# Comparisons to the Civil Rights movement are overused, incorrect, and insulting. **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 11, 2013, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105 "2013-12-11T21:25:31Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![ITR\_champion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c67d28/32.png) [@ITR\_champion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ITR_champion)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2013, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105/41 "2013-12-12T14:50:02Z")
> [@mhendo](#): > > So, by your definition, something is only a violation of civil rights if it involves “mass violence”? And a call for civil rights is only valid if it is specifically protesting against “mass violence”? Er, no. In the USA “civil rights” can mean constitutionally guaranteed rights generally, but more frequently refers specifically to the movement for rights for blacks in the deep South. I object to the cheap use of comparisons to the civil rights movement for blacks in the deep South. We could use the words “civil rights” to talk about my right to buy incandescent light bulbs, or my right to make unlimited donations to Super PACs, or my right to not have the government track my cell phone. But while I’m in favor of all these rights, I don’t claim that supporting them is a sign of courage comparable to that of Rev. MLK, Rosa Parks, and the Freedom Riders. That would be insulting, not to mention just plain dumb. ---
**Author:** ![DrCube](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a3d4f5/32.png) [@DrCube](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrCube)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2013, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105/42 "2013-12-12T14:53:18Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > I’m no fan of the drug war but what you just did is even stupider than comparing Castro to Hitler. > > Perhaps you genuinely do believe that Barack Obama is as bad as Theodore Bilbo(if you don’t then you really didn’t understand the implications of what you were saying) but I’d strongly recommend against making such a statement in Harlem, Watts, or Roxbury. Really? Because in my opinion, they are very similar. > **[US: Drug Arrests Skewed by Race](https://www.hrw.org/news/2009/03/02/us-drug-arrests-skewed-race)** > > (Washington, DC) - Blacks have been arrested nationwide on drug charges at higher rates than whites for nearly three decades, even though they engage in drug offenses at comparable rates, Human Rights Watch said in a report released... > [@](#): > > “Jim Crow may be dead, but the drug war has never been color-blind,” said Jamie Fellner, senior counsel with Human Rights Watch’s US Program and author of the report. “Although whites and blacks use and sell drugs, the heavy hand of the law is more likely to fall on black shoulders.” Somewhere between 5 and 7% of black men are in jail _right now_. 1 in 3 will be incarcerated at some point in their life. That’s compared to less than 1% of white men currently in jail and \<5% going to jail in their lifetimes. Without even looking at race, there’s this: [![](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/09/Incarcerated_Americans_as_a_Percent_of_Population.jpg/800px-Incarcerated_Americans_as_a_Percent_of_Population.jpg) ](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/09/Incarcerated_Americans_as_a_Percent_of_Population.jpg/800px-Incarcerated_Americans_as_a_Percent_of_Population.jpg) These are the methods of the Soviets and their gulags. The drug war is absolutely a civil rights issue, and America’s extremely high incarceration rates – especially among minorities – is a symptom of that. Integrating schools and getting rid of the “Whites Only” water fountains was just the beginning. We’ve got a long way to go. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2013, 3:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105/43 "2013-12-12T15:03:21Z")
> [@The\_Bigger\_Picture](#): > > I don’t see a precise parallel. Gays are protected by law and blacks in the South, back then… were not. Gays are “protected by law”\* in a decided minority of US jurisdictions, and not at all at the federal level (other than the very limited protection afforded by the recent _Windsor_ decision.) If the two situations aren’t parallel because gays are protected in a few places, then the Civil Rights Era didn’t parallel the Civil Rights Era either (prohibition against discrimination having been enacted in several northern states.) \*I assume you are using this phrase to mean “protected from discrimination”. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2013, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105/44 "2013-12-12T15:40:33Z")
