Should a business be allowed to discrimate on the basis of a customer's sexual orientation?
- Thread starter The Thriller
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I think you make a weaker argument, Dutch, than this calls for.
The government folks have welcomed every excuse for taking more power to themselves, and however we feel about the poor gay couple or the poor religious man, we are all losers right along with both of them when we give the government the power to impose values upon us.
So now, we're told to bake the cakes for the gays. Tomorrow the gays will be told to bake the cakes for the straights, who knows. I don't care who does what for or to whom at this level of commerce, so long as it's a mutually agreeable transaction. If I had lived in the South and seen the whites-only establishments, I would perhaps have opened one "Everyone Welcome". I expect I would have had a mob of KKK folks burning me down, and I might have welcomed Federal intervention. I just don't see any "Straights Only" signs, and not many people who would care, really. Nobody would burn down my store if I posted "Gays Welcome", and I could benefit from competitors who just didn't want the business. I might even go around town and tell all the other cake-makers that if anyone comes in they don't want to serve, I'll subcontract the job.
I think we can solve this problem without the government or the courts.
But the lawyer in the clip is right. The Constitution does not confer power on the Federal government to mandate beliefs. I'm sure the GLBT folks, if they were simply humble people cutting their own way in life, wouldn't want the Fed govt to have that power either. It is alarming to all the other people who presumed they still have freedom of belief to see this sort of judge handing out this sort of order, because it is a clear shot across the bow that none of us have any right anymore to our own beliefs.
well, some are very pleased with this "progress", the set of indoctrinated ideologues who believe in a march of "history" towards a utopian future of some kind, however they define it, that happens to fit the dialectics of Hegel and the doctrines of Karl Marx, who basically didn't believe in human rights or anything at all except a mesmerizing political tool for human management which would serve to re-establish medieval feudalism.
Religion can for actually committed believers be or become such an important internal thing it overshadows actual genetic traits like intelligence, logic, and functional characteristics that are intensely personal or private, like say "sex". However we think the world should be, the idea of having "rule of law" under a "constitution" or any other form of government, if we want to preserve the principle, we need to follow the process of changing the law that we have provided under that Constitution or government, or else just do a revolution and set up a better government.
The point is, we have a written Constitution that protects freedom of belief, freedom of speech, freedom of assembly..... that is association. . .. we get to associate with those we choose to associate with. . . and such. A judge who dictates beliefs from the bench is a threat to every right you value for yourself, and everyone else.
States can write laws that regulate business, and so can the Federal government. If you've got an issue with how people deal with people who are different somehow, commercial licenses can require non-discriminating services to the public you serve. But a judge just hauling off, without precedent or legal basis, and ordering a person to change his beliefs is pretty concerning.
fishonjazz
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I think religion is different than sexuality in that religion is something that is chosen and often changed where as sexuality is much less so.
No idea why you quoted my post or what the hell you are taking about, but carry on
you responded to Dutch citing his feeling that his religion is "inherent" and said most people don't feel that way. So what. That is irrelevant.
What is relevant is that Dutch, and some others feel that way, and they are as entitled to their rights as any other kind of minority. the definition of "gay" or whatever, however linked it may be to hormone levels in development, works out in practical terms to people "feeling" they are this or that. And maybe acting along a particular pattern. Religion is as powerful a basis for discrimination as sexual orientation is.
The regulation of other people isn't particularly the govt business either except as it pertains to respecting other's rights and defending them. So, anyway, I think all the laws should be written in terms that don't make classes or descriptions of folks different in the eyes of the law or in the value of their rights . Creating special classes and defining special rights goes the wrong way,
fishonjazz
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Ya, I also don't think that there should be discrimination against religion.
Dutch was saying that religion and sexuality are the same though. I disagree
As do I. Strongly.
jimmy eat jazz
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Since when are religious believers counted as a minority, let alone traditionally excluded minority?
I just love the irony. White, socially conservative Christians (particularly evangelicals) have have, since colonial days, been one of the most powerful social groups in America and have widely practiced discrimination against other social groups. Now that we are chipping away at their dominance, and their ability to discriminate, they are crying like babies howling about how unfair it all is and how much they are being persecuted. Irony just abounds. Boo hoo, cry me a river.
There is NO constitutional, or other, right to discriminate in the provision of rights or liberties, public services nor in access to public accommodation businesses. I don't care what your religious beliefs are or which deity you worship.
Cappy_Smurf
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Hey guys, I'm starting a new religion where we have sex with barn animals. Anybody want to join? Before you say no, let's discuss it over milk and cookies. I'll stop by your place later on with my presentation.
Taken at a micro level, sure. It's not worth their time to do all this.
Taken at a macro level, the day people are allowed to discriminate their public business (the business they decided to open to the public) is a bad day for the country. Anyone can discriminate anyone based on their religious beliefs.
