Christian florist v. homosexual couple in WA

Yes, but no mention of marrying the same sex. Not sure how you're not getting it.

 

I'm just pointing out the painfully obvious regarding the 1st Amendment.

Pay special attention to the underlined portion. It's why Congress hasn't added LGBTQ's to the civil rights act. States can pass all the laws they want, and even enforce them at the state level. Once it heads to the SCOTUS, they'll lose to religious freedom every time. You'll just have to get used to it.

 

Did you miss the word "OR"?

 

Now that I've given my answers, what are yours?

 

I'm saying that it should NEVER be okay for the government to discriminate against certain people. Government should therefore serve everyone. Are you seriously not making a distinction between government and private enterprise?

You're right, that's not my job. That's the job of individual business owners who should be able to pick and choose their customers free of government intervention. This really is a basic principle of libertarianism and frankly I'm surprised that I have to tell you. Thankfully in the year 2019, no business would dare refuse service on the basis of someone's race or sexual orientation.

You didn't read what I said properly! I said that gas stations would be in government hands IF the private sector never took on the industry.

Certain private businesses and indeed entire private industries only exist because of the talent and skills of the people involved in them. They would not otherwise exist but for private enterprise. Example are bakeries/baking industry and florists/florist industry. It's not hard to think about what other businesses and industries would apply. The fuel industry (which the government has always had a stake in) is NOT an example. Fuel is obviously an essential service.

The intent to discriminate specifically on the basis of sexual orientation is not clear in these gay wedding cases. This is because there is another possible basis for discrimination, and one which is much more likely: discrimination on the basis of the event that the service is for. This is particularly obvious when we consider that this florist and the Colorado baker happily serve homosexuals ALL THE TIME! They just don't want to participate, or even be seen to participate, in a same sex wedding. In the florist's case, the gay customer was her FRIEND! What more do people need?

Well they CAN can't they? I admit that this was a stupid argument pre-Civil Rights Act given the widespread nature of racial discrimination.

Which would be outrageously ridiculous, but has never happened and never will happen.

The pizza industry is another example of an industry which would not otherwise exist but for private enterprise. Indeed, pizza is food, however it is not the primary means of food distribution. Grocery stores on the other hand are the primary means of food distribution. And they would be in government hands if private enterprise weren't involved.

Also, you said, "there are many utilities that are not state owned assets." So what assets aren't state owned? You didn't answer this in your last reply despite being asked.

 

So you know what LIKE means, but yet you can't understand the difference between CHANGE and LIKE a change?

 

Why are you skeptical?

 

Born that way, I guess.

 

Weren't the boycotts and counter demonstrations working?

 

I really don't know. Demonstrators tend to clamor for state intervention, so discrimination and demonstrations and counter demonstrations might have continued forever without the legislation.

Did it do more harm than good? That's immeasurable.

 

I understand English. It’s why I keep correcting you.

 

your right, it did not mention either straight sex or same sex.. it said to the "unmarried" - it's better to not marry, but if your gonna burn with passion, better to marry then burn with passion

 

The legitimate authority of Gov't is protection from direct harm - one person on another - rape, murder, incest, theft and so on. Gov't is not to make any law messing with individual liberty outside that legitimate purview. The general rule is that rights end where the nose of another begins. This is where Gov't power is supposed to begin and end as well.

Obviously some forms of discrimination involves harm - It is an action of one person against another. It is not an act of individual liberty. If one wishes to hold personal beliefs - that is one thing - forcing those beliefs on someone else is different. For example not liking black people is a personal choice - the other person is not harmed by someone's thoughts. It is when those thoughts result in action that harm can result.

It is important to distinguish between harm - one person against another - and harm in the Utilitarian sense - some action that may harm society as a whole. One is an action of one person against another - the other is not.

The answer to the question depends on the situation and so is a bit grey - does with-holding a service necessarily harm someone. Is this harm direct (not emotional for example) - does the action have physical or financial consequences.

Not selling gas to someone would be an example of someone being harmed directly. Not producing a certain image on a cake is something different - I have trouble coming up with a direct harm that passes the giggle test. If something is that grey - and hard to validate - the Gov't should default to individual liberty - The business owner.

A business and an individual are two different things with different rights and responsibilities. A Business is not a person.

 

Assets that are "State owned" are assets that are "State owned". Gas stations for example are not State owned.

