Someone earlier asked about the Harvard Swimmer on 60 minutes.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/60-minutes-overtime-parents-of-transgender-schuyler-bailar/
None of the things in your example are protected classes though. People can choose to work for gun manufacturers or pro-life groups. LGBT is not a choice, and I believe that’s the essential difference. If you do marketing consulting for digital marketing, can you refuse to serve black customers? Can you refuse to serve women? They’re not asking for a service you don’t provide; they’re asking for your standard service but you just don’t want to provide your service to blacks or women. You could refuse to serve Black Lives Matter, but not all black customers.
What I would support is the baker or photgrapher or restaurant owner putting a huge sign in their window saying, “We prefer not to service LGBT weddings but are compelled to do so under protest.” That’s free speech letting people know where they stand and hopefully turning away customers who don’t like their stance.
The 60 Minutes story was about a young transgender male on the Harvard swim team, who had lived up through freshman year of college as a female. Growing up, “she” had always been a tomboy, dressed like a boy, hung out with the boys, etc, but, had periods of pretty intense struggle, especially once puberty hit. Once she identified as male, the swim team coaches worked with him to transition him from the women’s team to the men’s team. It was enlightening and encouraging to see coaches and students so open and supportive. Also, it would be hard to imagine this young man going to the ladies room.
But you’re not getting the distinction I’m making.
I (the baker) don’t have the right to not-sell the cookie in the display case to the lesbian who walks in the door. I do have the right not to create a cake that says “Happy Wedding Day Mary and Susie” - the same way I have a right not to create a cake that is chocolate when I’ve decided I only want to offer vanilla cakes.
I am not providing a customized service when I sell the cookie in the display case. I have to sell it to anyone who walks in the door - black, white, gay, straight, etc. But I am not obligated to provide customized services to anyone who wants my services. That’s the difference.
Here’s another analogy. I own an Italian restaurant. I am obligated to serve my fettuccine dish equally to everyone who walks in the door regardless of ethnicity, orientation, etc. I cannot say “my restaurant only serves Italian people, not Chinese people.” I have to serve them equally. However, I am not obligated to start making Peking duck because a Chinese customer requests that I do so. All that I “owe” the Chinese customer is that – OF THE THINGS THAT I OFFER - I offer them to him equally as I do anyone else.
Your solution doesn’t really work - as a consultant, I didn’t necessarily know what clients I did and did not want to serve until they came to my door, so to speak. I don’t really know if we would service, say, the National Rifle Association or Altria or Jack Daniels. We’d have to think about it and maybe we would, maybe we wouldn’t. I couldn’t possibly think of all the clients I don’t want to serve but would do under protest. Are you suggesting I would need to list those things out on my website - “we prefer not to service gun mfrs, tobacco cos and alcohol cos but will do so under protest”?
Look, I’m as pro-gay marriage who could possibly be, and I’d likely personally boycott someone who refused to make a wedding cake for a gay couple. But I think you do it a disservice when you conflate discrimination in offering the same service to different people and choosing not to offer certain services.
No, I understand you perfectly. I just think that you’re one mixing up the NRA with LGBT. To me, LGBT is in the same class as “African American” or “Muslim”. You’re putting LGBT in the same class as “NRA” or “pro-life”.
Refusing to make a cake that says “Gratz Mary and Susan” to me is the same as refusing to make a wedding cake for an interracial couple.
But you believe differently and that’s ok. Even the Supreme Court has split decisions on these issues.
Suppose I’m a baker and members of the Westboro Baptist Church come to me because they want to commission me to make a cake for one of their meetings that says “God Hates F—.” Am I required to create that cake for them? How many of you would bake that cake and decorate it?
Wow the bakery is getting convoluted here… customized or not lets take these colorado cases:
- Baker refused to sell cake to gay couple bc feels like every cake he makes he is participating in the wedding. If he is going to offer wedding cakes at all in his store he has to sell to all weddings (same sex, muslim, catholic black, white etc... ) or not sell wedding cakes at all. Period and upheld on appeal.
http://www.cnn.com/2015/08/13/us/colorado-same-sex-wedding-cake/
You cannot open a bakery and say “I will not sell a cake to you bc you are gay or I don’t believe in same sex marriage” You cannot choose to only offer wedding cakes to heterosexual couples. You cannot legally, if you sell wedding cakes, pick and choose what groups you want to serve (say no cakes for NRA members).
