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On March 26 2018 08:55 Toadesstern wrote:for me the biggest issue with Danglars reponses (in general) and Sermokala's response to me specifically is that i just see them as massive slippery slopes. And I guess you can argue that noone has tried to abuse it like that because people aren't assholes but it leaves the door open for the need of judges to specify what's a religion and what's a joke religion. I even understand Sermokala's idea that a ceremony for a gay marriage would be another type of ceremony altogether, if you happen to be christian and I can somehow understand that argument, but I just don't think it's one you want to make. Yes, it's nothing that happens in reality but what if the next guy says he only makes cakes for white, straight couples who haven't had sex before marriage. At least 2 of them I can easily see happening in some cases while the "white couples" was just thrown in there because why not. Who gets to decide that that's just a joke religion? Who gets to decide that his interpretation of christianity is incorrect because there's nothing written in the bible about whites or whatever? Sermokala wrote in his response Show nested quote +That being the type off marriage that has been traditionally accepted for hundreds of years , presumeably to ward of exactly against these kind of joke religions. But that leaves you with either a judge having to make a decision on what's a joke religion and what religion to take seriously or the big religions being above minor ones.
I just don't really understand what the slippery slope is. Even if you fall all the way down and off the slope, to the point where a baker can refuse to make a custom cake for anyone at any time, aren't you still left with the option to buy a standard cake and put some frosting on it yourself? I've asked this before, but why would anyone even want a custom cake from someone who hates their guts and doesn't want to make them a cake at all?
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On March 26 2018 08:37 Kyadytim wrote:Show nested quote +On March 26 2018 08:32 IgnE wrote:
What about a baker who refused to draw a Pepe on a cake? People who want Pepes on a cake aren't a protected class, so that would probably be fine. Same if someone wanted another nation's flag, or an anarchy symbol, or dickbutt on it.
I'm interested if people believe this is a special case because gay people are a protected class or if this is just a discrimination of commerce issue for people?
What would peoples opinions be if the roles were switched and a specialty "gay wedding" cake shop was asked to create a wedding cake for a christian wedding in a senerio were Christians were a protected class and gay people weren't?
As an side for the issue about the slippery slope I think it would definitely depend on our final decision on if a company can independently from a human decide to specialize in specific artistic expressions. If a company isn't allowed to specialize I could see issues from painters refusing to receive commissions of religious art work being discrimination against religious people despite the artist not having any experience or history with religious art work. I don't think joke religions would be much of an issue if we make the distinction between religious traditions from before the birth of the union vs after for the sake of whats a "tradition" and what isn't.
And again I firmly believe that there is an important difference between a marriage and a wedding.
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On March 26 2018 07:59 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On March 26 2018 07:43 Nyxisto wrote:On March 26 2018 07:24 Danglars wrote:On March 26 2018 07:20 NewSunshine wrote:On March 26 2018 07:15 Danglars wrote:On March 26 2018 01:12 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On March 25 2018 23:59 Danglars wrote:On March 25 2018 15:17 Kyadytim wrote:
I like how Danglars just subtly pushed the premise that refusing to make a cake for a gay wedding isn't truly discriminating, because discriminating is something else worse that includes not selling off the shelf cakes, too. It's a pretty nice rhetorical trick, but refusing to make a custom cake is still truly discriminating.
I'm pretty sure he's done the same sort of thing with racism when talking to GreenHorizons.
We can still talk about how we're weighing the harm of requiring bakers to make cakes against the harm of allowing bakers to opt of providing custom wedding cake services to gay couples. We can also talk about the larger harms set by the precedent of requiring people to provide services that in some way go against their religion or the precedent of allowing people to not provide services by claiming it's against their religion.
On the last of those subjects, allowing people to opt out of following non-discrimination laws by claiming it's against their religion is potentially going to open a floodgate of discrimination because religion has been a tremendously popular excuse for all sorts of terrible things throughout history, so anyone looking for a religious justification for discriminatory practices will probably be able to find one. And alternatively, passing blanket anti-discrimination laws is going to catch up religious objectors and lead judges to misapply them to Christians only and not to other religious/creeds (as happened in Colorado and as discussed in oral arguments). The harm done to the gay couple is they had to walk another block to another business offering the same service without religious objection. The harm done to the cake makers is that they no longer have the smallest freedom of religious conscience when it comes to their art. The state now owns their expression and can force whatever message at all. But you do show significant progress if you’re moving on to weighing harms. That’s where a big part of this lies, along with where artistic expression ends for types of businesses. I suppose that's one way to analyze the two kinds of harms experienced, but I'd imagine others might interpret them differently. For example: The harm done to the gay couple is that they had to experience yet another individual perpetuating an ignorant and discriminatory belief that unfairly judges them as inferior. The harm done to the cake maker is that he got called out on his bullshit and is now being forced to address the issue of whether or not his freedom to prejudge others is morally acceptable. And the religious person considers that ignorant attitude towards the role religion plays in his life and hopes God works on his heart. It’s both ways. I don’t really care about the ignorant and hateful characterizations along the lines of “getting called out on his bullshit.” It’s your opinion and try as best you can to convince people it’s the right way to view it. Just don’t enslave people’s artistic expression to the state. Preserve some rights while you figure it out. That's precisely the argument we're making. Being religious isn't a good excuse to deny the rights of others. Being religious isn’t a good enough reason to forfeit your free speech and free expression rights. Apparently, you’re allowed to have them as long as you’re a hypocrite or don’t seek gainful employment. I really didn’t expect such a callous approach. The problem is honestly not discrimination in some ethical sense but the fact that we'd be living in a clown car of a society if everybody who doesn't like each others ethics or religion would express that through the marketplace. Commercial cake-selling in a publicly licensed business should never be an issue of speech. Imagine if liberals would never hire conservatives or don't sell any goods to them because of their political orientation or vice versa. We'd constantly wage cultural war by economic means. It's better too keep that stuff apart. That’s why we should cut it off at artistic expressions for historically religious events. That’s why I’m not suggesting they have any right to put a No Gays sign in front of their store or asking somebody’s religion before selling them cookies. If you can’t separate things of particularly religious significance, the problem is your understanding of religion. Ignorance of rights is not an excuse to trample on them outright.
but it's not really arstistic expression, it's a commercial business that prdouces a product on demand. If you want to be a cake artisan in your free time I don't really think that's much of an issue, but if you operate under a normal business license it shouldn't matter what the people are buying your cakes for.
On March 26 2018 09:00 IgnE wrote:Show nested quote +On March 26 2018 08:55 Toadesstern wrote:for me the biggest issue with Danglars reponses (in general) and Sermokala's response to me specifically is that i just see them as massive slippery slopes. And I guess you can argue that noone has tried to abuse it like that because people aren't assholes but it leaves the door open for the need of judges to specify what's a religion and what's a joke religion. I even understand Sermokala's idea that a ceremony for a gay marriage would be another type of ceremony altogether, if you happen to be christian and I can somehow understand that argument, but I just don't think it's one you want to make. Yes, it's nothing that happens in reality but what if the next guy says he only makes cakes for white, straight couples who haven't had sex before marriage. At least 2 of them I can easily see happening in some cases while the "white couples" was just thrown in there because why not. Who gets to decide that that's just a joke religion? Who gets to decide that his interpretation of christianity is incorrect because there's nothing written in the bible about whites or whatever? Sermokala wrote in his response That being the type off marriage that has been traditionally accepted for hundreds of years , presumeably to ward of exactly against these kind of joke religions. But that leaves you with either a judge having to make a decision on what's a joke religion and what religion to take seriously or the big religions being above minor ones. I just don't really understand what the slippery slope is. Even if you fall all the way down and off the slope, to the point where a baker can refuse to make a custom cake for anyone at any time, aren't you still left with the option to buy a standard cake and put some frosting on it yourself? I've asked this before, but why would anyone even want a custom cake from someone who hates their guts and doesn't want to make them a cake at all?