> [@ITR\_champion](#): > > Er, no. In the USA “civil rights” can mean constitutionally guaranteed rights generally, but more frequently refers specifically to the movement for rights for blacks in the deep South. I object to the cheap use of comparisons to the civil rights movement for blacks in the deep South. We could use the words “civil rights” to talk about my right to buy incandescent light bulbs, or my right to make unlimited donations to Super PACs, or my right to not have the government track my cell phone. But while I’m in favor of all these rights, I don’t claim that supporting them is a sign of courage comparable to that of Rev. MLK, Rosa Parks, and the Freedom Riders. That would be insulting, not to mention just plain dumb. Yes, but we aren’t talking about light bulbs, we’re talking about protections against workplace discrimination, housing discrimination, access to public accommodations, and increased legal vigilance for a minority group that is frequently the target of violence. Which, as it happens, were also the major issues underlying the Civil Rights movement for blacks. So, how are these not comparable situations, exactly? ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2013, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105/45 "2013-12-12T16:54:11Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Yes, but we aren’t talking about light bulbs, we’re talking about protections against workplace discrimination, housing discrimination, access to public accommodations, and increased legal vigilance for a minority group that is frequently the target of violence. Which, as it happens, were also the major issues underlying the Civil Rights movement for blacks. > > So, how are these not comparable situations, exactly? Gay cooties. ---
**Author:** ![Sailboat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sailboat/32/461_2.png) [@Sailboat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sailboat)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2013, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105/46 "2013-12-12T18:01:49Z")
Speaking strictly locally: a church near where I live had a sign out front advocating marriage equality. Someone burned the sign to the ground. By luck, the leaves and sticks surrounding the sign (it was at the edge of the woods) did not catch fire, so neither the church, the woods, nor the community went up in flames. It certainly could have destroyed the church, and more, for all the arsonists knew. We wrote a letter to the local newspaper condemning this act of hate-fueled arson. A prominent member of our community wrote a _dissenting_ response to the same paper, _supporting_ the act. That’s right, in the 21st century, a pillar of the community felt comfortable advocating setting fire to church property to show gay people their proper place. This is usually regarded as a very liberal-minded progressive community, so we were shocked, to say the least. I’d call that at least remotely comparable to some Civil Rights Era events. ---
**Author:** ![SpoilerVirgin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4491bb/32.png) [@SpoilerVirgin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SpoilerVirgin)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2013, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105/47 "2013-12-12T18:45:55Z")
> [@ITR\_champion](#): > > But while I’m in favor of all these rights, I don’t claim that supporting them is a sign of courage comparable to that of Rev. MLK, Rosa Parks, and the Freedom Riders. That would be insulting, not to mention just plain dumb. How can you not be aware that the right for which Rosa Parks was fighting was the right to a seat in the front of the bus? It was certainly just one piece of a larger civil rights movement, but it was a signficant, galvanizing piece. The students who sat in at the Greensboro Woolworth store were fighting for the right to sit at a lunch counter. The Freedom Riders were fighting for the right to vote. I fail to see how the rights to marry, to be free from employment discrimination, to be able to use public services and be customers at private businesses are in any way different from the rights for which the Civil Rights movement fought. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2013, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105/48 "2013-12-12T18:53:53Z")
I’d suggest that the objection to this comparison makes more sense viewed through a strategic lens than an ideological one. Whether there should be racial equality is a settled issue in this country; the civil rights struggle was in the ideological sense an unqualified success. (Of course there are plenty of ground-game issues to resolve, and plenty of questions about equality and equity that are thorny; I’m not talking about those, but rather about the larger issue of whether there should be discrimination against racial minorities). Analogies to the civil rights struggle, to the extent that they are successful analogies, will borrow some of the struggle’s moral authority and by implication confer that moral authority on the analogized movement. Folks who don’t like the idea of equality for LGBT folks definitely don’t want the analogy to succeed, for that reason. If they can drive a wedge between the two issues, they can keep people from thinking that support for equal rights for racial minorities implies support for equal rights for sexual minorities, and they can make it harder for LGBT folks to achieve equality. Objecting to the analogy makes no sense on logical or ideological grounds, since the similarities between the two issues are so overwhelming. It absolutely makes sense on strategic grounds, since the analogy hurts the case for anti-gay discrimination. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2013, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105/49 "2013-12-12T18:55:39Z")
