Wednesday's oral arguments were full of contempt for women's lives, contempt for women's intelligence, contempt for women's privacy and contempt for women's very humanity. To be sure, Center for Reproductive Rights lawyer Julie Rikelman and Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar repeatedly emphasized that women are complex human beings who have as much a right to liberty and the pursuit of happiness as anyone. But it was like talking to a brick wall of misogyny offered by the Republican appointees on the bench. The Court now seems almost certain, as was requested by Mississippi Attorney General Scott Stewart, to overturn Roe v. Wade next year.

Perhaps the most repulsive moment of the morning came courtesy of Justice Sam Alito, who is always ready to act like the biggest mansplaining creep in the highly competitive field of GOP-appointed judges. In response to Prelogar's argument that American women have come to rely on abortion rights, Alito sneeringly argued that the South had also come to rely on "white supremacy" after Plessy v. Ferguson, but that didn't stop the court from overturning it in Brown v. the Board of Education. Yes, you read that correctly: Alito compared a woman's right to control her own body to upholding Jim Crow.
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At one point, Justice Brett Kavanaugh ran down a long list of cases he felt like overturned historical precedent, in the way he clearly would like to overturn Roe — including Brown and, more recently, Obergefell v. Hodges, the case that legalized same-sex marriage. Prelogar did her best to rebut this claim, pointing out that these decisions to overturn precedent expanded human rights, and overturning Roe would take them away. But the conservatives don't seem inclined to view women as humans with rights, and so ignored this crucial point.
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"Will this institution survive the stench that this creates in the public perception that the Constitution and its reading are just political acts?" Justice Sonia Sotomayor asked at one point.

But it's hard to imagine six justices are going to be that worried about being criticized in this way. They don't take women seriously as people, so it's unlikely they care much more for the opinions of people who do view women as full human beings. As with Kavanaugh whining and crying because he had to deal with a sexual assault accusation from Christine Blasey Ford, they are all likely to double down on their sense of grievance that they even have to waste time with the women-are-people crowd. Erasing women's rights will be as easy for them as stepping on ants.