See, I think this is the driving problem. You just don’t like their religious beliefs. It may surprise (and disgust) you that there are people so genuinely opposed to abortion, and to drugs that they believe induce it, but so what? This is precisely the reason that we need a strong religious freedom doctrine. There is a significant chunk of society that wants to shut people down for having the wrong religious views.
I think you have the shoe on the wrong foot. It’s the Hobby Lobby owners who wish to impose their puritanical morality on their employees. The idea of those plebes in the store having all this sex and no babies to show for it drives the guy batty.
Again?
You know your argument is weak. It sounds weak to your ears, and you’re in favor of your own position! So, you reason, it must sound even weaker to anyone unconvinced. And you solve that problem by changing the facts.
Hobby Lobby doesn’t wish to stop their employees from using contraceptives. They simply don’t want to buy them – or pay a third party to buy them on behalf of the employees.
See, now you get reduced to this.
It’s not clear if you dislike the people, or religious people more generally, or these people’s particular views. After all, you substantially (and consistently) misrepresent their position to make it easier to caricature them.
I don’t dislike religious people, I’m a cafeteria Catholic myself, but I think the Hobby Lobby guy is out of line. This isn’t being reduced to anything, I’m just calling a spade a spade. I understand the rationale that he doesn’t want to pay for it, but it doesn’t pass the smell test. Does he boycott goods from China, where they routinely abort female fetuses? Does he insist that none of his goods are made by slave labor? He seems to be focusing on the tiniest of motes in his brother’s eye but ignoring the huge timbers in his own.
Again: that’s YOUR opinion. The law says that his sincerely-held religious belief gets deference. It doesn’t say that his sincerely-held religious belief must be vetted by you.
And I hope the Supremes will rule that his employees have the right not to be bullied by the guy that signs the check. If this stands, what’s to prevent him from saying that paying for surgery violates his religious beliefs? Suppose he believes only in faith healing? If he wins, look for a bunch of employers to find religion and come up with all kinds of things they object to, and what a coincidence it will lower their insurance costs.
And this may possibly related to the fact that a faith-based business can require employees to be a certain religion while secular-based business cannot. Thus a RCC run charity service can require you to be Roman Catholic but a RCC run concession at Notre Dame University cannot. I wonder if this would be similar in that the RCC could deny contraception to the charity workers but not the concessionnaires.
Are you now trying to argue that it’s not a sincerely held religious belief?
Inasmuch as the opposition to paying for contraception expressed by these folks pre-dates the ACA by years and years, isn’t your suggestion that that they’re just saying it now to save money kind of misplaced?
I really like how the constant question of “Why won’t this apply to other types of medicine?” gets ignored, especially as stuff like birth control is often taken for reasons besides stopping pregnancy - but as it’s a woman’s health issue, that’s safely ignored.
So, what’s to stop this from happening when it comes to blood transfusions, or vaccines? Anything? Even just a “No, nothing” would at least acknowledge that questions are being asked.
For Hobby Lobby, I’m sure it is. Other business owners would probably find religion if they could save a buck. Some of these guys would steal a fly from a blind spider.
Obviously what we need is a constitutional amendment stating that all persons are entitled to birth control paid for by the government with no copays, that abortion during the first trimester be provided by the government with no copay and no questions asked, and that abortions during the 2nd trimester be provided by the government for medical reasons and that abortions in the 3rd trimester be provided by the government in order to save the live of the mother. Then the Hobby Lobby dude would rest easy knowing that (gasp) his employees aren’t having sex and getting away with it on his dime.
I don’t think I’ve been dodging the question. In post #283, I addressed an employer that says it can’t pay for any health insurance coverage at all. I get bored with the blood transfusion argument (and have said as much) because there’s no basis for it. Bring me someone who objects to facilitating blood transfusions, and I’ll take it more seriously.