> [@SpoilerVirgin](#): > > How can you not be aware that the right for which Rosa Parks was fighting was the right to a seat in the front of the bus? It was certainly just one piece of a larger civil rights movement, but it was a signficant, galvanizing piece. The students who sat in at the Greensboro Woolworth store were fighting for the right to sit at a lunch counter. The Freedom Riders were fighting for the right to vote. I fail to see how the rights to marry, to be free from employment discrimination, to be able to use public services and be customers at private businesses are in any way different from the rights for which the Civil Rights movement fought. They aren’t. The difference is that people in 2013 (well, most of us) can see how wrong it was to discriminate against someone for their color. There’s still a large chunk who can’t see how wrong it is to discriminate against someone for their orientation. Being a racist is obviously wrong and being homophobic is at least tolerable, so it can’t be a civil rights issue! Civil rights are the things that are obviously right! (Similarly, a large chunk of Americans will talk about American religious freedom and then exclude Muslims.) People in 1950 were not all sitting around saying “Civil rights for blacks are obviously right!” It’s only in hindsight that so few people defend those days. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2013, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105/50 "2013-12-12T19:08:54Z")
It took a lot of guys getting sprayed with fire hoses and clubbed with ax handles to get civil rights. Those rights are worth keeping, and when one party wants to start putting hurdles meant to make it more difficult for minorities to vote, the analogy to the civil rights movement is quite appropriate. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2013, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105/51 "2013-12-12T19:38:48Z")
> [@ITR\_champion](#): > > Er, no. In the USA “civil rights” can mean constitutionally guaranteed rights generally, but more frequently refers specifically to the movement for rights for blacks in the deep South. I object to the cheap use of comparisons to the civil rights movement for blacks in the deep South. We could use the words “civil rights” to talk about my right to buy incandescent light bulbs, or my right to make unlimited donations to Super PACs, or my right to not have the government track my cell phone. But while I’m in favor of all these rights, I don’t claim that supporting them is a sign of courage comparable to that of Rev. MLK, Rosa Parks, and the Freedom Riders. That would be insulting, not to mention just plain dumb. While carefully not responding to my post, earlier, you are, by omission, re-affirming my observation that you are simply not opposed to discrimination based on sexual orientation and are offended solely because you wish that the movement for civil rights for homosexuals would go away. Nothing you have posted, (in your OP or subsequently), provides any rational basis to avoid calling the current movement to secure civil rights based on sexual orientation a “civil right” and nothing you have posted provides a reason to consider insulting the use of the phrase “civil rights” in that context. ---
**Author:** ![stpauler](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9d8465/32.png) [@stpauler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stpauler)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2013, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105/52 "2013-12-12T20:10:54Z")
[List of countries where death penalty can be instituted due to homosexuality:](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBT_rights_by_country_or_territory) Libya Sudan Mauritania Saudi Arabia Afghanistan List of countries where death penalty can be instituted due to race: 0 Years that it’s been legal to have same sex intercourse in the USA: 11. (Lawrence v. Texas) Years that it’s been legal to be of a different race in the USA: 149 (13th Amendment) States that allow discrimination based on sexual orientation for housing: 28 States that allow discrimination based on race for housing: 0 A Wisconsin gay couple getting married in neighboring Minnesota, Illinois, or Iowa could be arrested upon returning to Wisconsin. And these aren’t civil rights? Being arrested? Forcibly removed from housing? Killed? The only thing insulting is the veiled homophobia by claiming that comparisons are invalid. ---
