quote:

---

“I’m not sure if I made the right decision [legally],” Marjorie says. “But it felt right to me as a person.”

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:
I agree with her. I think she has as much legal right to refuse to ice the message on this cake as the NI cake shop had to refuse to ice gay rights slogans on a cake for a gay rights organization, and were I her, I'd like to refuse to ice the message this customer wanted, too.

What say you all?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by L'organist:
What is it with homophobes and cake? I just don't see the connection.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Palimpsest:
You can buy toasters that burn pictures of Mickey Mouse or Hello Kitty on the toast. That could be the next court case.

---

quote:

---

Doesn't matter if it's a set-up. If you tell a homophobic baker they've got to write otherwise legally acceptable homophilic messages, then you also have to tell a homophilic baker they've got to write otherwise legally acceptable homophobic messages.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jane R:
But as Palimpsest says, if the ACLU support the plaintiff (as, logically, they should) it won't work.

---

quote:

---

I was asked by one of our local homophobes to make this cake. I made it because I believe that free speech should be exactly what it says. I hated every minute of making it because I'm opposed to what was asked to write.

The person who ordered the cake was very specific about the words. Fortunately for my sense of justice, they weren't so specific about the ingredients....

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by orfeo:
If you tell a homophobic baker they've got to write otherwise legally acceptable homophilic messages, then you also have to tell a homophilic baker they've got to write otherwise legally acceptable homophobic messages.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mdijon:

On the other hand if someone is having a wedding and asks for a cake in a bakery open to the public then it is discriminatory if a baker is happy to do "Anne and Jim many happy returns" but not "Dave and Jim many happy returns".

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mdijon:

quote:

---

Originally posted by orfeo:
If you tell a homophobic baker they've got to write otherwise legally acceptable homophilic messages, then you also have to tell a homophilic baker they've got to write otherwise legally acceptable homophobic messages.

---

I don't think you have the right to do either. If I say I want you to write "Gay people are fantastic" or "Gay people should be burned" on a cake I think you have the right to say you don't want to write that precise message in either case. (Arguably in the latter case you may be in for hate speech in some countries).

On the other hand if someone is having a wedding and asks for a cake in a bakery open to the public then it is discriminatory if a baker is happy to do "Anne and Jim many happy returns" but not "Dave and Jim many happy returns".

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Arethosemyfeet:
Surely you have the right to refuse custom for any reason so long as it doesn't involve discrimination on the grounds of a protected characteristic? The protected characteristic under Colorado law is "creed". Bigotry is not a creed.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by orfeo:
Doesn't matter if it's a set-up. If you tell a homophobic baker they've got to write otherwise legally acceptable homophilic messages, then you also have to tell a homophilic baker they've got to write otherwise legally acceptable homophobic messages.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by orfeo:
Consistency demands that if I think a baker is expected to convey any lawful message requested by a customer, that's true regardless of whether I like the message.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mdijon:
So I don't accept that bakers have the right to turn customers away based on sexual orientation etc. - or that they can censor bland messages which are essential to the trade (e.g. congratulatory messages).

But I do think that once you get to more off-piste messages it is acceptable for bakers to feel uncomfortable with political statements about George Bush (positive or negative), to fail to get the irony behind a faux-racist message and therefore decline it or to just feel not like stretching beyond 26 characters.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by orfeo:
Doesn't matter if it's a set-up. If you tell a homophobic baker they've got to write otherwise legally acceptable homophilic messages, then you also have to tell a homophilic baker they've got to write otherwise legally acceptable homophobic messages.

Or we could all just prove we're a bunch of hypocrites.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
This is why I'd rather give non-essential service people (like bakeries) back the right to refuse service in any situation they choose. I can think of plenty much more offensive messages that some trolling asshole could legally require a baker to write.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mdijon:
This is why I prefer the middle ground that says a baker of delicate constitution is not actually required by law to write a lurid salacious message on a birthday cake if asked to do so, but on the other hand isn't allowed to refuse to bake for filthy faggots.

Like teufelchen says the baker can refuse to do anything they want they aren't obliged to take a job, but they can't refuse to do serve a customer on the basis of sexual orientation. Personally I don't want to live in a society where that sort of casual bigotry in public is tolerated, either in essential or non-essential services.

I don't think this is anything to do with freedom of speech either. It might be legally protected that you can publish the message in a paper and sell it on the street corner, but that doesn't mean any editor/baker is obliged to carry your message in their paper/cake (delete as applicable).

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
Use the perfectly good and much more powerful tool already to hand. Use social pressure.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
Since baking is a nonessential service, why not allow the baker (the brewer, the candlestickmaker) to refuse to serve whomever, just as their tiny little neurons determine, and use social pressure to bring assholes into line?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Teufelchen:
I am no lawyer, but as I understand it, a business can refuse a customer's trade for any old reason they like, unless it's discrimination on the basis of protected characteristic. There is no general right to be allowed to do business with someone; you can't compel them to deal with you. But if it's obvious that they only refuse to deal with you because you possess some legally-protected characteristic that they object to, that's actionable.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
I think the alternative is worse.

---

Oh yeah, letting society do segregation and Jim Crow type stuff is soooooo much better than banning it. And we should tooootally let the bigots be as nasty as they want, because that's worked so well for societies in the past. And using the law to make people behave in a civilized way is just not at all what the law is for.


Lamb Chopped, it always horrifies/amazes me in these threads how your zeal to see gay people get persecuted so far outweighs the empathy you ought to have towards a fellow minority group getting persecuted. It comes across as "well I don't like the discrimination I've experienced in my own life, but I'm fine with suffering that sort of thing if it means I get to discriminate against those filthy homosexuals, which is my number one priority as a Christian".
 

---

Posted by mdijon (# 8520) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Starlight:
"well I don't like the discrimination I've experienced in my own life, but I'm fine with suffering that sort of thing if it means I get to discriminate against those filthy homosexuals, which is my number one priority as a Christian".

---

quote:

---

I can think of plenty much more offensive messages that some trolling asshole could legally require a baker to write. What, for instance, of religious slurs? racial slurs? references to the baker's personal life (demanded, for instance, by an ex who is a customer)?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
Since baking is a nonessential service, why not allow the baker (the brewer, the candlestickmaker) to refuse to serve whomever, just as their tiny little neurons determine, and use social pressure to bring assholes into line?

---

Jim Crow.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Starlight:
mdijon, my statement was not based on this thread alone, as there have been other threads on the subject in which Lamb Chopped has made her position clear. What I hope pointing this out adds to the discussion is that you realize previous discussions made clear that her motivations for rationalizing discrimination, and trying to defend the lawfulness thereof, are that she personally wants to be able to discriminate against gay people in the course of her own business activities. I am personally very fed up with her bigotry on the subject.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Nicolemr:

quote:

---

I can think of plenty much more offensive messages that some trolling asshole could legally require a baker to write. What, for instance, of religious slurs? racial slurs? references to the baker's personal life (demanded, for instance, by an ex who is a customer)?

---

Lamb chopped, why do you say religious slurs or racial slurs are more offensive than anti-homosexual slurs? Seems to me they are about the same degree of nastiness, and it puzzles me that you seem to feel differently.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Starlight:
mdijon, my statement was not based on this thread alone, as there have been other threads on the subject in which Lamb Chopped has made her position clear. What I hope pointing this out adds to the discussion is that you realize previous discussions made clear that her motivations for rationalizing discrimination, and trying to defend the lawfulness thereof, are that she personally wants to be able to discriminate against gay people in the course of her own business activities. I am personally very fed up with her bigotry on the subject.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by saysay:
And yet right now I'm fairly certain any gay couple could find a bakery perfectly willing to help them. ...

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by saysay:
And yet right now I'm fairly certain any gay couple could find a bakery perfectly willing to help them. Force all bakeries to serve them, and I'm guessing we'll wind up with a bunch of situations which are the gay bakery equivalent of sitting in a restaurant watching people who came in after you get served before you wondering if the problem is that you're in an inter-racial family. People won't be able to prove that the baker's lying and they didn't have some crisis that prevented them from baking their cake, they'll just have a lot of suspicions when it seems to happen with all gay couples who try to buy from a particular baker.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Stercus Tauri:
Someone asked me recently if I had noticed how often gay people show up as exceptionally talented cooks and bakers. Looking around family and friends, I'd say the evidence is almost overwhelming.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Starlight:
Same-sex attraction seems to be scientifically primarily a result of an unusual brain development process occurring in the womb.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
I was referring to other causes of poor treatment. Forget it.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Horseman Bree:
I guess the "equality" idea drives some people into "crazy" status.

---

quote:

---

And the paradox of this within the gay rights movement is an astounding one. For the past twenty years, the open, free-wheeling arguments for marriage equality and military service have persuaded, yes, persuaded, Americans with remarkable speed that reform was right and necessary. Yes: the arguments. If you want to argue that no social progress can come without coercion or suppression of free speech, you have to deal with the empirical fact that old-fashioned liberalism brought gay equality to America far, far faster than identity politics leftism. It was liberalism – not leftism – that gave us this breakthrough. And when Alabama is on the verge of issuing marriage licenses to its citizens, it is the kind of breakthrough that is rightly deemed historic. But instead of absorbing that fact and being proud of it and seeking magnanimity and wondering if other social justice movements might learn from this astonishing success for liberalism and social progress, some on the gay left see only further struggle against an eternally repressive heterosexist regime, demanding more and more sensitivity for slighter and slighter transgressions and actually getting more radicalized – and feeling more victimized and aggrieved – in the process.

Which reveals how dismal this kind of politics is, how bitter and rancid it so quickly becomes, how infantilizing it is.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Teufelchen:

quote:

---

Originally posted by orfeo:
Doesn't matter if it's a set-up. If you tell a homophobic baker they've got to write otherwise legally acceptable homophilic messages, then you also have to tell a homophilic baker they've got to write otherwise legally acceptable homophobic messages.

---

'Otherwise legally acceptable' is a nice weasel phrasing to conceal the equivocation here.

Sexuality is a protected characteristic in law. Being an asshole isn't. So one message is potentially legally protected, not just acceptable, while the other is potentially legally restricted. They're just not interchangeable.

If anyone wants to declare their sexuality to be 'misanthrophic bastard', I won't stop them, but they'll have difficulty making that one stick in law.

t

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by stonespring:
AND THEN I consider a hypothetical case of a baker being asked to bake a cake saying "No intermarriage: keep the races pure," or "Segregation forever," or some other message that is even more explicitly racist, Anti-Semitic, etc. I would think that even a sign maker would have a right to refuse to make a sign with writing like this on it, even if the sign was simply an enlarged reproduction of a printed image given to the sign maker and therefore did not involve any "artistic interpretation" whatsoever. But based on my reasoning above I can't justify this refusal, since here in the US there is no law against racist (or homophobic) speech, as long as you aren't directly encouraging people to commit violence against anyone. What are your thoughts?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by saysay:
But in the past seven years, there's been a serious increase in the power of the illiberal left. They have to be fought.

---

quote:

---

It doesn't help that the mainstream media has a habit of misrepresenting religious views that it doesn't understand.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by orfeo:
What does sexuality being "a protected characteristic in law" actually mean? I think you have to unpack that thought a great deal more.

Hint: It doesn't actually mean that it's completely illegal to ever say anything negative about a gay person.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by orfeo:
But it's the person that's protected, not the message. You started talking about legally protected messages, and that isn't what anti-discrimination law covers. It covers the treatment of you, as a person.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Teufelchen:

quote:

---

Originally posted by orfeo:
But it's the person that's protected, not the message. You started talking about legally protected messages, and that isn't what anti-discrimination law covers. It covers the treatment of you, as a person.

---

Not true. You introduced the concept of a 'legally acceptable homophobic message', and a lot of stuff involving the word 'homophile'.

Let's break this down, then, shall we:

If I go to the shop and say "I'd like a wedding cake with two grooms on the top, please", then I can reasonably expect to get what I pay for. If they'll sell one with a mixed-sex couple on, but not with a same-sex couple, that's clearly discrimination on the basis of sexuality. (Implicitly my sexuality, although for the purposes of this thought experiment I could be straight and buying for a gay couple among my friends.)

If I go to the shop and say "Gimme a fuckin' cake", I can reasonably expect to leave with no cake, whether I'm there with my wife or wearing a pride t-shirt.

The case in hand is much more like the latter than the former.

I don't give a damn whether the buyer's obnoxious statement is protected free speech or not. It's a total red herring. He can't compel the bakery to provide it.

