Would that bother you more than if someone refused to serve your child because they didn’t like him personally or for no reason at all?
I wasn’t talking about a house of worship, but about a business that caters to one group or another. In my area, there are wedding halls that cater to the Orthodox community. I have no knowledge of whether anyone outside the group ever wanted to hold an event there, but what if that venue which clearly markets itself as doing only Orthodox weddings, refused a gay couple or a Christian or Muslim couple?
I think the wedding cake case answers that question in the affirmative. In other words, if the business is in public commerce, it will not be able to refuse service to same-sex couples. The Orthodox and Muslim specialist wedding coordinators and caterers and wedding halls will have to provide services to gay couples. I don’t see a way around that.
What I think will happen is that either all religions will eventually approve same-sex marriage, so the issue will go away; or anyone who has profound religious objections will not go into any type of business that creates this personal religious dilemma for them. In the meantime, I think it will definitely be a big problem for some religious business people and will either put them out of business, or not put them out of business if they can fly under the radar until retirement.
I get frustrated with all the “…well, for example, how about this” arguments in the debate about same sex marriage. I believe that there are dishonest arguments on both sides and I tire of it. It’s clear that some vendors have suddenly found the religion that they’ve seldom expressed beforehand. But how is a pizza or wedding cake an expression of one’s faith in God? On the other hand, I do not want to be in the business of evaluating another person’s religious beliefs, and I am fearful if the government starts doing it.
As for the gay community, I hope that they will realize that some people do firmly believe in the tenets that discourage homosexuality. However, we all know that in the United States your religion can’t be used as a sword to limit or eviscerate the rights of others. That’s why state DMV offices can legally decline to issue a driver’s license to women whom refuse to remove a full-face burka for a photo. I support such reasoning. And at times I find it difficult to separate anti-same sex marriage arguments from the bigoted vitriol of the Jim Crow era. Moreover, it puzzles me that polygamists (some Bible- or Quran-based) still get imprisoned in this country and marriage equality proponents and civil libertarians say nothing. I think polygamy is a dopey idea, but if it’s among intellectually liberated adults exercising their free mind and their religious faith, it’s none of my business.
Intellectually, I am not free to debate whether someone was gay from the womb or adopted his/her gender attraction later in life. I don’t want our government fooling around with such a question either because that would inevitably lead to injustice. I also do not desire to have my personal choices dictated to me by religion-biased laws. I have my own religion and mandates about personal conduct inspired by my own faith, thank you.
Same sex marriage is now a fundamental right in this country. it’s time to put down the swords. Same sex marriage proponents and opponents need to look one another in the eye and honestly figure out what kind of country they want to live in. If they both wish to continue to fight every point in court, no matter how un-pertinent, well it’s a free country.
Before the SCOTUS decision I read numerous anti-gay-marriage arguments that included the statement that gays had the same right to marry as everyone else - they could marry someone of the opposite sex. So apparently a lot of them had no problem with gays pretending to be straight and undertaking heterosexual marriages.
In addition, you have those who believe/claim that you can “pray away the gay”. If a child has been raised to believe that, he/she may well have tried to do so and later finds that it just isn’t working out that way. If someone has been raised to believe that he/she will go to hell if they don’t live a straight lifestyle, they may very well try to do so as best they can.
In other words, this is a lot more complex and difficult a situation than you are giving it credit for.
And some people have life-long adherence to a particular set of religious principles. As I said, in my area, there are vendors who specifically and only deal with Orthodox Jewish weddings and have done from time immemorial. But what I am really asking is whether people who foam at the mouth at Christians they perceive to be hypocrites would behave the same way to non-Christian religious people who unquestionably follow a specific set of religious laws in every aspect of their lives.
Nope, lesbian couple was allowed 2 family members at each event where heterosexual couples were only allowed one family member at each event. My older kids weren’t even in the building but we were told to leave. I consider this discrimination. Feel free to pm and I’ll give you the name of the school.
" But what I am really asking is whether people who foam at the mouth at Christians they perceive to be hypocrites would behave the same way to non-Christian religious people who unquestionably follow a specific set of religious laws in every aspect of their lives. "
Are you deliberately trying to be offensive, zoosermom? I don’t think ANYONE here is “foaming at the mouth” about anything. Look, people can specialize in anything when it comes to businesses. There are “cat only” vets, there are men’s barbershops, there are vegetarian-only restaurants. So it stands to reason that there would be wedding venues that cater to Orthodox Jews only, or Muslims, or Christians.
What “we” (who are NOT foaming at the mouth") are criticizing, is that a CAKE shop can’t say a CAKE is against their religion and refuse to serve gays, but that a specialization based on actual religious laws is allowed. So no, you can’t make a kosher store sell bacon, or a Hindu shop sell beef. But WHATEVER they sell, they must sell to all who walk in. At least, that’s my reading of it.
