Right, or there’s the case discussed in the Colorado Supreme Court decision, where a baker refused to bake a Bible-shaped cake with a Leviticus quote about homosexuality inscribed on it.
What would be the joyous occasion calling for such a cake? Graduation from conversion therapy, maybe?
Hm, after reading both the states brief and the bakers brief, it would seem to me that the baker has the more compelling case. I would judge, based on just these briefs mind you, that the state was in the wrong in this case.
More likely, an artist may pick and choose what expressive result he produces - I.e. I only want happy scenes, I only want scenes from Nordic mythology, I only do a few commissions a year and yours is not one. Or a comedian, “I only do bar mitzvahs”. Or a clown who only does girls’ birthdays…
As opposed to a hotel - you want to open the business, you are open to anyone who walks in and meets certain non-discriminatory criteria (ability to pay, doesn’t smell too bad, clean, etc.) Or a plumber - people call, you fix their pipes. Similarly, say, a shoe store - there’s no artistry, you post a sign and sell inventory.
So what is a wedding cake baker? Presumably every cake is custom made, but only because nobody walks in and says “I’m getting married tomorrow, can I get a cake off the shelf?”; it’s the sort of thing planned weeks to months in advance for a particular time. Similarly, without a market for off-the-shelf cakes, (almost?) nobody makes cakes to wedding standard on spec that someone will walk in and buy that expensive creation. So the business is by definition a custom bakery. the question still is - how much is art, how much is the equivalent of plumbing - more formula than creativity? (a) generally, and (b) for this particular baker. How different is baking a cake like 1,000 other cakes the last year? Is it really different than ordering different pairs of shoes for sale, or cutting lengths of pipe and soldering them together? Or does it suddenly become art when you go for the brown icing roses instead of the pink ones? Or when you put that first icing decoration on?
The trick for the Supremes is to write an explanation of where to draw the line without allowing any business to discriminate however they want.
IMHO (which counts for as much as Guestchaz’s, i.e. nothing) the likely outcome will be that as a business, he is obliged to provide the cake for all customers first come, first serve until his card is full; but he can provide basic, generic output rather than putting his heart and soul into it… or if they have a fully formed design that he is capable of executing, he can follow that. For example, any half-way competent cake decorator could produce a red rose in icing or copy design elements from a set of directions - so the “art” level falls more to that of sign painter than Picasso.
You’re missing the important fact that the SCOTUS has not designated gays as a “suspect class” at the federal level. The idea that you can’t discriminate against someone doesn’t make sense unless you view it through the lens of which level of scrutiny the court uses for that class. I don’t want to get too much into GD territory here, but one reason these issues related to gays are so difficult to litigate is the Supremes have punted on the whole issue of suspect class as it relates to sexual orientation.
The thing I am wondering about in all this is:
Why on earth would a gay couple want an avowed homophobe to bake their wedding cake?
Wedding cakes are complex, intricate creations which take a lot of work and attention to detail. There are too many ways it could get screwed up, ranging from deliberate sabotage that would not show up until people actually tried to eat the cake, to negligence caused by not wanting to make the thing in the first place.
Why not respond by saying: “Thank you for letting us know about your feelings. Have a nice day.” And then going to the bakery down the street operated by reasonable people?
In my opinion, trying to force a homophobe to create one’s wedding cake against his wishes, just because you can, comes dangerously close to demonstrating an actual “Gay Agenda”, thus vindicating the fears of the anti-gay crowd.
Two things.
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You assume there is a wedding cake bakery just down the street. What if it’s a small town and this is the only place to get it?
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Would you say the same thing to a store of any kind that refused service based on race? Should the couple just say, “Thanks for not serving us because of our race”?
Anti-discrimination laws are based on the principle that services are available without that kind of refusal.
What would a black person want to eat at a racist lunch counter? Why would a Jewish person want to stay at a “restricted” hotel?
And on and on.
You don’t cave in to bigotry.
Why should the gay couple have to worry about whether or not the proprietor of the bakery is homophobic, anti-gay, overly religious, or any other such thing? The point to anti-discrimination laws is that, as a society, we shouldn’t have to have such discrimination be a part of our experience EVER in the business world. Just having it happen itself is a bad thing, even if there IS a “fix” available.
Well, this is the crux of the matter.
The guy makes really nice cakes, if Google Images is not lying to me.
In most cases, there’s nothing explicit about a gay vs. straight wedding cake. AFAIK the toppers if any come after, and rarely is there writing on the cake where I’ve gone to a few weddings. So a cake is a cake is a cake.
So to what extent is he just some guy who makes cakes, and to what extent is he an artist who makes exquisite creations? If he makes cookies and brownies, he’s not completely an artist unless you can make art with a pan of brownies.
Who knows why they picked him. Maybe it was a set-up. Maybe they saw his cake at a different wedding they went to. Maybe he’s the only game in town, maybe he’s one of the best and they had money to burn, maybe he had a prominent shop on the nearby main shopping street, maybe (straight) friends recommended him.
I don’t know if he had a sign in the window “No abominations allowed”, or if his attitude came as a surprise.
