I’m not a huge fan of Tim Cook professionally (personally, on the other hand, he seems like a nice guy), but on this one, he’s 100% right.
There’s something very dangerous happening in states across the country.
A wave of legislation, introduced in more than two dozen states, would allow people to discriminate against their neighbors. Some, such as the bill enacted in Indiana last week that drew a national outcry and one passed in Arkansas, say individuals can cite their personal religious beliefs to refuse service to a customer or resist a state nondiscrimination law.
Others are more transparent in their effort to discriminate. Legislation being considered in Texas would strip the salaries and pensions of clerks who issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples – even if the Supreme Court strikes down Texas’ marriage ban later this year. In total, there are nearly 100 bills designed to enshrine discrimination in state law.
America is the land of opportunity. Just don’t be black, gay, or transgender.
Obviously, you’ve never read the legislation. This bill is an affirmation of the federal law, signed into law and supported by Bill Clinton in 1993. It does NOT allow discrimination against ANYBODY.
I’m a big fan of Apple, Inc. and their awesome products, but Tim Cook is just wrong on this one.
Yes, please read the two acts and compare. You’ll find that you’re wrong:
http://thinkprogress.org/lgbt/2015/03/30/3640374/big-lie-media-tell…
Edited 2015-03-30 18:23 UTC
You’re right that the two laws are not the same. Indiana’s actually is the better of the two.
Yes, Indiana’s law will lead to some people putting “No gays” signs in the stores of their business. Free speech leads to skinheads and the KKK marching down public streets. The freedom of assembly leads to groups picketing with “God hates fags” signs. Freedom is like that. It allows people to performs acts that many find objectionable. It’s worth it.
The examples mentioned in the parent article are not the same either. Indiana’s law is intended to allow people the freedom of making their own choice. The Texas law is designed to prohibit individual from receiving equal treatment from government. A just government has an absolute requirement to treat all citizens equally. It has no business and legitimate authority to decide what is and isn’t an acceptable form of marriage. An individual has no right to determine what sort of relationship another person is allowed to engage in, but they damned sure do have a legitimate right to determine who they themselves will and will not enter into a business arrangement with.
Having a right to do a thing does not mean that doing that thing is right. I do not for a second support discrimination but I do absolutely support the right of people, even ignorant prejudiced scum, to make their own decision. I was quite happy to hear the SCOTUS say that the owners of Hobby Lobby cannot be forced to pay for abortion coverage for their employers. But because Hobby Lobby elects to use their rights in that manner, I refuse to set foot in their stores. The solution to hate speech is not to repress free speech but rather more free speech objecting to the hate speech. The solution to discrimination is not government dictates against discrimination but free people speaking out against the discrimination.
One question bothers me though, if “refusing to do business” is already protected by the constitution, then why is an additional law needed? I thought that by design the law can only take freedom away, not grant more. I.e. anything not specified by law is legal.
Edited 2015-03-31 09:19 UTC
I disagree, but I find it difficult to argue on other than moral ground why it is dispicable to refuse service to anyone as long as they do not disrupt your business in any way.
Let me look at it from state perspective: if the state wants to protect the rights of individuals as it foremost policy, there’s a clash of rights since there’s two sets of opposite rights here: the rights of the potential customers and the rights of the business owners. Can you explain why the rights of the latter need to prevail in this case? Giving that there’s a 1:n relationship between business and customers (and we agree, since it’s a separate discussion, that other customer’s opinions are not at stake here), if you want to maximize individual happiness, I’d say that the state should side with the customers.
Having said that, iiuc, the bill specifically allows the right to refuse business based on religious grounds. I’m at loss for any reason why these specific grounds, and not e.g. humanistic ones or other convictions, should be the litmus test for discrimination to be a-ok or not.
The problem being that the ignorant prejudiced scum easily thinks they’re above the law, and would be happy to ignore any common decency or human rights. To allow a slipery slope argument, where to draw the line? The line now lies at doing business, but what if a emergency room doctor would refuse to serve a gay or atheist patient? What if one of the prejudiced scum thinks it’s a good idea to inflict physical injury to someone they don’t agree with? Etc. etc. So why a law that focusses on doing business only, and only on religious grounds?
I agree. But free speech is rather different from free exercize of discriminatory actions.
To pull a Godwin, we all know what happened to those that protested attacks on Jewish people in Nazi Germany. The government is the only body that can prevent other people from infringing on your rights and well-being, and therefore should enforce with all its power, the removal of discrimination from any public space.
I think you’ve got it wrong here. The difference is the (lack of an) action: the “right not to serve someone” does not require an action from the one who is not served. If the server did not exist, the customer would not have to perform less actions.
However, your “right to be served” requires an action from another person. If the customer did not exist, the server would not have to do an action against his will.
A very concrete example from Belgium: this is already the case in abortion and euthanasia laws, you have the right to end your own life, but you can not force a specific doctor to do it. Any doctor may refuse on moral grounds (except in emergencies).
One can argue that this is a case with extreme demands: you demand someone to take a life which is outrageous to many people. On the other hand, who determines what is an outrageous demand and what is not? I’m sure some people do not care at all about taking lives. Don’t agree with someone’s demands? Fine, call him out and take your business elsewhere. You in turn vote with your money.
Note that I’m talking about the rights of individuals here. To me, companies are an artificial construction and hence have no basic rights. I think it’s perfectly fine to forbid them to discriminate.
Edited 2015-03-31 12:03 UTC
Of course there’s differences. But that doesn’t mean that both parties haven’t got an interest, and so does the state.
The server is serving the customer in exactly the same way as he’s serving other customers. It’s just that the specific customer has some properties that the server doens’t like. No-one’s forcing a random person to bake a cake: it’s the baker already baking cakes that therefore has comitted himself to doing business with anyone adhering to the terms of his business, and that *excludes* discriminatory provisions for things that are totally outside the bounderies of the transaction.
It’s more than the baker already baking cakes. It’s demanding that the baker contributes to something that he wishes to be no part of. I think it’s perfectly fair for him to refuse that, even if I strongly disagree with his reason to do so.
Why do the terms of his business, not yours, exclude discriminatory provisions? Do you decide those terms for him? Do I decide that? Does the government decide that?
Clearly the latter is true, after all we live in a constitutional democracy, and I accept that. That said, I believe meddling with other people’s personal business terms is very authoritarian as in my view it violates people’s basic rights (i.e. demanding an action against their will) and hence should not be done.
Edited 2015-03-31 12:25 UTC
The baker *isn’t* part of the wedding. He’s part of a business deal. What the customer is going to do with the cake is non of his business, literaly. Is the baker allowed to refuse baking a cake if the customer is going to feed it to his dog? Throw it in the trash? Use it in a kinky sex game? Well, it’s none of the baker’s damn business. The baker offers a service: you give me money, I bake a cake. What happens to that cake, and in which context is of no importance.
Again, it’s *not* an action against their will. Clearly baking a cake is not against the bakers will. It’s what happens with that cake later on that the baker is against. But that isn’t, and can’t be, part of the business deal. So all the baker can do is refuse it on discriminatory grounds, which is against the law, unless there’s specific loopholes provided, like in Indiana.
