Richard Thompson Ford is the George E. Osborne Professor of Law at Stanford Law School. His scholarship combines social criticism and legal analysis, and he writes for both popular readers and for academic and legal specialists. He's written for the Washington Post, San Francisco Chronicle, Christian Science Monitor, and other publications. He’s a regular contributor for Slate and has appeared on the Rachel Maddow Show, The Colbert Report, and other programs.

His most recent book is Dress Codes: How the Laws of Fashion Made History. His books The Race Card: How Bluffing About Bias Makes Race Relations Worse and Rights Gone Wrong: How Law Corrupts the Struggle for Equality have been selected by the New York Times as Notable Books of the Year. In 2012, On Being a Black Lawyer called him one of the most influential black lawyers in the nation.   

RICHARD THOMPSON FORD

One of the things that I've tried to do in my work is demonstrate the way that laws that don't seem to be directly related to social equality, to equality of opportunity, to racial justice in fact are and that it's only through also reforming these kind of systemic and institutionalized forms of discrimination that we could truly achieve an egalitarian society. So what I've really wanted to argue against is the idea that civil rights are kind of a magic bullet and that those kinds of laws alone would be sufficient to achieve.

There are a lot of other reforms that would be useful in improving American policing. And certainly, there are biased attitudes on the part of some police officers, but again, I think the structural problems are even greater with respect to this. There's the problem of racial segregation in high-crime neighborhoods, which means that when police are using aggressive tactics in the neighborhoods with the highest levels of crime, the targets are disproportionately people of color. There's also the fact that in the United States, it's not true in most other countries, policing is decentralized. It's a local matter. And so there's a wide range of training and a wide range of different types of protocols.

THE CREATIVE PROCESS

Fashion is sometimes seen as frivolous, but we see, as you illustrate, the many ways it can be used as protest – historically, women wearing trousers or others asserting their dignity as being perceived as being threatening to the social order?

THOMPSON FORD

And if you really think about it, it shouldn't be surprising. We present ourselves and our bodies every day in public, and the way we do that is profoundly important. It's the way we establish a sense of self in a social domain. And clothing is the most direct way that's accomplished, and so of course it has political significance, and that's why it's always been regulated. Something that's trivial and superficial doesn't inspire a lot of rules and laws, but in fact, in our society up to the present day, there are lots of rules and laws around what people can wear. So those statements that are made can have profound significance at an almost subconscious level.

That's why people were worried when African Americans dressed in refined clothing because it suggested - against the dominant ideology of the time of white supremacy - that African Americans were refined and sophisticated. That's what that clothing suggests. When women wore masculine clothing, it suggested that those women could assert masculine privileges and masculine liberties because that's what that clothing suggested. It suggested that the women were not only refined, but also sober, practical, industrious - all of the things that women were denied in that context, and that made it a threat to the existing social order. And this is still true today.

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I would like young people to keep two things in mind that might sound a little bit contradictory. One is that there's a great tradition of knowledge and intellectual endeavor and philosophy that the university has to offer, that our culture has to offer, that is important to master and that can guide one in the future, but at the same time, the older generation doesn't know everything. And often the older generation will belittle younger people. The contemporary example is that "they're snowflakes", that "they're engaged in cancel culture", this kind of thing. And sometimes us older people are right in those criticisms, and sometimes we're not. And so trying to navigate that, to say, "Yes, I have something to learn from you, but also..." You know, each generation needs to sort these things out for themselves. And sometimes the younger generation has got it right, and we've got it wrong. Figuring out which is and which is the challenge.

This interview was conducted by Mia Funk and Lucy Gordon with the participation of collaborating universities and students. Associate Interviews Producer on this podcast was Lucy Gordon. Digital Media Coordinators are Jacob A. Preisler and Megan Hegenbarth. 

Mia Funk is an artist, interviewer and founder of The Creative Process & One Planet Podcast (Conversations about Climate Change & Environmental Solutions).