Because it only isn't a problem if it's a single individual business. What if a town of a thousand people boycots the Jewish entrepreneur out of their city, is that fine?
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On March 26 2018 09:00 IgnE wrote:Show nested quote +On March 26 2018 08:55 Toadesstern wrote:for me the biggest issue with Danglars reponses (in general) and Sermokala's response to me specifically is that i just see them as massive slippery slopes. And I guess you can argue that noone has tried to abuse it like that because people aren't assholes but it leaves the door open for the need of judges to specify what's a religion and what's a joke religion. I even understand Sermokala's idea that a ceremony for a gay marriage would be another type of ceremony altogether, if you happen to be christian and I can somehow understand that argument, but I just don't think it's one you want to make. Yes, it's nothing that happens in reality but what if the next guy says he only makes cakes for white, straight couples who haven't had sex before marriage. At least 2 of them I can easily see happening in some cases while the "white couples" was just thrown in there because why not. Who gets to decide that that's just a joke religion? Who gets to decide that his interpretation of christianity is incorrect because there's nothing written in the bible about whites or whatever? Sermokala wrote in his response That being the type off marriage that has been traditionally accepted for hundreds of years , presumeably to ward of exactly against these kind of joke religions. But that leaves you with either a judge having to make a decision on what's a joke religion and what religion to take seriously or the big religions being above minor ones. I just don't really understand what the slippery slope is. Even if you fall all the way down and off the slope, to the point where a baker can refuse to make a custom cake for anyone at any time, aren't you still left with the option to buy a standard cake and put some frosting on it yourself? I've asked this before, but why would anyone even want a custom cake from someone who hates their guts and doesn't want to make them a cake at all?
The second part, the question why someone would want a cake from someone who hates their gut is besides the point I think. That's more a emotional one, right? I do agree with you on that one but I don't think it actually needs answering.
Yeah, you have the option to just buy a standard cake and put your own frosting on there, again on a practical level probably the best thing to do (or get another cakeshop to make the cake), but the argument is that you shouldn't have to do that in the first place. Hell, if it's as simple as to take a standard cake, write the name of the two people getting married with some frosting on there and call it a day I'm going to say that we probably should be fine with calling every kind of work you could be doing an artistic expression.
I'm pretty sure I even agree with people on the right that from a practical point of view it would have just been the easiest to wish that cakeguy a good day and search for another cakeshop. Noone wants that stress. But it shouldn't be something you have to do imo.
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Department of Fair Employment and Housing v. Cathy’s Creations
An article for those who want some additional legal viewpoints for bakers and gay weddings. This looks to be a near identical case to the one being heard by the Supreme Court, and the judge ruled in favor of the baker in this one.
Some relevant snippets from the article:
Case Summary and Outcome
Kern County Superior Court of California denied the State’s application for a preliminary injunction to restrain Cathy Miller, owner of Cathy’s Creations, a cake baking shop that catered to wedding cakes, from refusing to design and bake a cake for a couple for a same-sex marriage. The Department of Fair Employment and Housing complained that Miller had violated the Unruh Civil Rights Act which prohibits public businesses from denying service to anyone on the basis of a number of characteristics including race, gender, religion or sexual orientation. The Court reasoned that Miller’s right to freedom of speech through the artistic expression of baking a cake outweighed the State’s interest in preventing discrimination because generally-applicable public accommodation laws such as the Unruh Act could not be used to ‘compel speech’.
The State argued that forcing the Defendant to serve the complainants does not compel speech, but rather only compels conduct; the baking and selling of a cake. The State also argued that this was not a case of compelled speech because the Defendant is not being required to bake a cake with a message on it condoning same sex marriage. The Court disagreed, finding that the compelled speech doctrine was applicable in this situation, because the Defendant was being forced to bake a cake that would promote the message desired by same-sex marital partners and with which Miller disagreed.
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On March 26 2018 09:14 Nyxisto wrote:Because it only isn't a problem if it's a single individual business. What if a town of a thousand people boycots the Jewish entrepreneur out of their city, is that fine?
That's not quite right. The Jewish entrepreneur would be able to buy standard goods and services everywhere.
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On March 26 2018 09:14 Nyxisto wrote:Show nested quote +On March 26 2018 07:59 Danglars wrote:On March 26 2018 07:43 Nyxisto wrote:On March 26 2018 07:24 Danglars wrote:On March 26 2018 07:20 NewSunshine wrote:On March 26 2018 07:15 Danglars wrote:On March 26 2018 01:12 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On March 25 2018 23:59 Danglars wrote:On March 25 2018 15:17 Kyadytim wrote:
I like how Danglars just subtly pushed the premise that refusing to make a cake for a gay wedding isn't truly discriminating, because discriminating is something else worse that includes not selling off the shelf cakes, too. It's a pretty nice rhetorical trick, but refusing to make a custom cake is still truly discriminating.
I'm pretty sure he's done the same sort of thing with racism when talking to GreenHorizons.
We can still talk about how we're weighing the harm of requiring bakers to make cakes against the harm of allowing bakers to opt of providing custom wedding cake services to gay couples. We can also talk about the larger harms set by the precedent of requiring people to provide services that in some way go against their religion or the precedent of allowing people to not provide services by claiming it's against their religion.
On the last of those subjects, allowing people to opt out of following non-discrimination laws by claiming it's against their religion is potentially going to open a floodgate of discrimination because religion has been a tremendously popular excuse for all sorts of terrible things throughout history, so anyone looking for a religious justification for discriminatory practices will probably be able to find one. And alternatively, passing blanket anti-discrimination laws is going to catch up religious objectors and lead judges to misapply them to Christians only and not to other religious/creeds (as happened in Colorado and as discussed in oral arguments). The harm done to the gay couple is they had to walk another block to another business offering the same service without religious objection. The harm done to the cake makers is that they no longer have the smallest freedom of religious conscience when it comes to their art. The state now owns their expression and can force whatever message at all. But you do show significant progress if you’re moving on to weighing harms. That’s where a big part of this lies, along with where artistic expression ends for types of businesses. I suppose that's one way to analyze the two kinds of harms experienced, but I'd imagine others might interpret them differently. For example: The harm done to the gay couple is that they had to experience yet another individual perpetuating an ignorant and discriminatory belief that unfairly judges them as inferior. The harm done to the cake maker is that he got called out on his bullshit and is now being forced to address the issue of whether or not his freedom to prejudge others is morally acceptable. And the religious person considers that ignorant attitude towards the role religion plays in his life and hopes God works on his heart. It’s both ways. I don’t really care about the ignorant and hateful characterizations along the lines of “getting called out on his bullshit.” It’s your opinion and try as best you can to convince people it’s the right way to view it. Just don’t enslave people’s artistic expression to the state. Preserve some rights while you figure it out. That's precisely the argument we're making. Being religious isn't a good excuse to deny the rights of others. Being religious isn’t a good enough reason to forfeit your free speech and free expression rights. Apparently, you’re allowed to have them as long as you’re a hypocrite or don’t seek gainful employment. I really didn’t expect such a callous approach. The problem is honestly not discrimination in some ethical sense but the fact that we'd be living in a clown car of a society if everybody who doesn't like each others ethics or religion would express that through the marketplace. Commercial cake-selling in a publicly licensed business should never be an issue of speech. Imagine if liberals would never hire conservatives or don't sell any goods to them because of their political orientation or vice versa. We'd constantly wage cultural war by economic means. It's better too keep that stuff apart. That’s why we should cut it off at artistic expressions for historically religious events. That’s why I’m not suggesting they have any right to put a No Gays sign in front of their store or asking somebody’s religion before selling them cookies. If you can’t separate things of particularly religious significance, the problem is your understanding of religion. Ignorance of rights is not an excuse to trample on them outright. but it's not really arstistic expression, it's a commercial business that prdouces a product on demand. If you want to be a cake artisan in your free time I don't really think that's much of an issue, but if you operate under a normal business license it shouldn't matter what the people are buying your cakes for.
