Thread: Indiana's Pence to sign bill allowing businesses to reject gay customers

Originally Posted by Deuce

Yes. Objectionable because they're gay and the baker doesn't like gay people. It's not about his religion. The baker will sell cakes to women with shaved heads, he will sell cakes to fat people, there's one that happily sold cakes for a pagan solstice celebration, a dog wedding, and a divorce party. These people aren't following their ****ing holy books, they've just found a convenient justification for their hate.

I'll bet they don't ask every customer their sexual orientation when they buy donuts either.

Originally Posted by US Conservative

Then you know how the ACLU shops for cases, so stop pretending otherwise. They look for cases that will get through appeals making the strongest case, in order to have the biggest impact. DC vs Heller happened in DC for a reason. The Fluck case (at a Catholic university) was picked for a reason.

This is nothing new, goes back to at least the civil rights era, and the Rosa Parks case.

No need to pretend otherwise.

The ACLU generally does NOT shop for causes. The way it works is that people file complaints with the ACLU. The only argument that you can make that the ACLU "Shops for causes" is that the ACLU does not respond to every complaint that they receive. It would be impossible. We had a board that would review the complaints once a month and we would decide how to respond to them and which ones we would take up. It generally was not based on any particular political view but rather which causes we believed had merit and that we could prevail on. Perhaps on a "national level" you may be correct, I am not sure. But on a state level at the ACLU we were not concerned about appellate courts, let alone the Supreme Court. We were primarily concerned with the state courts and whether we could prevail on behalf of the client.

Originally Posted by joG

I know people like yourself hate the spin that conscientious objection lends the argument. That does not make it wrong. Just unconventional and an aggravation to gay activists.

I'm just saying you are using that word wrong. You can just as easily say that racists "conscientiously object" to being forced to support the mixing of the races, either in public accommodations or literally in reproduction or unions.

Originally Posted by Blemonds

No, it would be more like selling a hunting knife to a black person one week but refusing to sell him one another week if he said he was going to use it to kill someone

Nope. Bad analogy again because in this case, the seller never was willing to sell a "hunting knife to the black person". Your analogy would be more like saying the seller would sell the black guy a hunting knife, but not guns, because he only sells guns to white people. THAT is a more appropriate analogy.

Originally Posted by vesper

And this bill doesn't do anything like that. But it does help to protect already given freedoms in the First Amendment. Folks can still sue them if they think they are being discriminated against but it will level the field so one's rights doesn't trump another. At least that is the way I read it.

The Indiana law goes beyond that. This is the reason why the outrage. Pence is a liar. He thought he could sign this into law and expand the ability of people to use religion to discriminate. He got caught...plain and simple.

Originally Posted by Blemonds

How do you propose that a merchant could affect segregation?

Private schools.

Originally Posted by humbolt

Why don't you show me all the civil rights violations committed in Indiana instead of complaining about something that hasn't happened.

The law didn't have time to come into effect. The American people wouldn't stand for it.

Originally Posted by Samhain

No it can't. You keep trying to say it can, but it can't. I would love to see you show an example of how it can be used.

Why does the law need to be changed then? If your side is telling the truth....there is no need for changes or any other kind of "clarification". Sorry...but use your head.

Originally Posted by Fletch

But that's not true. There is no objection to the people involved but to the ACTIVITY those people are engaged in. In this case, marriage. The idea that the state should force me to provide my services to an activity that I deem immoral or objectionable is a violation of my individual liberty. That should be obvious yet it isn't to the totalitarian left. If I am a democrat, should I be compelled by the state to bake a cake for a republican convention? If I oppose legalization of drugs, should I be forced to provide my services to a legalization rally? If I believe abortion is murder, is it right for the state to force me to provide my services to a planned parenthood party? The answer is obvious. Yet liberals value equality over liberty so there is disagreement where there should be none.

Nope, the objection is to the people involved in that event. They have no objection to the actual event by itself. They sell wedding cakes. In fact, the cake wasn't even being used at an actual wedding, but rather after the fact, in celebration of the union.

It depends on whether or not you provide those services to others but refuse to certain groups based on classifications of those people protected by the law.

For example, you cannot agree to provide a cake for a "pot legalization" party/rally for everyone except Mormons, because your beliefs go against contributing to other people breaking what you believe to be their religious tenets/restrictions. You couldn't agree to sell a cake for a Republican candidate to anyone except gay Republicans, at least not in places that include sexual orientation/sexuality as protected class. You can't refuse to provide services to a Planned Parenthood party/event, unless it included a certain percentage of black people.

The bakers all provided wedding cakes. They were refusing service based on the people involved in the event, not the actual event.