You mean with the broad consensus of five of the nine Supreme Court justices, don’t you?
We can’t just pass a law limiting free speech? Like, say, anti-pornography obscenity laws? Laws limiting free speech didn’t require a Constitutional amendment, but simply required a case, most famously Miller v. California, that let the SCotUS to rule that this speech doesn’t rise to First Amendment protection.
There’s nothing in the CotUS about obscenity. Obscenity laws are not a violation of the First Amendment because two thirds of both chambers of Congress and 3/4ths of the states did something. Wanna show me the amendment that takes First Amendment protection away from obscenity and puts the Miller test into the Constitution? I can show you the case law that did do that.
We don’t amend the Constitution*, we read the Case Law!
*Except in cases where the CotUS actually requires an amendment to get to wanted result, e.g. Dred Scott v Sandford demanded the Thirteenth Amendment.
And the award for “shittiest post this month” goes to…
…Well, probably Steophan or that racist troll from a while back with a boner for the New Observer, but this is a strong contender. Jesus christ, I thought we were past the point where this kind of out-and-proud demonization was considered okay, even in the pit.
Hey fucko, are you aware that there’s a decade and a half between Lawrence v. Texas - the fact that you’re apparently upset that gay people are no longer persecuted simply for having consensual sex with their partners speaks volumes to your character, you fucking failure of a human being - that the plaintiffs are completely unrelated, and that gay people are not some fucking monolith! What the fuck is wrong with you?
Oh, and this:
This doesn’t fucking help, you disgusting sack of skunk shit.
What I don’t understand is that if the baker does not recognize it a REAL wedding and a REAL marriage, then how it is a REAL wedding cake.
From his point of view isn’t it just A CAKE. Can he legally refuse to sell a cake with fantasy decorations ?
If some kid wants a Jedi cake, shouldn’t the baker say his religion does not recognize Jedis so no cakes for you ? Can he legally pick and choose when he refuses ?
The Colorado commission already ruled that a baker could refuse to decorate a cake that Christians wanted. So we have indeed established that bakers can refuse customers.
No. We’ve established a baker can refuse to put a specific design on a cake. This baker under question didn’t onext to a specific design or decoration. He wouldn’t sell the gay couple a wedding cake at all.
Definitely. It’s amusing to see the religious right wailing “why couldn’t they just be satisfied with civil unions?” when at least half if not more of the anti-SSM bills passed by the states preemptively disallowed civil unions.
It’s really a shame that all these prospective laws protecting the right to discriminate for religious reasons keep get blocked and shut down by Democrat-dominated state and federal legislators. Total misuse of their overreaching political power. Wait, that’s not what happens, because Republicans dominate state and federal legislative bodies. Democrats are sadly lacking in overreaching political power.
What happens is that every time there is an attempt to legislate a return to discrimination, the invisible hand of the free market bitch slaps the right wing into submission. Because apparently corporate America, as an entity, is as socially liberal as a Berkeley freshman.
Yes. Freedom of religion for ONE PARTICULAR RELIGION (or one particular wing of several religions, which is what this is about) is the opposite of real religious freedom or a just society. There are plenty of Christian, Jewish and Muslim (and other) communities in the US who are fine with gay rights, including making cakes. Conservative branches of those religions need to get over themselves and this attitude that they are the reason for society to exist.
Nobody is saying that people don’t have religious freedom - they do. The baker has the right to believe what he wants and practice that religion. What people don’t have is the right for their religious beliefs to take precedent over other rules of modern society. Kim Davis can believe all the hateful shit she wants, but she can’t use it to refuse to do her job. An Amish person can believe that technology is sinful but he can’t then get a job in IT support and insist that he can’t use telephones or computers. And the baker can believe what he or she likes but can’t actively discriminate against certain customers.
The frisson isn’t between the baker and other people with conflicting beliefs; it’s between the baker’s religious beliefs and the requirements of his or her chosen profession. If the job conflicts with the beliefs, one of those will have to change. You can’t have your cake and refuse to let gay people eat it too.