The commercial business produces a custom designed product after a sometimes lengthy consultation with a client. The remaining products are different and “not really artistic expression.” That’s the difference that isn’t present in your post.
They could’ve walked out of their with any number of premade cakes, and t wouldn’t matter if it was for a bar mitzvah or gay wedding. That’s a fact.
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On March 26 2018 09:38 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On March 26 2018 09:14 Nyxisto wrote:On March 26 2018 07:59 Danglars wrote:On March 26 2018 07:43 Nyxisto wrote:On March 26 2018 07:24 Danglars wrote:On March 26 2018 07:20 NewSunshine wrote:On March 26 2018 07:15 Danglars wrote:On March 26 2018 01:12 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On March 25 2018 23:59 Danglars wrote:On March 25 2018 15:17 Kyadytim wrote:
I like how Danglars just subtly pushed the premise that refusing to make a cake for a gay wedding isn't truly discriminating, because discriminating is something else worse that includes not selling off the shelf cakes, too. It's a pretty nice rhetorical trick, but refusing to make a custom cake is still truly discriminating.
I'm pretty sure he's done the same sort of thing with racism when talking to GreenHorizons.
We can still talk about how we're weighing the harm of requiring bakers to make cakes against the harm of allowing bakers to opt of providing custom wedding cake services to gay couples. We can also talk about the larger harms set by the precedent of requiring people to provide services that in some way go against their religion or the precedent of allowing people to not provide services by claiming it's against their religion.
On the last of those subjects, allowing people to opt out of following non-discrimination laws by claiming it's against their religion is potentially going to open a floodgate of discrimination because religion has been a tremendously popular excuse for all sorts of terrible things throughout history, so anyone looking for a religious justification for discriminatory practices will probably be able to find one. And alternatively, passing blanket anti-discrimination laws is going to catch up religious objectors and lead judges to misapply them to Christians only and not to other religious/creeds (as happened in Colorado and as discussed in oral arguments). The harm done to the gay couple is they had to walk another block to another business offering the same service without religious objection. The harm done to the cake makers is that they no longer have the smallest freedom of religious conscience when it comes to their art. The state now owns their expression and can force whatever message at all. But you do show significant progress if you’re moving on to weighing harms. That’s where a big part of this lies, along with where artistic expression ends for types of businesses. I suppose that's one way to analyze the two kinds of harms experienced, but I'd imagine others might interpret them differently. For example: The harm done to the gay couple is that they had to experience yet another individual perpetuating an ignorant and discriminatory belief that unfairly judges them as inferior. The harm done to the cake maker is that he got called out on his bullshit and is now being forced to address the issue of whether or not his freedom to prejudge others is morally acceptable. And the religious person considers that ignorant attitude towards the role religion plays in his life and hopes God works on his heart. It’s both ways. I don’t really care about the ignorant and hateful characterizations along the lines of “getting called out on his bullshit.” It’s your opinion and try as best you can to convince people it’s the right way to view it. Just don’t enslave people’s artistic expression to the state. Preserve some rights while you figure it out. That's precisely the argument we're making. Being religious isn't a good excuse to deny the rights of others. Being religious isn’t a good enough reason to forfeit your free speech and free expression rights. Apparently, you’re allowed to have them as long as you’re a hypocrite or don’t seek gainful employment. I really didn’t expect such a callous approach. The problem is honestly not discrimination in some ethical sense but the fact that we'd be living in a clown car of a society if everybody who doesn't like each others ethics or religion would express that through the marketplace. Commercial cake-selling in a publicly licensed business should never be an issue of speech. Imagine if liberals would never hire conservatives or don't sell any goods to them because of their political orientation or vice versa. We'd constantly wage cultural war by economic means. It's better too keep that stuff apart. That’s why we should cut it off at artistic expressions for historically religious events. That’s why I’m not suggesting they have any right to put a No Gays sign in front of their store or asking somebody’s religion before selling them cookies. If you can’t separate things of particularly religious significance, the problem is your understanding of religion. Ignorance of rights is not an excuse to trample on them outright. but it's not really arstistic expression, it's a commercial business that prdouces a product on demand. If you want to be a cake artisan in your free time I don't really think that's much of an issue, but if you operate under a normal business license it shouldn't matter what the people are buying your cakes for. The commercial business produces a custom designed product after a sometimes lengthy consultation with a client. The remaining products are different and “not really artistic expression.” That’s the difference that isn’t present in your post. They could’ve walked out of their with any number of premade cakes, and t wouldn’t matter if it was for a bar mitzvah or gay wedding. That’s a fact.
So the problem comes when the baker has to actually interact with a gay person for any length of time. You don't see how that's problematic? You've made so many appeals to emotion on behalf of the poor oppressed religious person whose beliefs are being challenged, but how about the gay person that just wants to be treated like a human being?
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On March 26 2018 09:38 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On March 26 2018 09:14 Nyxisto wrote:On March 26 2018 07:59 Danglars wrote:On March 26 2018 07:43 Nyxisto wrote:On March 26 2018 07:24 Danglars wrote:On March 26 2018 07:20 NewSunshine wrote:On March 26 2018 07:15 Danglars wrote:On March 26 2018 01:12 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On March 25 2018 23:59 Danglars wrote:On March 25 2018 15:17 Kyadytim wrote:
I like how Danglars just subtly pushed the premise that refusing to make a cake for a gay wedding isn't truly discriminating, because discriminating is something else worse that includes not selling off the shelf cakes, too. It's a pretty nice rhetorical trick, but refusing to make a custom cake is still truly discriminating.
I'm pretty sure he's done the same sort of thing with racism when talking to GreenHorizons.
We can still talk about how we're weighing the harm of requiring bakers to make cakes against the harm of allowing bakers to opt of providing custom wedding cake services to gay couples. We can also talk about the larger harms set by the precedent of requiring people to provide services that in some way go against their religion or the precedent of allowing people to not provide services by claiming it's against their religion.