Yes it is. It *is* his business BEFORE he sells it to you. At that moment it is his cake, his time, his energy. Not yours. Buy your cake from someone who doesn’t care about feeding it to the dogs, or simply don’t mention what you’re going to do with it.
If I were to invest my time in a piece of art, then I’d refuse to do business with you if I knew you were simply going to burn it. However, AFTER I sold you the painting, it’s none of my business any more. If you do burn it AFTER the sale, well, I can’t and won’t stop you but I’ll be angry because I would not have wasted my time/resources on you and rather have dealt with someone who wouldn’t have done that.
To some people using their cake for your gay wedding is the equivalent of burning my painting. I think it’s a bigoted view, but I’ll not force them into selling it. However, if they do sell it, then do with it as you please because as of that moment, it is your cake and no longer theirs.
Edited 2015-03-31 15:08 UTC
Good point, I think you convinced me. As long as we agree that if it was an ordinary birthday cake, not a wedding cake, the baker should not be able to refuse.
Yes, another poster made a convincing point about that. If the general expectation is to be served at that point (i.e. there were no objections, the cake is ready and you just picked it, ready to pay), then I think this counts as a “verbal contract” (like ordering in a restaurant). So yeah, in that case, the baker should not be able to refuse.
It’s still a fuzzy line, but I think this is a sound argument.
The cake thing is again somewhat of a special case, as the service was refused over the inscription, not who the cake was being sold to. That does make it a free speech and religious freedom issue. Same with flags, insignias, books, etc.
But refusing to service a specific group once you’ve offered your services to the public in general? Yeah, we have laws regarding that, because they’re necessary to preserve our more fundamental freedoms and equities. So if you offer the same cakes to everyone, you can’t just suddenly decide NOT to provide that service to someone on the basis of their race, gender, or religion.
There is a difference between a decision to assist a suicide based on moral grounds, and a decision based on a patient’s race, gender, and/or religion. The former should not consider those factors. The latter leads to doctors being able to run assisted suicide clinics catering to those specific groups.
Can you see where this might be a problem?
This is where you are wrong.
The proposed law has nothing to do with the religion, gender, race or whatever of the customer, it makes no such mention at all. It only mentions the religion of the service provider: you can not force the service provider to act against his religion. It’s a defensive law.
Someone else posted an interesting link here: http://thefederalist.com/2015/03/30/your-questions-on-indianas-reli…
Go read it and get informed.
And to be clear, a case that led to this was from a baker who did not discriminate against gays. They were free to buy normal cakes. However, he did not want to participate/contribute to a gay wedding by designing a cake for that. [1]
Basically, he doesn’t have a problem with gays, he has a problem with directly contributing to a gay marriage.
[1] http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_25865871/civil-rights-commission-…
We tried that after Anders Behring Breivik killed a bunch of kids to raise awareness about the ongoing Muslim genocide of white people (which consists of having comparatively more babies), but the racists interpreted this to mean that they now should have the right to speak without criticism, and that speaking out against them is attempted censorship. It’s created an environment in which calling out racists for being racist is now more controversial than actually being racist: http://www.thelocal.no/20150329/norwegians-see-kesson-interview-as-…
I’m not saying bigoted speech should be suppressed, just that there’s no empirical evidence for ‘more free speech’ somehow being a solution to hate speech. And protecting it specifically by law is obviously only going to help it.
Its a tricky one this. I’m a firm believer in free speech, but refusing service is more than speech – it is discrimination. Do you think the “No Blacks” signs would have come down without legislation to force it? I certainly don’t.
I’m all for a business owner making their (objectional) views known, but acting on them is another matter.
I agree it’s tricky, but I think “refusing to do business” is a lack of action, and not an action.
Forcing people to perform an action [serving you], feels like you are the one actually acting on your views: you force them because your view is that they should perform that action.
Not an easy matter though.
Edit: as for the no black signs, I think they would have gone away automatically as clearly the majority found them distasteful enough to make it a law. In my opinion things like that just require some time before the right mentality is there (usually a generation).
Edited 2015-03-31 12:50 UTC
When you have a publicly-accessible business that is already providing a service to anybody that enters through the front door, then your refusal to serve a certain group of people becomes an action. You’ve already created a default position of providing service. Anything opposite of the default becomes an action.
While there was a national majority that was against segregation, when you’re operating a storefront, national opinion doesn’t matter. We’ve seen the effects segregation has on people – when it is widespread, it greatly reduces economic mobility of the people that are locked out of common business and employment, which in turns gives the target group less ability to use the free market to effect change.
The added economic difficult will lock them out of the political process, as well. When that is the case, then you have people with less economic and political freedom than is available to others: True second class citizens – kinda puts a damper on the “All men are created equal” thing.
This is what happens. We’ve seen this happen. If we let it happen again, it will take that much longer to undo the damage.
Well, I do kind of agree in principal. However, in most cases, buissiness doesn’t happen in a vacuum bit within the boundries of society. And buissnessowners generally uses services and utilities such as roads, water, electricity and such that only society can provide. Not to mention that mist buissuinessowners will cry foul to high heaven if society should fail to enforce its monopoly on violence should someone wrong them. Thus, in my view, society has good incentivces to enforce common deceny on buissinesses that wishes to act within the space of that society.
Good post, plenty of food for thought. When I enter a store, I do not immediately have the default expectation to be served though, not until I found what I want and I’m about to check out. In the case of that wedding cake, the goods are not there yet. You have a pretty good argument however. I need to think about this.
Yeah, I’m not saying segregation is a good thing at all, but the worst cases of segregation are/were almost always enforced by law. And it is the same kind of law that forces a set of views on people (in this case, racist views) and makes them act that way.
I think the moment you use that law to force your views upon society to make them behave in a “good, approved” way in their private domain, is the moment you lose the moral high ground and become a hypocrite when you complain others are using the law to force their version of “good” and “approved”. Then it’s just an argument of “my views” versus “your views” while hurting the freedom of the minority, which is why we have a constitution.
In a way this is a very pessimistic opinion: to deny laws with really bad intentions, we must also deny laws that intend to do good on the same ground. But in another way I think it’s optimistic in the sense that in due time people will figure out the right way without violating anyone’s rights.
Edited 2015-03-31 18:51 UTC
Context is what is important. These laws are being passed in response to the recent string of defeats that the anti-gay bigots have been handed by Federal Courts.
The Federal Statute signed by Pres. Clinton was designed to protect minority religious people from undue burden by the Federal Government.
The version of Religious Freedom Restoration Act (what a fucking stupid name, christ) passed in Indiana (and signed by Mike Pence, who you don’t have to look far to find out where he sits on the gay marriage issues) is different from Federal Law in that the Government need not be a party in litigation.
So no, Indiana has a broader wording of the law, and it is being pushed by the very same people who if they had their way, would still have the Defense of Marriage Act (I could throw up..) denying gays the right to equal protection under the law.
People need to get over the fact that gays actually exist, and they want to get married. And they will. You do not have the freedom to discriminate against them, regardless of what sky man you pray to.