Colorado and then the Supremes had the opportunity to fill in any of these details if they thought they were relevant. The press does not necessarily report these details accurately.
Thanks to all who responded to my post—
I do understand the principle of standing up to bigotry. I do, however, think there is a difference between being refused lunch, which is an everyday thing, and a wedding cake which is part of a celebration which is supposed to be a happy, joyous occasion (and, hopefully, once in a lifetime…). Why give a bigot the opportunity to spoil your special day? And even if nothing goes wrong, one’s memory of the day would include the fact that the cake was baked by someone who was only doing it under duress because a Judge said he had to. That’s not how I would want to remember my wedding.
As far as confronting bigotry on every front, to use an admittedly loose analogy, the U.S. won the war in the Pacific, not by capturing every single Japanese-held island, but by capturing the strategically important ones and leaving others to wither on the vine when the Japanese navy could no longer supply them. It is impossible to drag every homophobe into court for his/her attitudes and actions. Nor, I think, is it desirable. Society should focus on correcting the manifestations which are most important and impactful, such as discrimination in housing, employment, health-care, ability to marry and so forth. the individual bigot will either change on his own (which is not so likely, but not impossible), or he will be left behind by a changing society. That won’t happen overnight, but it will happen.
As for the suggestion that this bakery may be the only game in town - well that would have to be a very small town.
There is also no requirement for a fancy wedding cake. When my niece was married last year, she had several of her friends make batches of very fancy cupcakes. The result was much more meaningful than a fancy cake baked by a business. And, people got their choice of cupcakes, all of which were fresher and better quality than a commercial cake baked a few days in advance.
This is just my opinion and I realize nbot everyone will agree.
Thanks to all who responded to my post—
I do understand the principle of standing up to bigotry. I do, however, think there is a difference between being refused lunch, which is an everyday thing, and a wedding cake which is part of a celebration which is supposed to be a happy, joyous occasion (and, hopefully, once in a lifetime…). Why give a bigot the opportunity to spoil your special day? And even if nothing goes wrong, one’s memory of the day would include the fact that the cake was baked by someone who was only doing it under duress because a Judge said he had to. That’s not how I would want to remember my wedding.
As far as confronting bigotry on every front, to use an admittedly loose analogy, the U.S. won the war in the Pacific, not by capturing every single Japanese-held island, but by capturing the strategically important ones and leaving others to wither on the vine when the Japanese navy could no longer supply them. It is impossible to drag every homophobe into court for his/her attitudes and actions. Nor, I think, is it desirable. Society should focus on correcting the manifestations which are most important and impactful, such as discrimination in housing, employment, health-care, ability to marry and so forth. the individual bigot will either change on his own (which is not so likely, but not impossible), or he will be left behind by a changing society. That won’t happen overnight, but it will happen.
As for the suggestion that this bakery may be the only game in town - well that would have to be a very small town.
There is also no requirement for a fancy wedding cake. When my niece was married last year, she had several of her friends make batches of very fancy cupcakes. The result was much more meaningful than a fancy cake baked by a business. And, people got their choice of cupcakes, all of which were fresher and better quality than a commercial cake baked a few days in advance.
This is just my opinion and I realize not everyone will agree.
Being sneered at and told “We don’t serve your kind” is not exactly a pleasant experience. I’m not surprised they want the state to ensure that they can expect a reasonable level of service when they patronize a store.
Yeah, I don’t think the “don’t let it spoil your day” argument holds water, since during the course of your planning someone had to remind you that they consider you a second-class citizen.
#1…there is an article on Facebook that states these two " baiters" passed many other bakeries and specifically singled this bakery out.
OK, so they liked the cakes this particular guy makes. Should he complain about this?
Hmm, an article on Facebook? Without even a link to the article?
Color me convinced!
Yes, and the Jews will probably feel more comfortable with their own country club among their own kind, and women wouldn’t like the way men swear and smoke cigars on the men’s golf course, and in the colored people’s bathroom they won’t have to encounter Klan members and though the bathroom is smaller and inconvenient to get to it still works…so don’t let any of that spoil your luncheon, 18 holes, or movie experience.
Yeah, I had an awkward experience a few years ago at work. My receptionist told me she recognized a guy from the Megan’s Law website. She pulled him up on my computer, and told me she didn’t feel safe dealing with the guy. He was described as a violent predator, the highest tier on the site.
I went out front and sure enough, he was the guy. I explained to him that my employees did not feel comfortable dealing with him due to his criminal history. He said he totally understood and left. I then called my lawyer and asked him if I’d broken any laws. He told me I had not.
Masterpiece Cakeshop is located in Lakewood, Colorado which is in the Denver Colorado metro area. There are multiple bakeries in that area including one about a block away on the same street as Masterpiece Cakeshop. A search of Google maps returns multiple hits for bakeries in the general area. So in this instance this is not an issue of the only bakery in town refusing a customer.
Whether the couple involved in this case intentionally passed by those other bakeries in order to target Masterpiece Cakeshop might be an issue if the case gets kicked back for a trial. The couple have said in interviews that they saw the bakery’s website and liked some of what they saw so they decided to go there to order a cake for their wedding.