And last I heard, there are no requirements to use a Christian venue other than being, you know, CHRISTIAN. But I’ve never seen one other than a church, which are NOT public businesses and can turn people away. The one I work for though, allows any Christians to marry there, even gay couples. And yes, we’ve lost some members over it. But we’ve GAINED more.
Why can’t people just marry & have kids with who they want, recieve the health care they & their doctor decide is appropriate and not have to worry that they will be fired or evicted because of who they sleep with?
Seriously, 3scoutsmom? There was a space issue, so “extra” people weren’t allowed. If it is a mommy and me event, and the kid has two moms, than neither mom was “extra.” It is likely that the space was sufficient to allow for the one or two kids who might have two moms to bring a third person, but NOT sufficient for every child’s siblings to attend. If you want to argue that they should have made an exception for your children given that you home school, that’s one thing, but the fact that the school reasonably took it for granted that a mommy and me event should include both moms is immaterial.
SSeamom, I don’t think (if I’m interpreting her right) that zoosermom is drawing a comparison to making a Hindu shop sell beef, although someone else raised that earlier, but to the case of a religiously oriented business that specifically caters to a religious clientele.
For instance, there’s a difference between E-Harmony - whose owners are devout Christians, but whose service was itself indistinguishable from match.com or any other generic dating site – and Christian Mingle, which functions to set up marriages between Christians. E-Harmony was forced to begin allowing users to select a “men seeking men” or “female seeking female” option. I don’t think the same would or should be true of a site like Christian mingle, which sets up “Christian” marriages however they choose to define it.
Same argument, to me, applies in the case of Catholic Charities - despite the name, the adoption service was open to people of all faiths. They weren’t running a Christian adoption service, so they couldn’t discriminate against gay couples because of their religious belief that homosexuality is wrong. If a service only placed children with couples married in the Catholic church, that would, I think, be another matter.
Unless these properties are owned by churches, I don’t think they can refuse to host same-sex couples who want to hold their wedding reception there. Having said that, I’m not familiar with these types of venues, and didn’t know they existed. I imagine there could be a venue designed with a floor plan and decorations and rituals supplies that work for a particular religion, but they won’t be able to prohibit same-sex couples from holding a Jewish, or Muslim or Christian-themed wedding there, even if it means they are married by a justice of the peace rather than a religious officiant.
“Nope, lesbian couple was allowed 2 family members at each event where heterosexual couples were only allowed one family member at each event. My older kids weren’t even in the building but we were told to leave. I consider this discrimination. Feel free to pm and I’ll give you the name of the school.”
You poor thing. How you are oppressed. I’m thinking of turning lesbian because of the great advantage of being able to have two people at mommy-and-me celebrations.
“e you deliberately trying to be offensive, zoosermom? I don’t think ANYONE here is “foaming at the mouth” about anything. Look, people can specialize in anything when it comes to businesses”
In light of the fact that i don’t think you have previously posted in this thread, and not memorably on the topic of hypocritical Christians, I think you can safely exclude yourself from the offended “we.”
On the other hand, just to play devil’s advocate …
So, I offer certain marketing services to companies. I am not obligated to take on any client who has the bucks to pay for me. For example, our company would likely refuse doing the work that we do for a tobacco client. Not for any religious reasons – but because that’s a business / cause we wouldn’t want to promote. I do have the freedom not to take on certain clients, right? Of course that’s different because what I do is customized – as opposed to owning a retail store where anyone can walk in and buy off the shelf.
People who opposed interracial marriage absolutely did say that interracial marriages were against their religion. That was precisely what they said.
There is no right to refuse to serve certain members of the public because your religion says they’re icky. You can’t refuse to serve an interracial couple because you think they’re yucky, and you can’t refuse to serve a lesbian couple because they’re yucky. You can, however, refuse to serve pork at your establishment because you think it’s yucky: there is no constitutional right to a pork chop.
So it’s not ok that my kids sit out side when a same sex couple can have two family members attend event that everyone else is limited to one family member but its ok for them to have two family members attend both the mom and me event and the dad and me event? Why should everyone else be limited to one family person but the lesbian couple have two members for each event? Isn’t that desecration?
Cardinal Fang summed up what I was trying to say. And zoosermom, I have actually read the entire thread with great interest for two reasons-I bake cakes, including wedding cakes, for friends and family and I work at a church which is about to begin marketing as being available for weddings, including same sex weddings, to the general public, as long as they are Christian. But the foaming at the mouth comment got to me.
I do think that in the end, a gay couple which is not Orthodox would hardly be looking to book a hall that is run entirely by and for the Orthodox community. So it’s kind of a leap to even bring such a possibility up. It’s also unlikely that a non-Muslim advocate of same-sex marriage would ask to have a reception at a Halal Muslim venue. They CAN and DO refuse to serve certain foods, serve them in special ways, restrict men and women from being in certain parts of the room, etc. So chances are you’re not even going to ask unless you follow those same restrictions, which they are allowed to impose.