**Author:** ![ITR\_champion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c67d28/32.png) [@ITR\_champion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ITR_champion)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2013, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105/53 "2013-12-12T20:20:18Z")
> [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](#): > > Ugh. ITR, the fact is that the struggles of the civil rights movement are _almost perfectly_ analogous to those of the modern gay rights movement, save for the most visceral parts. Well, it’s kind of difficult to deny that the two movements are analogous except for the parts that are totally different. > [@tomndebb](#): > > I’m not quite sure what the purpose of your OP might have been. You may very well have a legitimate complaint against the use of the (racial) Civil Rights movement in the U.S. being overused as a point of comparison, but you tied it directly to a thread on civil rights based on sexual orientation, giving a pretty clear impression that you do not believe that homosexual civil rights are legitimate, (or legitimate “enough”), to bear comparison to the actions that dominated the news of the 1950s and 1960s. I never made any classification of the legitimacy of homosexual civil rights. The only time in the OP that I mentioned homosexuality was a reference to a thread about a gay couple suing a baker because that baker refused to make a cake for their wedding. Someone compared that situation to Rosa Parks’, which I find entirely ridiculous. It may be true, as one person said, that the one act of protest by Parks did not get a violent response, but she was acting as part of a broad strategy to confront the violence against southern Blacks. Overall the struggle to desegregate busses in the deep South was spectacularly bloody. Anyone who got involved in the struggle against racial segregation knew that their risk of getting assaulted, imprisoned, or even murdered by government or the Klan was very high. The same is not true for those who are filing lawsuits about cakes today. The situations are not remotely comparable. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2013, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105/54 "2013-12-12T20:29:40Z")
> [@ITR\_champion](#): > > I never made any classification of the legitimacy of homosexual civil rights. The only time in the OP that I mentioned homosexuality was a reference to a thread about a gay couple suing a baker because that baker refused to make a cake for their wedding. Someone compared that situation to Rosa Parks’, which I find entirely ridiculous. > > It may be true, as one person said, that the one act of protest by Parks did not get a violent response, but she was acting as part of a broad strategy to confront the violence against southern Blacks. Overall the struggle to desegregate busses in the deep South was spectacularly bloody. Anyone who got involved in the struggle against racial segregation knew that their risk of getting assaulted, imprisoned, or even murdered by government or the Klan was very high. The same is not true for those who are filing lawsuits about cakes today. The situations are not remotely comparable. If your beef is that people are saying suing about cakes is as brave and dangerous as being a Freedom Rider, then be at peace: **nobody is saying that**. What people are saying is that the causes are equally righteous, and opposition to them, while unequally violent, are equally foolish. Moreover, the causes are equally righteous because they have almost identical rationales, and opposition to them is equally foolish because opposition to them has almost identical rationales. But you’re right that it’s safer to sue about cakes. It’s just that nobody ever said otherwise, nor is that the important part of the analogy. ---
**Author:** ![stpauler](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9d8465/32.png) [@stpauler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stpauler)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2013, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105/55 "2013-12-12T20:34:27Z")
Yeah, except the problem is one doesn’t even have to order a cake.[Just a couple headlines from the last 12 months.](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/news/gay-hate-crime) Gay Man Left Paralyzed After Alleged Hate Crime Could Brutal Labor Day Attack Be The Latest In An Anti-Gay Crime Spate In Ohio? Gay Activist’s Home, Flag Vandalized In New Orleans Four Men Arrested After Another New York Anti-Gay Hate Crime Alleged Victim In NYC Gay Hate Crime Speaks Out NYC Activist Attacked In Alleged Anti-Gay Hate Crime Gay Couple Attacked By Basketball Fans In Alleged Hate Crime Gay British Teen Dies After Being Set On Fire At Birthday Party Texas Woman Has Jaw Wired Shut After Alleged Anti-Gay Hate Crime Was This Gay Oregon Man A Victim Of A Brutal Hate Crime? Gay Michigan Man Believes He Was Hate Crime Victim Suspects Sought In Gay Hate Crime At UCLA Anti-Gay Road Rage: 71-Year-Old Charged With Beating Woman WIth Steering Wheel Lock Two Chicago Gay Men, Female Friend Allegedly Attacked In Hate Crime Maryland Man Believes Christmas Attack Was An Anti-Gay Hate Crime But yeah, I guess if you ignore EVERYTHING ELSE GOING ON IN THE WORLD and just focus on the cake thing. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2013, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105/56 "2013-12-12T20:53:00Z")