On the last of those subjects, allowing people to opt out of following non-discrimination laws by claiming it's against their religion is potentially going to open a floodgate of discrimination because religion has been a tremendously popular excuse for all sorts of terrible things throughout history, so anyone looking for a religious justification for discriminatory practices will probably be able to find one. And alternatively, passing blanket anti-discrimination laws is going to catch up religious objectors and lead judges to misapply them to Christians only and not to other religious/creeds (as happened in Colorado and as discussed in oral arguments). The harm done to the gay couple is they had to walk another block to another business offering the same service without religious objection. The harm done to the cake makers is that they no longer have the smallest freedom of religious conscience when it comes to their art. The state now owns their expression and can force whatever message at all. But you do show significant progress if you’re moving on to weighing harms. That’s where a big part of this lies, along with where artistic expression ends for types of businesses. I suppose that's one way to analyze the two kinds of harms experienced, but I'd imagine others might interpret them differently. For example: The harm done to the gay couple is that they had to experience yet another individual perpetuating an ignorant and discriminatory belief that unfairly judges them as inferior. The harm done to the cake maker is that he got called out on his bullshit and is now being forced to address the issue of whether or not his freedom to prejudge others is morally acceptable. And the religious person considers that ignorant attitude towards the role religion plays in his life and hopes God works on his heart. It’s both ways. I don’t really care about the ignorant and hateful characterizations along the lines of “getting called out on his bullshit.” It’s your opinion and try as best you can to convince people it’s the right way to view it. Just don’t enslave people’s artistic expression to the state. Preserve some rights while you figure it out. That's precisely the argument we're making. Being religious isn't a good excuse to deny the rights of others. Being religious isn’t a good enough reason to forfeit your free speech and free expression rights. Apparently, you’re allowed to have them as long as you’re a hypocrite or don’t seek gainful employment. I really didn’t expect such a callous approach. The problem is honestly not discrimination in some ethical sense but the fact that we'd be living in a clown car of a society if everybody who doesn't like each others ethics or religion would express that through the marketplace. Commercial cake-selling in a publicly licensed business should never be an issue of speech. Imagine if liberals would never hire conservatives or don't sell any goods to them because of their political orientation or vice versa. We'd constantly wage cultural war by economic means. It's better too keep that stuff apart. That’s why we should cut it off at artistic expressions for historically religious events. That’s why I’m not suggesting they have any right to put a No Gays sign in front of their store or asking somebody’s religion before selling them cookies. If you can’t separate things of particularly religious significance, the problem is your understanding of religion. Ignorance of rights is not an excuse to trample on them outright. but it's not really arstistic expression, it's a commercial business that prdouces a product on demand. If you want to be a cake artisan in your free time I don't really think that's much of an issue, but if you operate under a normal business license it shouldn't matter what the people are buying your cakes for. The commercial business produces a custom designed product after a sometimes lengthy consultation with a client. The remaining products are different and “not really artistic expression.” That’s the difference that isn’t present in your post. They could’ve walked out of their with any number of premade cakes, and t wouldn’t matter if it was for a bar mitzvah or gay wedding. That’s a fact.
To you and igne above: and what if the standard product doesn't cut it for them? Software is usually the same thing. Long discussions with your client to figure out what he wants and yet that wouldn't be covered in this (from last page)? What about consulting an architect because you want to open a business somewhere and need some place to make your goods? Is there a "standard" factory to choose? No its going to be 100% custom. So you can turn that down if the factory were to make sextoys and you don't like them for religious reasons? What if there's an awful lot of people religious that way and it takes you forever to find someone willing to do it, if at all?
I just don't see this argument between standard goods versus custom ones tbh
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On March 26 2018 09:00 Sermokala wrote:Show nested quote +On March 26 2018 08:37 Kyadytim wrote:On March 26 2018 08:32 IgnE wrote:
What about a baker who refused to draw a Pepe on a cake? People who want Pepes on a cake aren't a protected class, so that would probably be fine. Same if someone wanted another nation's flag, or an anarchy symbol, or dickbutt on it. I'm interested if people believe this is a special case because gay people are a protected class or if this is just a discrimination of commerce issue for people? What would peoples opinions be if the roles were switched and a specialty "gay wedding" cake shop was asked to create a wedding cake for a christian wedding in a senerio were Christians were a protected class and gay people weren't? As an side for the issue about the slippery slope I think it would definitely depend on our final decision on if a company can independently from a human decide to specialize in specific artistic expressions. If a company isn't allowed to specialize I could see issues from painters refusing to receive commissions of religious art work being discrimination against religious people despite the artist not having any experience or history with religious art work. I don't think joke religions would be much of an issue if we make the distinction between religious traditions from before the birth of the union vs after for the sake of whats a "tradition" and what isn't. And again I firmly believe that there is an important difference between a marriage and a wedding.
I'd like some clarification on your proposed "before hte birth of the union" standard. which union are you referring to? and what other effects would there be of such adjudication?
sounds like a potentially problematic standard.
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On March 26 2018 10:04 zlefin wrote:Show nested quote +On March 26 2018 09:00 Sermokala wrote:On March 26 2018 08:37 Kyadytim wrote:On March 26 2018 08:32 IgnE wrote:
What about a baker who refused to draw a Pepe on a cake? People who want Pepes on a cake aren't a protected class, so that would probably be fine. Same if someone wanted another nation's flag, or an anarchy symbol, or dickbutt on it. I'm interested if people believe this is a special case because gay people are a protected class or if this is just a discrimination of commerce issue for people? What would peoples opinions be if the roles were switched and a specialty "gay wedding" cake shop was asked to create a wedding cake for a christian wedding in a senerio were Christians were a protected class and gay people weren't? As an side for the issue about the slippery slope I think it would definitely depend on our final decision on if a company can independently from a human decide to specialize in specific artistic expressions. If a company isn't allowed to specialize I could see issues from painters refusing to receive commissions of religious art work being discrimination against religious people despite the artist not having any experience or history with religious art work. I don't think joke religions would be much of an issue if we make the distinction between religious traditions from before the birth of the union vs after for the sake of whats a "tradition" and what isn't. And again I firmly believe that there is an important difference between a marriage and a wedding. I'd like some clarification on your proposed "before hte birth of the union" standard. which union are you referring to? and what other effects would there be of such adjudication? sounds like a potentially problematic standard.
The union as in the United states of america. As in 21st of June 1788. sorry I've been playing a lot of UG: civil war recently.
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On March 26 2018 09:00 IgnE wrote:Show nested quote +On March 26 2018 08:55 Toadesstern wrote:for me the biggest issue with Danglars reponses (in general) and Sermokala's response to me specifically is that i just see them as massive slippery slopes. And I guess you can argue that noone has tried to abuse it like that because people aren't assholes but it leaves the door open for the need of judges to specify what's a religion and what's a joke religion. I even understand Sermokala's idea that a ceremony for a gay marriage would be another type of ceremony altogether, if you happen to be christian and I can somehow understand that argument, but I just don't think it's one you want to make. Yes, it's nothing that happens in reality but what if the next guy says he only makes cakes for white, straight couples who haven't had sex before marriage. At least 2 of them I can easily see happening in some cases while the "white couples" was just thrown in there because why not. Who gets to decide that that's just a joke religion? Who gets to decide that his interpretation of christianity is incorrect because there's nothing written in the bible about whites or whatever? Sermokala wrote in his response That being the type off marriage that has been traditionally accepted for hundreds of years , presumeably to ward of exactly against these kind of joke religions. But that leaves you with either a judge having to make a decision on what's a joke religion and what religion to take seriously or the big religions being above minor ones. I just don't really understand what the slippery slope is. Even if you fall all the way down and off the slope, to the point where a baker can refuse to make a custom cake for anyone at any time, aren't you still left with the option to buy a standard cake and put some frosting on it yourself? I've asked this before, but why would anyone even want a custom cake from someone who hates their guts and doesn't want to make them a cake at all?
Isn't the slippery slope that once you've decided corporations can be religious, and religious people can use that as an excuse to discriminate, you've opened the door to a lot of potential violations of civil liberties by corporations claiming religious license on very shaky grounds?
