This is from the Conor Friedersdorf article in the Atlantic:
There speaks a man who has never planned a wedding, and has no concept of what it entails, how long it takes or how many different vendors will likely be involved, even for a small celebration: The venue, the florist, the caterer, the baker, the alcohol vendors, the party-rental place, the printer, the tux rental place and/or the wedding dress place, the hotel for out of town guests, the photographer, the DJ, and more. Knowing that the vendor can shoo you out of their business right in the middle of discussing how many chairs you need to rent or whether the ink should be black or blue on the save-the-date could ruin a lot more than one day.
If my caterer were to cancel on me tomorrow because he found out I was marrying a woman rather than a man, I’d be absolutely screwed and my wedding isn’t for two months.
Come to think of it, I don’t think he’s ever asked about my partner. Huh
CF - Between a bakery and a lunch counter that are both privately owned, no difference. But the lunch counter was refusing service based on race, which was already a Federally protected class even if the law had been ignored to that point in time. If the bakery could be shown to be refusing service based on race, gender, or national origin, they would be in violation as well. I am not saying I think this is the right way to behave, but I believe that they would be legally protected.
Um, what? The Woolworth lunch counter sit-ins were in 1960. Segregation was legal at that time. The Civil Rights Act of 1964, which made race a protected class, was passed in 1964.
I agree with this. The fact that some churches haven’t evolved yet is irrelevant. It took the Catholic Church 359 years to admit they were wrong about Galileo. I was raised Catholic but I’m not going to wait for them on this one.
Churches promote and/or declare forbidden many different things at many different times. For people in a public business to assert one particular church taboo as being sacred and unbreakable, when doing so causes definite harm to a group of people, is simply absurd, illogical, and ungodly, and our secular laws should not in any way tolerate it.
I saw best description in a nutshell of the illogic being used by the people wanting to condemn the pizzeria for standing by its religious beliefs. It was on a cartoon, and it said (paraphrased as close as possible):
“We are opposed to intolerance and people who disagree with us.”
Also note the illogic above is not dissimilar to the argument used on the free speech OU thread, which could be summed up this way:
“We are all for free speech after we determine the speech is not offensive us.”
At least the people are consistent in the structure of their arguments, even if the arguments make little operational sense.
Some actually think the pizzeria orchestrated all this to get the GoFundMe money! They must be the smartest people in the world! To think, in the split second before they answered the reporter’s question, all this had to be considered: “This will generate huge bad publicity, but there will be a backlash, someone will start an internet funding campaign, it will be a success and I will be rich!”
They are so smart one wonders why they were operating a small pizzeria in a small town in Indiana.
I agree with you, TatinG. The pizzeria just said what they believed-- they wouldn’t cater a gay wedding. And they are legally entitled to refuse to cater gay weddings, where they are, although I doubt it would have come up. I’d be furious if I’d contributed money to them on the basis that they’d been expressing sincere religious beliefs, only to find I’d been taken in by a cynical scheme… but I don’t believe for a millisecond that it’s a cynical scheme.
Tatin, don’t discount small business owners form holes in the wall. I don’t think the plan was to net the Gofundme windfall, but I bet they were thrilled to get some free publicity for their business. A free chat with a TV reporter surely beats paying to the local paper to print a $2 off coupon.
CF- Segregation wasn’t really legal, states were just counting on the Federal government being too afraid to enforce what was clearly the law. The Civil Rights Acts of 1964 did a lot of things, but as far as that aspect goes it simply reenforced what was already the law after the Civil War. Unfortunately it never got enforced in many areas, and not just the South, until after the protests of the 50’s and 60’s.
"I saw best description in a nutshell of the illogic being used by the people wanting to condemn the pizzeria for standing by its religious beliefs. "
When you say condemn, there are 2 possible ways of “condemnation” -
speaking out publicly, peaceful protests, word of mouth, boycotting, etc.
threats of violence (a la the threat to burn the pizzeria down or cause harm to the owners)
I hope we’re all in agreement that when we talk about this we’re talking about option 1, not option 2, right? That option 2 is a complete deal-breaker and inappropriate, and should be punished if any laws are broken?
Because there’s nothing un-American in the least about option 1, awc. I’m sure you speak out in appropriate public forums / settings in your opposition to gay marriage; perhaps you’ve been part of a peaceful, law-abiding protest and so forth. Perhaps you’ve written a letter to the editor, or to elected officials stating your POV. Perhaps you’ve boycotted the sponsors of a program or celebrity that promotes gay marriage. All of those things are perfectly fine actions to take, whether or not I personally agree with them. I hope you will agree that those sorts of actions can be appropriate on either side of the equation.
Two fundamental issues jump out at me from this sentence that really highlight the philosophies of the differing groups:
The word **behave** is salient because that is exactly how the secularists view the issue, as behavior (FC, I am speaking in general, not you directly). However, for people who follow religious beliefs and codes, it is not about behavior with respect to Man's interpretation of an act, but it is about following the Will of their God. Talk about a philosophical divide of epic proportions.
Not following the Will of one’s God is considered sinful and carries implications that secular man does not understand. Thus one group just sees malleable behavior, and one group sees a moral act directed by its God.
Basically, there can be no common ground ever, as one cannot just ignore religious teachings and act differently without disobeying the Will of God. Many religious followers believe they are living on this earth and preparing to meet their maker, not living on this earth to appease worldly man. Therefore, to heck with man and his worldly wishes, it is the Maker who counts and calls the shots.
I have not read some pages of the thread, as I have been busy (Easter). However, it is important to point out that protected classes have nothing, absolutely zilch, to do with this religious freedom discussion. Please excuse me if another poster already has stated this.
Simply, legislation, which creates protected classes do not supersede the Bill of Rights re the First Amendment or anything else in the Constitution. Therefore, using protected classes’ arguments as if such a class can be used to override the inalienable rights outlined in the First Amendment is a disconnected discussion. No legislation takes away fundamental religious freedom, and the Hobby Lobby case proved as much most recently. And, for sure, no protected class is in any position to make or to dictate any person act against his religion.
Cardinal Fang, fallenchemist is probably referring, among other things, to the 15th Amendment (guaranteeing African-Americans the right to vote), to the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and to the Civil Rights Act of 1875 – the last of which would have guaranteed equality in public transportation and accommodations, but was declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in 1883. So I do think the laws of the 1960s were necessary
So we should go back to public beatings and fines for sins like fornication and adultery? The Puritans did that in the US before we became, thank God, a secular nation.
What it still comes down to is victimizing some people, in the name of religion, when these people are doing nothing criminally wrong. Do you have to be a specifically protected class to avoid this? Should we legally protect fornicators and adulterers to prevent modern day people with “deeply felt” religious beliefs from putting them back in the stocks?