So if I pray to a sky man that says gay marriage/sex is immoral, go directly to hell… do not pass Go… do not collect $200, then the government could force me as a photographer to take photos at a gay wedding? Or as a hotel owner to offer up the honeymoon suite to a gay couple?
That just doesn’t sound right to me; what you’re basically telling these people is that their beliefs don’t matter. And if their beliefs don’t matter, why should yours?
Disclaimer: In case anyone wants to bring it up, I got nothing against gays and would never refuse service to them if I ran a business. I WOULD, however, probably refuse service to anyone in direct marketing
Bunch of loathsome scum …
Edited 2015-03-30 19:01 UTC
To whom would you ever want to refuse business to? If they pay what is your problem?
Can you imagine if a Jewish flag maker was asked to make pro-Nazi banners and HE WASN’T ALLOWED TO REFUSE?
Note, that the inverse would be true in the case of this law.
A group of people of any deeply held belief against Jews and or Isreal, would be able to deny a Jewish group any service they wanted. Heck, we could dust off those old “Irish need not apply” signs and put them back to work.
But before you think I’m against this law or laws in this vein, that’s not accurate either. This law is trying to define the boundaries between people’s rights. But that necessary,interesting and non controversial conversation isn’t being held. Instead a bunch of terrible accusations are flying everywhere. If we don’t have this law, than this terrible example will happen. If we do have this law then this terrible example will happen. Its like most otherwise smart people think about complex moral issues like they were five year olds. But maybe thats as far as most people develop. Kind of frustrating.
Oh well, argue on crazy knuckle heads. Try not to hurt each other too much in the process.
The whole idea of the right to refuse business is a slippery slope with the angle of a cliff.
What would happen if you are refused to buy a loaf of bread because you’re wearing shoes or you want to have your hair cut and the barber says he won’t because you have red hair?
Now of course, you have the right as a customer to chose your supplier, i.e. voting with your feet.
I guess my viewpoint is more like Voltaire:
“I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”
And yes, that would mean I would probably make pro Nazi banners if I would be Jewish flag maker. Even if that is extremely unpleasant.
You can also turn that around: “I may not agree with you refusing service based on your beliefs, but I’ll defend your right to do so.”
Forcing people to act a certain way against their will sounds very authoritarian to me.
If you argue against this law, you should also argue against things like scholarships dedicated to women and minorities, or things such as movie nights and gyms for women only, as those are just another form of refusing business to people based on the personal beliefs of the owner.
Edit: why is “J-ewish” being replaced by *** in my posts? How can that possibly be offensive? What is this for kind of censorship going on?
Edited 2015-03-31 08:54 UTC
That’s an old thing – we had a lot of antisemitic spam at some point, and this was a great way to combat it.
Why is it blocked in my post and not in the parent (which I simply quote)? What triggers it?
It annoys me a bit because it makes it appear as if I find that a dirty word that should not be mentioned, which in turn changes the tone of my post making it look from a bigoted perspective rather than the anti-authoritarianism perspective I actually hold.
Edited 2015-03-31 09:17 UTC
Well, I am not sure I support any of your 2 counter examples I have to admit.
But it is complicated, most constitutions also recognise the right to association and assembly or sometimes yo may want to ‘right’ a wrong situation.
For instance in South-Africa there is now a law that penalises employing White or Colored people. If you’re an employer you pay a lot more tax if you don’t meet a certain quota.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Economic_Empowerment
In Ireland there is a golf (Gentlemen Only, Ladies Forbidden
) club (Portmarnock) that was open only to men. They successfully defended a bid by women to become members.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/ireland/6495007/Ir…
And of course the Catholic church isn’t open to women.
In your examples I guess the women could form a club and refuse non-members. I still feel it isn’t the same as the orginal article but don’t know how to word it properly.
There are plenty of exclusive establishments that only cater to specific groups, and these laws do not impact them. But once you offer a service publicly, you have to follow the laws established by the secular government, and those laws state you cannot discriminate based on race, gender, or religion.
So I can simply place a sign at the door: “these are the terms and conditions before entering my shop and doing business with me”, and all is fine? Just because you can enter my store does not mean I offer a service publicly.
The law of the secular government also clearly says otherwise, else there wouldn’t be a discussion in the first place.
Well that assumes money is your only motive, which it might be.
But other people have other values they are willing to handle less money for.
Yes, it would be discrimination to refuse someone’s business.
But… it is also anti-freedom to force someone to do business with someone else.
Aside from life necessities (transit, food, housing, medical care), I would generally say to let someone run their business how they want it.
And yes, as a person of color, if that means some dimwit doesn’t want me to buy cupcakes from them…. well fine by me.
Yes… just like they legislated equal service regardless of skin colour despite Mormon doctrine insisting that dark skin was a mark of satanic corruption all the way up to the mid ’70s.
That was more our dumbass government fixing its own mistake. Had they considered blacks as a people from the beginning instead of 3/5ths of a person …
No, what he’s trying to say to you is that their beliefs are just shit and have to be wipe out.
Have you ever read the Universal Declaration of Human Rights?
I suggest you to read Art. 1, where ALL HUMANS have the same rights (to be married, to adopt) independently where they insert their dicks/dildos.
You want to remember me Art. 18? OK. You have the right to believe the shit you want; but you should read Art. 30 where it says you CAN NOT VIOLATE THE DECLARATION; as Jews, Christians and Muslims do [1].
So, again, you believe the shit you want as long as you don’t shit in my rights as human. If you do, you HAVE TO BE WIPED OUT.
[1] This’ an article by me with extended info:
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=6734613&cid=48839627
Unfortunately the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is just as man made as any religion.
Then, it’s great to hear you approve I create my own religion (also “man made”) which recollects money, make TV programs, teach the children that people like you have to be castrated, killed and obliterated.
I thank you for approving this!
Hi Franz,
First of all, I didn’t say that at all. Nowhere did I do approve of words you put into my mouth.
What I tried to suggest is that the UDHR isn’t worth much as it is an artificial human construction (unfortunately). One isn’t obliged to follow it and no country I can think of actually follows the Declaration, however it is of course an important document to aspire to.
I don’t like the WIPING OUT word you use, nowhere in the Declaration does it speak about retaliation or punishment. It strikes me you have the same fanatical mindset of the very same people you oppose.
Edited 2015-03-31 09:04 UTC
Wrong, EU’s Constitution and, specifically my own country’s Constitution (Spain), clearly states that it adheres and must comply with it for all its rules.
Another thing is that people don’t have the courage, money or time needed to send their scumbags governors to the International Tribunal of Human Rights (which they deserve).
Example: both Russia and Spain have signed to comply with the UDHR. From the scumbag Spanish President (my own) and the scumbag Russian President signed that no gay couple can adopt Russian children. They have violated Art. 1 (all humans have the same rights) and hence MUST TO BE PUNISHED.
No, the Art. 30 says the UDHR does not give anyone rights to violate the UDHR. It’s competence of each country (or tribunal) to take care that no rights are violated and, for that, a punishment is in order (sorry, throwing flowers to a violator’s face doesn’t make him/her change his/her mind).
