# Judge orders Colorado baker to serve gay couples **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 8, 2013, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792 "2013-12-08T01:57:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 34
**Author:** ![Ruken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f475e1/32.png) [@Ruken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruken)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2017, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792/661 "2017-12-11T16:19:19Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > He’s still got a case though, because the commission already endorsed bakers’ right to not endorse messages they don’t agree with. That same page I referenced details pretty much that argument. Unfortunately I don’t have a link on the fly but I originally pulled it from scotuswatch or something like that. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tooth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c67d28/32.png) [@The\_Tooth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tooth)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2017, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792/662 "2017-12-11T16:40:24Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > That is a great argument, IF, and only if, the rules are the same for all businesses. If a state decides that one type of business can pick and choose their customers but another can’t, then there’s legitimate room there to ask for a religious exemption. Does Colorado require tattoo artists to do any tattoo a customer requests? If not, then they can’t require a cake maker to make any cake a cutomer requests. The issue is not the cake, the issue is the customers; they’re gay. If you believe anything else, you’ve been sold a bill of goods. The only reason these arguments center around baked goods is it’s the sort of business where you’re likely to find out the sexual orientation of the customers. If right-wing Christian bigots who ran hardware stores knew which of their customers were gay and which were not, they’d turn the gay customers away as well. > [@](#): > > Secondly, if there are legitimate secular reasons to refuse to make a certain product that you offer, then religious reasons have to be permitted for refusal as well. Secular interests and religious interests are equal under the 1st amendment. Anything else is viewpoint discrimination, which also runs afoul of the 1st amendment. There are no religious reasons to refuse to cater to gay customers. There are right-wing bigots using their religion as cover for their bigotry. No religion requires one to open a business but refuse to serve gay people. > [@](#): > > The Colorado Civil Rights Commission directly ruled that a company can refuse to make a cake with a viewpoint against homosexuality. But that you can’t refuse to make one endorsing it. That’s viewpoint discrimination, open and shut, 1st amendment violation even if you don’t bring religious freedom into it. Cakes don’t have ‘viewpoints’. And even if they did, they don’t have rights to be violated. And were it open and shut I don’t think the issue would keep cropping up. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2017, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792/663 "2017-12-11T16:54:58Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > I am afraid that this model for an argument is not going to go very far. Aside from restrictions on sacramental participation, the RCC has not tried to impose rules regarding matrimony on the general public (at least in a very long time). > > A priest would be prohibited from witnessing a marriage where one or more participant was divorced without the marriage being annulled and persons in such a state are expected to refrain from receiving the Eucharist, but they are still allowed to walk into a church, be buried in a Catholic cemetery with the celebration of a Mass, (they will not be receiving communion, of course), and other practices. A baker who refused to prepare a wedding cake for the event would be regarded as more than a bit odd and would only have the support of his parish or diocese if the pastor or bishop was a bit of a crank. > [@John\_Mace](#): > > Catholics don’t acknowledge divorce, although they do have a process of annulment, but many Christian denominations do allow divorce. Are you aware of that? Besides that, a person’s religious beliefs are personal. I don’t think you’re going to get many SCOTUS justices who are going to insist that people must adhere to the canonical religious beliefs of a particular religion or else. Surely we don’t want the courts getting involved in what a Catholic must believe vs what an Episcopalian must believe. I sure don’t, but YMMV. > [@Bricker](#): > > According to who? > > Plenty of Christian sects don’t accept the idea that divorce and remarriage is sinful. Why must the baker reject that teaching? Why must he adopt your ideas in order to be consistent? There are Christian sects that don’t accept the idea that same sex marriage is sinful. It just seems to me, that with the bible having as many rules and contradictions to its own rules, that you can make up any beliefs to justify any form of discrimination. It is not my ideas that he needs to adopt in order to be consistent, it is the ideas that are laid out in the book that he claims to be the basis of his religious beliefs. It just seems as though it makes far more sense to simply say that one may not discriminate if one has a public accommodation, than to allow them to pretty much ex-post facto (not saying that this baker came up with his beliefs justifying his bigotry after the fact, but that they are beliefs that many bigots will