimate, sometimes it isn’t. Sometimes even when it’s technically illegitimate it gets passed-off anyways. But you can’t deny that it’s really important.

One comment though:
I think expanding standing for the example of group affiliation like race can be taken too far. Because people can just say “You have no standing, your argument holds no/less merit because you don’t belong to this group regardless of your logic and reasoning.” If the litmus test of whether a thesis can be proven true or not is based on the –source– rather than the –logic– and –evidence– then I think it’s not in the spirit of Occam’s Razor anymore.

More neb­u­lous kinds of dam­age, like harm done to ani­mals, the envi­ron­ment, or land­marks, give you fewer places to stand.

and sort of bothersome. The general public interest–or the interest held on behalf of those who cannot stand for themselves–is obviously easily abused, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.