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SCOTUS & gay wedding cakes

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  • Originally posted by Tassman View Post
    That is your opinion. In fact laws against interracial marriage on biblical grounds existed until the 1967 Supreme Court decision on Loving v. Virginia deemed "anti-miscegenation" laws unconstitutional. The trial judge in that interracial marriage case “apparently agreed that racial separation was God's will and that mankind must not reverse that principle”.
    Very much a 'dodge'/'evade' sort of answer. People can and do distort the writings of the Bible (or any other respected text) in an attempt to justify their own wants or goals. That does not mean the written text actually implies the distorted conclusion.
    What I have said is not simply an opinion, it is a fact. The Bible (specifically the Christian Bible) does not command purity of the races as a generalized concept. There is nothing more to say here unless you are willing to provide justification for your assertion it does so beyond someone somewhere said they could do it.

    The fact some people ABUSE a text cannot be used as a summary of the content of that same text. Otherwise, it would be fair to say Darwin supported Hitlers Eugenics. Or that YECs have good arguments for an Earth <10,000 years old.


    As I said, people can make the bible say whatever they want, whether about anti-miscegenation laws or anti-homosexual laws.
    No - they can't. This is, again, simply a disingenuous and intellectually empty dismissal of the Bible base on your own prejudice against it.


    Not if his “freedom” overrides the freedom of another. He does not get special treatment in law just because he is Christian.
    You can't get out of the real conflict this way. Simply putting quotes around one instance of the word freedom and not around the other! Really? The freedom to the free exercise of religion is guaranteed by the constitution. The conflict that arises here is real and you need to step up to the plate and acknowledge it ... unless you prefer deceptive and disingenuous arguments and debates.


    The only freedom being removed is the freedom of the baker to discriminate against a homosexual couple lawfully marrying each other.
    Simply not true. For a person to be forced to violate the moral principles of their religion is to deny them the right to the free exercise of their religion - which I repeat is guaranteed by the US Constitution.


    It does not take away the baker’s right to freely practice his religion, it takes away his perceived right to discriminate against those he disapproves of. The same would apply to discriminating against an interracial couple in recent times past. The same would apply to the perceived right to discriminate against blacks, as it did under Jim Crow, or Jews or Muslims in the name of God. There is NO place for discrimination under the Civil Rights Act.
    It you say it a million times it will not make it correct. Taking your cues from Donald Trump?

    While sexual-orientation might* be an inherited trait, sexual actions and practices are choices and subject to almost all religious moral codes. There is no discrimination against anyone's sexual orientation. However, what does exist here is the attempt to force a person to violate their religion's moral code as regards certain types of sexual action and thus restrict their right to follow and obey their religions teachings. Specifically, you want to force a man to design and create a symbol of a marriage which sanctions same-sex actions which according to a straight-forward reading of both Old and New testament texts are forbidden.


    There seems to be no problem in bakers making cakes for divorced persons remarrying, which according to Jesus is adultery.
    All bakers? How do you know that? And how do you know this baker does not in fact refuse to make such cakes? He refuses to make Halloween cakes or cakes made from or celebrating alcoholic revelry. I wouldn't be at all surprised if he refused to make cakes for remarrying divorces unless the met the exceptions defined in the Bible. To the point. He refuses to make any cake that violates the moral convictions his religious faith requires. And he serves any customer any product that does not violate those religious convictions. Clearly the issue here is religious conviction, not discrimination - except for those that would like to control his religion and its expression.


    Not so. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 guarantees all citizens equal protection of the laws under the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution and its duty to protect those rights under the Fifteenth Amendment.
    And in this case that protection is being made to directly conflict with the free exercise clause of the 1st Amendment! You don't get to pick and chose which amendments you follow and which ones you can ignore.


    We’re not talking Hitler. The topic is the right to refuse a service to a gay couple seeking to legally marry and this is unconstitutional.
    You are using arguments to dismiss the harm to the baker caused by your position that were used by the guards in the Nazi interment camps to justify their actions.