be adopting if the baker’s side is upheld) pick out any verse of the bible, and hold that out as their legal justification for discrimination. Were a baker to refuse to make a cake a mixed race wedding, or even a wedding where the participants are not white, based on his interpretation of bible quotes, could they use this case as a precedent to allow that? As far as I am concerned, you are welcome to pick and choose from your bible the parts that you want to believe and the parts you do not. But, when it comes to using the bible to justify your treatment of others, picking and choosing is no longer a matter of only choosing to believe that parts that are convenient for you to believe, but you are picking and choosing the parts that justify abuse. TL;DR: I just don’t see how the bible can be the basis of a belief system that can be used to justify treatment of others, if the social contract laid out in bible itself is not being followed in all other aspects as well. If parts of the bibles teachings are left out because they are inconvenient to you, then you can leave out the ones that discriminate against others as well. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2017, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792/664 "2017-12-11T18:07:49Z")
> [@The\_Tooth](#): > > The issue is not the cake, the issue is the customers; they’re gay. If you believe anything else, you’ve been sold a bill of goods. The only reason these arguments center around baked goods is it’s the sort of business where you’re likely to find out the sexual orientation of the customers. If right-wing Christian bigots who ran hardware stores knew which of their customers were gay and which were not, they’d turn the gay customers away as well. > > There are no religious reasons to refuse to cater to gay customers. There are right-wing bigots using their religion as cover for their bigotry. No religion requires one to open a business but refuse to serve gay people. > > Cakes don’t have ‘viewpoints’. And even if they did, they don’t have rights to be violated. And were it open and shut I don’t think the issue would keep cropping up. This is indeed what the case hinges on: was the gay couple refused service for being gay? I have no particular concern for this baker. If he gets his legal ass handed to him because he doesn’t want to serve gays, no skin off my back. I would be more concerned if the issue was about the cake itself and the court ruled against him. If he was in fact willing to sell a premade cake, then it wasn’t their gayness that made him not want to do business. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2017, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792/665 "2017-12-11T18:10:13Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > There are Christian sects that don’t accept the idea that same sex marriage is sinful. > > It just seems to me, that with the bible having as many rules and contradictions to its own rules, that you can make up any beliefs to justify any form of discrimination. > > It is not my ideas that he needs to adopt in order to be consistent, it is the ideas that are laid out in the book that he claims to be the basis of his religious beliefs. > > It just seems as though it makes far more sense to simply say that one may not discriminate if one has a public accommodation, than to allow them to pretty much ex-post facto (not saying that this baker came up with his beliefs justifying his bigotry after the fact, but that they are beliefs that many bigots will be adopting if the baker’s side is upheld) pick out any verse of the bible, and hold that out as their legal justification for discrimination. > > Were a baker to refuse to make a cake a mixed race wedding, or even a wedding where the participants are not white, based on his interpretation of bible quotes, could they use this case as a precedent to allow that? > As far as I am concerned, you are welcome to pick and choose from your bible the parts that you want to believe and the parts you do not. But, when it comes to using the bible to justify your treatment of others, picking and choosing is no longer a matter of only choosing to believe that parts that are convenient for you to believe, but you are picking and choosing the parts that justify abuse. > TL;DR: I just don’t see how the bible can be the basis of a belief system that can be used to justify treatment of others, if the social contract laid out in bible itself is not being followed in all other aspects as well. If parts of the bibles teachings are left out because they are inconvenient to you, then you can leave out the ones that discriminate against others as well. He’s on pretty firm ground there though, because the idea that homosexuality is sinful is not exactly a controversial viewpoint in Christian practice. It is the mainstream view, and there are no Bible verses that contradict that. The idea that homosexuality is forbidden is as solid as prohibitions on having sex with your mother, stealing, bearing false witness, and general fornication. He’s also on firm ground establishing his Christian faith as the basis of his business, since he won’t do divorce celebration cakes or Halloween cakes. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2017, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792/666 "2017-12-11T18:20:57Z")