I’m also not familiar with the many reasons that the drugs these plaintiffs believe are abortofacients are taken for other reasons (I phrase it in that long-winded way because of the peculiar insistence on framing the objection as one to all contraceptives).
But, the answer to your question is: nothing prevents a person from claiming that a violation of their sincerely held religious beliefs entitles them to an exemption.
Depending on the burden imposed by the violation, or the justification for the imposition, the result might be different.
Then you argue lack of sincereity at that point. It’s not uncommon, lots of questionable religious claims get made. We’re pretty confident of our ability to root out the fake claims.
Thank you; yes, it does make a good (or at least “acceptable”) place to start. However, I emphasized the portion of your post that I did, because I was interested in both of the assertions that you implied: that it happens regularly; and that the bankruptcies/liquidations are the results of fines.
Your link to the Arthur Andersen cite makes no mention of any fines that the firm paid, or even that were imposed. I understand that none were paid, as the SCOTUS overturned the outcome of the trial on the basis of flawed jury instructions, but the ensuing article on Andersen’s appeal also makes no mention of any monetary consequences that may have been at stake, had the outcome been upheld. So your cite of Arthur Andersen as an example of corporations that are “regularly ‘executed’ when they get fined into bankruptcy and liquidation” strikes me as somewhat weak.
But a discussion of the proximate cause of the fate of Arthur Andersen also strikes me as a bit of a distraction, so I won’t pursue it right now. However, since you mention it as a good place to start, I wonder if I might trouble you to provide some others as being good places to continue. Because as it is, your cite also has the appearance of a good place to finish.
Thanks so much for your assistance.
This question seems to take for granted the idea that the employer has a responsibility to cover health, period, and that we should discuss contraception coverage as an exception to that rule.
Is that your belief?
This was not directed at me, but this question gives me pause – I don’t know if insurance should cover every health ailment, but I *want *to say it should. Should the employer provide said insurance? Maybe, maybe not, but that seems to be the way the system is set up in this country.
So I ask the question in return – do you think that insurance should cover a common treatment for endometriosisor polycystic ovary syndrome? Birth control pills are a common treatment for both. While the much more common use of birth control pills is just that – birth control – the Pill is prescribed for other reasons. Should a Christian company provide the benefit of a comprehensive insurance plan for their employees? Should it only be covered if the patient can prove that they aren’t using it for birth control reasons? I can prove that I don’t need it for birth control purposes; my SO has had a vasectomy. Should Hobby Lobby (if I were an employee there) be able to say “Nope, we won’t cover your medical treatment”?
“Period” ? No, I am fairly certain the law doesn’t work that way, although I admit I will not be able to provide all of the exact details. If you’re not talking legally, and instead talking ideally, I don’t think health coverage should be handled by employers at all. But, unfortunately, that’s the reality of life right now.
I do find it very frightening that “We’ll provide health insurance, except for treatments that only women would need” (as pointed out by raventhief with more details than I had) is something that Christians would actually consider an OK thing to do. It goes far beyond birth control, and right into “suing to specifically not cover health concerns for women”. I’d also be willing to give these groups more flak if the right wing religious nuts didn’t have a history of blatantly lying about how these medications work.
Looking at it, it appears that Hobby Lobby may object specifically to IUDs and Plan B, more so than hormonal BC. I personally cannot take The Pill for my endometriosis, so my doctor has strongly urged me to have an IUDimplanted. I cannot say how common that is, just that my own doctor wants me to get one.
This is basically the same as the women who die from being denied abortions despite having an already dead fetus inside of them. It doesn’t matter the medical reality - facts don’t get in the way of faith, and their faith tells them that this is wrong, always. Who needs to do things like actually know how stuff works or what it might be used for before making decisions for the lives of others? Jesus wouldn’t want that!
I hadn’t heard that this is happening. Could you provide a cite for all these people arguing on religious grounds that women with dead fetuses should be denied abortions?
I mean, surely you’re not massaging and exaggerating the facts.