Again, scumbags that create religions to shit on the UDHR HAVE TO BE WIPED OUT. WIPED. Again, the *religions*. Because if you don’t do that, then, you’re saying you agree with the “Nazism Religion”, which violates UDHR.
In theory most countries support the UDHR, the Red Cross, the International Court of Justice in the Hague and various other noble treaties. But in practice I don’t know *ANY* country that fully complies with the UDHR, as you show yourself in your examples of Russia and Spain.
Again the UDHR art 30 doesn’t say non-followers should be wiped, it says that no wording in the UDHR can be used to deny any rights and freedoms stated in the declaration. There is no wiping
What about necrophiles, pedophiles and incestuos people? Souldn’t they also have the same rights?
So, ‘believe as I do or get wiped out’ … are you sure you’re not a member of ISIS or the Taliban?
No, if you would have read the link with my complete comment about this matter, you’d have read this:
“So, Jews, Christians and Muslims MUST be wipe out (as religions) and be treated as traitors to the human race and be condemned and punished for their genocides.”
But, it’s nice to see you approved shitting in the Human Rights. Hence, it’s OK for you that I create my own religion where people like you have to be castrated (or chemically treated) and forbidden to have children or marry! I like your POV. Let me teach that to your children (if you have any)!
You need to get back on your meds, dude.
What the hell are you talking about?
That paragraph is exactly what the Jews, Christians and Muslims shout in their buildings, in TV and teach children.
Do you read the news now and then, I guess not.
So I guess you would also be ok with muslim business owners refusing to service women who aren’t covering their face? Or refusing to serve people of the Christian denomination?
Tim Cook: “From North Carolina to Nevada, these bills under consideration truly will hurt jobs, growth and the economic vibrancy of parts of the country where a 21st-century economy was once welcomed with open arms.”
A bit of pity he measures it in money though, it has nothing to do with money. Even if it would be extremely profitable to discriminate against LGBT people, it’s wrong.
Edited 2015-03-30 18:47 UTC
Money talks in a lot of cases — all it took was a few Silicon Valley companies crying foul and threatening to pull back investments for Gov. Pence to consider “clarifying the law”.
States are especially easy to pressure on this, as they often have very fragile budgets to balance.
Would be great for you to recognize that peoples’ lives are being destroyed because of those who are asking for tolerance. They are being removed from their jobs and livelihoods because they disagree with a lifestyle choice and simply have asked to recuse themselves from participating in it.
This legislation is simply protecting overreach because of LGBT activism.
lolwut
Being destroyed? Lifestyle choice? Encino man, is that you?
I feel dirty just for visiting and posting in this webside again, but I have to say that this law is to protect religious people from LGTB bigots, with this law, things would have been different for Brendan Eich.
You’re retarded. Brendan Eich donated money to deny LGBT people from having the same rights as heterosexuals; LGBT activists then had a campaign to stop donating money to him through Mozilla. There’s no bigotry there, they were just voting with their wallets, the only way they could.
It works both ways
“Atheists and homosexual-rights activists in Ireland are threatening protest marches. A local government in the overwhelmingly Catholic country has fined a homosexual baker in the village of Inch (County Clare) for refusing to produce a wedding cake featuring, on its icing, the inscription, ^aEURoeA man shall . . . hold fast to his wife ^aEUR” Gen. 2:24.^aEUR
. . . Well, Mr. Sullivan is right. Or at least he would be if he actually existed. I invented the entire story above. Sullivan does, however, have a like-minded counterpart in Northern Ireland. His name is Aidan O^aEURTMNeill, and he is a ^aEURoeprominent human rights barrister^aEUR in Northern Ireland. He is representing the Ashers Baking Company against charges by the Equality Commission for Northern Ireland that it is illegally discriminating against a would-be client who wanted a cake featuring Sesame Street characters Bert and Ernie under the slogan ^aEURoesupport gay marriage.^aEUR O^aEURTMNeill argued, quite cogently, that if these charges stand, then (in the Telegraph^aEURTMs summation of his report) ^aEURoeMuslim printers could be forced to produce cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed^aEUR or ^aEURoea T-shirt company with a lesbian owner [could be forced] to print tops denouncing same-sex marriage as an ^aEUR~abomination.^aEURTM^aEUR
via http://www.nationalreview.com/article/416155/baking-liberty-conscie…
Edited 2015-03-30 19:28 UTC
That’s an easy defense. Bert and Ernie images are surely protected IP by Sesame Workshop, and use of said images would require a license. The other defense could just be that the bakery didn’t believe Bert and Ernie are gay (how can puppets be sexual) and therefore refused the work on editorial grounds.
“Just don’t be black, gay, or transgender”
How many blacks does Apple – or any of “big-tech” employ? I can count on one hand the number I’ve seen and have fingers left over. But let’s not look there because it would be really inconvenient to point that out.
Meanwhile Brendan Eich was hounded out of Mozilla. No, I don’t believe the fancy line – I experience a “hostile work environment” as a Christian, I have to just suck up insults, blasphemies, being (indirectly) called stupid, crazy every day, and I do get tired of it.
In the High Tech world, it is open-season on Christians. I don’t think any work for Tim Cook, or they, like me have to hide it.
“The land of opportunity” is the ability to compete – if one person won’t sell you a wedding cake, someone else will, or you can provide the service yourself.
Unless the politically correct government goods come by and fine you and arrest you.
Is this what the LGBT community wants me to think of it – because they had to stay hidden, and experienced bigotry and discrimination, now that they are in power instead of showing how to tolerate they will be ten times as hateful and have their revenge upon Christians?
I don’t think I could ever work for Apple – I could under Steve Jobs who didn’t care about politics or religion, just the insanely great products and services. Tim Cook has already found me guilty of a thought-crime.
Maybe Apple should be forced to open up its iTunes store to apps by the same government force under the same principle that forces Christians who curate the kinds of wedding cakes they bake to serve those whom they don’t want.
Edited 2015-03-30 20:14 UTC
It may surprise you to know that the Christians are still in power. All but 3 of the US presidents have been Christians.
Interesting, the 2 of the 3 exceptions are regarded very highly: Abraham Lincoln and Thomas Jefferson. (I know very little about Andrew Johnson, so reserve judgement there).
Good point. If Tim Cook was truly committed to a discrimination-free marketplace, he wouldn’t allow apps to be barred just because he doesn’t like the viewpoint of an app (as opposed to the app belittling, encouraging violence, or using pejoratives against a group).
And yet, instead of saying he regretted financially backing a proposition that took rights previously granted by the Federal Government AWAY, and sharing views even Barack Obama held at the time, he stepped down as CEO.
First, what kind of Christian, because there are lots, despite the Evangelical Right trying to appropriate the entire group for themselves.
Second, LGBTQ, Women, Blacks, Jews, Muslims, and Sikhs are just as tired of exactly the same thing. You are not special. In fact, you are still the majority, and it saddens me that people such as yourself are so self-absorbed with their persecution complex that they don’t notice all the other people suffering in exactly the same way, and so end up adding to it.
The High Tech world SHOULD have an issue with incoherent belief systems, and judging by this post (and NOT the fact you’re a Christian), I suspect there’s more than a little inconsistency in your thought process.
