In 1920 the United States Supreme Court ratified the 19th Amendment, giving women the right to vote.

We think of it as a single event, but it wasn’t. Even if we ignore the movement that came before, this bill itself took two years to pass and was passed in spite of a filibuster.

With that amendment, women officially became people. What a wonderful event.

Now, corporations are people.

The notion that for profit businesses are not people has been challenged in court and failed repeatedly.

They have freedom of speech, as ruled by the court in the Citizens United ruling. (Also, money=speech.)

And now they have freedom of religion. The owners of Hobby Lobby have, thanks to the Supreme Court, won the right to provide health insurance to their employees without including full contraception access.

That was one of the provisions in the Affordable Care Act. The writers of the ACA knew that contraception access is important to overall health.

It was predictable. We knew the court had this philosophy. Corporations, even for profit ones, have the same rights as you and I and that’s that.

Now, when non-profit religious orders want to be exempted from this provision, that’s a different story. Obviously an order of monks doesn’t need to be provided with contraception and we can allow that because they are non-profit.

I wonder why the owners of Hobby Lobby even did this. It’s bad publicity. People use birth control. Is there really an anti-birth control movement out there? They must not realize that access to contraception prevents more abortions than any other factor. Including religion.

Or were they making a political statement. Was it more of an “F— Obama!” than anything else?

I don’t know.

Do the owners of Hobby Lobby have a religion that is hostile to birth control? Apparently. I heard they have a bunch of kids. Does Hobby Lobby itself have a religion? How can it? It’s a business. It can’t grasp things like doubt and faith.

If you don’t like birth control, don’t use it. I’m relatively certain the Bible is silent on the subject, but I’m not a believer, so what do I know?

I submit to you that corporations are not people.

They are better than people.

They can do anything and not be held responsible. They can kill people through gross negligence and pay fines instead of going to prison. They can poison the water and the air for years and only pay small fines.

They can sabotage the economy.

And now they can choose certain parts of the law to ignore at will by pretending that they are motivated by religious belief.

People think this ruling is anti-woman and I’m not sure it is. Women are being targeted only because they are in the way. This is against all of us.

This is just another step in the emergence of a new being. Corporations are like us, only more powerful.

They are superior to human beings, like vampires. They can’t be killed by conventional weapons. They don’t get old. They can’t be stopped. Even when they fail, they sometimes succeed.

Corporations are trying to roll over us and take their place as the only ones with rights.

But there is something that can be done to stop this. The Supreme Court isn’t going to listen, that’s obvious.

But we can amend.

In 1920 the 19th Amendment did what the Supreme Court was unwilling or unable to do. It declared that women were people with the right to vote.

We need an amendment.

Corporations are not real. Not in the sense that you and I are. They were created to diffuse responsibility, so no one person in an organization could be held accountable. Because they’re artificial, they shouldn’t have rights. Send an email to your congressman asking them to amend the constitution to declare that only people are people.

We might think that we’re powerless and that’s understandable in the modern age, but these people really want to get re-elected and this is something that could potentially have bi-partisan support.

Corporations can’t go to prison or be sent to war or executed. They aren’t people. If we don’t do something it’s going to get worse. This is only one step. There will be more.

Love elephant and want to go steady?

Sign up for our (curated) daily and weekly newsletters!

Editor: Catherine Monkman

Photos: Brian Turner/Flickr, Nicholas Eckhart/Flickr