And I'm really, really perplexed that anyone thinks there's any ambiguity about this. This guy has no legal right to be served anything by the bakery, and that's that.

t

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by orfeo:
But as soon as you have a shop that says that it offers the service of writing a message of your choice, you DO run into issues of free speech, and you waving those issues away as a red herring does little to convince me.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mdijon:

quote:

---

Originally posted by orfeo:
But as soon as you have a shop that says that it offers the service of writing a message of your choice, you DO run into issues of free speech, and you waving those issues away as a red herring does little to convince me.

---

I don't think you do have the issues of free speech. Aren't publishers who allow self-funded publications allowed to decide who they will and won't publish? Aren't T-shirt designers allowed to decline to print what they regard as an offensive slogan? Are internet forums allowed to not take posts from annoying posters?

The question is whether or not the decision to not take my posts is discriminatory or not. If you say mdijon is boring and winds me up, I'm going to ban him then there's no law that says you can't. If you say mdijon is from a despised ethnic group I'm going to ban him then I think you're in trouble.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by orfeo:
Of course I don't think it's morally equivalent, but the entire question is to the extent to which we can impose our own moral viewpoint on the people around us.

When you walk into a bakery that has (1) offered itself as a business open to the public at large, and (2) offered a service of writing requested messages, at what point is the bakery allowed to give you a moral opinion about the content of your message?

---

quote:

---

I think there is at least a very serious question as to why the mood on the ship has been to say that the bakery CAN'T reject a pro-gay message, yet say that it CAN reject a anti-gay message. That's not giving homosexuals equal treatment. That's giving homosexuals favourable treatment, and protecting pro-gay opinions over and above anti-gay ones. That's moving into the realms of positive discrimination. And even though I'm thoroughly pro-gay, that strikes me as a serious philosophical issue.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by orfeo:
Are you not now acknowledging the very point I was making, that it's gay customers that are protected rather than gay messages?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Teufelchen:
You were the one who began this line about some messages being permissible and others not.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by orfeo:
You're basically proposing a position where a gay person, as a member of a protected class, can be in a better position than non-protected people by forcing a service provider to be an unwilling vehicle for a pro-gay message. It's far from obvious that that laws about NON-DISCRIMINATION in service provision are a trump card in this way, that are actually likely to give pro-gay messages an advantage rather than equality.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Teufelchen:

quote:

---

Originally posted by orfeo:
You're basically proposing a position where a gay person, as a member of a protected class, can be in a better position than non-protected people by forcing a service provider to be an unwilling vehicle for a pro-gay message. It's far from obvious that that laws about NON-DISCRIMINATION in service provision are a trump card in this way, that are actually likely to give pro-gay messages an advantage rather than equality.

---

Again: You can come back and tell me I'm a member of a privileged class when LGBT people don't live in fear of straight people. Until then, it's bollocks.

t

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
I AM on the sharp-and-pointy end of this policy for several reasons, you remember. I know what I'm suggesting. I think the alternative is worse.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Golden Key:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
I AM on the sharp-and-pointy end of this policy for several reasons, you remember. I know what I'm suggesting. I think the alternative is worse.

---

I may well be misreading LC. But I *think* maybe she's saying that she and her family (and probably her Vietnamese religious community) experience discrimination, too--and that's informing her views. She's not (IMHO) saying anything against LGBT folks; but, as someone who's faced discrimination for other reasons, she knows how bad it can get--and she thinks her social pressure/education approach is better than the brute force of the law.

LC, did I get it right?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Starlight:

quote:

---

Originally posted by saysay:
But in the past seven years, there's been a serious increase in the power of the illiberal left. They have to be fought.

---

I think what we've observed is a generational shift, and I think this is typical of any civil rights issue.


So I see this as a predictable pattern for civil rights issues. It's not a matter of the "illiberal left" getting out of control. Legalize same-sex marriage, prohibit discrimination and hate-speech, and it's done, problem solved, and we can all move on to whatever future civil rights movement history has in store for us

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Bibliophile:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Starlight:
So I see this as a predictable pattern for civil rights issues. It's not a matter of the "illiberal left" getting out of control. Legalize same-sex marriage, prohibit discrimination and hate-speech, and it's done, problem solved, and we can all move on to whatever future civil rights movement history has in store for us

---

I think what people are talking about when they speak about the "illiberal left" is exactly the attitude that you are displaying here. If the law agrees with a liberal position on an issue then 'hate speech' should be prohibited and 'its done'. The term 'hate speech' seems to be very generously interpreted to mean any speech that opposes liberal ideology on some point so that you then get 'its done'. 'Its done' here seems to mean 'that is now a closed issue, anyone even trying to discuss it should be prohibited from doing so because that is 'hate speech''.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Bibliophile:
I think what people are talking about when they speak about the "illiberal left" is exactly the attitude that you are displaying here.

---

quote:

---

The term 'hate speech' seems to be very generously interpreted to mean any speech that opposes liberal ideology on some point

---

Hate speech means saying nasty things about a minority group.

If one particular political viewpoint finds that restriction far more problematic than the other side does, in terms of expressing their arguments and views, then that probably says something significant about the immorality of their views.

quote:

---

'Its done' here seems to mean 'that is now a closed issue, anyone even trying to discuss it should be prohibited from doing so because that is 'hate speech''.

---

Nope. "It's done" in my post was not referring to ending discussion or suppressing viewpoints but to having fully enacted all the desirable laws.

[ 09. July 2015, 02:32: Message edited by: Starlight ]
 

---

Posted by Bibliophile (# 18418) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Starlight:
Okay, well that's probably not surprising, because I'm probably one of the people who constitute the "illiberal left" insofar as that designation makes any sense. I suggest the "moral left" would be a better term, as what drives the "illiberalism" (and the "left" part of it, for that matter) is a strong moral code and strong sense of moral outrage at the evils the religious right has been perpetrating.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Starlight:

quote:

---

The term 'hate speech' seems to be very generously interpreted to mean any speech that opposes liberal ideology on some point

---

Hate speech means saying nasty things about a minority group.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Bibliophile:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Starlight:
Okay, well that's probably not surprising, because I'm probably one of the people who constitute the "illiberal left" insofar as that designation makes any sense. I suggest the "moral left" would be a better term, as what drives the "illiberalism" (and the "left" part of it, for that matter) is a strong moral code and strong sense of moral outrage at the evils the religious right has been perpetrating.

---

Oh Please! What would the left know about strong moral codes?

quote:

---

Originally posted by Starlight:

quote:

---

The term 'hate speech' seems to be very generously interpreted to mean any speech that opposes liberal ideology on some point

---

Hate speech means saying nasty things about a minority group.

---

The way the left interpret the term 'hate speech' is to include any disagreement with left wing ideas of 'progress' no matter how politely or respectfully expressed. It doesn't include the most vile, nasty, aggressive or even violent language if those words are spoken in support of 'equality'

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Bibliophile:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Starlight:
Okay, well that's probably not surprising, because I'm probably one of the people who constitute the "illiberal left" insofar as that designation makes any sense. I suggest the "moral left" would be a better term, as what drives the "illiberalism" (and the "left" part of it, for that matter) is a strong moral code and strong sense of moral outrage at the evils the religious right has been perpetrating.

---

Oh Please! What would the left know about strong moral codes?

---

quote:

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Starlight:

quote:

---

The term 'hate speech' seems to be very generously interpreted to mean any speech that opposes liberal ideology on some point

---

Hate speech means saying nasty things about a minority group.

---

The way the left interpret the term 'hate speech' is to include any disagreement with left wing ideas of 'progress' no matter how politely or respectfully expressed. It doesn't include the most vile, nasty, aggressive or even violent language if those words are spoken in support of 'equality'

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Bibliophile:
Portland Baker's ordered to pay $135,000 damages for 'emotional suffering'

http://portland.suntimes.com/por-news/7/89/105245/portland-bakers-refused-same-sex-couple-pay-135000

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
You don't get it do you? It's perfectly possible to express the most obnoxious and hateful opinions in a very polite manner, and equally to agitate for good in a forthright and uncompromising manner. You seem to confuse medium and message. If you say you believe that homosexual relationships are wrong, you are disagreeing. When you go on to call gays a cancer in our society and start saying how they should all be thrown into jail or shunned or made to feel how disgusting you think they are, you're starting to cross into hate speech.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Starlight:
If one particular political viewpoint finds that restriction far more problematic than the other side does, in terms of expressing their arguments and views, then that probably says something significant about the immorality of their views.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Bibliophile:
The way the left interpret the term 'hate speech' is to include any disagreement with left wing ideas of 'progress' no matter how politely or respectfully expressed. It doesn't include the most vile, nasty, aggressive or even violent language if those words are spoken in support of 'equality'

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Bibliophile:
Oh Please! What would the left know about strong moral codes?

---

What did you think motivated people on the left? Tea and biscuits?

The entire concept of human rights, the basic modern political paradigm, utilitarianism, the social gospel, universal healthcare, etc are all products of liberalism or the left.

quote:

---

The way the left interpret the term 'hate speech' is to include any disagreement with left wing ideas of 'progress' no matter how politely or respectfully expressed. It doesn't include the most vile, nasty, aggressive or even violent language if those words are spoken in support of 'equality'

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Keromaru:
Not necessarily. Remember when the Dixie Chicks spoke out against the Iraq war?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Penny S:
A much more serious issue than cake icing has surfaced in the UK. Pension companies are refusing to make pensions available to same sex partners with the same rules as hetero partners, so that where a widow would get £200 odd, a SSP would only get £40 - these figures are pulled out of my vague memory (I was driving at the time).
The reason given is that the company will only calculate from the time that civil partnerships became available.
I didn't hear if they would limit a widow's pension according to the date of marriage or not. I was left with the idea that a woman who had been married to a man for less than the time in which a SS partnership could exist would still be eligible for the larger amount.
If I have this correctly, it is not acceptable.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Keromaru:
Here's my question: where does Brandon Eich fit into all this?

Because that whole situation left a rotten taste in my mouth, and still does. It felt less like a principled protest and more like one tech company (OKCupid) using its customers as proxy warriors against another.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Keromaru:
And if the CEO of a major company can lose his job because of a politically unpopular opinion, where does that leave the millions of Americans who happen to agree with him?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Keromaru:
Here's my question: where does Brandon Eich fit into all this?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Macrina:
I really, really, really do not get why Christianity thinks it is so special that the laws of a secular country should bow to it?

If Catholics and other Christians want to say homosexual behavior is a sin according to their religion then fine, go ahead knock yourselves out. Just please leave the rest of us who don't share your opinion alone.

How would Christians feel if we decided to make hair salons illegal because Sikhs believe that cutting hair is against the commandments of God?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Starlight:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Bibliophile:
Oh Please! What would the left know about strong moral codes?

---

What did you think motivated people on the left?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Starlight:
The entire concept of human rights, the basic modern political paradigm, utilitarianism, the social gospel, universal healthcare, etc are all products of liberalism or the left.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Starlight:

quote:

---

The way the left interpret the term 'hate speech' is to include any disagreement with left wing ideas of 'progress' no matter how politely or respectfully expressed. It doesn't include the most vile, nasty, aggressive or even violent language if those words are spoken in support of 'equality'

---

What matters is whether the nasty language is being used against a specific identifiable group of people on the basis of some personal trait.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Bibliophile:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Starlight:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Bibliophile:
Oh Please! What would the left know about strong moral codes?

---

What did you think motivated people on the left?

---

Pride, envy, wrath, amongst other things

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Macrina:
I really, really, really do not get why Christianity thinks it is so special that the laws of a secular country should bow to it?

If Catholics and other Christians want to say homosexual behavior is a sin according to their religion then fine, go ahead knock yourselves out. Just please leave the rest of us who don't share your opinion alone.

---

quote:

---

Bibliophile

quote:Originally posted by Starlight:
The entire concept of human rights, the basic modern political paradigm, utilitarianism, the social gospel, universal healthcare, etc are all products of liberalism or the left.

So various things the left likes are products of the left. Your point being?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Bibliophile:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Starlight:
What did you think motivated people on the left?

---

Pride, envy, wrath, amongst other things

---

As Mousethief has pointed out, those things seem to often be what motivates the right.

quote:

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Starlight:
The entire concept of human rights, the basic modern political paradigm, utilitarianism, the social gospel, universal healthcare, etc are all products of liberalism or the left.

---

So various things the left likes are products of the left. Your point being?

---

quote:

---

The left in particular tolerates bile directed at its political opponents who can be described in the most hateful language imaginable without calling it 'hate speech'.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Penny S:
So we are left to think that you do not like the listed items, which many people consider to be public goods? You do not believe in rights available to all humans? You do not believe in universal healthcare?

---

quote:

---

Jindal said the state judiciary committee should review the incident in which Keith Bardwell, justice of the peace for Tangipahoa Parish's 8th Ward, refused to issue a marriage license to Beth Humphrey, 30, and her boyfriend, Terence McKay, 32, both of Hammond.