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On March 26 2018 10:08 Sermokala wrote:Show nested quote +On March 26 2018 10:04 zlefin wrote:On March 26 2018 09:00 Sermokala wrote:On March 26 2018 08:37 Kyadytim wrote:On March 26 2018 08:32 IgnE wrote:
What about a baker who refused to draw a Pepe on a cake? People who want Pepes on a cake aren't a protected class, so that would probably be fine. Same if someone wanted another nation's flag, or an anarchy symbol, or dickbutt on it. I'm interested if people believe this is a special case because gay people are a protected class or if this is just a discrimination of commerce issue for people? What would peoples opinions be if the roles were switched and a specialty "gay wedding" cake shop was asked to create a wedding cake for a christian wedding in a senerio were Christians were a protected class and gay people weren't? As an side for the issue about the slippery slope I think it would definitely depend on our final decision on if a company can independently from a human decide to specialize in specific artistic expressions. If a company isn't allowed to specialize I could see issues from painters refusing to receive commissions of religious art work being discrimination against religious people despite the artist not having any experience or history with religious art work. I don't think joke religions would be much of an issue if we make the distinction between religious traditions from before the birth of the union vs after for the sake of whats a "tradition" and what isn't. And again I firmly believe that there is an important difference between a marriage and a wedding. I'd like some clarification on your proposed "before hte birth of the union" standard. which union are you referring to? and what other effects would there be of such adjudication? sounds like a potentially problematic standard. The union as in the United states of america. As in 21st of June 1788. sorry I've been playing a lot of UG: civil war recently.
so religions made after that date don't count as religions, for a number of purposes? which other purposes would they not count as "real" religions for?
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On March 26 2018 10:18 zlefin wrote:Show nested quote +On March 26 2018 10:08 Sermokala wrote:On March 26 2018 10:04 zlefin wrote:On March 26 2018 09:00 Sermokala wrote:On March 26 2018 08:37 Kyadytim wrote:On March 26 2018 08:32 IgnE wrote:
What about a baker who refused to draw a Pepe on a cake? People who want Pepes on a cake aren't a protected class, so that would probably be fine. Same if someone wanted another nation's flag, or an anarchy symbol, or dickbutt on it. I'm interested if people believe this is a special case because gay people are a protected class or if this is just a discrimination of commerce issue for people? What would peoples opinions be if the roles were switched and a specialty "gay wedding" cake shop was asked to create a wedding cake for a christian wedding in a senerio were Christians were a protected class and gay people weren't? As an side for the issue about the slippery slope I think it would definitely depend on our final decision on if a company can independently from a human decide to specialize in specific artistic expressions. If a company isn't allowed to specialize I could see issues from painters refusing to receive commissions of religious art work being discrimination against religious people despite the artist not having any experience or history with religious art work. I don't think joke religions would be much of an issue if we make the distinction between religious traditions from before the birth of the union vs after for the sake of whats a "tradition" and what isn't. And again I firmly believe that there is an important difference between a marriage and a wedding. I'd like some clarification on your proposed "before hte birth of the union" standard. which union are you referring to? and what other effects would there be of such adjudication? sounds like a potentially problematic standard. The union as in the United states of america. As in 21st of June 1788. sorry I've been playing a lot of UG: civil war recently. so religions made after that date don't count as religions, for a number of purposes? which other purposes would they not count as "real" religions for?
No but when considering religious traditions from being either real or fake that would be a credible cut off date. Long enough for modern times to respect it as legitimate but not too long as to get into reformation era issues.
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On March 26 2018 10:30 Sermokala wrote:Show nested quote +On March 26 2018 10:18 zlefin wrote:On March 26 2018 10:08 Sermokala wrote:On March 26 2018 10:04 zlefin wrote:On March 26 2018 09:00 Sermokala wrote:On March 26 2018 08:37 Kyadytim wrote:On March 26 2018 08:32 IgnE wrote:
What about a baker who refused to draw a Pepe on a cake? People who want Pepes on a cake aren't a protected class, so that would probably be fine. Same if someone wanted another nation's flag, or an anarchy symbol, or dickbutt on it. I'm interested if people believe this is a special case because gay people are a protected class or if this is just a discrimination of commerce issue for people? What would peoples opinions be if the roles were switched and a specialty "gay wedding" cake shop was asked to create a wedding cake for a christian wedding in a senerio were Christians were a protected class and gay people weren't? As an side for the issue about the slippery slope I think it would definitely depend on our final decision on if a company can independently from a human decide to specialize in specific artistic expressions. If a company isn't allowed to specialize I could see issues from painters refusing to receive commissions of religious art work being discrimination against religious people despite the artist not having any experience or history with religious art work. I don't think joke religions would be much of an issue if we make the distinction between religious traditions from before the birth of the union vs after for the sake of whats a "tradition" and what isn't. And again I firmly believe that there is an important difference between a marriage and a wedding. I'd like some clarification on your proposed "before hte birth of the union" standard. which union are you referring to? and what other effects would there be of such adjudication? sounds like a potentially problematic standard. The union as in the United states of america. As in 21st of June 1788. sorry I've been playing a lot of UG: civil war recently. so religions made after that date don't count as religions, for a number of purposes? which other purposes would they not count as "real" religions for? No but when considering religious traditions from being either real or fake that would be a credible cut off date. Long enough for modern times to respect it as legitimate but not too long as to get into reformation era issues.
so that removes mormonism.
an odd standard of legitimacy of course, in that has nothing to do with whether the belief is true or not, or how fervently the belief is held.
if a standard exists for measuring real/fake, it will be applied in other contexts; as there are a numbe rof other legal contexts where such can and does come up.
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On March 26 2018 08:58 IgnE wrote:Show nested quote +On March 26 2018 08:37 Kyadytim wrote:On March 26 2018 08:32 IgnE wrote:
What about a baker who refused to draw a Pepe on a cake? People who want Pepes on a cake aren't a protected class, so that would probably be fine. Same if someone wanted another nation's flag, or an anarchy symbol, or dickbutt on it. What about a person asking for something like "Burn in Hell, Pagans?"
I have no idea, I'm not a legal scholar. That's why I avoided listing crosses and stars of david in my examples.
On March 26 2018 09:52 Toadesstern wrote:Show nested quote +On March 26 2018 09:38 Danglars wrote:On March 26 2018 09:14 Nyxisto wrote:On March 26 2018 07:59 Danglars wrote:On March 26 2018 07:43 Nyxisto wrote:On March 26 2018 07:24 Danglars wrote:On March 26 2018 07:20 NewSunshine wrote:On March 26 2018 07:15 Danglars wrote:On March 26 2018 01:12 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On March 25 2018 23:59 Danglars wrote:
[quote]
And alternatively, passing blanket anti-discrimination laws is going to catch up religious objectors and lead judges to misapply them to Christians only and not to other religious/creeds (as happened in Colorado and as discussed in oral arguments).
The harm done to the gay couple is they had to walk another block to another business offering the same service without religious objection. The harm done to the cake makers is that they no longer have the smallest freedom of religious conscience when it comes to their art. The state now owns their expression and can force whatever message at all.