> [@ITR\_champion](#): > > I never made any classification of the legitimacy of homosexual civil rights. The only time in the OP that I mentioned homosexuality was a reference to a thread about a gay couple suing a baker because that baker refused to make a cake for their wedding. Someone compared that situation to Rosa Parks’, which I find entirely ridiculous. Then, as I mentioned in my first post, your lack of clarity in the OP and your silence on that aspect of the discussion for another 52 posts has clearly left an impression that your complaint was in regard to the group seeking their rights and not the particular situations that were reported. I would tend to agree that there is not a direct level of equivalence between state enforced Jim Crow laws and a single baker refusing to perform a specific service. However, as I noted in my first post, you are the one who did not make it clear that that was your issue. The baker may not be a clean comparison to National City Lines bus company, Montgomery, AL, and Jim Crow South, but if you had simply wanted to point out that the baker incident did not rise to the same level of importance, you had 51 posts in which you could have pointed to a case of the abuse of homosexual civil rights that you thought did compare, making it clear that your complaint was with the specific incident rather than the overall cause. If you do not like the inferences that readers draw, then do a better job of making your point clear or clarifying it when it is obvious that it was not originally clear. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2013, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105/57 "2013-12-12T20:56:22Z")
> [@stpauler](#): > > And these aren’t civil rights? Being arrested? Forcibly removed from housing? Killed? The only thing insulting is the veiled homophobia by claiming that comparisons are invalid. Veiled? ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2013, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105/58 "2013-12-12T21:31:05Z")
> [@ITR\_champion](#): > > . . . It may be true, as one person said, that the one act of protest by Parks did not get a violent response, but she was acting as part of a broad strategy to confront the violence against southern Blacks. Overall the struggle to desegregate busses in the deep South was spectacularly bloody. Anyone who got involved in the struggle against racial segregation knew that their risk of getting assaulted, imprisoned, or even murdered by government or the Klan was very high. The same is not true for those who are filing lawsuits about cakes today. The situations are not remotely comparable. Things were worse, in that respect. How does that make the current debate not one over civil rights? If I simply tell a black man, “Go away, I won’t rent to you,” is that not a civil rights violation? I have to shoot him in the kneecaps for it to count? Denial of equal access to civil institutions on the basis of externalities is a “civil rights” issue. You’re adding terms to the definition that are not intrinsic. (“We cut him open with a chainsaw, so no one could accuse us of ‘lynching.’”) ---
**Author:** ![ITR\_champion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c67d28/32.png) [@ITR\_champion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ITR_champion)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2013, 9:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105/59 "2013-12-12T21:37:07Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > If your beef is that people are saying suing about cakes is as brave and dangerous as being a Freedom Rider, then be at peace: **nobody is saying that**. > > What people are saying is that the causes are equally righteous, and opposition to them, while unequally violent, are equally foolish. Moreover, the causes are equally righteous because they have almost identical rationales, and opposition to them is equally foolish because opposition to them has almost identical rationales. I see it more like this. 60 years ago, if a black man went into the White section of a bus terminal in Mississippi, he could be arrested for doing so–many were. In other words, the power of government and its legal punishments fell on the black man in that situation. In the current situation of a gay couple suing the baker, the power of government and its legal punishment also falls, but it falls on the baker, not on the gay couple. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2013, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105/60 "2013-12-12T21:39:02Z")
> [@ITR\_champion](#): > > I see it more like this. 60 years ago, if a black man went into the White section of a bus terminal in Mississippi, he could be arrested for doing so–many were. In other words, the power of government and its legal punishments fell on the black man in that situation. In the current situation of a gay couple suing the baker, the power of government and its legal punishment also falls, but it falls on the baker, not on the gay couple. So, do you have problems with the law falling on the same baker for a refusal to bake a cake for the same black man? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/comparisons-to-the-civil-rights-movement-are-overused-incorrect-and-insulting/676105.md?page=4)