They couldn’t care less what you think, as long as you’re not passing religion based laws which remove their rights, control how they must do business, and what they can do to/with their bodies.
So maybe they do care, because ‘christians’ have done (and are still trying to do) all these things.
It seems you follow two religions here
Also, you have no idea what it was like working under Steve Jobs, do you?
No, but I think they should be forced to allow their devices to use other app stores. Because it’s my device. I own it. And yet I can only run the apps they find acceptable.
So tell me again how Apple and Christians have not used force to impose their way of thinking and acting on me? Because as bad as the worst social justice warriors are, they’re still not trying to turn me gay.
As for the cake thing, it’s a tricky edge case because it wasn’t even about not selling a cake to a gay couple, but the inscription they requested (an inscription which even Fox News refused to put in their news story about it). The latter does involve free speech and religion issues, and I’m fine with refusal on that basis. What I’m not so fine with is refusal based solely on the beliefs and practices (or rather what the seller believes those to be) of those you’re selling to.
I’m going to celebrate when the whole insane circus sinks.
… who’s having sex with whom. I don’t care who’s baking cakes for whom. When religious people fight gay marriage, they look like asses and they lose. But when progressives start forcing religious people to bake cakes for gay weddings, they look like asses. Let restaurants do the “whites only” shit if they want. I’ll know not to patronize those places. Why does EVERYTHING think they need the government to force everyone else to buy into their religious / inclusive / because God says so / because I say so bullshit? I hate the dumb f–k theocrats, but I’m not looking to trade one group of busy bodies for another. You can’t legislate away bigotry, so stop with the thought crimes!
Edited 2015-03-30 20:31 UTC
Whatever happened to separation of God and State?
My beliefs are my beliefs. Why should they carry more or less weight because of a stupid religious connection?
Why should secular busy bodies be immune to the notion of “separation of church and state” when they push their ideology? You an’t have it both ways. Either religion is special or all philosophies (secular and religious) are the same under the law. This is really about freedom of association, or put more plainly, “I don’t have to like you or work with you if I don’t want to.”
In a country that emphasizes religious freedom, one person’s religious beliefs should not impede on another person’s ability to pursue the life of their choosing, so long as they allow others to lead a life of their choosing as well. In the US, where “religious freedom” is a core belief of the nation, the Christian extremists quickly seem to forget that other religions exist. The moment you create laws that are based on religious beliefs (beliefs that have no reason for existing other than religion), religious freedom is lost. People also seem to quickly forget that the loss of rights for one group is a loss of rights for everyone. What if my religious beliefs stated that left-handed people were “unholy”? How about blonds? How about Jews? How about all non-Caucasians?
If an organization or individual is allowed to deny services to individuals based on religious beliefs, you may not think it’s that big of a deal. So maybe a restaurant won’t serve you, which is a bit disturbing by itself, but what if you need medical services, housing, or law enforcement?
I am personally wrapped up in the middle of this mess. I’m a gay software engineer. I just married my husband last October in Iowa, where it is legal and fully recognized, but we live in Nebraska, where a state constitutional amendment exists prohibiting same-sex marriage. My husband and I are pretty well entrenched in this area… our jobs are here, our families and friends are near by… but we struggled to make sure he would be covered by my medical insurance, he decided to take my name but the state government won’t recognize it even though the federal government does, we would like to adopt in the future but Nebraska law makes it significantly more complicated as well as preventing us from becoming foster parents (one of the more common ways to go about adoption), we’re scared of buying a house in Nebraska for fear of what might happen if one of us dies (inheritance taxes… that’s if the survivor would even get the house at all). He and I are living with a lot of legal uncertainty. If Nebraska adopted law similar to Indiana’s law, we would have even less certainty than we do already.
We’re not asking for special treatment. We’re not asking for churches to perform gay weddings or for people to change their religious beliefs. We just want to build our life together and to live our life with dignity and the basic respect everyone deserves. To do that, we need to know that we are legally protected.
Yep, just because the government is not forcing someone do stop doing something, it will cause them to do run out and start doing something.
This is the same lame ass argument people have for “If you make drugs legal, then every single person I know will instantly turn into a heroin addict over night”.
It’s the last gasp of the old, white guys club. Unfortunately, they can do quite a lot of damage before they are done.
so what will happen next time Apple refuses a contract with someone?
The basic issue is the freedom to enter into a contract. To do so, both parties have to come to an agreement, and if that cannot happen for any reason – any reason by either party, it does not need to be stated – then no contract exists, and the one party cannot force the other party to enter into a contract against their will.
If you do not have a right to refuse to enter a contract, then you do not have any rights at all. That in itself is against the U.S Constitution.
Would you accept a bus with a sign “no blacks, jews, indians, hispanics, yellow or whatever” ?
Does it sound OK to you to put the same sign on restaurants or any walk-in no-contract business ?
Of course not !
If you have a walk-in no-contract business you should not be allowed to discriminate anyone or risk to lose your license to be open. Simple as that.
If you are a private club, a church or a thing like that, I am OK with you discriminating who can enter but it should be obligatory to put a slab discriminating who can get in or not. It is your right to be an a**hole moron but it must be made clear beforehand or else prosecuting and reparation must be paid ASAP.
Like on any other sensible case where the boundaries of personal freedom and public interest is involved, the rules should be clear in advance.
Don’t lump black people with gay and transgender. One is genetically born black, the others are choices made by people.
science hard. me believe old book instead. very simpler.
Hahaha, you almost made me laugh out loud there Thom
Though I suppose you cry a little every time you see such dumbfounded foolishness declared by readers of your blog…
You know what else is a choice? Being religious.
Long time reader. I disagree with you. But that doesn’t mean we should get a law that would force you to cater to my beliefs. I am free to stop reading this site and start reading other sites if I choose. That is how it should be if we disagree. Now Gays and Christians have different beliefs about appropriate behavior, but this is america, they can get along in a civilized manner. It also bothers me that you insult African Americans. African americans do not choose there skin color, and being Black has no correlation with how a man acts. On the other hand, all people including gay people have control how they act. We do believe that ones actions should be considerate to others when in public. We don’t force christians to promote gays anymore than we force gays to promote being christian.
Being black or being gay is the same thing. It’s not a choice. That’s the kind of ignorant crap I thought belonged back in the ’50s. I guess us Dutch are just a little more evolved than the average American Christian extremist.
Saying being gay is a choice is incredibly offence, ignorant, and just plain stupid. I know Christian extremists tend to lack the capacity to understand science, but I never cease to be amazed by it – probably because that kind of backwards, outdated, barbaric thinking has mostly died out over here. We don’t get to interact with that kind of stupidity, so we forget it exists.
There are a few things you got wrong.. People are born as they are. However, skin color can be changed and thus choice is available. By not choosing to alter your skin color, you are choosing to leave it as is. That _is_ a choice. Sexual orientation is a little more complex. A person may feel homosexual inside but act as a heterosexual. That _is_ a choice. And naturally the reverse is true. There’s tons of accounts of people who acted homosexual thinking they are/may be, ultimately to realize they aren’t. Behavior is almost always an expression of choice.
