Christian Baker Fined & Silenced

[Credo in Deum]

 

I guess I'm not seeing the problem.  Companies should be allowed to discriminate against events which go against their beliefs and their companies core values.  Gay bakeries are not prosecuted when someone wants a cake that goes against their beliefs and are denied service.  Rather when this happens people all of a sudden put on their thinking caps and see that the gay bakeries are refusing service for an event which goes against their beliefs and not refusing service based on the individuals sexuality.  Yet when the situation is reversed its a hate crime.  Hypocrisy at its finniest, yet you don't see any Christians or anti gay marriage people asking for those companies to close and pay 135k in emotional damages.

In the end all companies should continue having the right to refuse service for events.  Not allowing companies this right is fundamentally wrong.  As long as the situation shows what was being denied was an event then the company should suffer no legal fines or penalties regardless of what product was being denied, cakes, paper towels, urinal cakes, chairs, etc.  It really is that simple.  

  

Edited July 4, 2015 by Credo in Deum

[Peace]

 

I guess I'm not seeing the problem.  Companies should be allowed to discriminate against events which go against their beliefs and their companies core values.  Gay bakeries are not prosecuted when someone wants a cake that goes against their beliefs.  Rather when this happens people all of a sudden put on their thinking caps and see that the gay bakeries are refusing service for an event which goes against their beliefs and not refusing service based on the individuals sexuality.  Yet when the situation is reversed its a hate crime.  Hypocrisy at its finniest, yet you don't see any Christians or anti gay marriage people asking for those companies to close and pay 135k in emotional damages.

In the end all companies should continue having the right to refuse service for events.  Not allowing companies this right is fundamentally wrong.  As long as the situation shows what was being denied was an event then the company should suffer no legal fines or penalties.  It really is that simple.

  

Well. Presumably if there were a gay bakery in Oregon that refused to bake a wedding cake for a straight couple then the same penalty would apply. When such a gay bakery comes into existence and acts accordingly we will have a chance to test whether there is or is not hypocrisy there. Are you aware of any specific gay bakery in Oregon that has refused to bake a wedding cake for a straight couple?

I am not so sure if companies should have an absolute right to refuse service for an event. I do not see what would be so different about a company that says "I will not allow you to eat at this restaurant because of your race" and "I will not bake a cake for your wedding because of your race." I don't see what would be fundamentally wrong about refusing either company the right to engage in business.

[Credo in Deum]

Well. Presumably if there were a gay bakery in Oregon that refused to bake a wedding cake for a straight couple then the same penalty would apply. When such a gay bakery comes into existence and acts accordingly we will have a chance to test whether there is or is not hypocrisy there. Are you aware of any specific gay bakery in Oregon that has refused to bake a wedding cake for a straight couple?

I am not so sure if companies should have an absolute right to refuse service for an event. I do not see what would be so different about a company that says "I will not allow you to eat at this restaurant because of your race" and "I will not bake a cake for your wedding because of your race." I don't see what would be fundamentally wrong about refusing either company the right to engage in business.

In Oregon none that I know of, but you can YouTube gay bakeries refusing service to a straight man for a cake he wanted made about traditional marriage.

It's different since the company didn't refuse service to gay people, it refused service for an event where they didn't not agree with what the customer called a marriage.  It is different since this same bakery would have served them if they had asked for other services.  Your example doesn't indicate that.  If the bakery was discriminating against homosexuals it wouldn't have served them anything for any reasons.  

 

[Winchester]

So what happens if she ignores the judge, doesn't show up to court, talks all she wants, and keeps running her business? Obviously nothing will happen to her, because we live in a civilized society where armed men will not force her to comply with demands of service.

[dUSt]

So am I not allowed to refuse to DJ a rap show with excessive profanity anymore? Is my DJ business no longer allowed to determine which events I can or cannot provide services for? Seems wack.

[Yaatee]

So am I not allowed to refuse to DJ a rap show with excessive profanity anymore? Is my DJ business no longer allowed to determine which events I can or cannot provide services for? Seems wack.