But you do show significant progress if you’re moving on to weighing harms. That’s where a big part of this lies, along with where artistic expression ends for types of businesses. I suppose that's one way to analyze the two kinds of harms experienced, but I'd imagine others might interpret them differently. For example: The harm done to the gay couple is that they had to experience yet another individual perpetuating an ignorant and discriminatory belief that unfairly judges them as inferior. The harm done to the cake maker is that he got called out on his bullshit and is now being forced to address the issue of whether or not his freedom to prejudge others is morally acceptable. And the religious person considers that ignorant attitude towards the role religion plays in his life and hopes God works on his heart. It’s both ways. I don’t really care about the ignorant and hateful characterizations along the lines of “getting called out on his bullshit.” It’s your opinion and try as best you can to convince people it’s the right way to view it. Just don’t enslave people’s artistic expression to the state. Preserve some rights while you figure it out. That's precisely the argument we're making. Being religious isn't a good excuse to deny the rights of others. Being religious isn’t a good enough reason to forfeit your free speech and free expression rights. Apparently, you’re allowed to have them as long as you’re a hypocrite or don’t seek gainful employment. I really didn’t expect such a callous approach. The problem is honestly not discrimination in some ethical sense but the fact that we'd be living in a clown car of a society if everybody who doesn't like each others ethics or religion would express that through the marketplace. Commercial cake-selling in a publicly licensed business should never be an issue of speech. Imagine if liberals would never hire conservatives or don't sell any goods to them because of their political orientation or vice versa. We'd constantly wage cultural war by economic means. It's better too keep that stuff apart. That’s why we should cut it off at artistic expressions for historically religious events. That’s why I’m not suggesting they have any right to put a No Gays sign in front of their store or asking somebody’s religion before selling them cookies. If you can’t separate things of particularly religious significance, the problem is your understanding of religion. Ignorance of rights is not an excuse to trample on them outright. but it's not really arstistic expression, it's a commercial business that prdouces a product on demand. If you want to be a cake artisan in your free time I don't really think that's much of an issue, but if you operate under a normal business license it shouldn't matter what the people are buying your cakes for. The commercial business produces a custom designed product after a sometimes lengthy consultation with a client. The remaining products are different and “not really artistic expression.” That’s the difference that isn’t present in your post. They could’ve walked out of their with any number of premade cakes, and t wouldn’t matter if it was for a bar mitzvah or gay wedding. That’s a fact. To you and igne above: and what if the standard product doesn't cut it for them? Software is usually the same thing. Long discussions with your client to figure out what he wants and yet that wouldn't be covered in this (from last page)? What about consulting an architect because you want to open a business somewhere and need some place to make your goods? Is there a "standard" factory to choose? No its going to be 100% custom. So you can turn that down if the factory were to make sextoys and you don't like them for religious reasons? What if there's an awful lot of people religious that way and it takes you forever to find someone willing to do it, if at all? I just don't see this argument between standard goods versus custom ones tbh
Software development is a great subject for this. A huge amount of software is custom built for a specific use, and would fall under creative expression as much as a wedding cake.
On March 26 2018 10:16 iamthedave wrote:Show nested quote +On March 26 2018 09:00 IgnE wrote:On March 26 2018 08:55 Toadesstern wrote:for me the biggest issue with Danglars reponses (in general) and Sermokala's response to me specifically is that i just see them as massive slippery slopes. And I guess you can argue that noone has tried to abuse it like that because people aren't assholes but it leaves the door open for the need of judges to specify what's a religion and what's a joke religion. I even understand Sermokala's idea that a ceremony for a gay marriage would be another type of ceremony altogether, if you happen to be christian and I can somehow understand that argument, but I just don't think it's one you want to make. Yes, it's nothing that happens in reality but what if the next guy says he only makes cakes for white, straight couples who haven't had sex before marriage. At least 2 of them I can easily see happening in some cases while the "white couples" was just thrown in there because why not. Who gets to decide that that's just a joke religion? Who gets to decide that his interpretation of christianity is incorrect because there's nothing written in the bible about whites or whatever? Sermokala wrote in his response That being the type off marriage that has been traditionally accepted for hundreds of years , presumeably to ward of exactly against these kind of joke religions. But that leaves you with either a judge having to make a decision on what's a joke religion and what religion to take seriously or the big religions being above minor ones. I just don't really understand what the slippery slope is. Even if you fall all the way down and off the slope, to the point where a baker can refuse to make a custom cake for anyone at any time, aren't you still left with the option to buy a standard cake and put some frosting on it yourself? I've asked this before, but why would anyone even want a custom cake from someone who hates their guts and doesn't want to make them a cake at all? Isn't the slippery slope that once you've decided corporations can be religious, and religious people can use that as an excuse to discriminate, you've opened the door to a lot of potential violations of civil liberties by corporations claiming religious license on very shaky grounds?
Opening the door to a lot of violations of civil liberties is the point. The same way that republicans have spent the last 10 years or so passing a huge number of laws restricting abortions or that force abortion clinics to close by making it harder to keep one open or laws to make it harder to vote, they're going to keep throwing legal challenges at civil rights for gay people to try to open some cracks in the legal system that they can then force wider, until the protections afforded by law are hollowed out.
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On March 26 2018 10:39 zlefin wrote:Show nested quote +On March 26 2018 10:30 Sermokala wrote:On March 26 2018 10:18 zlefin wrote:On March 26 2018 10:08 Sermokala wrote:On March 26 2018 10:04 zlefin wrote:On March 26 2018 09:00 Sermokala wrote:On March 26 2018 08:37 Kyadytim wrote:On March 26 2018 08:32 IgnE wrote:
What about a baker who refused to draw a Pepe on a cake? People who want Pepes on a cake aren't a protected class, so that would probably be fine. Same if someone wanted another nation's flag, or an anarchy symbol, or dickbutt on it. I'm interested if people believe this is a special case because gay people are a protected class or if this is just a discrimination of commerce issue for people? What would peoples opinions be if the roles were switched and a specialty "gay wedding" cake shop was asked to create a wedding cake for a christian wedding in a senerio were Christians were a protected class and gay people weren't? As an side for the issue about the slippery slope I think it would definitely depend on our final decision on if a company can independently from a human decide to specialize in specific artistic expressions. If a company isn't allowed to specialize I could see issues from painters refusing to receive commissions of religious art work being discrimination against religious people despite the artist not having any experience or history with religious art work. I don't think joke religions would be much of an issue if we make the distinction between religious traditions from before the birth of the union vs after for the sake of whats a "tradition" and what isn't. And again I firmly believe that there is an important difference between a marriage and a wedding. I'd like some clarification on your proposed "before hte birth of the union" standard. which union are you referring to? and what other effects would there be of such adjudication? sounds like a potentially problematic standard. The union as in the United states of america. As in 21st of June 1788. sorry I've been playing a lot of UG: civil war recently. so religions made after that date don't count as religions, for a number of purposes? which other purposes would they not count as "real" religions for? No but when considering religious traditions from being either real or fake that would be a credible cut off date. Long enough for modern times to respect it as legitimate but not too long as to get into reformation era issues. so that removes mormonism. an odd standard of legitimacy of course, in that has nothing to do with whether the belief is true or not, or how fervently the belief is held. if a standard exists for measuring real/fake, it will be applied in other contexts; as there are a numbe rof other legal contexts where such can and does come up.
I'm not talking about Mormonism as a religion I'm talking about religious traditions that recognizably predate june 1788.
And the rest of the post I'd ask such as?
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On March 25 2018 23:51 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On March 25 2018 13:12 Stratos_speAr wrote:On March 25 2018 12:34 Danglars wrote:On March 25 2018 11:19 Stratos_speAr wrote:On March 25 2018 08:14 Danglars wrote:On March 25 2018 07:38 Stratos_speAr wrote:On March 25 2018 06:19 Danglars wrote:On March 25 2018 06:10 iamthedave wrote:On March 25 2018 04:38 Danglars wrote:On March 25 2018 04:25 iamthedave wrote:
[quote]
This thread is getting to be a pain to chop up so I'm cutting it down again.
How am I restricting anyone's civil rights? You can have any sort of marriage you want. But that doesn't make it an actual religious ceremony. It doesn't mean it ever has been. It's just an unjustified assumption that people have run with and never examined. In almost every culture everywhere in the world, churches need to go to the government and say 'may we perform marriages in our establishment?' And the government has the right to say 'no you may not'. And if the government does that, no 'marriage' performed in that establishment is legitimate.
HOW is that a religious ceremony? That is a secular ceremony that people choose to apply religious overtones to. That's not my opinion, that is the objective facts of what actually happens. If it were a genuinely religious ceremony, the government would not be necessary.