Being black and being gay is only the same thing in the most basic way possible. Beyond that they are completely different. Have you ever heard of black parents disowning their child because he/she is black? Is being gay something you immediately identify when looking at somebody? Do I really need to continue? It should already be obvious how ridiculous it is to say these things are the same. I know blacks, gays, and blacks who are also gay… I’ve never heard any of them say `we’re in the same boat`.
Further, the way you describe your “Christian extremists” sounds equally stupid and ignorant as those you’re trying to humiliate. While you may like to think Dutch people are superior in some way, or void of ignorance, reality disagrees. Unfortunately we can’t have any meaningful dialog on that subject until you’ve stopped patting yourself on the back.
Actually, I know of TWO black couples who disowned their children because they weren’t black enough, by their definition of ‘black’, which shockingly had nothing to do with skin color.
So you were saying?
What science?
This is a serious question. I don’t believe homosexuality is a choice but I don’t know the science behind it.
Homosexuality is seen in multiple species and can be traced to certain genes. You literally have no choice when it comes to attraction. You may ask, when did they choose to be gay? Ask yourself, when did I decide to be straight? It just is the way it is.
Edited 2015-03-31 04:03 UTC
(This is from memory. Feel free to correct where I might be wrong)
Sexual identity and orientation is generally thought to be determined by epigenetics – that is, the information that describes how genes are expressed.
During the development of the fetus, these epigenetic factors can influence how the body develops. Some of modifications are physical – different levels of testosterone throughout the development process can affect the ratio of the length of the index finger versus the ring finger, for example.
The various hormones control development at all stages, and different mixes at different stages of brain development affect sexuality through modification of associated brain structures.
But yet there’s no proof that homosexuality is genetically determined. No one discovered the “gay gene”. Probably because there’s none to be discovered and homosexuality is a choice.
Well, the only sure proof would come experimenting on fetuses during development, which would be highly unethical.
Instead, we can look look at measurable physical traits, and see how they correlate between straight and gay men and women.
Single correlations are mostly useless, of course, but when you have many correlated sources that all derive from the same known mechanism – hormone exposure (primarily testosterone) during fetal development.
Things that correlate with homosexuality:
2D:4D finger length ratio
Direction of hair whorl
Finger tip ridge density on pinky finger
Number of older brothers
Additionally, there are genetic markers that can be attributed to homosexuality, specifically markers on the Xq28 gene (at least with gay men).
When did you choose to be straight? What age were you when you said, “Fuck it. I think I want to be straight.”
I’m going to guess you were always straight, just like every gay person I know says they were always gay. Considering EVERY gay person I’ve met, or seen asked in interviews, says they were born gay, and it wasn’t a choice, there are two possibilities:
1. You are wrong, and homosexuality isn’t a choice
or
2. All gay people are liars.
No one has found the “straight gene” either so what could that mean?
Always fun when Christians bring genetics into the argument, especially with their aversion to evolution and odd concepts of what ‘proof’ is.
For example, here one implies the gay gene doesn’t exist because it hasn’t been discovered. In other words, lack of evidence supports a negative. Well, as anyone who has done any debugging can tell you, testing can’t prove or even imply the absence of bugs.
Gee, I hope this guy isn’t a software engineer.
Also there’s no proof that God created Man. No one has discovered anything supporting this claim, probably because He doesn’t exist and Christianity is a choice.
…yeah, that makes about as much sense as what you’re saying
I don’t agree with that poster’s sentiment, but you fancy yourself the tolerant, reason-loving champion with those kind of hate-filled invectives?
“average American Christian extremist”
“lack the capacity to understand science”
“barbaric”
“stupidity”
Gotta love that sophisticated lefty tolerance!
For a European who loves America, you really don’t read widely on American opinion, do you? There are gay opinion writers who have no problem with the Indiana law, including gay opinion & legal writers who are lawyers. There are law professors who support SSM & don’t object to the law.
You DO know that the Almighty Tolerant One Obama voted for VERY similar language in ’98–BEFORE it had been amended to satisfy concerns about discrimination against gays & lesbians, right? You DO know that He was FOR SSM, then changed His position to be AGAINST SSM to run for political office, then changed it back to be for SSM when it was politically safer, right???
Did the gay scientists discover the gene of homosexuality?
Calling christians extremists, barbaric, ignorant, unable to understand science, stupid makes you a noble and a gentleman.
If you had actually read the comment, you’d know I said “extremist Christians”.
Then again, I’m not surprised you ave difficulty reading, considering your other bigoted, uneducated, barbaric, medieaval, hateful comments.
Let’s ask Anne Frank and the rest of the Dutch Jewish community about that, ok?
Oh please Thom, get off your high horse and stop spreading nonsense. I guess you’ve never heard of your own bible belt of fundamental protestants? Hint: it’s the same huge area across the Netherlands that suffered from the measles outbreak two years ago.
Heck, you even have a TV broadcast that actively spreads their creationism propaganda on national television. Your biggest party right now (Staten 2015) is a religious party made up of these folks. What kind of backwards country are you living in?
Also, it’s rather sad that you pretend to be so much more enlightened while using the same generalising and demeaning language as the usual bigots use.
You may want to do some introspection and go outside a bit more often to get a real idea of the world around you before preaching from the armchair in your hugbox.
Edited 2015-04-01 14:16 UTC
Hahahahahahaha…no. As much as I enjoy that you bring up controversial issues that is just idiotic flamebait.
Your fa~A§ade of tolerance is not without cracks and what can be glanced through is not very pretty.
Edited 2015-04-02 11:09 UTC
So, in your view putting black, gays and transgenders inside the same sentence is a insult to black because of what ?
When Thom wrote it my understanding was that he was referring to people that experience an unusual amount of mean discrimination, is your view different ?
I care about people and I care about science. Science says that using “color” to classify human races is stupid and I never heard of a colorimeter to determine if someone is black enough to be called black.
Don’t know what your beliefs are but most religions and political systems neglected woman’s rights not so long ago, English science/religious man debated if blacks had a soul and slavery was an accepted practice, and all those and many other foolish thinking and behavior are inconceivable today.
I talk with lots of people and I don’t ask them to respect my views – after all, opinions are things we should ponder about and agree, disagree or partially agree/disagree, but I do ask them to show the same kind of respect I direct toward them, human beings should be respected unless they demonstrate a very strong reason we should drop it. Showing that we disagree is not a form of disrespect but negating them an explanation of why you disagree is.
What I am saying is: this semi-chaotic human grouping we call society is constructed on top of specified and not-so-specified set of rules that change with time, even religious ones, despite what priests may repeat ad nauseam, and whatever set is the most accepted we should try to respect each other and their will, of course, inside the usual “sensible” limits of “your rights end where mines start”.
We can not expect that bad “manners” do not exist and, as so, we must establish reasonable rules. Drop of civil rights and access to open spaces because someone chose a different sexual orientation of mine is a bit too much to be asked, of course, in my opinion.
Edited 2015-03-31 00:30 UTC
Or you could shrug it off, and focus on the tech news. I don’t think disagreement should always be the cause to part ways.
