The Shirley Exception

Hey! Let's talk about something I'm seeing here online that I'm also seeing in the community where I live.

Let's talk about

***THE SHIRLEY EXCEPTION****

So, remember when Texas and lots of other U.S. states had a law on the books that said sodomy was illegal?

Awful law, right? And actually ridiculous. And overturned in 2003's SCOTUS case Lawrence v. Texas.

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But here's a thing that might sound familiar, like something you've heard before:

In 2002, a group of friends - a few sets of couples - in Oklahoma are having dinner together and deciding where to go on vacation together. Someone proposes a resort in Texas: it's cheap and beautiful and not too far.

The gay couple in the group immediately says, "No way. This is supposed to be a fun romantic vacation for us all. Can't do Texas. They have laws against people like us."

The straight couple who suggested the resort roll their eyes. "Okay, sure, it's on the books, but it's not like the cops go around to every hotel room every night and listen at the door for possible tourists doing private things in their own hotel rooms. It's not like this law really gets ENFORCED."

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If you've heard this argument before - "Sure, the law/policy is terrible, but I'm not going to spend my time, money, or social connections trying to fight it because it's not like it's going to hurt ME, or YOU, a person I care about" - then you've encountered the Shirley Exception!

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This is where we're gonna pause to read the original thread about the Shirley Exception. There's a link to the original author's twitter thread where she defines it, and there's a link to someone who compiled it all in a single blog post.

The original post, by Alexandra Erin.

The all-in-one blog post. Same text exactly, just not in twitter form.

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So let's talk about ways I've seen the Shirley Exception in my own community.

"The supreme court ruled that we can make sleeping outside in public a crime, but our town would never do that, so it's not a danger here."

"My county just passed a mask ban, but I mask all the time and no one harasses me."

"ICE only goes after people who are criminals. They wouldn't touch the good undocumented people who keep our farms running."

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Hell, I've caught myself making the Shirley Exception. When Nassau County passed a mask ban last week, my first thought was, "Okay, but surely they won't ACTUALLY ARREST people for wearing masks..." before I caught myself and was like, "I bet a lot of people won't. But some will. And when they do, the ones they arrest will have NO legal protection because of that law."

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The Shirley Exception says, "The law may be inhumane, but people will be good. I'm not going to fight it." And that's a really dangerous risk to take.

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"Okay, so they're banning books from school libraries, but surely they won't actually arrest a teacher for having Maus on the classroom shelf...if they're not teaching it."

They might not. But they could.

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"Okay, so there's a law against sleeping in public parks, but surely they won't take away a homeless mother's children because all the shelters were full and they had nowhere else to go and she was just trying to keep them together and safe..."

They might not. But they do sometimes.

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Any time you catch someone saying, "Yeah, but some/most people will still be safe under that law," you're seeing the Shirley Exception in action.

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So: Where have YOU seen the Shirley Exception? Can you think of an example from your own community?

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Now let's talk about what happens when someone who made a Shirley Exception gets confronted with the reality - the exception does not get made. Their trusted neighbor gets deported. Their innocent teen gets profiled. Their second cousin who's a teacher gets fired for teaching banned books.

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The Shirley Exception's premise is that a good person can support [either actively support, or tacitly support by not fighting] a bad law, because nobody they care about will get hurt.

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Once we prove that no, bad laws get applied with cruelty and lots of people get hurt, The Shirley Exception Maker now gets stuck: they've supported a bad thing that has hurt people they care about!

For a lot of people, that mental leap is INTOLERABLE. They will do ANYTHING not to think of themselves as part of the problem.

So what do they do? They use one of two methods to further DISTANCE themselves from their support for the bad law.

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Option 1: Blame the victim.

This is our old friend, "But What Was She Wearing?" By blaming the victim, the Shirley Exception Maker can now put the victim in the bucket of People Who Do Not Deserve An Exception, and preserve their own self-image, because they still support Good People Who Deserve Exceptions!

Option 2: Bad Apples.

If you REALLY can't figure out a way to put the victim in the Bad People bucket, then you can put the ENFORCER of the bad law into the Bad Apple bucket. This is where we get, "Well, obviously, that cop didn't know better," or "That teacher didn't understand the spirit of the law." The Shirley Exception Maker can now preserve their own self-image because they still don't have to object to the LAW, just the People Who Enforced It Wrong And Failed To Make The Right Exceptions!

Have you seen either of these in action?