"This is a clear violation of constitutional rights and federal and state law. ... Disciplinary action should be taken immediately -- including the revoking of his license," the Republican governor said.

---

quote:

---

Gov. Bobby Jindal's administration has said Louisiana court clerks and other state employees who don't want to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples because of religious objections won't have to do so.

Jindal's office has said the governor's religious freedom executive order as well as state and federal law will protect clerks and state employees who have moral objections to gay marriage and don't feel comfortable handing out licenses to same-sex couples.

"We believe the U.S. Constitution, Louisiana Constitution, Louisiana's Preservation of Religious Freedom Act, as well as our Executive Order prevents government from compelling individuals to violate sincerely held religious beliefs. We will continue to fight to protect religious liberty," said Mike Reed, spokesman for the governor's office.

---

So Mr. Hammond's strong and sincere objections to inter-racial marriage aren't sufficient to protect him from the consequences of not doing his job, but anti-gay prejudice should be protected?

It's hard to avoid the conclusion that what's being sought isn't so much a general right of conscience under which any government official can discriminate against any member of the public if they feel like they should be able to. What's being sought is a protection for a specific set of prejudices. Is there any reason why Mr. Bardwell's racism is less worth of protection than other government officials hatred of homosexuals? I can't see any, other than the fact that racism is generally disapproved of more strongly than gay hate.
 

---

Posted by Brenda Clough (# 18061) on :
 
You can test it by swapping out the word 'gay' for some other word. Like say 'Jewish' or 'black' or 'Asian'. Sounds nasty? Then it is.
 

---

Posted by Pigwidgeon (# 10192) on :
 
This just in -- Court Rules Bakery Illegally Discriminated Against Gay Couple.

 

---

Posted by Soror Magna (# 9881) on :
 
From the link:

quote:

---

... Phillips admitted he had turned away other same-sex couples as a matter of policy. The CCRD’s decision noted evidence in the record that Phillips had expressed willingness to take a cake order for the “marriage” of two dogs, but not for the commitment ceremony of two women, and that he would not make a cake for a same-sex couple’s wedding celebration “just as he would not be willing to make a pedophile cake.” ...

---

OK, so he played the pedophile card, but he's ok with dogs getting married. To another dog!!!!!


 

---

Posted by Penny S (# 14768) on :
 
Did he check that it was a dog and a bitch?
 

---

Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Penny S:
Did he check that it was a dog and a bitch?

---

 

---

Posted by Soror Magna (# 9881) on :
 
And there's another one:
Calgary Transit pride bus has driver threatening to quit

But I'll bet he loves to drive the Rudolph bus during the holidays, because everyone knows Rudolph and Santa were Fathers of the Church. (Assuming Calgary HAS a Rudolph bus. Caprica City has two!)
 

---

Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on :
 
He is an idiot.
 

---

Posted by LeRoc (# 3216) on :
 
If he wants to quit, go ahead.
 

---

Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on :
 
Honestly, why is he even raising it? It might be worth raising if he'd actually been assigned to that bus - although I wouldn't have an enormous amount of sympathy for him, it might not even be that difficult to just have him drive another vehicle.

But he's decided to complain about the prospect of him, or even another bus driver, being required to drive a rainbow bus. Methinks he's being far too precious about it and is showing a spectacular lack of workplace negotiation skills.

Honestly, any normal person's first option when something comes up in a workplace that they don't personally want to do is to softly explore whether someone else can do it instead. Not go "Help! Help! I'm being oppressed!"
 

---

Posted by Penny S (# 14768) on :
 
But isn't there a group of people who have been enticed into believing that this oppression is happening, backed up by people prepared to bear the legal costs? If your coterie believe this stuff, it would be hard not to join in and go round looking for hardships to protest.
 

---

Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on :
 
Yeah, but even someone backing court cases would want a case where something had actually happened. This guy is just engaging in catastrophic thinking and running with it.

What's the legal remedy? First thing a court would do is say "is there any evidence your employer planned to roster you on that bus?", and when the answer is No the judge will just tell him to stop wasting everybody's time. Courts absolutely hate being asked to rule on hypotheticals.

[ 01. September 2015, 11:48: Message edited by: orfeo ]
 

---

Posted by Soror Magna (# 9881) on :
 
Update on the bus driver from Calgary: he has been fired....

... but not for refusing to drive the Pride bus. The employer had promised him he wouldn't have to drive the bus. He was fired for a) lying to the media about it and b) posting Nazi shit on his Facebook page, where he identified himself as a transit employee.

Sure looks like, as we say here on the Ship, he wasn't persecuted because he's a Christian, he was fired because he's a prat.
 

---

Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on :
 
I can't say I'm surprised, given how incongruous the original story was. This guy was angling for manufactured outrage.

And now he's got his martyrdom.

I doubt it's going to get him far in Canada, though. Such tactics might succeed in some parts of the United States, but my impression is that north of the border he won't get much sympathy at all.
 

---

Posted by Alogon (# 5513) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Siegfried:
Baking and providing a cake and being asked to put a message on it are different things entirely. And very clearly a trolling attempt by the orderer.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by lilBuddha:
I'm going to kick myself for engaging, but what on earth is your post supposed to mean?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by lilBuddha:
there are still things which must be confronted.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Alogon:
The point is that a few gay people (not many, I hope), having achieved the legal right to marry, are now using the law to bludgeon other people in unnecessary and trivial confrontations. Milo doesn't approve, and neither do I. It's not only unsportsmanlike, but it gives ammunition to those who have never liked us and make dire predictions about the consequences of giving us a place at the table. We should stop it, for our own sake.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Crœsos:
CNN ran an interesting segment a few months ago where they determined that five florists in a small Georgia community (and I can't imagine they had that many more than those five) would all refuse to sell flowers to a same-sex couple for their commitment ceremony. (This was pre-Obergefell so Georgia didn't have legal same-sex marriage yet.) At what point does a pervasive discriminatory cartel become a problem that's worth addressing?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Alogon:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Crœsos:
CNN ran an interesting segment a few months ago where they determined that five florists in a small Georgia community (and I can't imagine they had that many more than those five) would all refuse to sell flowers to a same-sex couple for their commitment ceremony. (This was pre-Obergefell so Georgia didn't have legal same-sex marriage yet.) At what point does a pervasive discriminatory cartel become a problem that's worth addressing?

---

In cases like that, where there is no alternative, then of course we should protest. But in metropolitan areas there are plenty of choices. These bigots will die out if (1) our cause is just; and (2) we don't scare the fence-sitters by picking petty fights.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Palimpsest:
There's always the few who think they are expert in deciding what amount of discrimination is ok, and protesting it would disturb the fence sitters.

---

quote:

---

We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed. Frankly, I have yet to engage in a direct action campaign that was "well timed" in the view of those who have not suffered unduly from the disease of segregation. For years now I have heard the word "Wait!" It rings in the ear of every Negro with piercing familiarity. This "Wait" has almost always meant "Never." We must come to see, with one of our distinguished jurists, that "justice too long delayed is justice denied."

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Palimpsest:
There's always the few who think they are expert in deciding what amount of discrimination is ok...

---

Still discrimination against gays? I can't imagine what you mean.

Utah judge removes lesbian couple’s foster child, says she’ll be better off with heterosexuals.


 

---

Posted by Crœsos (# 238) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Pigwidgeon:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Palimpsest:
There's always the few who think they are expert in deciding what amount of discrimination is ok...

---

Still discrimination against gays? I can't imagine what you mean.

Utah judge removes lesbian couple’s foster child, says she’ll be better off with heterosexuals.

---

I'm sure Alogon will point out that the couple's big mistake was living somewhere like Carbon County, Utah. (Population 21,403, largest city Price, UT.) If they'd lived in a "metropolitan area" they'd have a choice of which judge would hear their case, or something like that.
 

---

Posted by Kelly Alves (# 2522) on :
 
I can't believe anyone would think throwing a kid back into the foster system would be prefereable to any reasonable adults taking on adoption. Gay, straight married, unmarried...
 

---

Posted by Pigwidgeon (# 10192) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Kelly Alves:
I can't believe anyone would think throwing a kid back into the foster system would be preferable to any reasonable adults taking on adoption. Gay, straight married, unmarried...

---

Apparently this all ties in with the new LDS edict. This poor child can't be a Mormon in good standing if she lives with same-sex parents.

 

---

Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Alogon:
In cases like that, where there is no alternative, then of course we should protest. But in metropolitan areas there are plenty of choices.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Pigwidgeon:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Kelly Alves:
I can't believe anyone would think throwing a kid back into the foster system would be preferable to any reasonable adults taking on adoption. Gay, straight married, unmarried...

---

Apparently this all ties in with the new LDS edict. This poor child can't be a Mormon in good standing if she lives with same-sex parents.

---

Fortunately the judge has modified the order and will have another hearing in December; the child will remain with the couple until then. I suspect all the parties concerned have arranged for an immediate appeal if necessary.

In the meantime there was a mass resignation in Salt Lake City on Saturday though most were likely inactive members.
 

---

Posted by Kelly Alves (# 2522) on :
 
I heard about that. Inactive or no, it blew my mind.
 

---

Posted by Net Spinster (# 16058) on :
 
The judge has now removed himself from the adoption case.
 

---

Posted by Kelly Alves (# 2522) on :
 
HELL. YES.
 

---

Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gee D:
As a matter of interest Orfeo , have you experienced that sort of discrimination in your shopping here? I've never heard of it - from time to time there have been instances of discrimination at bars and pubs, usually in the country and none of those for a number of years, but I've not heard of it otherwise.

---

quote:

---

It certainly wasn't the text message Candice Lowe was expecting to get on her honeymoon.

She says it came from the owner of Take the Cake Bakery in Toledo, canceling the order for her wife's birthday cake.

Lowe says, "after she saw my Facebook page, she found out that I was in a same-sex marriage and she could not do my cake."

"She did all of their effort to get a cake and gets a text message and has to tell me her surprise, it kind of ruined our day," Amanda Lowe said of her wife.

The couple was just married two weeks ago and are still on cloud nine after celebrating with their son, family and friends. But that all came crashing down. In some ways, they say, it's like taking two steps back.

"It wasn't a wedding cake, it was just a birthday cake," Candice said. "A birthday cake has nothing to do with your sexual preference."

---

quote:

---

Candice, I’m sorry … I just realized your in a same sex relationship and we do not do cakes for same sex weddings or parties … I’m so sorry. I wasn’t aware of this exactly until I saw your page …

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Nicolemr:
Anyone but me think it's really creepy that the baker investigated the client's facebook page before baking her a cake? WTF?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Brenda Clough:
Yeah, I would love to see the chapter and verse in the OT (it would be the OT) that forbids bakers to bake birthday cakes for sinners.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Crœsos:

quote:

---

Candice, I’m sorry … I just realized your in a same sex relationship and we do not do cakes for same sex weddings or parties … I’m so sorry. I wasn’t aware of this exactly until I saw your page …

---

Ellipses in the original....

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Net Spinster:
I wonder if this is breach of contract; it is not as though they refused before accepting the order. I'm not a lawyer but had the necessary conditions been met to make this a contract? If they had, finding out that your customer wanted the cake for their same-sex spouse is not, as far as I know, good grounds for breaking the contract.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Soror Magna:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Crœsos:

quote:

---

Candice, I’m sorry … I just realized your in a same sex relationship and we do not do cakes for same sex weddings or parties … I’m so sorry. I wasn’t aware of this exactly until I saw your page …

---

Ellipses in the original....

---

And italics mine.

Regardless of how the baker feels about marriage equality, saying you won't do "same sex parties" is pretty clearly "we don't serve your kind here."

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gee D:
And what would the damages be for breach of contract, pure and simple? Any extra cost involved in having a similar cake made and decorated by someone else. Damages for a breach of any anti-discrimination legislation would be another matter, but probably not much.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Net Spinster:
Some punitive damages above that are likely. It seems this particular locale may not have appropriate anti-discrimination legislation so one might not be able to sue under that.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Net Spinster:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gee D:
And what would the damages be for breach of contract, pure and simple? Any extra cost involved in having a similar cake made and decorated by someone else. Damages for a breach of any anti-discrimination legislation would be another matter, but probably not much.

---

Some punitive damages above that are likely. It seems this particular locale may not have appropriate anti-discrimination legislation so one might not be able to sue under that. However depending on the locale a sizable number of people (gay or otherwise) might not be willing to give business to a bakery that is openly anti-same sex couples.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Joesaphat:
A tad sad to watch, actually. None of those refused service seem to be bothered by the actual discrimination about gay people, only by the fact that, hey, ''They're not gay' or 'I've been married twenty-two years.' That's ok then, it's not fair that they should be denied service, never mind the next gay person who might. I saw that happen in a gay pub once: a bunch of thugs was waiting outside to have a bit of fun and all the straight folks who'd been drinking inside shot out screaming they weren't poofters.

