• @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    English
    10ā€¢1 year ago

    This is the best take Iā€™ve seen in this thread so far. Itā€™s an issue of compelled speech, not of this or that demographic or ideology of the client or service. Iā€™m not trying to dog whistle here, I hate that any business would exercise this in a hateful way, but another example of the reverse would be compelling a black-owned bakery to write an awful racist message on a cake. Obviously no person should be compelled to say what they donā€™t believe, regardless of the level of asshattery they dabble in.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      English
      17ā€¢1 year ago

      A lot of shitty analogies abound.

      How about these ones:

      Is it ok to refuse service to a mixed race couple getting married?

      Is it ok to refuse service to a couple, both of whom are black who are getting married?

      I think these examples are much closer to the analogies people are coming up with in this thread. Or do you think being gay is an ideology? Is being gay a religion? Is being gay like being a racist?

      Or is being gay something that a person is born as? If so isnā€™t this a lot like being refused service because of race?

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        English
        -2ā€¢1 year ago

        The question THIS LAW interacts with is the CONTENT of the message. If youā€™re providing tables for a wedding this law wouldnā€™t protect you. If you were asked to write something specific for the wedding and the content of the request is antithetical to your beliefs, this law would protect you, if you could show that. Not a lawyer, but thatā€™s how I read it.

        Now. Is it ā€œrightā€ to do so? I would say in absolutely no universe. Itā€™s morally wrong, it undermines our liberal society, and I have no tolerance for it. My point is that this particular law isnā€™t about whether someone is a Christian, their race, or sexuality. This decision wouldnā€™t protect me from writing some basic software for a nazi (others might) but it DOES protect me from building a website supporting them, or writing prose related to nazism, or anything else which would be CLEARLY against what I believe. Please DONā€™T read that Iā€™m saying that being a nazi is the same as being homosexual, it isnā€™t, Iā€™m not, fuck nazis.

        To get back to your question: as I read this decision, a cake maker could potentially be compelled to make a cake for an interracial couple, but they might not be compelled to make a cake with something like ā€œinterracial is the only way to goā€

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          English
          8ā€¢1 year ago

          This all sounds like the staff using religion as an excuse to discriminate against gay people. Doesnā€™t seem all that Christian to me, and in fact it seems like theyā€™re taking Our Lordā€™s Name in vain by using it to justify their hateful actions.

          But maybe they donā€™t follow the teachings of Jesus Christ and donā€™t follow the Commandments. Even if thatā€™s the case, the business is responsible for ensuring that customers arenā€™t discriminated against by staff. If the business owners arenā€™t up to meeting that standard, then they shouldnā€™t be trying to run a business.

          • @[email protected]
            link
            fedilink
            English
            3ā€¢
            edit-2
            1 year ago

            Youā€™re right, and it doesnā€™t to me either, and I feel that itā€™s wrong, and I wouldnā€™t go and get a cake made with someone I know does this. I also think that you and I would agree on more than not. Iā€™ll also add that I donā€™t have a dog in the religion debate here. But I still feel very strongly that in a free society it is their right not not be compelled to write something which directly contradicts their belief. Iā€™ll need to think about this more in general, I might end up changing my mind on it, but at least for right now the right to not have to say something you donā€™t believe feels important to me. Let me ask you this, if an atheist baker were asked to write ā€œJesus is Lordā€ on a cake and said no, would you take issue with that? I wouldnā€™t; Iā€™d argue that is a very clean first amendment right, and an important part of living in a liberal society. I also would go as far as to say that isnā€™t even intolerance from the atheist, itā€™s simply them believing something.

            To your second point, while I agree that a business owner should not discriminate against a particular demographic, Iā€™m not sure Iā€™d go all out on any time someone says this theyā€™re discriminating. Every religion and value system has prohibitions, and few of them are aligned. Itā€™s possible to respectfully decline to do something as it directly contradicts your beliefs. Now if your beliefs are discriminatory, thatā€™s a different and more complex question entirely. Iā€™m not sure what to think about that case.

