The Indiana Religious Freedom law famously would allow businesses to refuse to sell a cake to a same sex wedding, if the baker’s beliefs were against gay marriage.
However, how would the law apply in the following situations?
A pharmacy that refuses to fill a contraceptive prescription or emergency birth control to underage women.
Funeral home refuses to offer cremation services due to their beliefs.
Bed and Breakfast won’t offer accommodations to un-married couples.
Religious objections by employers to unmarried women who become pregnant.
Organizations who discriminate due to customer’s religion, or lack thereof, being different . (Lutheran Nursing home not reading the Rosary to Catholic residents.)
Obviously, the law would discriminate in the above situations based on sexual orientation and identification. But it seems to me that a law like this would apply to a wider range of situations and that everyone should be concerned. Or are there other protections?
Pregnancy is a protected class, whether the woman is married or not, and religion is sort of a protected class in that if one religion is accommodated they all need to be. Getting the morning after pill was already tricky here no matter what your age, since a pharmacist can choose not to stock it; other birth control can be obtained from clinics like Planned Parenthood (and yes, I know that there are plenty of places without a PP), but there have been workarounds for pharmacists for a long time.
This mostly has to do with gay marriage. It’s eye-rolling, but on the other hand, it doesn’t hurt for people to have their prejudices out in the open. You want your photographer and caterer to WANT to work your event. And I personally plan not to use anyone who has the “No gay weddings” sign in the window even if I’m planning the straightest, whitest event in history.
I really hope this law hits these people in the bottom line.
X nursing home offering to drive residents to temple meetings of X denomination but not to others might be a better example (the Rosary doesn’t require anybody reading, having someone lead it when performed in a group is just a matter of custom and coordination).
I imagine if a funeral home doesn’t offer cremation services to anyone it’s ok. It’d be a problem if they did cremations for most people, but not Hindus. Just like if a bakery doesn’t do wedding cakes at all, not just saying no to gay marriages, they’d be ok too.
Pharmacists have already been able to choose not to fill birth control prescriptions and do exercise this right. This is quite problematic in places where there is only one pharmacy in town.
And why not Muslim owned businesses refusing to sell to Christian ‘infidels’? Or refusing to sell to Jews ? How is it not self evident that this way is madness?
I’m surprised this measure is not being decried as religious extremism. Excluding wedding suppliers, every other business in this state serves, knowingly or not, gays every day. Home builders, clothing sellers, restaurants. One can only assume that, in this state, many of those business owners must also be fundamentalist Christians. Yet they seem unconcerned about their part in promoting or enabling the ‘gay agenda’. How is that possible unless the wedding suppliers represent an extremist view?
Or are all the realtors, clothing retailers and restaurants just waiting till the wedding suppliers get this enshrined in law, so they can behave in kind?
So, from Imams, to the Pope, to Presidents, the world over, are decrying the influence of religious extremism but in Indiana they are making it the law? Shiver
This is what I don’t get. Trying to force someone to participate in your wedding is just about the most retarded thing I’ve ever heard of. A guaranteed disaster for everyone concerned, with no upside to anyone. If a local baker doesn’t want to make a cake for a gay wedding, how does it possibly make any sense to sue him, rather than just find someone else to make the cake?
Oh for crying out loud. There are multiple threads on this MB right now explaining why you are wrong. If you feel the need to be victimized, then knock yourself out. If you want to actually understand the laws, take time to read and learn.
Some states protect the right to refuse, while others say the pharmacist must fill or transfer the prescription. In general, pharmacists do have the legal right (and obligation) to refuse to fill prescriptions that they believe will cause harm, so some take this to mean protecting you from an eternity in hell or whatever. Strangely, many large employers actually go along with this and let them withhold prescribed birth control at their own discretion.
The OP proposes nothing. WPA-Guy posits a situation and asks how, if at all, a particular piece of legislation applies to the situation. As other posters have explained, the law does not apply because the establishment simply does not perform this service.
The same is true of both of your bookstore examples. If the store simply doesn’t stock or sell porn because then find porn objectionable or unprofitable, that’s not illegal discrimination. If the local porn shop doesn’t stock gay porn because they perceive that there’s insufficient demand, that’s almost certainly not illegal discrimination.
If a bookstore in Indiana stocked heterosexual port but did not stock gay porn - *and *would not order it for a customer, *and *cited the owner’s religious opposition to homosexuality as an excuse, *then *the owner would be invoking Indiana’s RFRA and *that *would be discrimination (which might or might not be illegal depending on other laws in force).
Why does her age matter, specifically, in this example?
How would they know? Lack of shared name or wedding rings is not proof of unmarried status, and I can’t imagine most carry their marriage certificate around.
I’m in Indiana. It’s been fascinating, to say the least. The questions I keep asking my tea-partier relative (who naturally supports the law):
What if my religious beliefs prevent me from serving soldiers and their families? True-blue, honest-to-goodness red-blooded defenders of the American way: can I refuse them service because I believe war is immoral or against my religion?
What if I object to people praying before their meals in my restaurant? Can I ban it? (I think this has been an issue somewhere–not necessarily Inidana; I don’t know where or when, though.)
Suppose my religion tells me that Catholics and Jews are hellbound heathens. Again…can I refuse to serve them?
It’s been proposed that businesses should just go ahead and post a sign listing those groups they refuse to serve. That way we can direct our dollars as we see fit. Not a bad idea, imo.
I see some changes are being implemented. Pence has been back-pedalling pretty fast since his party threw him to the wolves.
Has your Tea Party relative been able to answer those questions?
Because they are not mysterious questions. Twenty states have RFRAs. Many of them have had them for years and years, starting when the Supreme Court decided City of Bourne v. Flores in 1997.
So there is a reasonably well-developed body of federal and state case law for how to analyze factual patterns under the RFRA.
Did your relative mention any of these answers to you?
Why is answering the questions ask ed something you appear unwilling to do?
Answer it non-age specific if you so choose. I suspect the OP specified underage because there is a sizable population that believes birth control is not something a minor should be able to aquire without parental consent.
Asking. Simple social interaction. Should people attempt to ofphuscate thier unmarried status to avoid being refused service? I think any hotel clerk could figure out if a couple is married or not via a minute of chit chat. So what if the clerk assumes incorrectly anyhow, does it matter if they discriminate against you incorrectly and you were actually married?
It does matter if they are in the US the Pregnancy Discrimination Act makes it illegal to discriminate against someone for being pregnant.
It’s a question, assume they do know how and are refusing.
I dunno, it just seems like a separate issue on whether the age is pegging their objection, or the treatment in general.
Yes, I do believe that the intent matters more than the facts. If someone discriminates against someone with a Jewish name, it does not matter whether it turns out they were actually Episcopalian. Google fu not finding an example.
Ah yes, that makes sense. Providing it is another matter, but a company would be stupid to try.
Why would a Lutheran study practices from a different religion? To paraphrase a Presbylutheran, he might as well be practicing voodoo!
It looks like they’re clarifying the law and it will be less discriminatory. That’s good in the end, I guess?