I don't think anyone should be able to discriminate anyone else if their business is open to the public, with some exceptions (say a tshirt shop shouldn't have to print something really offensive if they don't want to).
The easier thing to do is to make sexual orientation a protected class under the Civil Rights Act like race/nationality/gender/religion/etc. are. Then public businesses would have no legal ground whatsoever to deny people based on their sexual orientation. However, the religious right still has enough influence over the GOP to stop that from happening. However, that support is eroding very quickly. I expect to see it in 10 years tops, if that.
mellow
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Abortion is murder
Washington Redskins
God hates gays
Jesus loves gays
Meat is murder
Please tell us, Which one of those is too offensive for a tshirt? How do you possibly draw a line?
I personally see no problem letting private, individual shops or businesses choose their customers so long as there are not government actions that prohibit anyone else from entering the market place and competing. So if I don't want to print shirts that say "Smile" I can chose to pass on that business. Someone else can step in and fill the market. Either the price of printing smile shirts wil go so high that I will be enticed to reconsider my conviction, or a competitor will see an opportunity and start a business.
But if a company provides electricity to a community and Has a state granted monopoly...then it must offer its service to everyone.
mellow
Well-Known Member
So, you don't really believe equity or justice, just vengeance? It's good to lower the pretenses and just say it like it is. How much vengeance will satisfy you? Will it be enough to stop them from worshipping they way they want, or do you need to exact a pound of flesh so to speak, maybe a little blood in the streets? What did you have in mind? Jimmy Eat Evengelicals perhaps?
By the way that reference in the bill of rights is in there, it is right below the section that says the government can force people to say and print things that they don't believe just so that someone's feelings aren't hurt. Oops, I probably shouldn't have said that, you'll be lusting after my blood too.
Would everyone feel the same way if they didnt allow someone of your religion to buy from their bakery? How about if your white or male? What if the only store near your house that you have been shopping at most your life stopped allowing straight people to shop at it? I am guessing a lot of you might still say okay thats fine ill shop some where else. Its easy to think that way and not care when you are the dominant race, sex and sexuality. If you are a minority and the majority start treating you this way its a different story.
Fully agree that personal beliefs and ideology are very different from sexual orientation. But I would not call sexual orientation inherent, immutable, and unchangeable attribute of a person's being and personality. I think we are born with parameters but I also believe that your sexuality and gender are fluid and most studies are showing that. Where we are on the spectrum can change. More people are bi-sexual than outright gay in this world. I do think some people are born gay/straight and have very little fluidity in that. Many people are born somewhere in between at some point in a spectrum and have parameters on that spectrum. I also think people can push, pursue, be influenced to different places on a spectrum. Although this is a different discussion.
I like what this women from UofU has to say about it
https://www.newscientist.com/articl...-is-fluid-its-time-to-get-past-born-this-way/
for some reason this article is making you sign up now for some reason, it was free to read a few days ago.
Fully agree that personal beliefs and ideology are very different from sexual orientation. But I would not call sexual orientation inherent, immutable, and unchangeable attribute of a person's being and personality. I think we are born with parameters but I also believe that your sexuality and gender are fluid and most studies are showing that. Where we are on the spectrum can change. More people are bi-sexual than outright gay in this world. I do think some people are born gay/straight and have very little fluidity in that. Many people are born somewhere in between at some point in a spectrum and have parameters on that spectrum. I also think people can push, pursue, be influenced to different places on a spectrum. Although this is a different discussion.
I like what this women from UofU has to say about it
https://www.newscientist.com/articl...-is-fluid-its-time-to-get-past-born-this-way/
for some reason this article is making you sign up now for some reason, it was free to read a few days ago.
No, you freaking idiot. It's going to a car dealership, and he won't sell you a pink car, even though he'll sell a pink car to 95% of the people who come in, simply because he doesn't like your choice of who to have sex in the back seat with. It's absolutely none of his business.
*SIGH* In no way does this decision, or the decision in Oregon, or by the Supreme Court, mandate beliefs. You are still absolutely free to hate homosexuals as much as you want. It mandates behavior. You are not entitled to discriminate against people based on their sexuality, any more than you are entitled to discriminate against people based on the color of their skin, or their genitalia.
You can believe that homosexuals are going to hell all you want, just as you can believe that Quetzalcoatl is desirous of human sacrifice. That doesn't mean you have the right to do anything concrete about it.
That's what I'd call a radical interpretation of the text.
You have no problem with it because you are not in a position where you have been seriously discriminated against. Seriously. I hate to use the phrase "white privilege," but...
You don't know that. You don't know anything about him. You have no clue of why he holds that position.
jimmy eat jazz
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It is like Godwin's law. If the debate goes on long enough, eventually someone will invoke it. I was just trying to cut them off at the pass.