I’m sure that even in the US, there are plenty Christians that find nothing wrong with gays, or their behaviour. It’s funny to see the die-hard Christian extremists to act like they’re talking for all Christians.
That’s mighty liberal of you, but many people disagree with that, unfortunately. And most of the people disagreeing with that, agree with you on the gay thing. That should tell you something.
That’s true. But then we come to the question, why the !@#!@#$ would they “control how they act”, if in any way that matters, they act *exactly* the way that you do, except that same vs. opposite sex thing? Because it’s in an ancient hate book? You also have control to how you act. And the fact that you chose to follow the words written down by ancient goatherders, or, have it your way, handed over by a facist, misogynist god, makes you a dispicable excuse for a human being. THE RELIGION YOU FOLLOW IS YOUR CHOICE. IF YOU CHOSE NASTY RELIGION, YOU = NASTY! So there.
Yet there are christian gays, and I bet there are a lot more proselytizing christians than gays (I know there’s plenty of the former, but I’ve yet to encounter any of the latter). Besides gays aren’t promoting being gay, they are promoting being treated as humans with equal rights. Rights you want to deny them because you chose to follow a hateful religion, with a hateful god. Your choice dude. I’d rather die and go to hell for having loved my fellow human beings, than go to heaven for discriminating against them!
They are promoting doing disgusting things in public.
If you click on the link please read the disclaimer carefully before clicking further. The story and images might affect you in a negative way.
http://www.zombietime.com/up_your_alley_2008/
Sure. Come by in Amsterdam during the canal pride parade, I’m sure you’ll faint
.
Wait..”on the other hand”? So are you saying black people does not have control over how they act?
What on earth does this have to do with being able to shop in whatever store you like?
Most of the stories about people wanting to refuse services lack the proper details. For instance:
The story about the bed and breakfast owner and the gay couple who wanted to get married there frequently left out the important details. The B&B owners would have been ok to refuse to rent out the place for the reception. But the law says that you can NOT discriminate when it comes to housing. Temporary or not, a B&B is housing and everyone has a right to that housing. Thats why the couple lost. They probably would have been ok if they had just said the place was going to be closed that weekend. But they were specific about why they wouldn’t let the married couple stay the night.
Restaurants that have liquor licenses also are required to be open to the public as part of the license. The restaurant can always give the license back if they don’t like it.
What the heck color is the president again? Yeah sure the whole country is racist, yep.
to a good proportion of the US population[1] the current incumbent is not an American and is nothing more than a mouthpiece for (to quote) ‘his towelhead brothers in the Middle east’.
Not being American by birth means you can’t stand for election to the Presidency/VP.
[1] I saw many roadside posters in states such as AZ, NM, UT etc that made the that claim. This was in 2014.
So did the Dutch elect a black president? How about the Germans? The french? No you say? Well clearly the Americans are much more racist than those highly evolved countries.
And no, I’m not an American. Just tired of the holier than thou attitude around here.
The Constitution is a one way street from the people to the Government, therefore discrimination is outside the bounds of the Federal and State Governments. The Governments are prohibited from discriminating, not the private sector.
is this on OSAlert?
Because the CEO of the world’s largest company, which just so happens to be connected to technology, spouts some personal opinion?
If I wanted to read this sort of rubbish I would go to another site. Please stick to doing the main job of reporting on OS news.
It’s more like gaynews. It’s a funny place where you can read about unicorns and rainbows and be proud about being gay.
The law protects christians who morally cannot participate in gay weddings. It has nothing to do with the fact that they’re gay and everything to do with the fact that weddings are religious ceremonies. Gay weddings are a perversion that christians cannot morally endorse or participate in. The law helps protect christians from homofascists who intentionally seek out private christian businesses to perform services they know they cannot morally perform, so that they can inflict life ruinous penalties on them while at the same time claiming to be the victim.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l8ukak8P2vY
I love Monty Python! Look, if the first amendment protects us from *anything* it’s forced compulsion to participate in religious events, including weddings. The “repressed” are being fined to oblivion. How is it not fascist to fine a christian baker $750,000 for not participating in a gay wedding?
It’s $75,000 per case, so $150,000 in total. See here: http://www.inquisitr.com/1810664/refusal-to-make-same-sex-couples-w…. This article also lists a distinction that seems to be totally lost in all of the above discussion: it’s perfectly ok for a business owner to refuse to provide a certain type of business, just not with the sole reason that the customers are gay!
Yes, I made a typo, but there was no edit button(or it was too late and it disappeared), sorry it was $75,000, which is still pretty ruinous.
I genuinely think most business could rightfully be sued if they refused service to gays, but I draw the line at forcing Christians/Muslims to participate in religious events that they find perverse. Ironically it’s not just gays, but I’ve seen ministers refuse service to couples who lived together before marriage, or refused only because they provide services only for Christian weddings. To Christians/Muslims, weddings are religious events and forcing them to participate in them, is very anti-first amendment.
Just as gays believe this is who they are and who they must be, Christians/Muslims believe that is who they are and what they must be, and neither should be forced to compromise. It’s called “lets agree to disagree”.
I don’t think anyone would no draw the line there. If it’s a religious service, you can’t be forced to do something against that religion. But we’re not talking about religious services, we’re talking about mundane things like baking a cake, or serving a drink.
It probably has something to do with the fact that the Baker agreed to abide by the rules of the state when he got his restaurant license to serve the public. No one forces him to be in that business.
Further more, there is NOTHING in the bible that says that Christians must shun gay people. Jesus did not shun any non believers he met. He fed them fish just the same as everyone else. Maybe if people were a little more open crap like this wouldnt even be newsworthy.
You’re absolutely right. There is nothing in the Bible that says we should shun people; actually the Bible says to do quite the opposite. I would gladly support almost all discrimination lawsuits against Christians(or Jews or Muslims) that did.
But I think it goes both ways, there are gays that want to force them to participate in gay weddings, which they find immoral. Knowing that their conscience prohibits them from participating, they know that can sue for lots of money and get free stuff because they’re “offended”.
I have seen this mentioned more than once: Name me one example of someone being forced into a wedding they don’t approve of? Catering a wedding is not being “in” the wedding.
Which religion, then? Just Christian? Then how do Muslims or Jews get married? How the heck do Athiests get married?
It’s those damn Gay Fascists again, with their Gay Fascist Agenda. No doubt they’re in collusion with the RAND Corporation and the Reverse Vampires.
Edited 2015-03-31 10:45 UTC
You mean that your personal christian cult finds it a perversion. I know many christian denominations that are perfectly ok with gays marrying, even performing it in their church. But those wouldn’t be True Christians, amiright?
I’m not sure I understand your argument, are you saying because some Christians allow gay marriage, that means my beliefs are not sincerely held?
There’s no need for “cult” name calling. I’m listening with an open mind, and name calling is the fastest way to close it. So let me ask you this, why do you think, in the US, it is ok to force someone to participate in a religious event they find is immoral?
No, it means that you seem to think you speak for all christians when you proclaimed that “christians cannot morally endorse (…) a perversion” (quoted liberaly) when talking about gay weddings.