> [@The\_Tooth](#): > > …There are no religious reasons to refuse to cater to gay customers… Of course there are. If there weren’t, the SCOTUS would’t be taking this case in the first place. They would just let the lower court ruling stand. The question the court is weighing the tension between the 1st amendment guarantee of the free exercise of religion and the CO law as it is interpreted by the state. You might wish that the free exercise clause in the 1st amendment didn’t exist, but declaring that it doesn’t exist is to deny reality. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2017, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792/667 "2017-12-11T18:23:20Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > He’s on pretty firm ground there though, because the idea that homosexuality is sinful is not exactly a controversial viewpoint in Christian practice. I’m gonna guess you aren’t Christian, or you wouldn’t say that. Christ had exactly nothing to say on the subject (but was pretty voluble about loving everyone else as yourself etc.), and Leviticus decrees a whole lot of other things that even Roy Moore wouldn’t cop to. There are many, \*many \*Christian denominations and congregations that take that “All are welcome” stuff pretty seriously. So, the suggestion that he’s using religion as a cover for bigotry, and may not even be aware he is doing so, is on much more solid ground than your assertions about what that religion actually says. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2017, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792/668 "2017-12-11T18:25:11Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > It is not a Christian business, because businesses do not hold religious beliefs. If you want to say that it’s a business run by a Christian according to Christian beliefs, OK, but that’s not the same thing. > > (and yes, this also means that I think that the Hobby Lobby case was decided incorrectly) Should we abandon discussion of what the actual law says and focus on discussing your beliefs about what it would say if you were King, then? ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2017, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792/669 "2017-12-11T18:26:41Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > Of course there are. If there weren’t, the SCOTUS would’t be taking this case in the first place. They would just let the lower court ruling stand. The question the court is weighing the tension between the 1st amendment guarantee of the free exercise of religion and the CO law as it is interpreted by the state. You might wish that the free exercise clause in the 1st amendment didn’t exist, but declaring that it doesn’t exist is to deny reality. Does he refuse to cater to gay customers, or just refuse to help them celebrate gay weddings? An equivalent case with race would be serving black customers, but being unwilling to do a cake for a Black Lives Matter meeting. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2017, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792/670 "2017-12-11T18:28:27Z")
> [@The\_Tooth](#): > > I did not acknowledge it, and I did not address the laws. I addressed your claim that volunteering to adhere to them, whatever they might be, constitutes being forced to do something. The claim is false, since the business owner voluntarily became such. Perhaps your analytical method would produce a different result if another state passed a law that said that gays could not marry, and I claimed that this was not forcing anything on gays because, after all, they voluntarily lived in that state. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2017, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792/671 "2017-12-11T18:31:34Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Does he refuse to cater to gay customers, or just refuse to help them celebrate gay weddings? > > An equivalent case with race would be serving black customers, but being unwilling to do a cake for a Black Lives Matter meeting. Race and sexual orientation are not treated the same way at the federal level, so I don’t know what that type of analogy is supposed to show. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2017, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792/672 "2017-12-11T18:32:42Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > I’m gonna guess you aren’t Christian, or you wouldn’t say that. Christ had exactly nothing to say on the subject (but was pretty voluble about loving everyone else as yourself etc.), and Leviticus decrees a whole lot of other things that even Roy Moore wouldn’t cop to. There are many, \*many \*Christian denominations and congregations that take that “All are welcome” stuff pretty seriously. I’m not a Christian, but I’m friends with very devout Christians and I think you’re misunderstanding something key here: All are welcome. I know of no churches that chase out gays wanting to seek God. But few would say that homosexuality isn’t a sin. Almost all of the major denominations regard it as a sin. > [@](#): > > So, the suggestion that he’s using religion as a cover for bigotry, and may not even be aware he is doing so, is on much more solid ground than your assertions about what that religion actually says. He also refuses to endorse divorce, alcohol use, or Halloween. He seems to be pretty Christian to me. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2017, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792/673 "2017-12-11T18:33:59Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > Race and sexual orientation are not treated the same way at the federal level, so I don’t know what that type of analogy is supposed to show. Federal anti-discrimination law isn’t at issue in this case. This is about the constitutionality of how a state law has been applied. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2017, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792/674 "2017-12-11T18:34:22Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > But few would say that homosexuality isn’t a sin. Almost all of the major denominations regard it as a sin. You are badly misinformed. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2017, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792/675 "2017-12-11T18:39:11Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Federal anti-discrimination law isn’t at issue in this case. This is about the constitutionality of how a state law has been applied. Federal anti-discrimation jurisprudence is, which is why the race analogy doesn’t hold. I can refuse to rent my house out to a gay couple and if there is no state law concerning such action, there is no federal remedy for the gay couple. But there is a federal remedy if I refuse to rent to a couple because of their race. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tooth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c67d28/32.png) [@The\_Tooth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tooth)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2017, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792/676 "2017-12-11T18:42:46Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > Of course there are. If there weren’t, the SCOTUS would’t be taking this case in the first place. They would just let the lower court ruling stand. The question the court is weighing the tension between the 1st amendment guarantee of the free exercise of religion and the CO law as it is interpreted by the state. You might wish that the free exercise clause in the 1st amendment didn’t exist, but declaring that it doesn’t exist is to deny reality. Oh, this again. No religion requires one to open a business and refuse to serve gay people. It’s not a religious practice. If you’re going to argue again that one is free to decide on one’s own what constitutes free exercise of one’s chosen religion, anyone can do anything and say “God Will’s It” and that’s that. That your SCOTUS may come down on the side of the right-wing Christian bigot doesn’t mean the right-wing Christian bigot has a point, it means they’re right-wing Christian bigots too. Why do you think the Republicans were so keen to ignore their duties under the Obama administration and get one of their own on the bench? ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2017, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792/677 "2017-12-11T18:51:06Z")
> [@The\_Tooth](#): > > Oh, this again. No religion requires one to open a business and refuse to serve gay people. The SCOTUS is not in the business of determining what a religion requires or doesn’t require, as long as the person can demonstrate that he has a sincerely held religious belief. Free exercise means just that-- the government doesn’t interfere in the exercise of religion unless it has a compelling reason to do so. The court might very well determine that there is a compelling reason to interfere in this case, but that is not a given. And I don’t know where you get this idea that religions require people to open businesses. That is not an issue before the court. Americans are free to open businesses with or without a religious reason, and the courts are not going to involve themselves in that issue. The business has been opened, and the issue is whether the baker can refuse to accept the particular type of business under consideration here. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2017, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792/678 "2017-12-11T18:51:13Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > You are badly misinformed. Seems pertinent enough to this thread, so explain. I did a quick check to see which denominations don’t regard it as sinful, and they are almost all European Protestant. The congregations that regard it as a sin: Catholic Church: 1.2 billion Baptists: 75 million Methodist: 60-80 million Presbytyrians- 40-50 million Pentecostals-280 million Calvary Chapel-25 million Seventh Day Adventists-20 million Eastern Orthodox-270 million Mormons-16 million Jehovas Witnesses-8 million ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2017, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792/679 "2017-12-11T18:58:26Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > TL;DR: I just don’t see how the bible can be the basis of a belief system that can be used to justify treatment of others, if the social contract laid out in bible itself is not being followed in all other aspects as well. If parts of the bibles teachings are left out because they are inconvenient to you, then you can leave out the ones that discriminate against others as well. Then you need better eyesight. It’s perfectly possible to believe that the Bible is not inerrant in every particular, and that the particular rules it contains that must be followed are a subset of the entirety of the Bible. A moment’s thought would make this clear, since you must know of many people who profess belief in the Bible but fail to adhere to the rule that every woman that prays or prophesies with her head uncovered dishonors herself, or at least her head ---
**Author:** ![D\_Anconia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/67e7ee/32.png) [@D\_Anconia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D_Anconia)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2017, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792/680 "2017-12-11T19:01:59Z")
> [@The\_Tooth](#): > > Why do you think the Republicans were so keen to ignore their duties under the Obama administration and get one of their own on the bench? Oh, this again. Which duty did the Republicans ignore under the Obama administration? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792.md?page=33) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/judge-orders-colorado-baker-to-serve-gay-couples/675792.md?page=35)