---

Well, I'm not proud of it, but if I were in fear of physical harm I might do the same.
 

---

Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Joesaphat:
A tad sad to watch, actually. None of those refused service seem to be bothered by the actual discrimination about gay people,

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Joesaphat:
Perhaps, LilBuddha, I certainly hope so; yet, if this were done about any other minority group (a la, we do not serve Jews, or Asians, or Muslims... pretty much any other) it would not be comedy, I can assure you.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Joesaphat:
Perhaps, LilBuddha, I certainly hope so; yet, if this were done about any other minority group (a la, we do not serve Jews, or Asians, or Muslims... pretty much any other) it would not be comedy, I can assure you.

---

But the point of the stunt was that this was legal behaviour in the state. It was explicitly made legal thanks to the "bathroom bill".

Discriminating on racial grounds is not legal in any state.

As to why the responses of the rejected customers were mostly "but I'm not gay" rather than "I just want to buy some food - I'm not proposing to have sex with it", I'm rather afraid that that's human nature for you. People tend to operate within the framework that has been created for them. Most people don't step back and point out that the framework is bloody stupid.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Joesaphat:
I don;t see the fun in 'You would not like these manly burgers anyways, homosexuals have more refined tastes like cilantro and penis' I'm not laughing, sorry.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Joesaphat:
'Trotting out a list of stereotypes,' yep, you nailed it, not funny at all.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by lilBuddha:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Joesaphat:
'Trotting out a list of stereotypes,' yep, you nailed it, not funny at all.

---

Except The Daily Show bit said absolutely nothing that I've not heard said by gay male friends. And they think it is funny.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:

---

Originally posted by lilBuddha:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Joesaphat:
'Trotting out a list of stereotypes,' yep, you nailed it, not funny at all.

---

Except The Daily Show bit said absolutely nothing that I've not heard said by gay male friends. And they think it is funny.

---

It matters a great deal who says it. Young black men can call each other "nigga." I cannot call them that. (And that's okay.)

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:

---

Originally posted by lilBuddha:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Joesaphat:
'Trotting out a list of stereotypes,' yep, you nailed it, not funny at all.

---

Except The Daily Show bit said absolutely nothing that I've not heard said by gay male friends. And they think it is funny.

---

It matters a great deal who says it. Young black men can call each other "nigga." I cannot call them that. (And that's okay.)

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by lilBuddha:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Joesaphat:
'Trotting out a list of stereotypes,' yep, you nailed it, not funny at all.

---

Except The Daily Show bit said absolutely nothing that I've not heard said by gay male friends. And they think it is funny.

---

quote:

---

I profoundly disagree with Asher’s opposition to same-sex love and marriage, and support protests against them. They claim to be Christians and followers of Jesus. Yet he never once condemned homosexuality. Moreover, discrimination is not a Christian value. Ashers’ religious justifications are, to my mind, theologically unsound.

Nevertheless, on reflection, the court was wrong to penalise Ashers and I was wrong to endorse its decision.

This begs the question: Will gay bakers have to accept orders for cakes with homophobic slurs? I don’t think LGBT people should be forced to promote anti-gay messages.

The court judgement also leads me to ask: Should a Muslim printer be obliged to publish cartoons of Mohammed or a Jewish one a book that propagates Holocaust denial?

If the current Ashers verdict stands it could, for example, encourage far right extremists to demand that bakeries and other service providers facilitate the promotion of anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim opinions. It would leave businesses unable to refuse to decorate cakes, print posters and emblazon mugs with bigoted messages.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Joesaphat:
A tad sad to watch, actually. None of those refused service seem to be bothered by the actual discrimination about gay people, only by the fact that, hey, ''They're not gay' or 'I've been married twenty-two years.' That's ok then, it's not fair that they should be denied service, never mind the next gay person who might. ...

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:
I can't see that the discrimination law would force a gay baker to promote anti-gay messages, but it would be more difficult to show that a Jewish printer would be able to refuse to print Islamic texts.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:
being a nasty bigot isn't a protected class, religious faith is, so it's hard to see how anti-gay messages phrased as statements of religious faith wouldn't qualify

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
...There's something to be said for giving people in business the freedon to serve a particular customer or not as they choose. And conversely there's something to be said for requiring those who advertise a product or service to make it available to anyone who offers the price in legal tender.

But who wants a system that gives some people but not others a legal right to be served ?...

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
If I made the laws, I'd have it that icing words onto a cake is a type of speech act, and give cake-icers the same right as printers and newspaper lettercolumns to not publish stuff they don't want to publish.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Soror Magna:
nobody wants a system based on abject confusion between people and services...

...Thus, anyone should be able to get a "Congratulations, Adam and Steve" cake.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Soror Magna:

Thus, anyone should be able to get a "Congratulations, Adam and Steve" cake. Depending on where you live, a "Die, faggots, die!" cake may be illegal no matter who orders it.

---

quote:

---

On Ashers’ stance regarding the cake, Morgan said: “The supplier may provide the particular service to all or to none but not to a selection of customers based on prohibited grounds. In the present case the appellants might elect not to provide a service that involves any religious or political message. What they may not do is provide a service that only reflects their own political or religious message in relation to sexual orientation.”

---

quote:

---

“The fact that a baker provides a cake for a particular team or portrays witches on a Halloween cake does not indicate any support for either,” the lord chief justice said.

---

quote:

---

On Ashers’ stance regarding the cake, Morgan said: “The supplier may provide the particular service to all or to none but not to a selection of customers based on prohibited grounds.

---

quote:

---

In the present case the appellants might elect not to provide a service that involves any religious or political message. What they may not do is provide a service that only reflects their own political or religious message...

---

quote:

---

...in relation to sexual orientation.”

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
Given that this is Northern Ireland and that some religious messages have the potential to be hugely inflammatory, it would seem much better to give bakers (and signwriters and printers and publishers) the discretion to refuse particular messages. So long as they refuse them equally to all customers.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Golden Key:
A baker could have a set menu of possible wording and decorations.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:
you're saying as long as we prohibit both gays AND straights from ordering pro-gay cakes, then we're not discriminating.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
If it's wrong in general, I don't see how relating to sexual orientation suddenly makes it right.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
If it's wrong in general, I don't see how relating to sexual orientation suddenly makes it right.

---

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:

But the baker hears through the grape vine that this is for a "gay wedding." And refuses the commission. Because to bake a cake for the "gay wedding" would be promoting sin.

Is that okay?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
If it's wrong in general, I don't see how relating to sexual orientation suddenly makes it right.

---

Sexual orientation is one of the protected classes in discrimination law (along with age, marital status, gender identity, pregnancy, disability, race/ethnic/national origin, religion and sex.

You are free to discriminate against people with small hands and bad hair, if it floats your boat.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:
An Orthodox Jewish boy stops at an icecream van wanting to buy an icecream. The owner refuses because he is an Orthodox Jew . . . [and] a friend of the boy's parents. <<snip>> In England and Wales, a publican can refuse to sell beer to anyone at any time for any reason. . . . It seems to me to be a difficult argument to assert that a person selling beer has this provision and yet a person selling cake does not.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:
In England and Wales, a publican can refuse to sell beer to anyone at any time for any reason. He doesn't even have to give a reason for refusal of service.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:
I don't believe this exempts him from the Equality Act.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:
But it seems that if the manager had simply said that he refused to serve them because they looked drunk - or just refused to serve them without giving a reason - there wouldn't have been a case.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:
Yes - because there wouldn't have been any proof that he was discriminating on grounds of ethnicity. In that case, and in the Ashers case, the shop made it clear why they were discriminating. If the cake shop was just "all booked up" when a gay couple came calling, that's harder to prove.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:
I suppose it'd have then been about whether the baker was really discriminating based on sexuality rather than shoe size.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:
How many justifications can we give for Jim Crow?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:
How many justifications can we give for Jim Crow?

---

By "Jim Crow" I understand you to mean a law that gives different rights to different classes of people.

I'm arguing for exactly the opposite - that everyone should have the same legal rights.

That doesn't mean that every decision that everybody takes has to impact on everybody equally. There is nothing to object to in a shop that sells men's clothing and only men's clothing. The disadvantage that women suffer by not being catered to in such an establishment is not blighting anybody's life.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Cottontail:
There is no law saying a men's clothing outlet must sell clothing for woman. But there is a law saying that a men's clothing outlet must sell clothing to women.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
... There is nothing to object to in a shop that sells men's clothing and only men's clothing. The disadvantage that women suffer by not being catered to in such an establishment is not blighting anybody's life.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Cottontail:
There is no law saying a men's clothing outlet must sell clothing for woman. But there is a law saying that a men's clothing outlet must sell clothing to women.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
That doesn't mean that every decision that everybody takes has to impact on everybody equally. There is nothing to object to in a shop that sells men's clothing and only men's clothing. The disadvantage that women suffer by not being catered to in such an establishment is not blighting anybody's life.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Cottontail:
There is no law saying a men's clothing outlet must sell clothing for woman. But there is a law saying that a men's clothing outlet must sell clothing to women.

---

I've always found it interesting that the fashion world has given us suits, ties, and other items of men's clothing designed for women, but that the opposite has not happened.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
That doesn't mean that every decision that everybody takes has to impact on everybody equally. There is nothing to object to in a shop that sells men's clothing and only men's clothing.

---

This is a case of, "Oh look, I found a faulty analogue that's okay, so the original example is okay." Also I'm wondering why you think I was talking about you, when my post was several posts removed from your last post.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
That doesn't mean that every decision that everybody takes has to impact on everybody equally. There is nothing to object to in a shop that sells men's clothing and only men's clothing.

---

This is a case of, "Oh look, I found a faulty analogue that's okay, so the original example is okay." Also I'm wondering why you think I was talking about you, when my post was several posts removed from your last post.

---

Do please feel free to clarify.

Who is that you think has argued for a Jim Crow law that distinguishes certain categories of people as having fewer rights ?

If there were such a thing as cakes that men tend to like and cakes that women tend to like, would it be morally wrong for a baker to choose to sell one and not the other ?

If there were such a thing as gay clothes and straight clothes, would it be morally wrong for a shop to choose to sell one but not the other ?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:

If there were such a thing as cakes that men tend to like and cakes that women tend to like, [..]

If there were such a thing as gay clothes and straight clothes, [..]

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
But they're not doing anything morally wrong if they choose not to offer other hair-related services.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by orfeo:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
But they're not doing anything morally wrong if they choose not to offer other hair-related services.

---

I would say they would be risking breaching quite a few rules about trade practices if they advertised themselves as a "hairdresser" and offered exactly one hair-related service.

---

quote:

---

people walk into bakeries with the intention of purchasing baked goods, because that's what a bakery is FOR

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
But this isn't about refusing to sell baked goods. It's about refusing to sell words that one believes are offensive to God or otherwise morally wrong.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by orfeo:
And indeed, I have commented before on how fundamentally stupid it is to talk about "gay wedding cakes" as if they are any different in terms of ingredients or taste from "straight wedding cakes".

They're the same wedding cakes. The cakes don't change, only the purchasers. It has nothing to do with asking for a different service from the one provided.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by orfeo:

[qb]This is all just excuses for attempting to justify the real aim, to not serve certain kinds of customers.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:

quote:

---

Originally posted by orfeo:

[qb]This is all just excuses for attempting to justify the real aim, to not serve certain kinds of customers.

---

If that were true, what conclusion folows ?

Not convinced it is true. Seems to me entirely plausible that a right-wing baker might happily sell buns to his left-wing neighbour but draw the line at icing left-wing slogans onto cakes for him. Why should this be different ?

---

quote:

---

When one of the reporters called and asked if the business could make two identical cakes to help a friend celebrate the grant she received for cloning human stem cells, a Sweet Cakes employee simply laughed and said, “It’ll be $25.99 each, so about $50 to start.”

A request for a cake to congratulate a friend on her divorce was also happily accepted, with a Sweet Cakes worker saying, “We can definitely do something like that.”

Sweet Cakes was even happy to take orders for cakes for a pagan summer solstice fete — complete with a green pentagram decoration — and celebrating babies born out of wedlock.

---

 

---

Posted by Russ (# 120) on :
 
I agree that each of those examples would be thought offensive by some people. And thought acceptable by some people.

So what's wrong with letting people decide for themselves ?

Why this ridiculous notion that there's a moral obligation to engage with all controversial issues identically ? That if you don't object to X then you're doing wrong by obecting to Y ?
 