    Bigotry can never be justified even if done in the name of Jesus.
    To say Adultery is wrong is not bigotry. To say same-sex acts are wrong is not bigotry. To refuse to participate in a ceremony that justifies actions you believe are wrong are not bigotry.

    What is bigotry is to despise another person simply because their religious faith causes them to have different moral standards from your own.



    The rest is snipped! It’s just repetition, with a fair does of Godwin’s Law thrown in for good measure. If you need so many words to try and make your point, then your argument cannot be very strong. And it isn’t.
    No answer for the argument I see ...

    Jim
    My brethren, do not hold your faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ with an attitude of personal favoritism. James 2:1

    If anyone thinks himself to be religious, and yet does not  bridle his tongue but deceives his own heart, this man’s religion is worthless James 1:26

    This you know, my beloved brethren. But everyone must be quick to hear, slow to speak and slow to anger; James 1:19

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    • Originally posted by Sparko View Post
      So governments are never wrong?
      Not according to Rep. Atty Gen. Jeff Sessions, according to him, and apparently your Bible, governments are ordained by God for his purposes. But of course Sessions is an idiot, and governments are often wrong, case in point the anti-christian Trump/republican agenda in general.

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      • Originally posted by Yttrium View Post
        Isn't that actually against the law? I thought that there were some anti-discrimination rules in place that dealt with that kind of thing.
        There are two forces at play - the constitutional freedom both of worship and association and the enacted law that states race is a protected class and cannot be the basis of refusal of service ALONE. BUT there are some instances where even the enacted law has exceptions - private versus public entities and business capacity (a black barber can refuse a white patron - and vice versa - when they lack the skills to perform the service. Yep, this does occasionally still happen especially with older barbers who've never worked on the other race for logistical or other reasons and/or weren't trained in both).

        The Court has been ambivalent about the 1964 CRA from the start - it long recognized that the CRA in fact tramples on constitutional rights. In the last decade, we've seen the beginnings of erosion of the CRA. The Court basically allowed the CRA as a social engineering experiment - one the Court believed would eventually end. I suspect that end has begun - although it will be a long one.

        Once the CRA is gone the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments will do their job alone - losing the CRA doesn't return Jim Crow - that was a violation of the Constitution to begin with (Plessy is an ACTIVIST decision!!!! And CRAP!!!!! And... okay, getting back on track now...). The biggest danger to civil rights is buried in Roe- and I think it too, will fall in the not too distant future.

        Whether or not Carpe's misleading counter example has legal validity is pretty obvious - name a case where a mixed race couple has been unable to obtain service and had to go to court? Yeah, I can't either - despite mixed race marriage being legalized universally over fifty years ago with Brown.
        "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose." - Jim Elliot

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        • Originally posted by One Bad Pig View Post
          Weren't miscegenation laws scrapped as unconstitutional awhile back? If the baker is race x, then he's discriminating against non-x.
          They were. Brown.

          They went down with separate but equal.

          Um, if the baker will make cakes for race x, then this cannot be the case.
          "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose." - Jim Elliot

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          • Originally posted by JimL View Post
            But that wouldn't be equal treatement now, would it?
            The CRA doesn't guarantee that - equal ACCESS, not equal TREATMENT. Equal treatment would mean giving all couples the exact same cake despite their wishes. Everybody gets a happy birthday with blue roses and likes it - no matter what they actually wanted.
            "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose." - Jim Elliot

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            • Originally posted by JimL View Post
              No, they are meant to ensure that people are not discriminated against due to their sexual orientation, the same as they can't be discriminated against for any other reason related to their personal identity.
              Then you are of the opinion that Colorado's commission ERRED when it allowed gay bakers to refuse service to gay marriage opponents, and other bakers to refuse service for messages they deemed inappropriate (racist) - right? The former fits your definition here perfectly - the latter fits the CRA.
              "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose." - Jim Elliot