I'm guessed you're a Christian from some of your comments, apologies if I'm wrong. But I'll assume you're a church goer. Your church does not need anyone's permission to perform Sunday mass, and it sure as hell doesn't need the government to say 'your sunday mass is legitimate'. Because Mass is a religious ceremony and it's validation comes from all the trappings of its performance within the context in which it is performed.
A wedding requires none of that. I could literally take my housemate to the registry office and be married tomorrow evening if I wanted, and that marriage would be as legitimate as a £10,000 marriage that takes place in the cathedral down the road. The trappings are entirely irrelevant, the meat and bones of a marriage is the secular, legal structure that supports and legitimises it, and it has always been so. That is why King Henry the 8th was able to say 'Actually... no,' when the church tried to force him to keep his wife. No amount of excommunications or wars were able to change the fact he had a divorce and then had another marriage and the child of one of his later marriages ended up King.
It's also - not coincidentally - why the rich and powerful throughout history conveniently find their way into and out of marriages that are supposed to be unbreakable until death. Ain't no wealth getting someone around Mass, though.
I don't care how you practice your faith. But you can't redefine reality with it. Marriage is still secular. Now I appreciate Christians believe that there is a spiritual component to marriage, and that is where much of the issue arises re: teh gayz. But that's your trappings. It's not real. And that is not my opinion, that's the state's opinion. The state doesn't care if you think you've married someone. It cares that you married someone in a place that it considers legitimate, and if the state doesn't think your marriage is legitimate you'll very quickly run into problems when you try to assert otherwise.
As to your last point, compelled speech is a thing. It just is. Complaints about compelled speech are a far bigger slippery slope than 'let the public know that you're putting certain elements of your religious beliefs ahead of your business'. I mean, why SHOULD I be forced to let the public know all of my sliced ham includes uranium in it? They're trampling my first amendment rights and making me say things I don't wanna!
Yes, it's a silly, extreme example, but compelled speech is a standard part of business. If you want to make your religion part of your business, you're damn skippy you should be expected to say up front that you're doing so.
Religions do not deserve the special pleading and status they unduly get, not in your culture or mine (not that we're half as bad as your lot are on that front). 'Good' Christians are far too often content to hide behind the sort of Christians who don't give a fig about civil liberties for anyone but themselves, who believe gay people deserve no rights, who think Muslims should be thrown out of their 'Christian' nation, who would gladly outlaw any beliefs but their own and enforce those beliefs on anyone who disagreed and crush any speech that went against them. You know those people exist and so do I, and unfortunately for you, an awful lot of them get voted for by your good honest religious Christians. It is an utter embarrassment that Roy Moore came so close to being elected, even without the allegations that brought him down.
Your lot are not content to keep their religion private. Far too many of you want to enforce it on everyone else, and damn the consequences. That is your slippery slope, and it's a far more dangerous, far more deadly one than being forced to tell people you aren't going to serve them if they're gay. I covered the trampling of civil in the unquoted part of my last post. You can read it there and respond to what I wrote if you still don't understand. As you haven't responded to it, I don't know what was less than clear. You're still really deep in the hole with a historically acknowledged religious ceremony. Religions all over the world call the union of a man and woman a central God-purposed event. God ordains this union. You act or don't act in accordance to his will in this union. Et cetera. You're taking a historical revisionist route, and frankly an unsupported assertion, that it should be a secular event because you think some people just happen to choose to put religious undertones on the event. It's a religious event that some people adopt secular attitudes towards, and that's precisely why it's a core feature of this case. None of this wordy mash justifies adopting your attitude. It is a religious ceremony for a huge number of Americans, and just because you think it shouldn't be the case does not diminish that it will involve religious objections if they're making you be part of the service. Will you force a pastor to officiate the event on grounds of discrimination, because after all it's just this secular event to you? The folly just stretches on and on. I understand your perspective in the last three paragraphs. I live in a country that recognizes the role religion plays in life and how government intrusion on core beliefs would destroy a society and cause it to trend authoritarian over time. To re-purpose a sentence of yours, you really don't give a damn about civil liberties for people who you don't think deserve them. You simply don't think they should exist, therefore they don't exist, therefore they should be done away with. Therefore, direct your attention to constitutional amendments because I'm definitely talking about interpreting laws on the books by judges ... the proper realm for judicial battles. Okay. I'd like to get you to directly engage with something you consistently are ignoring, as it seems you don't understand my actual argument. If religion is required for marriage and it is a God-purposed event, why is the marriage a) not legal unless the state recognises it and why b) can the state annul it irrespective of the wishes of religious leaders? I have yet to see you concretely point towards a group I think don't deserve civil liberties. I do think that no group has the liberty to oppress another, and I think that the religious hide behind their religion regularly and use it as a shield to permit them to discriminate. And I think that is wrong. I don't think I'm rocking the boat there. I think I've already answered the post you're directing me towards. I believe marriage is obsolete personally so I do not intend to get married. I have no issues with other people choosing to do so, or the methods and trappings they use to complete that union. But I believe it is objective fact that marriage is secular, and that marriage being secular is the only way to reconcile the vast gulf between what people say marriage is and what it actually is, and which part of that union the state - which is required to legitimise the union in the first place - actually cares about. We entered into this when you thought religious objections shouldn't even be here in the first place: it's asserted to be a secular event in your eyes, case closed. History tells a different tale. It supports the side that says it's very likely for such a ceremony to entangle religious people in conscience objections by its own nature. That's why very sympathetic individuals, such as the baker, will be kind and offer all there wares to gays and transgenders ... it's not participation in a religious ceremony. Your first problem is showing why your personal view that it is secular should trump the historical reality that it's intimately religious. Your second problem is showing where I said "religion is required for marriage." I said it very easily raises freedom of conscience objections because of its historical religious nature. I do not imply the reverse is true: all marriages must be religious or it's not a marriage. You haven't engaged with my arguments that you require religious persons to engage in forced speech (forced expression) and require them to violate their religious liberties (participate in ceremonies complying with their religious beliefs). I can't really help you. From what I gather, because you declare it secular, then no civil rights are violated, because they're secular ceremonies, and no religious person could object. ("I believe it is objective fact that marriage is secular"). That's the only point you come back to and the only sense I can make of your argument. It's ludicrous. Rights don't cease to exist because you don't acknowledge them. The problem with your argument is that you try to imply that the religious aspect is inseparable from marriage due to the fact that marriage was historically co-opted by religion. What you don't do is acknowledge that marriage has pretty much universally been a legal/cultural institution that shaped the family dynamic, and religion has absolutely no right to uniquely claim it. To strengthen your argument, you would have to make a plausible argument as to why marriage is required to be religious. For example, why did my marriage that was strictly secular (not in a church, no involvement of religious ideas or practices) have some kind of religious component to it? What about the very nature of marriage makes it OK for religious people to discriminate based on it? This also brings up a larger question of why is religious belief ever an acceptable excuse to discriminate, but that's an entire discussion on its own. No requirement, just an extreme likelihood that someone religious would find the ceremony in direct conflict with his or her sincerely held religious views. I only bring it up because someone thought it was secular by nature and nobody’s civil rights were being violated. So really you’re falsely reducing my argument to points I never made. So then you have to justify why religion is an acceptable excuse to discriminate, because this is precisely what your argument is supporting. If he was truly discriminating against gays, he wouldn’t sell premade cakes to them either. The US has a rich history of weighing religious liberty concerns against others ... like unemployment benefits even though jobs were available that didn’t have sabbaths off .. or LGBT groups in a veterans parade. If we could return to a rational discussion of trade offs compared to the unilateral declaration that it’s discrimination ... that would be a good step one. It's the definition of discrimination. You can be triggered by the word "discrimination" since it seems to be a buzz word, but this isn't a debate. It is the very definition of discrimination. He is refusing service to an individual based on a particular trait of that individual. It doesn't matter if it's only a single service, it's still discrimination. There are different situations in which different institutions are allowed to discriminate. This is easily shown by many examples. However, there is always a reason or justification under the law; as you said, a trade-off. There are two different facets to the discrimination that is in question here; the basis for it (religion) and the reason for it (homosexuality, specifically a perceived endorsement of homosexuality). If you really want to justify this instance of discrimination, then you have to tell us why religion is an acceptable reason to allow discrimination, because that is the argument that you are constantly throwing your support behind. You will have to open your mind to alternative looks if you want to truly understand this issue. When you call it discrimination and leave it at that, you can’t progress to see what rights the other party has. That’s one of the reasons this is such a cantankerous issue in general: too many people are willing to cry discrimination and leave apart whether artists have the ability to be in business and still reject messages and whether or not that applies here. One easy reason why the uniform view of discrimination does not bear out is why the Supreme Court actually took up the case. According to some of the people in here, they should never has issued a writ of certiorari, just a one word rejection “Discrimination is not ok!” In real life, this is a balance of rights and responsibilities.