- You cannot be forced to write hate speech on a cake!! You as a baker do not have to write DEROGATORY or obscene images on a cake ... no one can force you to write hate speech The courts ruled in CO baker didn't have to write "god hates gays" on cake.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/04/06/azucar-bakery-anti-gay-message_n_7011202.html
@Pizzagirl You never have to write derogatory hate speech on cake, but you do have to sell a cake to the WBC! http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/04/06/azucar-bakery-anti-gay-message_n_7011202.html
You do NOT have the right to NOT create a cake that says Happy Wedding Day Mary and Susie
@anomander You are exactly correct, but the supreme court is not split on this. You have to sell cake to everyone… you have to say congrats Mary and Susan… but you don’t have to write hate speech on a cake. You have to sell to all, but you can’t be forced to write hate or derogatory speech.
The only way to avoid legally public accommodation laws ifs if you are a religious institution and have been granted waiver status from Gov… but there is paperwork that you have to file ahead of time…
That is why there has been big increase in colleges applying for title IX waivers from colleges to legally discriminate http://thecolu.mn/21270/dozens-christian-schools-win-title-ix-waivers-ban-lgbt-students
deleted, posted accidentally
This needs to go to the supreme court. I see this being a slippery slope especially the North Carolina law, which undid a bunch of protections under the guise of a bathroom law. I also watched a story on a Mississippi dressmaker, who happened to be Black, who supported the law in that she did not want to make a dress for a same sex ceremony. I certainly have no problems with same sex marriage but how do you force folks who honestly have religious beliefs that would not allow them to produce a product for a gay wedding?
PS regards to the cake There is NOT an “Artisan” exception saying that because I am an artist I can pick and choose who to sell my artistry to…
The Colorado cake baker used thinking that in his case
http://www.wsj.com/articles/court-rules-baker-cant-refuse-to-make-wedding-cake-for-gay-couple-1439506296
There have been many state rulings on this in 13 states now all in favor of having to sell the cake!
@partyof5 Your right in that these laws in NC and MS discriminate and will go to the SCOTUS because they are discriminatory BUT its been ruled the only people who “participate” in weddings are the ministers who already have legal protection on basis of religion to say no.
A dressmaker is not a “participant” in the wedding they are merely a purveyor of goods… You can’t say I don’t want to make dresses for an interracial/mixed religion wedding bc my religion says that each should stay with his own kind… or I don’t want to sell dresses to muslim weddings bc I don’t believe in the Muslim religion
If you have strong beliefs about the “only” people you will sell to/serve then you can become a private club to escape public accommodation laws!
Yes that actually makes sense - you can’t advertise to the public at large and then discriminate by refusing to serve certain segments of that population.
Any lawyers reading who might clarify?
LGBTQA is not a choice, but neither is gender. It’s kind of tiring acting like me, being female and therefore being forced to use the ladies room is different than being transgender and being forced to use their birth gender. If they can choose, why can’t I? For me, it is a reality that I didn’t choose my gender, and I don’t identify with either gender. I don’t care if I am identified by others as one or the other gender.
There is no real answer unless gender neutral bathrooms become the norm.
Anyone who feels the rights of children will somehow be infringed upon need to start with banning urinals. Urinals are the only possible answer to not making all bathrooms gender neutral, because it is legal to expose yourself in front of others, whereas anywhere else in the US it is not (barring doctor’s offices and surgery).
The whole bakery/dressmaker etc. thing is troubling. At some point, no one will be able to refuse anyone service for any reason. What if you don’t want to serve Michael Vick because he electrocuted dogs? What if you don’t want to serve Cam Newton because he lose the Super Bowl? Or Sarah Silverman because you find her “comedy” extremely offensive?