---

Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
I agree that each of those examples would be thought offensive by some people. And thought acceptable by some people.

So what's wrong with letting people decide for themselves ?

Why this ridiculous notion that there's a moral obligation to engage with all controversial issues identically ? That if you don't object to X then you're doing wrong by obecting to Y ?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Actually, those two in the truck; Jordan Klepper(white) and Roy Woods Jr.(black) do the same thing with racial stereotypes. Given the Daily Show's history, ISTM they are playing the edge to make a point. And the closer you get to any border, the more likely opinions will be divided. But the point is to make you think. That is the heart of the Daily show.

---

quote:

---

Because the end result is refusing to d business with some people. IOW, Jim Crow.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
by Mousethief;

quote:

---

Because the end result is refusing to d business with some people. IOW, Jim Crow.

---

Except that the 'Jim Crow' business was about racism which in turn is simply about what people ARE with no choice and very importantly NO moral implication in their being so.

'Gay' is not just about what people ARE, it is about ACTIONS which they wish to DO, with at least possible moral implications and therefore on the face of it every right for people to legitimately disagree with those ACTIONS and take steps to put that disapproval into practice.

Because there is wide disagreement it is reasonable that THE LAW/Government doesn't discriminate - but ipso facto, they shouldn't discriminate either way, neither for nor against those practices, and neither for nor against those who want to perform those acts OR those who disapprove and want to say so.

Because of this difference in the matter discriminated about, the reference to Jim Crow is completely irrelevant if not downright deceitful.... It's NOT the same kind of issue...!!!

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
by Mousethief;

quote:

---

Because the end result is refusing to d business with some people. IOW, Jim Crow.

---

Except that the 'Jim Crow' business was about racism which in turn is simply about what people ARE with no choice and very importantly NO moral implication in their being so.

'Gay' is not just about what people ARE, it is about ACTIONS which they wish to DO, with at least possible moral implications and therefore on the face of it every right for people to legitimately disagree with those ACTIONS and take steps to put that disapproval into practice.

Because there is wide disagreement it is reasonable that THE LAW/Government doesn't discriminate - but ipso facto, they shouldn't discriminate either way, neither for nor against those practices, and neither for nor against those who want to perform those acts OR those who disapprove and want to say so.

Because of this difference in the matter discriminated about, the reference to Jim Crow is completely irrelevant if not downright deceitful.... It's NOT the same kind of issue...!!!

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Joesaphat:

quote:

---

Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Actually, those two in the truck; Jordan Klepper(white) and Roy Woods Jr.(black) do the same thing with racial stereotypes. Given the Daily Show's history, ISTM they are playing the edge to make a point. And the closer you get to any border, the more likely opinions will be divided. But the point is to make you think. That is the heart of the Daily show.

---

Soooo, do we still find the sketch funny now that Mike Pence is vice-president? and Ben Carson rumoured to be secretary for education?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
Except that the 'Jim Crow' business was about racism which in turn is simply about what people ARE with no choice and very importantly NO moral implication in their being so.

Christianity is not just about what people ARE, it is about ACTIONS which they wish to DO, with at least possible moral implications and therefore on the face of it every right for people to legitimately disagree with those ACTIONS and take steps to put that disapproval into practice.

Because there is wide disagreement it is reasonable that THE LAW/Government doesn't discriminate - but ipso facto, they shouldn't discriminate either way, neither for nor against those practices, and neither for nor against those who want to perform those acts OR those who disapprove and want to say so.

Because of this difference in the matter discriminated about, the reference to Jim Crow is completely irrelevant if not downright deceitful.... It's NOT the same kind of issue...!!!

---

quote:

---

Oh, and there's no such line between what people do and what they are, you try being a Christian without acting on it.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:
For me the point is, what you think about what somebody else does is irrelevant to the requirement to do business with ALL the public or none...

...If you don't like that, don't go into business serving the public.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:

That doesn't give you the moral right to refuse to do business with them.

---

quote:

---

Analogous arguments can be presented about slavery and the status of women. The underlying issue about slavery is that it was a normal aspect of the culture. Christian values did not require the slave owner to give up his legitimate ownership, but to treat the slave well, and if the slave were a Christian, like a brother. So scripture is silent about the inherent wrongness of slavery.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by lilBuddha:
You honestly think those are the same thing?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:

quote:

---

Originally posted by lilBuddha:
You honestly think those are the same thing?

---

No - I'm wondering how far mousethief's "refuse to do business" extends. Of course I don't think they're the same thing at all.

Because I get the sense that mousethief's boundaries are rather wider than mine. For example, I'm happy to have a leftist printer refuse business from his local right-wing political candidate. I'm happy for a magazine run by teetotallers to refuse to sell advertising space to Jack Daniels.

From what mousethief has said, I understand that he would force both of those vendors to undertake work that they find offensive. So I'm wondering how far his boundaries extend.

My position is that you need widespread likely discrimination in order to justify constraining people's natural right to associate with whoever they choose. So you can't discriminate on grounds of sexuality or race, for example, because lots of people want to, and we know what that ends up looking like.

---

quote:

---

I get the sense that mousethief's boundaries are rather wider than mine. For example, I'm happy to have a leftist printer refuse business from his local right-wing political candidate. I'm happy for a magazine run by teetotallers to refuse to sell advertising space to Jack Daniels.

From what mousethief has said, I understand that he would force both of those vendors to undertake work that they find offensive. So I'm wondering how far his boundaries extend.

My position is that you need widespread likely discrimination in order to justify constraining people's natural right to associate with whoever they choose.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
the Bible believes in a God-created purposeful world

---

quote:

---

You make it sound as if the Bible is a person rather than a collection of books.

---

quote:

---

12 For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.
Heb 4:12 (NIV)

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
by leo;

quote:

---

You make it sound as if the Bible is a person rather than a collection of books.

---

Leaving aside the minor point that you really should be able to cope with the figure of speech involved

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
by leo;

quote:

---

You make it sound as if the Bible is a person rather than a collection of books.

---

Leaving aside the minor point that you really should be able to cope with the figure of speech involved there without such pointless nit-picking at my phraseology....

There is also Hebrews 4;12.

quote:

---

12 For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.
Heb 4:12 (NIV)

---

---

quote:

---

A pointed piece of unintended irony.

---

quote:

---

If the 'word' in Hebrews is the Bible, then your argument is circular - the Bible has a pesonality because it says so.

More likely, Hebrews refers to the Logos - the Second Person of the Trinity.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
by lilBuddha;

quote:

---

A pointed piece of unintended irony.

---

Not sure but I think you're suggesting I then myself missed the 'figure of speech' in the Hebrews passage I then quoted....

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
by lilBuddha;

quote:

---

A pointed piece of unintended irony.

---

Not sure but I think you're suggesting I then myself missed the 'figure of speech' in the Hebrews passage I then quoted....

No, I didn't miss it; but if the Bible is 'the Word of God' then it is not quite as detachable from its author as other writings, and indeed the subsequent passage in Hebrews effectively identifies God and his Word.

by leo;

quote:

---

If the 'word' in Hebrews is the Bible, then your argument is circular - the Bible has a pesonality because it says so.

More likely, Hebrews refers to the Logos - the Second Person of the Trinity.

---

And of course the Bible might say so truthfully....

But no, as I hinted above in response to lilBuddha, the point is that God and his word are rather less distinguishable than a human author and his word, and even reading such a human author can feel like a personal encounter at times. We're in a thought world, I think, where a person and his word are conceived as identified, at least ideally, and the wrongness of lying is partly with the way the liar breaks that integrity.

The Bible is depicted as 'the sword of the Spirit', and as you rightly say, Jesus is identified with the Word of God.

As far as I know, Hebrews was almost certainly written before John, so I doubt whether the writer is consciously meaning Jesus as the 'logos' of God. Reading beyond the bit I quoted suggests rather that the writer identifies the word as God himself speaking, and as the Spirit and as omnipresent, able to speak personally to the reader to have the effect on the reader which is described. So yes there's a 'figure of speech' involved - but also a reality that in the Bible and with the Spirit the reader can find God speaking to him personally....

I'm always a bit puzzled by those who want to distinguish between the Bible and Jesus, and I assume it's generally to on the one hand disparage the Bible and on the other hand to have an 'our Jesus' detached from the Bible who agrees with them when they want to disagree with the Bible.

All very well but of course Jesus himself could hardly have a higher view of the Bible and constantly quotes it as the word of God - if you accept the basic Christian confession that Jesus is Lord, then you should accept his view of the Bible as well....

---

quote:

---

Where does Jesus call the Bible (never mind just the Torah), the 'Word of the Lord,' pray tell?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
by Joesaphat;

quote:

---

Where does Jesus call the Bible (never mind just the Torah), the 'Word of the Lord,' pray tell?

---

Not sure I can quote a specific example, though I'll check; but just look throughout the Gospels at the way Jesus treats the OT and uses it as authoritative.... Doesn't really need even one explicit example of Jesus saying the OT is the Word.

As this is a bit of a tangent on this thread, I'm quite happy for purposes of the thread that you should take references to 'the Bible says/the NT says' etc as figurative personification meaning more prosaically "I believe God says through the Bible..." or words to that effect....

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
I'm always a bit puzzled by those who want to distinguish between the Bible and Jesus, and I assume it's generally to on the one hand disparage the Bible and on the other hand to have an 'our Jesus' detached from the Bible who agrees with them when they want to disagree with the Bible.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by leo:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
I'm always a bit puzzled by those who want to distinguish between the Bible and Jesus, and I assume it's generally to on the one hand disparage the Bible and on the other hand to have an 'our Jesus' detached from the Bible who agrees with them when they want to disagree with the Bible.

---

No - it is to avoid bibliolatry

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
No, I didn't miss it; but if the Bible is 'the Word of God' then it is not quite as detachable from its author as other writings, and indeed the subsequent passage in Hebrews effectively identifies God and his Word.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by ThunderBunk:

It also proves the massive lack of parity between the issues involved: the right to marry one's loved one, irrespective of one's respective genders, vs. the right not to be told how to ice a cake.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:

quote:

---

Originally posted by ThunderBunk:

It also proves the massive lack of parity between the issues involved: the right to marry one's loved one, irrespective of one's respective genders, vs. the right not to be told how to ice a cake.

---

And there was I thinking it was about equality under the law and respecting people's religious convictions...

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
You're right that it's nothing to do with cake - it's about whether the bakery should be legally compelled to produce words which go against the baker's religious convictions.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
You're right that it's nothing to do with cake - it's about whether the bakery should be legally compelled to produce words which go against the baker's religious convictions.

And I've been arguing against Leorning Cnight's approach that identifies "protected characteristics" that convey legal rights that other people don't have.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:

In favour of law that gives each right being considered to either everyone or no-one.

---

quote:

---

Is it? Who writes words on a wedding cake?

---

quote:

---

"Support Gay Marriage"

---

quote:

---

Queer Space born 1998

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
Indeed, effectively trying to have the bakery legally persecuted....

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Bullshit. No one goes to an event and gives a flying fuck about who baked the cake unless they want one themselves. And then they do not give a flying fuck about the politics of the baker. No one expects a baker to endorse their life, just to bake them a cake. And, as has been pointed out many times, bakers do not vet their clients for anything else.
People are attempting to make the case for their right to discriminate. End of.

---

quote:

---

Yes, I'd believe their good faith if they had refused to bake cakes for other sinners. As is, they never have.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:


Much of the problem here is that it is being treated as if 'gay' was comparable to racial differences. It's not and the comparison is simply deceitful. 'Being' gay is not like having genetically, say, purple hair or green skin which involves no 'doing' of possible moral implication. On the contrary it is rather the point of 'gay marriage' that those involved very much want to 'do' gay sex. Others will not necessarily agree that those sexual acts are appropriate/fitting/etc. They may quite reasonably believe that God does not intend that use of the sexual organs. And not only should they be entitled to so believe - in a plural society they should not be forced to support the conduct they disagree with.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
Yes, gay people write words or ask have words written on a wedding cake when they are trying to make trouble for a Christian bakery.... Indeed, effectively trying to have the bakery legally persecuted....

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:

Much of the problem here is that it is being treated as if 'gay' was comparable to racial differences.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
...
Perhaps you should test it out by devising other slogans supporting, say, gambling, and see whether they'll do that for you.......

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
... And not only should they be entitled to so believe - in a plural society they should not be forced to support the conduct they disagree with. ...

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
by Joesaphat;

quote:

---

Yes, I'd believe their good faith if they had refused to bake cakes for other sinners. As is, they never have.

---

Somewhat inexact wording here....

Clearly as "All have sinned and come short of the glory of God" every cake baked in that bakery has been 'for... sinners'. But how often have they been asked to bake a cake propagandising for a sin??