If the decision SCOTUS makes says that a) public accomodations can’t discriminate, but b) they can choose not to make products that seem to endorse a certain viewpoint, then I’ll be quite satisfied.
That’s like saying, “Of course we have freedom of speech! Just keep it to yourself if it offends me.”
Religious freedom has no meaning if you can’t bring it into the public square with you. Now I agree that “generally applicable laws”, in other words laws that apply to ALL, trump religious freedom. However, most laws include exceptions and if there are exceptions for some, there is room for exceptions for a few more.
Firstly - no it isn’t, as the Kim Davis example demonstrates. If your religious beliefs prevent you from doing your job properly and the two cannot be reconciled, the onus is on you to decide whether you want to adhere to your religious principles or continue doing your job, not on others to accommodate you under any circumstance. You remain free to believe and practice your religion; that you may have to change jobs in order to do so is a choice you make based on how you’ve chosen to practice your religion. “Religious freedom” is not a “Get out of personal responsibility” card; your freedom to worship does not impose a requirement on the rest of the world to give you special rights and privileges over other people.
Consider the more value-neutral proposition of civil disobedience. A law may be unjust and you may sincerely believe that the law is unjust, yet neither of those facts inherently form a valid defense against being arrested for violating that law (despite what some more naïve activists appear to think). Your sincerely-held views do not give you the right to be treated differently.
Secondly - you are misrepresenting the fundamental issue here. A somewhat closer analogy would be “Of course we have freedom of speech! Just keep it to yourself if it HARMS me.” Which of course is exactly how our freedom of speech laws work. This would be more evident if you would stop persisting in reducing discrimination to mere ‘hurt feelings’.
Your argument is more akin to saying “We have freedom of speech, therefore if you don’t give me airtime on PBS you are persecuting me.” You are asserting extra rights that do not exist.
You can bring it into the public square with you. What you can’t do is then declare that your religious freedom means that other people aren’t allowed to be in the same square while you’re there.
The bits of this that aren’t tautological are nonsensical. Yes, there are often “exceptions” to laws in the sense that court decisions interpret the extent to which laws apply. It doesn’t follow that because exceptions exist all proposed exceptions are equally valid.
True, but as a general rule, if you allow people to opt out of a law or regulation for secular reasons, you also have to allow it for religious reasons. Either cakemakers can refuse to make custom cakes for certain types of customers or they cannot. If they can, then religion is a valid reason to do it. If they can’t, then religion is not an excuse. Since the Colorado commission ruled that bakers actually can refuse to make custom cakes with messages they disagree with, then bakers can refuse to make cakes endorsing gay marriage as well.
Now of course the baker could lose the case based on the fact that they never got around to discussing design, but I do think SCOTUS will establish that he could in effect refuse to make them any cake theyd want by simply nixing any design that seemed “gay”. They’d end up just going elsewhere or buying a pre-made cake, which he did offer to them. So even if he lost it wouldn’t really change his business practice at all.
Are you saying that Its a fair assumption that every single custom cake this customer would’ve accepted would have some sort of “gay” design element? Because I think that a reach. Would they still have refused to make the cake if one of the grooms had come into the shop with his sister to order the cake? Would the design have seemed too gay to bake then? Has Masterpiece Cakes EVER refused to make a cake for a straight couple because the design they chose was “too gay”?
If Masterpiece Cakes wins I hope they are deluged by straight couples ordering cakes for the SSM weddings of their friends and family. And I hope every one of those SSM couples prominently features the cake on social media. And I hope they credit the bakery. Because once the cake and money exchange hands the owner of the cake can do what they want with it.
Actually I’d love to see a viral social media campaign where scores of gay men video themselves pulling an “American Pie” stunt using Masterpiece Bakery cakes. It would bring a new perspective to the sentiment “Fuck Masterpiece Bakery and their cakes”.