You seem to get mixed up when it comes to Law - we are talking about Law here - that you do not get to chose how the law is applied. As soon as something is law - legalized - its legalized. It is Judges who will determine when something is OK and what is not.. and who knows how they will rule. Business do not decide how the law is applied.

"They can just go down the road" is a bad argument. What about a small town where there is only one service provider ? It would be nonsense to make law that folks in the city can discriminate but folks in small towns can not. One could claim "there is another small town down the road".

The other problem is that when something is legal - obviously more people will do it and you could end up like back in the day where large numbers of businesses discriminate against a certain group. Saying "that will not happen" is pure BS - as you simply do not know this and it could well happen. Say in the State of Utah where a large percentages of businesses are owned by Mormons - and one day the Mormon Church decides to discriminate against some group. The Church could start tracking people and keeping lists of the names of "homosexuals" - and distributing that list out to all the members. This could easily happen.

That one would seriously consider this a valid argument speaks to an inability to understand the potential consequences of legalizing discrimination by businesses.

What you also fail to consider is that the folks implementing the law might fail to consider these things as well - especially if it is at the municipal level. You fail to consider political motivation which can extend up higher - perhaps even to the State level. We have a kinds of dumb laws on the books.

You say one thing is an essential service - someone else could say it is not - or come up with some justification why discrimination with respect to essential services is OK - saying "well the person knew this was a non-Chinese region - why did they move here". The number of dumb arguments is endless.

Do you not remember the child support discussion ? One person is punished for the consequences of the unilateral actions of another with respect to the decision to carry an unintended pregnancy to term ... but - only if the person being punished is a man.

This is an obvious anathema to the rule of law - "Equal Justice" "one person is not to be punished for the actions of another". Stuff like this happens. People make up all kinds of justifications as to why we should violate the founding principles.

As I stated in my previous post - sometimes things are grey. Is it reasonable to say that someone was harmed. In the case of the Baker I agree with the Baker. He was OK with selling cakes to gays but did not want to produce art for a gay wedding.

Pizza guy is completely different. He is not providing something unique and he is refusing to sell his product. He is refusing to do something that his business normally does. In addition - his argument was abject hypocrisy.

Pizza guy does deliveries all the time - that he will not deliver to an event that happens to be a "gay wedding" is with-holding a service normally provided. The Baker was not refusing to sell cake - the Pizza guy was refusing to sell pizza.

 

I agree with all that except the last sentence. Sole proprietors like Giftedone dba What a Great Dog Boarding and Grooming, with 1 or 2 or 0 employees, is as much person as business.

 

"Giftedone dba What a Great Dog Boarding and Grooming?" Interesting.

 

Source?

Oh you don’t do those do you???

I guess the founders misplays congress, they absolutely meant no one

Like as others have posted. The 14th applies the law equally to all Americans.
Not just a special few

 

That is my entire premise.
Why is making a floral arrangement (from a company that is all they do) more of a burden than having to make an entire facility accessible to a group that may never even enter your building?

I have a warehouse that we are having to enlarge bathrooms and hallways even though we do not have handicap employees. Why has no one protested equal accommodation prior to gay people? (They did with blacks and women we just didn’t have the internet then)

Who would be upset at changing the oil in a gay persons car or treating a gay couples daughter? There are 350 million people in this country, I am sure there are more than a few that would like to discriminate in this manner.

 

Yes I missed the or in the first two words, care to point it out?

 

You are so confused. In the first place, I cited the source (called the incorporation doctrine) in another post somewhere up above. I don't have the time or the inclination to separately spoon feed every constitutional ignoramus.

You are further confused in that you don't understand that the person invoking the Constitution here is the florist. This is because the plaintiffs are relying on state law, and it's a good thing, inasmuch as neither the constitution nor the federal civil rights laws afforded sexual orientation any particular protection.

The florist is invoking her first amendment right to both religious freedom as well as freedom of association.

 

I understand what she is evoking however no one is taking her religious freedom to believe in the Flying Spaghetti Monster or any other deity away. Does her freedom of association allow her to refuse business to handicapped people? Or black people?

And give it a few years and a few more cases like doctors refusing to treat kids with gay parents and orientation will be added to much head explosions and gnashing of teeth.

 

Invoking, not evoking. Quit trying to use fancy words.

 

I doubt she'll be able to find any biblical disapproval of the handicapped, so no.

As for blacks, that question has been answered at least twice in this thread. Did you forget already?

 

If you believe that’s a fancy word... it isn’t.

I never articulated I was proficient at spelling