Well, I'm sorry, dUSt, but I have to agree with you, , that it does--seem wack.  My daughter, a v opinionated lady and not usually on your side either, said, "After all, it's not medical insurance."  There's going to have to be a lot of shakedown on all of this.  I do think that a few state supreme court cases might clear the air and the precedents.

Edited July 4, 2015 by Yaatee

[Gabriela]

The root of the problem here is that she's running a private business that has somehow been construed as a "public service".

She's not the freaking government. She has no obligation to serve anyone.

[Luigi]

Lets say that another gay couple who just happens to love chocolate walk in to the same bakery and say "please bake us a simple chocolate cake that we will eat after dinner tonight." Can the owners of the bakery refuse them?

The couple who sued had done business with the baker previously. She had always served them "a simple chocolate cake that we will eat after dinner tonight." It was only when they specified a cake for their wedding that she declined to fulfill that request. 

The whole thing looks like a money-grab on the part of the couple.

[Yaatee]

The above is how to say "Bye Felicia" to litigious gays. Or anybody else who tries to get the law to force you to violate your conscience. You want some freedom to marry? Have some freedom of me expressing my self by donating your money to a cause you can't stand. 

It will work every time and its completely legal.

Look Nihil, another lifehack. I came up with this and the airline work-around in the same 12 hour period. God bless America.

 

ETA: p.s. also, not sure if serving cake is required for a legally valid wedding. I'm leaning towards "yes."

Yes.  Chocolate. And a piece for everyone.

[Kateri89]

And this is one of the problems - freedom of expression should freedom of expression, no matter what the topic or which state one is in. At the moment, it seems like what's legal here is not legal there.

To me, the larger issues are:

1. The fine. I can understand some sort of fine if the baker has broken the law. But $135K? The original request was for $150K, so the judge-mediator-whoever gave the baker a 10% discount - but, big deal! How does a $135K make it right? Just how insulting was the insult? And how does $135K make the insult go away? Will the insulted couple use it to pay for therapy, or what?

I've always wondered about this.  How does anyone place a monetary value on emotional suffering?

Furthermore, just because the judge ordered the couple to not speak about this does not mean that other people have the same gag order placed on them.  We may not know all of the details of the case firsthand but that doesn't mean that we can't show our support for the bakery owners.  Use social media and be a voice for them since apparently they don't have their first amendment rights.

[Peace]

The root of the problem here is that she's running a private business that has somehow been construed as a "public service".

She's not the freaking government. She has no obligation to serve anyone.

Well here is a big part of the issue I think. We get to pick and choose who enters our home. When we open our doors in a place of public accommodation, we do not have complete freedom to do whatever we want. Can she say "I am not a government entity. This is a private business. I have no obligation to serve anyone. I can serve who I choose to serve and deny service to whom I choose to deny service. And I choose to deny service to all African Americans."?

Some might argue that she should have that right. The segregationists certainly did in opposition to the Civil Rights Act.

When you open your doors in a place of public accommodation the state gets to regulate your activity. One example of that for a bakery might be in the form of food safety inspections that most businesses that serve food are subject to.

I think the question we are dealing with here is - to what extent can the state put limits on our ability to discriminate? Specifically, under what circumstances should there be exceptions for  religious beliefs?

[Peace]

The reality is a heterosexual couple looking for a cake for a gay wedding would have also been denied service had they made it known what the cake was for.  This has been the policy of many Christian businesses.  This bakery did not discriminate against gays, it discriminated against an event which went against their beliefs.  In the same way they would discriminate against Planned (un)Parenthood if they had requested a cake for one of their events, or if a Pornography provider had requested a cake for one of their events. 

Businesses have and should always have the right to do this.  They, however,  do not have a right to not serve someone because they're gay and that is something I think all of us can agree on.  If a gay couple wanted a birthday cake, then they should be served.  A wedding cake? No.

And for those who think they hold some moral high ground because they closed a small business for a false social justice reason while ruining an entire family's business and livelyhood over a cake? well you seriously have your priorities all out of whack.

Actually - I see your point now after thinking about it a bit more. It is a good argument I think. How about this?