I didn’t mean it as an insult. I just meant your specific denomination (also see this joke: http://www.theguardian.com/stage/2005/sep/29/comedy.religion with regards to the slight rediculousnes of all these different denominations).
That depends on what you call “participate”. If you are talking about a baker, and the wedding cake is a normal cake, without any overt “gayness” indicators, than it is discrimination to not sell it, because you would sell such a cake to non-gays. It is ok to force the baker to sell the cake, because it is not ok to discriminate against someone solely for their sexual orientation. The baker is not really “participating”, they’re just providing a service.
Actually, if a straight couple came to order a cake for a gay wedding, I would probably refuse that too, it’s not limited to gays. The first amendment of the constitution protects us from compelled speech, and I consider forced baking a cake for a gay wedding as compelled speech, same with photography. I say this because cake baking, and photography are both forms of artwork, and artwork is used to convey an idea, and fits the constitutional definition of speech.
If the KKK wanted me to bake a cake for their ceremony, I would refuse that too – even if the cake was “religiously neutral”. I would know it would be used immorally, and I would refuse. If someone tried to hire me as a photographer for an orgy, I would refuse that too. I have a right and duty to do what is moral.
Edited 2015-03-31 12:00 UTC
That would be ok, if you’d also not sell a cake to gays for another gay couple’s wedding. But if you sell cakes to straight couples for *their* wedding, you also must sell cakes to gay couples.
You can consider all you want of course, but it’s nonsensical to equal speech with actions. It is legally not compelled speech if you are forced to bake a cake, no matter how you personally feel about it. If that were true *any* action would be protected under the 1st amendment, which is a ludicrous proposition.
No it doesn’t. The link between art and free speech is that one can produce “speech” by e.g. drawing. It’s about expressing yourself, and your ideas. That has nothing to do with baking a cake or taking photographs for someone else. That’s *not* expressing yourself, so falls way outside the definition of free speech.
But it IS compelled speech if you are forced to inscribe something counter to your beliefs or what you wish to say.
Not a photographer I see, let alone a baker.
Thankfully the copyright and speech laws in my country completely disagree with you here.
Well, IANAL, but though a baker may refuse a certain text to *any* customer (e.g. a racist one), it can’t refuse a gay customer a text it would have no problems with for a straight customer.
I doubt it. Otherwise states like Indiana would’t need extra special measures to punish the gay^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H protect the religious.
“I’m listening with an open mind.”
You didn’t create that impression when you stated: “Gay weddings are a perversion that christians cannot morally endorse or participate in.”
Which was not only prejudicial (i.e. pre-judged), but inaccurate as there are many (quite likely the majority) of Christians who really have no problem with gay marriage or homosexuality generally.
Maybe you mean to some “some Christians”. There are plenty of *real* Christians who accept gay weddings. You know, those who actual read what Jesus said and love and accept everyone.
Oh yeah, it’s all plot against the oppressed white Christian majority.
tl;dr:
I’m not saying it’s because they are gay
…but..
it’s because they are gay.
The constitution supposed to be protecting the rights of individuals to exercise their religion. Now, there are people especially the atheists and the godless society were supporting the LGTB agenda, that feeling like a woman even if physical evidence exists on the contrary is fine. ANd now they were legalizing their perversion by lobbying politicians to support them. And when it becomes the law of the land as some of the states in the US were, they were threatening Christian businesses to serve them intentionally having them support the very practices that Christianity does not agree with. One such event was a florist who happened to be a Christian such as this one:
http://www.christianexaminer.com/article/florist.faces.fine.damages…
ANd many other examples of persecution against the Christian faith.
Do you know how screwed up you sound? Your argument is like Muslims suing grocery stores for selling pork. Or Hindu’s suing Burger King for selling beef. You don’t get to pick and choose based on religion. No one is asking these people to change their religion. And as I mentioned in another post, all evidence from the Bible says that you are wrong. Jesus fed the non believers the same as the faithful. He NEVER shunned anyone because they were different. Maybe your kind should try reading the bible instead of using it as a club.
Of course.
On the contrary, if I exercise my rights(traditional, already well known to you folks, that Christianity is in direct conflict with same-sex marriage or any related practices, (IT IS ALREADY A GIVEN KNOWLEDGE!), I will submit to any folks who happened to be lesbians to make videos for them in their marriage ceremony, thus violating my own conscience and rights to exercise my faith. Your comparison is utter bullocks.
Yes I know, as a Christian, doctors need to treat those who are sick. In lay man’s term, Jesus came to save the lost and not to save the self-righteous people of his day. Now it doesn’t mean that he was not bringing justice with him. He was anti-divorce, even if Judaism permits the Jews to file a divorce because of their hardness. He defined marriage as between a man and a woman, and the disciples elaborated this law.
So your comparison is totally bullocks. Sorry.
Really? Maybe you can enlighten us to where Jesus actually said that.
So you’re saying you should be free to practice your religion but these men and women should not have the freedom to be the gender they want? How convenient. Hypocritical much?
I wish Europeans would quit pretending they actually know anything about America. There is no war on homosexuals, black, transgender, or females here. There are ignorant people in all groups. There is no more bigotry here than anywhere else in the world, and quite frankly, there is probably less here than in most European countries.
As for marriage, the government shouldn’t be involved in that at all. Marriage isn’t between the government and couples, priests and couples, pastors and couples, state and couples. In fact, a marriage is between two individuals, and is witnessed by a priest, pastor, state, etc. Also, it doesn’t exist unless it is consummated, which requires the natural potential for procreation. Without that potential, it is a civil union. If the government isn’t willing to grant the same privileges to civil unions as to marriages, than it is at fault, not “religious” people.
Quite frankly, there is a bigger worldwide war on religion, particularly the Christian religion, than perhaps any other group. Whether that fits your world view or not, it is true.
I wish Americans would quit pretending they actually know anything about the world outside America.
I guess it’s payback time for the Crusades, the genocides in South America etc etc.
It boggles me that so many ‘christians’ still have the audacity to claim to be the victim here, when throughout history Christians have been the ones to brutally force their views and ways on people.
They still do. Here’s a list of laws imposed by ‘christians’ which are still in effect today:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_laws_in_the_United_States
In other words, you’re still at the apex of privilege you dimwit.
Wikipedia? Great source, Sherlock! Wikipedia is even more dominated by “impartial” activist/advocate lefty editors & admins than the top ranks of US journalism. At least with major news outlets there is SOME level of editorial oversight.
I see you fancy yourself as a champion of non-discrimination in commerce, Tim Cook. So when are you going to de-ban the Manhattan Declaration app you banned based upon its viewpoint that you disagreed with, Mr. Cook?
I like seeing something from many angles. Here is an article by Gabriel Malor: http://thefederalist.com/2015/03/30/your-questions-on-indianas-reli…
The law is fairly well analyzed in this article. Why I think this is good for another viewpoint is that the author is a lawyer and homosexual while supporting the law.
Our nation recently celebrated the 70th anniversary of the march across the bridge in Selma. Such brave people to fight for what was right. Its sad that we are still fighting the same fight.
For everyone here who believes in this law, it is the same thing as hanging a sign on the door that says: “No Colored Allowed”. Don’t we know better by now?