This is another example of you being intellectually dishonest and being too afraid to be held accountable for your own opinions.
It is discrimination. This is a fact. And in many instances around the world, discrimination is acceptable, i.e. discrimination in a neutral sense.
You're refusing to actually own up to your opinions because you're too scared of a buzz word. It's a straightforward question; you are advocating for someone's religious beliefs to be a legitimate justification for discrimination. Why is religion an acceptable justification for this? And does it stop at homosexuality? If so, why is homosexuality uniquely fit to be legally/morally discriminated against? If not, is discriminating against race, or sex, or nationality, or religion, or anything else OK if your religious beliefs demand it?
These are all questions you need to answer if your opinion is to have any merit.
"But you don't respect religious rights!" isn't an answer. Why does religion seemingly have the right to discriminate?
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On March 26 2018 07:08 IgnE wrote:Show nested quote +On March 24 2018 12:25 KwarK wrote:On March 24 2018 10:55 mierin wrote:
It sucks because in theory, if everyone making below a certain amount (say 60k for arguments' sake) just stopped coming in to work, the country would be crippled (and workers' rights might have to be addressed). Unfortunately there would be an unlimited number of "scabs" or people who would go in to work regardless of the low pay. Most Americans don't generate anything like the value equivalent to the purchasing power in their labour. The value of their labour is amplified through artificial barriers to trade, the dominance of the dollar as a global currency, the exploitation of the third world, and American ownership of the means of production globally. The reality is that minimum wage workers are only underpaid in relative terms when compared to previous generations and their American peers. What is this "value" you are referring to? The market only recognizes exchange value.
I would appreciate some clarification here as well. The original statement appears to contain a lot of evidence-free assertions whose truth value would depend enormously on definitions anyway.
My guess (though I suspect you've made the same guess) is he means your average minimum wage American McDonalds worker is doing a job that an unskilled Chinese laborer would do roughly equivalently well, yet the American would have more purchasing power because it's done in the US (and he's paid US minimum wage).
I can agree to that in the minimum wage tier, but that becomes less and less true as you up the labor value chain. Quantifying this and drawing conclusions about whether "most Americans don't generate anything like the value equivalent to the purchasing power in their labour" seems extremely difficult, and certainly requires more than a simple assertion.
And obviously as you point out if we're going by exchange theory of value than the claim is literally senseless.
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On March 26 2018 09:52 NewSunshine wrote:Show nested quote +On March 26 2018 09:38 Danglars wrote:On March 26 2018 09:14 Nyxisto wrote:On March 26 2018 07:59 Danglars wrote:On March 26 2018 07:43 Nyxisto wrote:On March 26 2018 07:24 Danglars wrote:On March 26 2018 07:20 NewSunshine wrote:On March 26 2018 07:15 Danglars wrote:On March 26 2018 01:12 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On March 25 2018 23:59 Danglars wrote:
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And alternatively, passing blanket anti-discrimination laws is going to catch up religious objectors and lead judges to misapply them to Christians only and not to other religious/creeds (as happened in Colorado and as discussed in oral arguments).
The harm done to the gay couple is they had to walk another block to another business offering the same service without religious objection. The harm done to the cake makers is that they no longer have the smallest freedom of religious conscience when it comes to their art. The state now owns their expression and can force whatever message at all.
But you do show significant progress if you’re moving on to weighing harms. That’s where a big part of this lies, along with where artistic expression ends for types of businesses. I suppose that's one way to analyze the two kinds of harms experienced, but I'd imagine others might interpret them differently. For example: The harm done to the gay couple is that they had to experience yet another individual perpetuating an ignorant and discriminatory belief that unfairly judges them as inferior. The harm done to the cake maker is that he got called out on his bullshit and is now being forced to address the issue of whether or not his freedom to prejudge others is morally acceptable. And the religious person considers that ignorant attitude towards the role religion plays in his life and hopes God works on his heart. It’s both ways. I don’t really care about the ignorant and hateful characterizations along the lines of “getting called out on his bullshit.” It’s your opinion and try as best you can to convince people it’s the right way to view it. Just don’t enslave people’s artistic expression to the state. Preserve some rights while you figure it out. That's precisely the argument we're making. Being religious isn't a good excuse to deny the rights of others. Being religious isn’t a good enough reason to forfeit your free speech and free expression rights. Apparently, you’re allowed to have them as long as you’re a hypocrite or don’t seek gainful employment. I really didn’t expect such a callous approach. The problem is honestly not discrimination in some ethical sense but the fact that we'd be living in a clown car of a society if everybody who doesn't like each others ethics or religion would express that through the marketplace. Commercial cake-selling in a publicly licensed business should never be an issue of speech. Imagine if liberals would never hire conservatives or don't sell any goods to them because of their political orientation or vice versa. We'd constantly wage cultural war by economic means. It's better too keep that stuff apart. That’s why we should cut it off at artistic expressions for historically religious events. That’s why I’m not suggesting they have any right to put a No Gays sign in front of their store or asking somebody’s religion before selling them cookies. If you can’t separate things of particularly religious significance, the problem is your understanding of religion. Ignorance of rights is not an excuse to trample on them outright. but it's not really arstistic expression, it's a commercial business that prdouces a product on demand. If you want to be a cake artisan in your free time I don't really think that's much of an issue, but if you operate under a normal business license it shouldn't matter what the people are buying your cakes for. The commercial business produces a custom designed product after a sometimes lengthy consultation with a client. The remaining products are different and “not really artistic expression.” That’s the difference that isn’t present in your post. They could’ve walked out of their with any number of premade cakes, and t wouldn’t matter if it was for a bar mitzvah or gay wedding. That’s a fact. So the problem comes when the baker has to actually interact with a gay person for any length of time. You don't see how that's problematic? You've made so many appeals to emotion on behalf of the poor oppressed religious person whose beliefs are being challenged, but how about the gay person that just wants to be treated like a human being?
Nyxisto: It's not artistic expression, it's just a product on demand.
Danglars: Actually, this is a long consultation to design the artwork on the cake.
NewSunshine: So the baker has to actually interact with a gay person for any length of time. You don't see how that's problematic? How about the gay person that just wants to be treated like a human being.
This is a clear twisting of words. I clarified why it wasn't just a product disconnected with artistic expression to Nyxisto, and you used that to suggest the baker is afraid to actually interact. Do you see why the religious faithful think this looks like persecution based on how bad faith/low you're willing to go? This isn't even logical from you.
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EPT