In our sorry past there were some religious folk who interpreted the Bible as prohibiting interracial relationships. Let us suppose that some of these folk run a bakery today. A black-white couple walks in and says "please make us a cake for our wedding". The bakery owners say "Sorry. Interracial relationships are against our religious beliefs. I will not sell you a cake."

I think most people would say that the couple has been discriminated against. But then John Smith comes along and says "No. You see, if a white couple came in and asked for a cake for a black-white wedding, the bakery also would not have sold it to them. Therefore, the bakery owners are only discriminating against an event that goes against their beliefs."

By your reasoning it would seem that the Bakery could also deny service to black-white couples on religious grounds. I assume that you believe that would be wrong (as do I). How do we distinguish the gay case from the black-white case?

[Nihil Obstat]

 

Well here is a big part of the issue I think. We get to pick and choose who enters our home. When we open our doors in a place of public accommodation, we do not have complete freedom to do whatever we want. Can she say "I am not a government entity. This is a private business. I have no obligation to serve anyone. I can serve who I choose to serve and deny service to whom I choose to deny service. And I choose to deny service to all African Americans."?

Some might argue that she should have that right. The segregationists certainly did in opposition to the Civil Rights Act.

When you open your doors in a place of public accommodation the state gets to regulate your activity. One example of that for a bakery might be in the form of food safety inspections that most businesses that serve food are subject to.

I think the question we are dealing with here is - to what extent can the state put limits on our ability to discriminate? Specifically, under what circumstances should there be exceptions for  religious beliefs?

Whatever the answer to that may be, it is clear that no government could ever lawfully compel a person to sin. Error has no rights, therefore no true conception of civil rights can obligate businesses or workers to support evil.

[Papist]

The way things are now either you will have to provide a service to everyone, or to no one.  Make wedding cakes for everyone, or dont make them at all.  Saying Im a Christian so i dont agree with what youre doing and cant make a cake for that well do they do that for heterosexual couples too?  Maybe that heterosexual couple youre making a cake for is getting married as the result of an adulterous relationship.  Maybe they are living together already as so many do.  Sodomy is a sin but so is fornication and so on.   Stick a sign out front saying that you only sell your stuff to people in a state of grace.

Man and woman asking for wedding cake, the baker doesn't assume they are living in sin and gives them benefit of the doubt. With the lesbian couple there was no doubt. Owner did not ask if couple were gay/lesbians. The fact that what they ordered revealed cake was for lesbian wedding.

[Peace]

 

Whatever the answer to that may be, it is clear that no government could ever lawfully compel a person to sin. Error has no rights, therefore no true conception of civil rights can obligate businesses or workers to support evil.

But who gets to decide what is evil and what is not evil? If you want to impose Canon Law on the entire world I am all for it (seriously). But if not, then you are left with a situation where some people say that gay "marriage" is evil and others say that it is not evil. Not everyone would agree that selling a wedding cake to a gay couple constitutes evil (it appears that the majority of Americans believe that it is not evil). So, in their view, the government forcing them to sell to a gay couple is not forcing them to engage in evil. 

And it seems to me that the same argument could have been made by those who thought (or sadly continue to think) that interracial relationships are evil. What would stop such a person from arguing "black-white relationships are evil therefore the government cannot compel me to sell a black-white couple a wedding cake"?

Sure - as Catholics we know that interracial relationships are not evil, and that gay "marriage" is evil. But to make a distinction between the two we need to use a Christian moral standard. I think you have to impose your moral standard on everyone for your argument above to work.

I dunno. It is not an easy question to tackle I think. And it will be interesting to see how it plays out in the courts. I do have a sense that people should have a right not to bake a cake in that situation, if they believe that it conflicts with their morals. But how is it different than the black-white case? Why should we get to say "we don't have to sell to a gay couple because we believe that gay marriage is evil" while someone else does not get to say "we don't have to sell to a black-white couple because we believe that interracial relationships are evil"? If you make a distinction between the two cases it seems that you are simply imposing your moral standards on others, while rejecting their moral standards. . .

Perhaps the answer to that question is that people who believe that black-white relationships are evil should be allowed to refuse them service. That would be logically consistent, at least. But would you be OK with that?