That’s not my read. The business can refuse to produce material in support of a practice they oppose, but they cannot refuse to do business with particular people (on the basis of protected class membership).
It’s academic in this particular case, since why would anyone but a gay couple commission a website for their own wedding? But it does mean that a gay person ordering the same thing (say, a meal) as a straight person still cannot be discriminated against. The “sundown town” thing seems like quite a stretch.
The idea that “religious” belief is entitled to the slightest consideration is utterly anathema to everything the Enlightenment project called the United States of America stands for or ever stood for.
I don’t see that. It seems simply that it’s been defined as having historical evidence of such a practice, and an actual group of people who practice it, rather than individual belief.
I don’t think that’s workable, mind you. But it’s not as bad as saying “the way my church does it.”
The main problem is that their idea requires the State to be very involved in the Church, which is the opposite of freedom of religion. And that isn’t something that is only in the US Constitution, but considered a fundamental right.
Honestly, I think the better argument should be that you can’t violate the civil rights of others because of your religious belief. You are free to do what you do, and free to evangelize, but not free to deny service.
I’m sure Paul made tents for those “fornicators” he got mad about so much. It’s really only those who are the majority religion who can get away with that sort of thing.
All we need for the risk of sundown towns is for SCOTUS to send this kind of signal that discrimination is okay. Then a community tries it out, perhaps subtly at first, but with friendly lawyers who specifically craft the terms of refusal of service and such to fit into the “logic” of this ruling. And boom, we have a sundown town. If the DoJ, or an individual, tries to sue, are you really that confident that this SCOTUS wouldn’t rule in favor of the businesses and town? I’m not.
You’re basically making a slippery-slope argument here. Which isn’t entirely without merit; this kind of stuff happens by degrees. But by that standard, none of these decisions really matter at all; the worst members of the SCOTUS will come up with whatever justification they need to get the outcome they want at any given point, and continue to push only in one direction.
But that is not, in my view, what happened here. There is a distinction between refusing service to a protected class vs. refusing to create a particular work. And I find it very hard to argue that there should be no exceptions to the latter.
Out of curiosity, suppose the case was Westboro Baptist Church vs. Bob Website. Bob says he does not refuse service to anyone. And he makes a variety of general websites of all sorts. But WBC asked for a “God Hates LGBTQ+” website, and Bob refused based on his own atheist moral system. The WBC sues, saying that the CADA prevents Bob from discriminating against their own heartfelt religious beliefs.
Should Bob have been able to refuse the job or not? And if so, at what point does the argument differ from the one made in this case?
I’m with LSLGuy in that it’s insane how we treat religious belief as being of equal consideration to truly immutable characteristics like sex or skin color. But that’s the way things are. And eliminating it from consideration has certain downsides.
It would be wrong for the US government to say that it’s okay to oppose gay marriage for religious reasons. That’s because everyone should have the right to oppose, or support, gay marriage. That’s what freedom of speech is - the right to hold and express your opinions. CREATIVE LLC ET AL. v. ELENIS ET AL upholds the idea that an artistic service is a form of speech and thus protected by the First Amendment. It equally protects atheist web designers who are willing to create gay marriage websites but refuse to create heterosexual marriage websites.
Wouldn’t a straight couple commission a website for their own wedding?
In this case, the gay couple is ordering the same thing as a straight couple would.
Not really. I hasn’t been all that long since there were official sundown towns, and even today, there are a number where it is still the unofficial practice.
This isn’t a slippery slope argument, where the concern is that things will roll out of control in ways we don’t understand. This is a backsliding argument, where the concern that things will return to the state the were in not all that long ago.
Sure, if Bob makes hate sites, he should make hate sites for everyone. If he doesn’t make hate sites, then he shouldn’t be required to make hate sites for anyone. That’s easy enough.
Same as, if someone doesn’t make websites for weddings, then they shouldn’t have to make a website for a SSM. If they do make websites for weddings, but just not for those people, then that’s discrimination.
It also seems as though people in this thread seem to think that political affiliation is the same as sexual orientation, as that is the entire basis of any of the analogies proposed. I would posit that they are not the same, and shouldn’t enjoy the same level of protection. I’ve never changed my sexual orientation, but I have changed my political affiliation a few times in my life.
This is in the context of a decision most people hate, which seems reasonable to me. I think it’s a reasonable personal opinion to have, but this reads to me like you’re making a statement about history. As a statement about history I think it’s somewhat selective. They wrote quite a lot about what their project was, and religion was definitely involved. And it was the first amendment they made, after all.
It would take a hell of a lot of changes to the way things are done in the US for there to be no consideration for religious beliefs, and I would have thought that a lot of them would be really offensive to most people. Trump’s Muslim ban comes to mind.
Yes, and the point of it was to be free from having other people’s religions imposed on you, not to make one free to impose their religion on others.
Trump’s Muslim ban had nothing to do with being a matter of consideration of religious beliefs, it was banning people based on their religion. Those are not the same thing. No one is proposing that we ban Christians, we are just asking Christians to not impose their religious beliefs on others.
Why is that superior to separating the two, such that people are free to believe as they wish, but not to impose their beliefs on others (including religious/ethnic/sexuality/gender identity discrimination in goods and services)?
So if a Baptist says that something is against their religion, do we consult the Baptist Pope? Because there is no Baptist Pope. Are the Baptists a “real religion”? How about Hindus, or Buddhists? I know that it seems odd to a member of a hierarchical religion (I’m a Catholic myself), but most religions aren’t hierarchical.
This is all interesting history, I just don’t see why it’s useful here. Maybe that’s better than a theocracy, but it’s far worse than separation of church and state, which makes sure neither interferes with the other. History is replete with governments controlling churches, and vice versa, when they’re intermingled.
You want it both ways: either two websites with different words and different pictures are essentially the same thing, or they aren’t. Either argument can be made, but it either applies to both or neither.
There’s no more such thing as a “hate site” as there is a “gay wedding site”. There’s some boilerplate text and some pictures and links. Bob acknowledges that the WBC isn’t requesting anything fundamentally different than the Pride Month website he made for a different church earlier. They provided some text and pictures and they want him to assemble it into pages and upload to a site. His objection is solely based on the specific content.
I’m not sure that distinction matters in this case. The argument was that Colorado’s law violated the freedom of speech aspects of the First Amendment, not the religious ones.
I’d like to quote NY Times columnist, David Brooks, from “PBS Newshour” last eve:
Brooks, IMHO, is another one who still reflects many of the old-school Conservative positions, and – de facto – whose party has left him behind (ie, “RINO”).
But – disagree with him though I may, on occasion – I could probably talk with him for hours and it would never become heated.