            • @[email protected]
              link
              fedilink
              English
              1ā€¢1 year ago

              To me there needs to be a distinction between a business and a person. Sure maybe a person canā€™t be compelled to do something against their beliefs, but a business canā€™t claim to have beliefs and therefore can be compelled to do whatever the law requires.

              And claiming religious beliefs isnā€™t a card you can lay down anytime you want to get out of your responsibilities. I mean if I claim that paying taxes is against my religious beliefs do you think the government shouldnā€™t be able to compel me to pay taxes simply because itā€™s against my religious beliefs?

              Thereā€™s always an element of common sense judgement needed in the law which is why the people that do that are called Judges. So if in our best judgement these people simply donā€™t like gay people and in our judgement theyā€™re just using religion as a way to trick people into thinking theyā€™re motives are based in religion and not based off on their prejudice, then what is the decision? To go along with their trickery thatā€™s using religion as an excuse? Or just tell them their arguments about religion is bullshitt and they have to get over their dislike of gay people and follow the law?

              The problem here is members of Supreme court are willing to abdicate their responsibility to use judgement and go along with the obvious trickery because they share the bakerā€™s dislike for gay people.

              • @[email protected]
                link
                fedilink
                English
                1ā€¢1 year ago

                I think that I agree with you in general on your first point. A business isnā€™t a person, it doesnā€™t have a religion, it canā€™t have an opinion on people. But weā€™re talking about a small business. If someone is running a web design company, they donā€™t have a huge staff, theyā€™re just one person, so their individual convictions are at play, donā€™t you think?

                The example you give in your second point isnā€™t quite congruent with this case, taxes are not speech. Weā€™re talking about speech. Now I have a personal conviction that the USA shouldnā€™t be spending nearly so much on the military, but unfortunately for me, my taxes, and many people around the world, I donā€™t have a say in the matter. If someone said something like ā€œI donā€™t want to pay this tax because itā€™s being spent on something antithetical to my religious beliefā€ even there, itā€™s not speech.

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        English
        2ā€¢1 year ago

        Alright Iā€™m sorry, I donā€™t either. Which is actually why I pointed out specifically that I hate that anyone would use this in a hateful way. Iā€™m surprised you think that I do think that itā€™s the same. Is there something in my comment which indicates that I believe that?

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          English
          13ā€¢
          edit-2
          1 year ago

          You reached for a completely non sequitur analogy.

          compelling a black-owned bakery to write an awful racist message on a cake

          Itā€™s not at all like that. If youā€™re in the business of making cakes, and if you make cakes that have peopleā€™s names on them for their weddings, and then you refuse a cake that looks like all the other cakes to a couple because you donā€™t approve of which two consenting adults want their names on the goddamn cake because you just think exactly only one peen should be named in their relationship, that is just bigoted bullshit, and yes, this free country should stamp that shit out and not apologize for it, and we should all burn sparklers and celebrate that this free country offers us all the same freedom to buy a cake from the already-putting-peoples-names-on-wedding-cakes baker. There is no analog there for hateful messages on cakes whatsoever.

          Edit: And if I missed your point entirely, I apologize. Iā€™m not trying to be combative with anyone, but I am trying to stop what seems like people rationalizing this situation as having anything to do with free speech. I emphatically believe that it is a shitty excuse to apologize for a clearly biased agenda from the people who wormed their way into the US Supreme Court.

          • @[email protected]
            link
            fedilink
            English
            2ā€¢1 year ago

            Yeah sorry, a couple of people sound like they think I meant that, I must not have articulated myself well.

            If this decision protects that cake maker from doing so, then I would worry about it. Imagining EVERY cake were the same, obviously that would be wrong. Iā€™m just trying to say that it seems like the law has more to do with the content of the message. If a couple wanted a cake saying ā€œonly gay sexā€ or something similarly funny, or a straight couple wanted a cake saying ā€œall gays are badā€, I would feel that while we donā€™t need to be tolerant of the former business person, or the latter client, neither business person should be compelled to write the message on the cake. In the former case, they should be compelled to make a blank or similar cake with no message, simply not compelled to write the message.

            Again, Iā€™m not a legal expert so if Iā€™m misreading the decision, thatā€™s a different story.