---

quote:

---

On the contrary it is rather the point of 'gay marriage' that those involved very much want to 'do' gay sex. Others will not necessarily agree that those sexual acts are appropriate/fitting/etc. They may quite reasonably believe that God does not intend that use of the sexual organs. And not only should they be entitled to so believe - in a plural society they should not be forced to support the conduct they disagree with.

If you're in reality abandoning the plural society for a secular tyranny be frank about it, please.

---

quote:

---

In a parallel universe
On the contrary it is rather the point of 'interracial marriage' that those involved very much want to 'do' interracial sex. Others will not necessarily agree that those sexual acts are appropriate/fitting/etc. They may quite reasonably believe that God does not intend that use of the sexual organs. And not only should they be entitled to so believe - in a plural society they should not be forced to support the conduct they disagree with.

If you're in reality abandoning the plural society for a secular tyranny be frank about it, please.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
...Much of the problem here is that it is being treated as if 'gay' was comparable to racial differences. It's not and the comparison is simply deceitful. ...

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
Much of the problem here is that it is being treated as if 'gay' was comparable to racial differences.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
'Being' gay is not like having genetically, say, purple hair or green skin which involves no 'doing' of possible moral implication. On the contrary it is rather the point of 'gay marriage' that those involved very much want to 'do' gay sex. Others will not necessarily agree that those sexual acts are appropriate/fitting/etc. They may quite reasonably believe that God does not intend that use of the sexual organs. And not only should they be entitled to so believe - in a plural society they should not be forced to support the conduct they disagree with.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Soror Magna:
Steve Langton will just say that's a false analogy:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
...Much of the problem here is that it is being treated as if 'gay' was comparable to racial differences. It's not and the comparison is simply deceitful. ...

---

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Soror Magna:
Let's say we accept that argument purely for the purpose of this thread. Steve Langton has yet to clarify whether or not I can treat Christians the way he thinks gay people can / should be treated.

---

quote:

---

Turning the "Jesus gave me the right to be a bigot and marginalise others" thing into a "we're being persecuted" thing is a tiresome christian trait.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:

What concerns me here more is that we seem to be seeing examples of the very human reaction that "now we're on top we're going to persecute back and become as bigoted and nasty to those who disagree with us as were those who used to persecute us".

---

Straight, white males are still very much on top. All anyone else is asking is to not be discriminated against.

quote:

---

A plural society doesn't mean that.... A plural society means you have to accept being disagreed with....

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Soror Magna:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
... And not only should they be entitled to so believe - in a plural society they should not be forced to support the conduct they disagree with. ...

---

So you believe that a baker can refuse to sell a cake to a same-sex couple, and any owner / operator / employee can refuse to serve a gay person. After all, if you sell food to a gay person, you're giving them the sustenance they need to go on to "do gay sex". If you sell them auto insurance, they can drive around with their same-sex partner. They definitely shouldn't be allowed to buy a mattress, because we all know what mattresses are for. And so forth and so on.

Now, give me one reason why I should continue to serve Christians at my workplace. Because I don't want to support sexism, homophobia, racism, violence, and hypocrisy.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Which the bakers are not accepting. Being a service provider has nothing to do with one's beliefs. Baking a cake does not infer acceptance of the customer's life in any way shape or form.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
You've maybe not come across me on the forum before. I belong to the 'Anabaptist' tradition which strongly objects to the old idea of 'Christian countries' in which dissenters including gays are persecuted in the name of Jesus. And for so believing, people like me used to get persecuted - to the death - by the same people who persecuted gays.

As such I'm not remotely claiming a right to persecute anyone else; and if anything I expect to find governments trying to marginalise people like me.

What concerns me here more is that we seem to be seeing examples of the very human reaction that "now we're on top we're going to persecute back and become as bigoted and nasty to those who disagree with us as were those who used to persecute us".

A plural society doesn't mean that.... A plural society means you have to accept being disagreed with....

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Goldfish Stew:


Are you advocating a libertarian plural society, where the baker may refuse any of these messages?

Because I will admit, part of my dilemma is that if there is a line, where must it lie?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:
I don't think many would stand for that, and Greggs would rapidly find that they had no business if they tried that trick.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mdijon:

By the way under current UK legislation I think printers can say they find sex manuals distasteful and refuse to print them, but they can't say they find gay material distasteful and refuse. If I'm correct I think that's a reasonable balance. I think trade relationships should be protected to prevent minorities being marginalized, and society can't be relied on to do the policing without legal redress.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gee D:
... I don't know about the jurisdiction where you are, but to refuse to serve someone on the basis of their religion would contravene legislation here. ...

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mdijon:


But if the baker's by their own admission say "We don't do cakes for Gay people" or "We don't put messages supporting Gay marriage" when they would put messages supporting heterosexual marriage then they are hoist by their own petard as far as demonstrating the case in court goes.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
Much of the problem here is that it is being treated as if 'gay' was comparable to racial differences. It's not and the comparison is simply deceitful. 'Being' gay is not like having genetically, say, purple hair or green skin which involves no 'doing' of possible moral implication. On the contrary it is rather the point of 'gay marriage' that those involved very much want to 'do' gay sex. Others will not necessarily agree that those sexual acts are appropriate/fitting/etc. They may quite reasonably believe that God does not intend that use of the sexual organs. And not only should they be entitled to so believe - in a plural society they should not be forced to support the conduct they disagree with.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
I belong to the 'Anabaptist' tradition which strongly objects to the old idea of 'Christian countries' in which dissenters including gays are persecuted in the name of Jesus. And for so believing, people like me used to get persecuted - to the death - by the same people who persecuted gays.

As such I'm not remotely claiming a right to persecute anyone else; and if anything I expect to find governments trying to marginalise people like me.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:
A printer could, presumably, refuse to print Jack Tracts and we might agree this was an honorable (if ultimately futile) thing to do. Are we saying that icing the cartoon on a cake is different to printing it on paper?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Crœsos:
Can a printer actually refuse to print the materials approved by his employer? This seems to be very close to arguing that you can cite religious conscience as a reason not to do your job and not to get fired for not doing your job.

---

quote:

---

Can a typesetter (or whatever the digital age equivalent would be) refuse to set the type for the opinion section of the newspaper because she objects to the content? Does it matter if the objection is religious or for some other reason? And if a typesetter isn't allowed to refuse assigned work, does that mean that she doesn't have a right of religious conscience?

---

quote:

---

That seems the most troubling to me. A sort of neo-feudal assumption that business owners and proprietors have a legally-protected right of religious conscience but that their workers do not. Or even more perniciously that an employer's rights of religious conscience includes the right to dictate the compliance of his employees with his own religious beliefs. That's the sort of thing that has transitioned from a "right", as we normally understand the term (something enjoyed by all), to a "privilege" (something enjoyed by a few).

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mdijon:

I think it would also be legitimate for a baker to refuse to write "Equal rights for SSM"

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:
The selling of labour under contract is a different thing to selling a service as a free agent to a customer.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mdijon:

I think it would also be legitimate for a baker to refuse to write "Equal rights for SSM"

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:
The ruling in the Ashers case is the opposite of this. The bakery were asked to bake a cake with a political slogan in support of marriage equality. They refused. The Appeal court called this unlawful.

"What they may not do is provide a service that only reflects their own political or religious message in relation to sexual orientation."

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:
The issue was that they were asked to ice a particular slogan, and therefore the court decision seems to run coach-and-horses through the idea that there is an easy way to distinguish between serving the individual gay person and making a moral decision as to the words written on a cake, printed on a page etc. If those words can clearly be seen as supporting gay people/marriage then the court has decided it is illegal discrimination.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Crœsos:
Can a printer actually refuse to print the materials approved by his employer?... A sort of neo-feudal assumption that business owners and proprietors have a legally-protected right of religious conscience but that their workers do not.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mdijon:


I think that is appropriate, because I don't want the marketplace in society to be inaccessible to certain minorities. That way lies marginalization and injustice. And I don't believe that societal pressure alone can be relied on to produce a fair marketplace.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:
A neo-Nazi gay person goes into a Muslim t-shirt printer and asks him to print "White Gays say Go Home Ali" on t-shirts. The shop owner refuses.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mdijon:
I think if the Muslim t-shirt printer says he doesn't want to print racist slogans he's going to get out of it OK.

---

quote:

---

The Act says that a philosophical belief must be genuinely held and more than an opinion. It must be cogent, serious and apply to an important aspect of human life or behaviour.

---

quote:

---

For example, an employee believes strongly in man-made climate change and feels that they have a duty to live their life in a way which limits their impact on the earth to help save it for future generations. This would be classed as a belief and protected under the Act.

---

quote:

---

Thus the supplier may provide the particular service to all or to none but not to a selection of customers based on prohibited grounds. In the present case the appellants might elect not to provide a service that involves any religious or political message. What they may not do is provide a service that only reflects their own political or religious message in relation to sexual orientation.

---

quote:

---

A racist or homophobic political philosophy would not qualify as a philosophical belief, as it would not be 'worthy of respect in a democratic society and not incompatible with human dignity'.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Leorning Cniht
"What they may not do is provide a service that only reflects their own political or religious message in relation to sexual orientation."

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
Is there any coherent position here at all ?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
... I'm struggling to see what general principle is being put forward here. ...

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
I'm struggling to see what general principle is being put forward here.

Are Muslim printers allowed to print pro-Islamic texts but refuse anti-Islamic texts ?

---

quote:

---

Or is that right conditional on those texts not mentioning sexual orientation ? If so, why single out that protected characteristic over all others ?

---

quote:

---

Does it matter who does the refusing and who does the asking ?

---

quote:

---

Can a gay advocate of free love who is committed to the idea that SSM is a bad thing refuse a print order for a text that says it's a good thing ?

---

quote:

---

If being Muslim and being gay are both protected characteristics, who has the right to insist on or refuse a text that sets out the Islamic view of homosexuality ?

---

quote:

---

Is there any coherent position here at all ?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Soror Magna:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
... I'm struggling to see what general principle is being put forward here. ...

---

"I think gay sex is icky" (or the equivalent theological mumbo-jumbo) is not a valid legal reason to refuse to serve a customer. Is that clear enough for you?

And since Steve Langton has apparently bailed, perhaps you could provide me with the counter-argument that says I don't have to serve Christians at my workplace anymore.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Cottontail:

They can also refuse to print anti-just-about-anything. General rule: be nice, don't be nasty.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Goldfish Stew:


But I will say, in my view, that any rule protecting people from having their religious sensibilities offended by the refusal of a baker to ice a cake the way they want it should protect people from offence based on sexual identity. In fact in my view, if there were a line drawn in a continuum, religious believe would be cut free from protection before sexual identity.

---

quote:

---

So as I see it, the "plural society" notion where legislation allow a plurality of views in the public sphere would mean that a baker/printer/webhost may deny a particular viewpoint about sexual identity may also deny a particular viewpoint about religion.

The response of the public in general, however, is another matter.

---

quote:

---

I just don't know if legislation should provide better protection than that, as that still leaves a lot of scope to be hurtful and downright inhuman.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Goldfish Stew:


But I will say, in my view, that any rule protecting people from having their religious sensibilities offended by the refusal of a baker to ice a cake the way they want it should protect people from offence based on sexual identity. In fact in my view, if there were a line drawn in a continuum, religious believe would be cut free from protection before sexual identity.

---

I'm not sure I'm following this. Are you saying that if I don't want to be offended by the non-sale of cakes for religious/political reasons, that should also mean that other people's right to be offended should be protected?

---

quote:

---

quote:

---

So as I see it, the "plural society" notion where legislation allow a plurality of views in the public sphere would mean that a baker/printer/webhost may deny a particular viewpoint about sexual identity may also deny a particular viewpoint about religion.

The response of the public in general, however, is another matter.

---

It seems like the situation in the UK is that "plural society" means that extreme views which disproportionally impact on minorities are outlawed. The problem is not this per say, but that the way it is being interpreted by the court. Saying that homosexuality is wrong and having a conscience position with regard to providing a service which can be seen as supporting it has been determined to be beyond the pail.

---

quote:

---

quote:

---

I just don't know if legislation should provide better protection than that, as that still leaves a lot of scope to be hurtful and downright inhuman.

---

Again, I can't see that it is in any way practical for the state to make moral judgements about private commerical relationships between free individuals where a range of other options are available.

