I don’t know what “OSM” means – but the law does permit a baker to refuse service to a marrying couple because he thinks the age difference is too great.
And if that actually happened, I doubt there would be much condemnation of it. A Missouri baker refuses to provide a wedding cake to a fifteen year old girl who is marrying, with parental permission, a sixty-five year old man, calling it “disgusting.” A wedding planner declines to accept the couple as clients, for the same reason. Yet the marriage is unquestionably legal.
Are you prepared to argue that there would be some sort of groundswell of public condemnation against the baker? There certainly wouldn’t be any legal recourse. Should we, as a society, tell the baker and the planner that they must do the work?
In the case of an interracial couple, we have already answered that question: yes.
The implied equivalency is that there’s something wrong about being black or gay or Jewish or whatever. So the bigot argues, “If I have to tolerate (blacks/gays/Jews/whatever) then you have to tolerate bigots.”
No, it doesn’t work like that. It’s not a reciprocal trade of equal terms. We’re saying that people who are black or gay or Jewish or whatever should be tolerated because there’s nothing wrong with them. But there is something wrong with bigots so they are not entitled to the same toleration.
If I knew someone who constantly ragged on gays and I told them to knock it off, and they came back at me with the retort in the OP, my response would be:
“I don’t tolerate meanness and hatefulness. Being gay is neither mean or hateful, so that’s why I can tolerate homosexuality but not you.”
It’s a person’s right to go outside wearing an ugly dress. It’s also someone else’s right to loudly express an unfavorable opinion about that dress. But that dress is neither rude or offensive. It’s just a dress. On the other hand, opinions can be rude. They can hurt feelings. So it’s not hypocritical to think people should be free to wear whatever they want, but think that people should keep their nasty opinions to themselves.
The simple answer to the OP is that it is not “intolerance” that I won’t tolerate. You are free to be as close minded, stupid, ignorant and wrong as you like. And so long as you keep your thoughts to yourself that is your problem.
What I won’t tolerate is the bullying, mistreatment, exclusion or marginalisation of an individual. This is different to intolerance.
Intolerance is tolerated, at least in the United States. You can hold Klan rallies and protest funerals with “GOD HATES FAGS!” posters and you won’t be arrested. Intolerance isn’t tolerated in some countries though, like Germany.
I am kind of surprised that there are people who heard pleas for tolerance and honestly thought that segregated bakeries were included in that. It reminds me a little of the view that hell is an expression of God’s love.
Of course it is; the homophobes want their form of segregation to be tolerated. They define “oppression” as someone preventing them from harming others.
My question was not about the legality of the situation, it was about whether serving any of these people meant there was approval of them. The baker might have been disgusted at that marriage - that is his right - but I suspect that even he would never think that baking the cake would have meant approving it.
It is clear that gays are not protected in Arizona already.
If the baker refused to serve those with a ten year age difference - maybe more in line with the number of SSMs in states allowing them, then there might be a groundswell of opposition. Even if he made up some kind of religious objection to it.
As we heard in the Prop 8 debate, the next step beyond not serving those whose existence is offensive is calling same sex couples showing affection in public an attack upon their type of Christianity.
I think this issue has been raised before: you can be too focused on the law and you lose sight of the bigger picture.
The moral opinions of individuals and societies change. And the law follows this. The law doesn’t create morality; morality creates the law.
If the law defined morality, then there would never be any basis for changing the law. We enact and repeal laws because we recognize that our laws are not always in accord with our morality.
That’s a bait and switch, as the words are not symmetric opposites. Intolerance typically applies to stances on another race, creed, gender, sexual preference, etc. Left outside of such human characteristics are being a crook, asshole, dick, difficult individual or any number of vices. No, you don’t have to tolerate vices, especially if they are in your face.
The simplest answer is “Your intolerance IS tolerated. It’s not illegal to be a dickhead. Ergo, your bigotry is tolerated. Be as intolerant as you please. Just remember that what’s good for the goose is good for the gander. You have a right to your opinion, but I have a right to an opinion about your opinion, and my opinion of your opinion is that your opinion on gays/women/other races/religions etc… makes you a dickhead, and I will happily exercise my right to tell you that.”
What these people really want isn’t tolerance but deference. Fuck 'em.
Of course, some may point to anti-discrimination laws as evidence that their bigotry isn’t tolerated, but all you have to do is point out that those same laws protect them as well, so no-one is getting special treatment.