At some point, we need to stop the ridiculousness and start looking at the issue: Does it violate the rights of a protected class to do something - or not do something - that would not be an issue for a member of the general public not of that class?
Does it violate the rights of a female to not be able to use a mens room? Why or why not?
Like my son said about one of his classmates - “yeah, he’s gay, but he’s an dirtbag. Nothing to do with him being gay, he’s just not a nice person.” That’s the point we need to get to, where someone is refused service because they are mean or won’t work with the provider, not because of any protected status.
Also private property vs public property still doesn’t give the right to discriminate against lgbt weddings upheld on appeal
http://thinkprogress.org/lgbt/2016/01/15/3739998/liberty-ridge-appeal/
SCOTUS has already ruled that states can’t enact laws that single out a class of people like LGB to be able to legally discriminate against in 1996 Romer vs Evans that said:
The Court’s 1996 decision in Romer v. Evans, struck down a Colorado constitutional amendment that singled out gay men, lesbians and bisexuals for inferior treatment under the law. Labeled as a ban on “Protected Status Based on Homosexual, Lesbian, or Bisexual Orientation,” the amendment forbade any arm of Colorado government from extending civil rights protections “whereby homosexual, lesbian or bisexual orientation, conduct, practices or relationships shall constitute or otherwise be the basis of or entitle any person or class of persons to have or claim any minority status, quota preferences, protected status or claim of discrimination.”
The primary sin of this amendment, as Justice Anthony Kennedy explained for the Court, was that it made gay people and bisexuals into a kind of underclass who were not even permitted to seek out civil rights protections through the ordinary political process. “Homosexuals, by state decree, are put in a solitary class with respect to transactions and relations in both the private and governmental spheres,” Kennedy wrote. “The amendment withdraws from homosexuals, but not to others, specific legal protection from the injuries caused by discrimination, and it forbids reinstatement of these laws and policies.”
“Laws singling out a certain class of citizens for disfavored legal status or general hardships are rare,” Kennedy added. “A law declaring that in general it shall be more difficult for one group of citizens than for all others to seek aid from the government is itself a denial of equal protection of the laws in the most literal sense.”
Which brings us back to HB 1523. The Mississippi law, like the Colorado amendment, explicitly singles out LGBT people “for disfavored legal status.” The law begins with a declaration that “the sincerely held religious beliefs or moral convictions protected by this act are the belief or conviction that . . . marriage is or should be recognized as the union of one man and one woman” and that “male (man) or female (woman) refer to an individual’s immutable biological sex as objectively determined by anatomy and genetics at time of birth” (additionally, the law also purports to give special rights to people who object to extramarital sex of all kinds). Though dressed up somewhat in the rhetoric of religious liberty, this declaration is about as explicit a statement as Mississippi could have mustered expressing animus towards LGBT individuals. It specifically identifies same-sex couples and trans people as the “solitary class” disabled by the law
Now Romer vs Evans didn’t deal with Transgender but one can’t help see that They are protected under sex discrimination at the very least and also for similar reasons to Romer ruling about singling out a class of people
Right. They could be Christian, they could be Orthodox Jewish or they could be Muslim. Devout adherents to all of those faiths oppose gay marriage with sincerity. What about a baker/florist/whatever who refuses to serve polygamous marriages? I know that I personally would have a problem with that one. I’ve always been a supporter of gay marriage, and my denomination was on the forefront of that issue, but my personal believe system says that marriage should be between two consenting adults. If I had a bakery/florist/whatever, I could see myself refusing to serve a polygamous family for a wedding cake. I would bake a birthday cake, a Halloween cake, whatever, but I would have a problem with making a wedding cake for a polygamous family.
And this is the distinction i keep coming around. You’re not refusing service to the polygamous (or whatever) family who walks into your shop - they are perfectly free to buy your cookies, cakes, etc. But you do not have to create something special for them.
I’m not going to refuse to ring up an order to the guy with the KKK tattoo, but I’m not about to custom-decorate a cake for him that says “KKK Forever, Down With Jews and Blacks.” Throw me in jail if you need to, I’m not doing it.