Personally I support SSM and think that private views on homosexuality have nothing to do with the need of the state to treat different people with diverse views fairly. But to then say that someone who disagrees with me is forced to service my view even to the extent of tacitly supporting it seems unfair too.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:
Why should the homosexual be protected - to the extent of being able to force a Muslim printer to print that their own religious view about homosexuality is blasphemous - whereas the Muslim would not similarly be able to force the gay printer to do the reverse?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Cottontail:
Can you not see the difference? A Muslim printer may be obliged to print a pro-gay leaflet. A gay printer may be obliged to print a pro-Muslim leaflet. If that pro-gay leaflet includes anti-Muslim sentiment, they would not be obliged to print it. If the pro-Muslim leaflet includes anti-gay sentiment, they would not be obliged to print it. Both are protected.

---

quote:

---

However, an anti-gay belief is not on an equal legal footing with a pro-gay belief. To print a pro-gay slogan is not to attack another protected group. To print an anti-gay slogan is to attack a protected group. Substitute 'pro-Muslim' and 'anti-Muslim', 'pro-Christian' and 'anti-Christian', and you get the same result.

---

quote:

---

You main worry seems to be nothing to do with gay people at all, but more to do with inter-religious conflict: asking a person to print a proselytising leaflet from another religion. That would be interesting to test in court, but it is not the issue here, and nor is it opened up by this court case. Supporting gay marriage is not a 'belief' that needs protecting: it is gay people as a class that need protecting. Ashers thought they were believers refusing to print someone else's belief (i.e., effectively an inter-religious conflict). The court ruling implies that this was not about belief - it was about treating a protected class of people as equals.

---

quote:

---

Although equalities laws are UK wide, remember that the context here is Northern Ireland. You don't need to go to Muslims to find religious groups whose 'serious cogent belief' is that another religious group is living in damnable sin. It wouldn't have been hard in the old days to find a Protestant baker who refused to make a First Communion cake, or a Catholic printer who refused to print flyers for an evangelical rally at the Presbyterian Church. Equalities law is at the basis of the Peace Agreement precisely because you can't have peace if this kind of apartheid situation is perpetuated. So to reverse your question, why should equalities law protect Protestants and Catholics, and not gay people?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mdijon:
I don't want the marketplace in society to be inaccessible to certain minorities. That way lies marginalization and injustice.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
Because words have no cost of production. The only reason why I might agree to print Duck! on your t-shirt but refuse to print Fuck! on your t-shirt is to do with my feelings about what the latter word means and whether I want to associate myself and my business with that text.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:
Words don't have civil rights. People do.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:
Words don't have civil rights. People do.

---

Absolutely.

But I take that to mean that each of us has a moral obligation to deal fairly with the real individual in front of us at any moment.

And no obligation to any particular phrase or text or opinion or group of words.

Slogans having no civil rights means that we can reject them as we choose. People having rights means that we treat them with a certain dignity even if we disagree with their opinions.

Why is this so hard to grasp ?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:
by allowing some slogans but not that one, you are discriminating against a people group.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
... Goodbye religious bookshops. ...

---

Oh, FFS.
 

---

Posted by Russ (# 120) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Cottontail:
A Muslim printer may be obliged to print a pro-gay leaflet. A gay printer may be obliged to print a pro-Muslim leaflet. If that pro-gay leaflet includes anti-Muslim sentiment, they would not be obliged to print it. If the pro-Muslim leaflet includes anti-gay sentiment, they would not be obliged to print it. Both are protected.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Goldfish Stew:
If I ask a baker to pipe the message "congratulations on your promotion", does that mean that the baker personally believes that the backstabbing lying git who got the promotion deserved it?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:
The ruling in the Ashers case is the opposite of this. The bakery were asked to bake a cake with a political slogan in support of marriage equality. They refused. The Appeal court called this unlawful.

"What they may not do is provide a service that only reflects their own political or religious message in relation to sexual orientation."

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Cottontail:
A Muslim printer may be obliged to print a pro-gay leaflet. A gay printer may be obliged to print a pro-Muslim leaflet. If that pro-gay leaflet includes anti-Muslim sentiment, they would not be obliged to print it. If the pro-Muslim leaflet includes anti-gay sentiment, they would not be obliged to print it. Both are protected.

---

If I've understood you right, you're suggestng that anyone can morally refuse a commission involving an anti-someone text, but that no-one can morally refuse a commission on the grounds of disagreeing with a text that is not anti-someone.

Do you mean that to apply only where the someone refers to a protected group ? Or is a text that is anti-anyone refusable ?

Seems clear to me that this is only workable if every text is unambiguously and objectively either an anti- text or not.

Is "we don't need no education" anti-teacher ?

Is "we are the One True Church" anti-every-other-Christian ?

Is "what has the EU ever done for us ?" anti-immigrant ?

Life's more complicated than that...

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Cottontail:

You seem to be looking for a one-size-fits-all general law that will cover each and every eventuality. Law doesn't work that way. It deals with context, intention, motivation, precedent, effect, outcome. It is a much more subtle instrument than you envision.

---

quote:

---

... Kisilowsky can practice his faith as he chooses "but is simply not permitted to use his faith as a basis to refuse to marry couples whose weddings, due to religious or moral views, offend him."

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Soror Magna:
Oh, man, it's almost like an echo:
Former Manitoba marriage commissioner loses battle to opt out of performing same-sex weddings

quote:

---

... Kisilowsky can practice his faith as he chooses "but is simply not permitted to use his faith as a basis to refuse to marry couples whose weddings, due to religious or moral views, offend him."

---

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gee D:
As long as he's a marriage commissioner, he must perform any marriage permitted by the Province. But he can't be forced to be a marriage commissioner even if he be qualified.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Soror Magna:

"What they may not do is provide a service that only reflects their own political or religious message in relation to sexual orientation."

So regardless of whether the baker is a WASP or a differently-abled trans Mennonite, they cannot select their customers according to their own beliefs about gender, ability, religion or race.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gee D:
I appreciate that a county clerk is a public employee (probably employed by the county rather than the State). I had worked on the basis that the marriage commissioner is what we would call a marriage celebrant - that is, a private person who performs secular marriages.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
First, it's not about selecting one's customers. It's about setting the boundaries of the service that one offers

---

quote:

---

(and whatever service one offers should be available to all customers).

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
...
In other words, do you think it wrong to provide a service that is limited to reflecting one's own belief / message Full Stop ?

Or do you think that there is something special about sexual orientation that removes it from the domain in which freedom of thought / freedom of conscience / freedom of religion apply ?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Net Spinster:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gee D:
I appreciate that a county clerk is a public employee (probably employed by the county rather than the State). I had worked on the basis that the marriage commissioner is what we would call a marriage celebrant - that is, a private person who performs secular marriages.

---

The states vary but the county clerks (or probate judges in other states) are elected officials not employees (their deputies are employees). In Kentucky at least their salaries are set by the state and depend on the size of the county and longevity in office. There is also the difference between issuing the license and doing the ceremony. In at least one state (Alabama) the probate judges by virtue of their office can do the ceremony but get to pocket the fee or part of it (it doesn't go to the state/county coffers, the ceremony can be done in the government office) as well as issue the license (fee split between the state and the county probate court itself).

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Soror Magna:
Broadly speaking:

#1. Serving the public does not give the server the right to judge said public according to the server's beliefs or values.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gee D:

FWIT, that report of the Northern Ireland case has the court saying that a wedding cake vendor cannot refuse to include a political message of which the vendor does not approve. Is that true? It would mean, if correct, that a vendor cannot refuse to sell a cake with a Heil Hitler message piped onto the top.

---

quote:

---

Thus the supplier may provide the particular service to all or to none but not to a selection of customers based on prohibited grounds. In the present case the appellants might elect not to provide a service that involves any religious or political message. What they may not do is provide a service that only reflects their own political or religious message in relation to sexual orientation.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:
That's way too broad. The law (in many places) has said that someone serving the public can't judge said public according to a specific list of characteristics.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gee D:
That's where I found the reference by the court to political opinions. Surely the relevant legislation does not require a cake decorator to include a political comment?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:
appears to be saying that if a baker is prepared to make a cake with a slogan, he can't then decide to refuse any legal slogan, whoever is asking for it - on the basis that the cake maker isn't professing support for the position by making the cake.

Which to me still seems stupid, but I appreciate that almost nobody else on this thread agrees with me.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mdijon:
Actually I think I would agree with you if that's what I thought the judgement was saying. But I don't think it is, I think it is saying because the occasion for disagreeing with this slogan was related to sexual orientation then the basis of not supporting the slogan isn't a sufficient defence.

To get caught by this law you don't just have to be bigoted, you have to make a point of professing the bigotry as your defence.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mdijon:
And I see why you conclude that based on the short version, but it seems to me that the longer version makes it clear that the issue is a) the slogan is legal *and* b) the discrimination against the slogan in this instance is based on a protected characteristic.

---

quote:

---

As far as I know all the discriminators caught by these laws have obligingly taken a public stand of principle on their motivations and therefore been thoroughly incriminated.

---

quote:

---

It would be interesting to see a case where the accused deny homophobia but have some tissue-thin excuse to cover their homophobia. In terms of racist discrimination that is much more common in my experience. Very few individuals make it a point of principle that they are entitled to be racist, they are more likely in denial. And generally very little can be done.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:
If the court is determining motivations of the person doing the discriminating, one would think that they could use available evidence to show that the barman was indeed ejecting people because they were Romany and not because he had an objection to blue shirts.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:
The issue is that the protected characteristics include political/philosophical beliefs, so just as one cannot decide to refuse to make a cake with a slogan supporting gay marriage, one equally cannot decide to refuse to make a cake with any political or philosophical slogan (which, if one stops to think about it, pretty much includes everything).

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:
The issue is that the protected characteristics include political/philosophical beliefs,

---

quote:

---

The EAT (Employment Appeal Tribunal) also expressly confirmed that the EqA (Equalities Act) does not give special protection to one category of belief and less protection for another. It also emphasised that there had been no appeal on the Tribunal’s finding that Mr Henderson’s beliefs did amount to philosophical beliefs for the purposes of the EqA. The EAT confirmed that all qualifying philosophical and religious beliefs are afforded equal protection by the EqA.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Soror Magna:
I think I won't waste time on sophistry.

---

quote:

---

here's what the law and the courts have now said in many nations.

---

quote:

---

#1. Serving the public does not give the server the right to judge said public according to the server's beliefs or values.

---

quote:

---

the Catholic church has rights that Tesco doesn't have!!!! Do you think that's wrong?

---

quote:

---

There are some situations where the server and/or establishment can be held responsible for the public's subsequent actions, such as over-serving liquor to someone who then crashes their car. Do you think that's right?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:
I am not a lawyer, however those who are lawyers say that the Equalities legislation protects political views.

---

quote:

---

It gave guidance on what amounts to a philosophical belief for the purposes of the EqA. The belief must be genuinely held, must have a similar status or cogency to a religious belief and must be more than an opinion or viewpoint. Support of a political party cannot, itself, amount to a philosophical belief but belief in a political philosophy might qualify.

---

I find "must be more than an opinion" amusing, as it suggests to me that one is not protected for things that one thinks because of data, but is protected for things that one thinks in spite of data
 

---

Posted by mr cheesy (# 3330) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:
I find "must be more than an opinion" amusing, as it suggests to me that one is not protected for things that one thinks because of data, but is protected for things that one thinks in spite of data

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
Is this an Argument from Authority that I see before me ? In a thread where mousethief keeps referencing Jim Crow for some reason, you're suggesting that it's the law so it must be morally right ?

Come on, you can do better than that.

---

quote:

---

... If I refuse to print for you a t-shirt that says "XXXX" that is not about you It is about me and my belief system and the relationship of the slogan "XXXX" to that belief system. ...

---

quote:

---

quote:

---

the Catholic church has rights that Tesco doesn't have!!!! Do you think that's wrong?

---

Yes, I do. But, without knowing exactly what rights you have in mind, it's possible that I would give Tesco more rights rather than the Catholic church fewer rights...

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Soror Magna:
And right before that quote you snipped, I specifically said that religious organizations are allowed to serve only their own members, and can restrict their services according to their beliefs. So St. Mary-up-the-Creek can refuse to marry a Jewish couple, but Tesco still has to sell them a cake. Do you think that is right or do you want to give Tesco the right to refuse service to Jews as well?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:
Well it appears from the slender case law to be the reverse - one has to prove that this thing isn't just some passing opinion you've taken on for the afternoon but something that you honestly and completely believe in.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Soror Magna:
I thought we were discussing a legal case and human rights law.

---

quote:

---

When me and my girlfriend walk into your shop to buy matching "best girlfriend ever!!!" shirts with each other's picture on them, what are you going to say?

---

quote:

---

[QUOTE]
St. Mary-up-the-Creek can refuse to marry a Jewish couple, but Tesco still has to sell them a cake. Do you think that is right or do you want to give Tesco the right to refuse service to Jews as well? [/QB]

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
then you have no moral right to compel him to act against his beliefs.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:
What would really happen, of course, is that when the two girls come in he will claim he is morally opposed to the word "girlfriend," but after they storm out, the boy and girl who come in will find that word is part of his company's repertory after all.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:

But in seeking to be just both to your good self (and girlfriend) and this hypothetical printer with a religious conviction against lesbianism, I'd have to say that:

- if he'll sell a "best girlfriend" shirt to a girl & boy who come into the shop together arm in arm then he shouldn't refuse to sell the same thing to you

---

quote:

---

If I made the laws, I'd have it that icing words onto a cake is a type of speech act, and give cake-icers the same right as printers and newspaper lettercolumns to not publish stuff they don't want to publish.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
.... But in seeking to be just both to your good self (and girlfriend) and this hypothetical printer with a religious conviction against lesbianism, I'd have to say that:...
... if his religious beliefs are offended by the word "girlfriend" and he thinks it's a dirty word and refuses to print it for anyone, then you have no moral right to compel him to act against his beliefs. ...

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
... The Catholic church does not sell wedding services. In Catholic thought, the couple marry each other. ...

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Soror Magna:
Why do I have the sneaking suspicion that the printer with a religious conviction against lesbianism will find any word describing a lesbian relationship to be obscene?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:
That's not where I'm at. I don't want to live under Sharia law and force people to follow my religion's specific moral code, other than the what's required for any society to function peacefully and equitably. But peace and equality are hardly the exclusive property of the Orthodox Church.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:

On the general point, the problem with the state determining who can trade with whom is that the "Sharia" situation becomes more not less likely.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Only if the state defines itself by a limited POV. In a democratic society, the state takes in multiple views in its determinations. Sometimes this takes a while, but the result is a distrusted set of rights instead of a limited one.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:
That's not where I'm at. I don't want to live under Sharia law and force people to follow my religion's specific moral code, other than the what's required for any society to function peacefully and equitably. But peace and equality are hardly the exclusive property of the Orthodox Church.

---

But isn't it the case that the legal culture where you live (USA?) is such that a premium is put on freedom of speech? If that's the case, it can't also be true that traders are forced by the state to trade with specific groups. For one thing, telling someone who they have to trade with would be a against the First Amendment, wouldn't it?

Of course, I'm not trying to have you defend your legal system, but it does seem to me that the balance between equality rights and freedom of speech is different in the UK (and possibly places like Australia etc who have intertwined legal histories) and the USA.

On the general point, the problem with the state determining who can trade with whom is that the "Sharia" situation becomes more not less likely.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:
Oh right. Well they have.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:

quote:

---

Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Only if the state defines itself by a limited POV. In a democratic society, the state takes in multiple views in its determinations. Sometimes this takes a while, but the result is a distrusted set of rights instead of a limited one.

---

I don't see it like that.

If the state determines that it has a right to read my emails, then one might argue that's ok because my inbox is just filled with junk. And that the current government is fairly benign.

But if that is legal then it opens the door for invasion of privacy by people who are not benign and the control of an ever wider collection of activities.

If the state can determine who I must trade with, that leaves the door open for someone to decide who I mustn't trade with. And if the state then determines that (for example) women in Burkas are a threat to national security, then it isn't much of a step to then tell me that I must not trade with them.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:
You seem to be arguing that a t-shirt saying "I support same-sex marriage" is a political statement that a printer can refuse, whereas a shirt saying "I love my husband" worn by a man is not.

Have I understood your position correctly? If so, can you defend its coherence?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:
You seem to be arguing that a t-shirt saying "I support same-sex marriage" is a political statement that a printer can refuse, whereas a shirt saying "I love my husband" worn by a man is not.

Have I understood your position correctly? If so, can you defend its coherence?

---

I'm coming from the position that a printer can refuse anything, so long as he refuses it to all customers equally. Which seems entirely coherent.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:

Because what he will print or not print - primarily touches him. The printing occurs in his personal space. And for the state or anyone else to dictate to him what he must or must not print is an imposition of someone else's values on him.

For him to decide which customers he will or won't sell particular t-shirts to is him imposing his values on others.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
... If it were up to me, I'd rule that the printer should sell a t-shirt with the text ("support marriage") and no photo. And supply a voucher entitling the customer to have a photo added to one of his existing t-shirts. Which voucher the printer should of course honour the next day.

---

quote:

---

... I see the word "discrimination" as having several slightly different senses. Singling out a person for worse treatment because you don't like something about them is the sense that's tied up with prejudice, and that's bad.

Doing something that affects different groups of people unequally is discrimination in a different sense of the word, and is not of itself bad.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:
You seem to be arguing that a t-shirt saying "I support same-sex marriage" is a political statement that a printer can refuse, whereas a shirt saying "I love my husband" worn by a man is not.

Have I understood your position correctly? If so, can you defend its coherence?

---

I'm coming from the position that a printer can refuse anything, so long as he refuses it to all customers equally. Which seems entirely coherent.

---

Just as consistent as forbidding both the rich and the poor to sleep in the park. And just as unjust. You're saying it's somehow equitable to deny both gays AND straights from getting cakes saying "It's good to be gay." It's not coherent to claim that's equitable.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:
Just as consistent as forbidding both the rich and the poor to sleep in the park. And just as unjust. You're saying it's somehow equitable to deny both gays AND straights from getting cakes saying "It's good to be gay." It's not coherent to claim that's equitable.

---

I wonder why Russ hasn't answered this point. I wonder if he can.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
"Gay" means....????

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
I'm coming from the position that a printer can refuse anything, so long as he refuses it to all customers equally. Which seems entirely coherent.
...

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Soror Magna:
Supposedly, one of the principal differences between progressives and conservatives is the value placed on purity, with an accompanying fear of taint by association. I think that is a huge part of the obsession to deny cakes and mugs to teh gayz: to avoid any impression of supporting that which is unclean.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
"Gay" means....????

---

Oh FFS look it up.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
"Gay" means....????

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
.... one recent and dubious meaning seems to have eclipsed all the others. ... The rhetoric of 'gayness' treats it as the same kind of issue as race or disability - but it's really about a different kind of issue.....

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:

And I repeat - you be specific about what 'gay' means, and it will be much easier to work out how 'gays' should properly be treated. The rhetoric of 'gayness' treats it as the same kind of issue as race or disability - but it's really about a different kind of issue.....

---

You're absolutely right. This whole thread started because some baker refused to bake a cake for people who were planning a joyful and vibrant marriage, as the baker in question believes marriage is a sombre institution.
 

---

Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
"Gay" means....????

---

Oh FFS look it up.

---

Actually a thesaurus gives dozens and dozens of meanings only one of which is 'homosexual' - unfortunately that one recent and dubious meaning seems to have eclipsed all the others.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Soror Magna:
So how do you think the customer will view being denied the product he wants, and being told he can have half of it today and come back tomorrow to get something else of equal value to the other half?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Soror Magna:
So how do you think the customer will view being denied the product he wants, and being told he can have half of it today and come back tomorrow to get something else of equal value to the other half?

---

Apologies, Soror Magna. Seems I expressed myself badly. I'm suggesting that the customer gets exactly what he wants. But that the transaction gets broken down into 2 transactions. One in which the customer buys a t-shirt with just the words (which product the printer would happily supply to others and therefore has no valid objection to). And one in which the printer prints a photo onto the same t-shirt (which service the printer would happily supply to others and therefore has no valid objection to).

Thereby avoiding a transaction in which the printer is obliged to make a product which goes against his convictions (however irrational they may be) to which he would have a valid objection.

Bit of a cop-out I know. But the best I can do to be fair to both sides.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:
You're saying it's somehow equitable to deny both gays AND straights from getting cakes saying "It's good to be gay." It's not coherent to claim that's equitable.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
...
Thereby avoiding a transaction in which the printer is obliged to make a product which goes against his convictions (however irrational they may be) to which he would have a valid objection.

...

---

So the printer will print an "F" on a shirt, add "uck" to the same shirt some interval of time later, and thus, will not have actually ever printed "Fuck".

I don't know whether to or

ETA: xpost with mousethief

[ 04. December 2016, 18:59: Message edited by: Soror Magna ]
 

---

Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
You seem unwilling to recognise that there are two parties to the transaction and both of them have rights and both of them are hurt by being coerced.

---

quote:

---

If you know that that one meaning has eclipsed all others, then you know which one we mean and are being disingenuous when you make like you don't.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:
But being hurt in that way is part of the price you pay to be in business in a plural society.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:
But being hurt in that way is part of the price you pay to be in business in a plural society.

---

Selling to everyone, yes. Selling any words that the customer might ask for, no.

A plural society can cope with different people drawing the line - as to what words they find acceptable - in different places.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
by Mousethief;

quote:

---

If you know that that one meaning has eclipsed all others, then you know which one we mean and are being disingenuous when you make like you don't.

---

OK, just being a bit annoyed that as usual we lose the best of our wonderful language to the worst.... And pointing out in response to your 'look it up' that looking it up produces an interesting result....

But also I think lots of you use the word 'gay' and even to yourselves are not being explicit on its full implications. Spell out what 'gay' means in terms of activity and it may not look so cosy as appears from hijacking all the original associations of those effectively lost meanings - the modern meaning is so removed from the original as to be basically contradictory; pretty much a lie.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
OK, just being a bit annoyed that as usual we lose the best of our wonderful language to the worst....

---

quote:

---

...But also I think lots of you use the word 'gay' and even to yourselves are not being explicit on its full implications. Spell out what 'gay' means in terms of activity ...

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
OK, just being a bit annoyed that as usual we lose the best of our wonderful language to the worst....

---

quote:

---

Spell out what 'gay' means in terms of activity and it may not look so cosy as appears from hijacking all the original associations of those effectively lost meanings - the modern meaning is so removed from the original as to be basically contradictory; pretty much a lie.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by lilBuddha:
You wish to complain about abuses in our "wonderful" language, better to crusade against the word irony. It is so misused as to render any specific definition difficult to ascertain.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by lilBuddha:
There are many abused words. Though I think literally is on the path trod by decimate. It is the middle of a shift from one usage to another, broader one.
Whereas Irony has as many different meanings as are likely possible (comedic, tragic, coincidental, accidental, fitting, etc) meaning a path through to a change rather than disintegration is difficult.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steve Langton:
But also I think lots of you use the word 'gay' and even to yourselves are not being explicit on its full implications. Spell out what 'gay' means in terms of activity and it may not look so cosy as appears from hijacking all the original associations of those effectively lost meanings - the modern meaning is so removed from the original as to be basically contradictory; pretty much a lie.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Goldfish Stew:
(Spot the irony).

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by lilBuddha:
That seems all well and normal, but what do straight people do?

---

quote:

---

ETA:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Goldfish Stew:
(Spot the irony).

---

Actually, no. There are a few possibilities, but nothing that is necessarily ironic.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by lilBuddha:
That seems all well and normal, but what do straight people do?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:
Refusing to print words that only one set of people are going to ask for is de facto discriminating against hat one group.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
I stress "this type of discrimination" - please don't confuse it with other types...

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
... I stress "this type of discrimination" - please don't confuse it with other types...

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
But since your style seems to be long on snappy retorts that duck the hard questions, and short on clearly setting out and defending a coherent position, it's kind of hard to tell.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:

Somebody remind me, what fucking year is this?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:

Somebody remind me, what fucking year is this?

---

Let's see. Last year was Year of the Missionary. Is this Year of the Dog?

---

quote:

---

What was '69?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:

---

What was '69?

---

That sounds like a Jeopardy answer.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Soror Magna:
Well, I have no idea what type of discrimination we're supposedly confusing, because you've posted three wildly different examples - one is a religion, the second is a crime, and the third is a matter of taste.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:

Any preference you express is an act of discrimination against those who hold the opposite opinion. Any choice you make is an act of discrimination against the option you reject.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Russ:
... Mousethief's argument rests on uncritical acceptance of "discrimination" as a bad thing. But the word is used to mean both
- acts of prejudice
- acts which have differential impact on different groups....

---

quote:

---

Scope
The principle of equal treatment corresponds to the prohibition of direct discrimination * and indirect discrimination * . It applies to everybody in the private or public sector and in public bodies. Its scope covers social protection (including social security and health care), social advantages, education, as well as access to and supply of goods and services, such as housing and transport.
...
Key terms of the Act
•Direct discrimination: discrimination caused when one person is treated less favourably than another is, has been or would be treated in a comparable situation.
•Indirect discrimination: discrimination caused when an apparently neutral provision, criterion or practice would lead to a particular disadvantage compared with other persons. Unless it is objectively justified by a legitimate aim and the means of achieving that aim are appropriate and necessary.

---