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              • Originally posted by carpedm9587 View Post
                All it says is "other products." I haven't found anything else.
                Nope, that's not it. Read it again.
                "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose." - Jim Elliot

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                • Originally posted by carpedm9587 View Post
                  In the 1950s, your sentence would have read, "Yet "I'm black" is all that is sufficient to coerce someone into abandoning their religious beliefs"


                  No one is being required to abandon their religious beliefs. They ARE required to provide any service they choose to provide without prejudice, or not provide the service. The baker has a way to follow his conscience/beliefs without engaging in prejudice.
                  The Court never held this back in the day - the Court in fact commented that it WAS trampling on Constitutional rights but felt that the long history of injustice could only be overcome by allowing that. I don't know of any decision where the Court has gone this far off the rails - the problem with CRA and like legislation is that it really DOES violate the Constitution - and the Court has never pretended otherwise. Excused it, yes; pretended it wasn't there, no.
                  "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose." - Jim Elliot

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                  • Originally posted by carpedm9587 View Post
                    I have responded to all of this in previous posts, and showed how these parallels fail.

                    ...
                    No, you haven't. Creed is ALSO protected under the '64 CRA - it's protected both by the Constitution directly (First Amendment) and the CRA specifically. The 'parallels' are in fact valid cases of identical legal standing (arguably stronger legal standing but we'll go with identical). You CANNOT show that they aren't because the law and the Constitution both say you're wrong - and even the Court would snicker at that one.

                    This is why the Court dodges - a lot. It recognizes that it CAN'T apply sauce only to the goose. You may want to, but the Court can't and won't.
                    "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose." - Jim Elliot

                    "Forgiveness is the way of love." Gary Chapman

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                    • Originally posted by Roy View Post
                      True - but one should not conflate them with non-extreme cases in order to promote extreme solutions that aren't justified.
                      Um, Roy, in fact, the CRA protects EXACTLY the sort of crap that Rogue is talking about. That such cases never end up in court is probably a combination of rarity, lawyers who aren't willing to take them on for personal reasons and the rest who don't want losing cases. It's political gamesmanship, not legal precedent, that's fueling the current pro-gay legal fad. Any other ridiculous combination is unlikely to see a courtroom because it would be considered frivolous - as these baker cases are. The Constitution trumps the CRA - always has - but in this case they actually agree. Creed is a protected form.
                      "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose." - Jim Elliot

                      "Forgiveness is the way of love." Gary Chapman

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                      • Originally posted by JimL View Post
                        No, I think you're confusing discrimination law Tea. Any baker refusing to bake such a cake would not be discriminating against the customer, he would be refusing to participate in the customers discrimination against gays in general. Actually I don't think that an "anti-gay marriage cake" makes any sense anyway. What is an anti gay marriage cake? If by that you mean to imply a "same sex marriage cake", then the Homosexual baker, like any other baker, would of course have to make the cake.
                        Jim, no I'm not - this is exactly why the Court ruled AGAINST Colorado - they were unfairly allowing gays to discriminate but not Christians (we're using your terminology here). And whether or not it makes sense, they had been ordered, service was refused, it was brought before the commission and the discrimination was allowed.
                        "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose." - Jim Elliot

                        "Forgiveness is the way of love." Gary Chapman

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                        • Originally posted by Joel View Post
                          It seems arbitrary to me to make such a distinction between buyers and sellers. (Buying and selling are really the same thing, seen from different directions.) If you are going to defend the rights of buyers, then surely you should defend the same right for sellers, which are just buyers when viewed in the other direction.


                          (In case I'm not being clear: If Alice gives Bob a quantity of fish in exchange for a horse, then depending on our choice of point of view, we could say either/both that Alice sells the fish for a horse or buys the horse with fish. And vice versa for Bob. Introducing dollars, as a medium of indirect exchange, doesn't change that. If Alice instead receives dollars from Bob and uses the dollars to buy the horse from Charlie, she's ultimately still buying a horse with fish (or selling fish for a horse). And currency is yet another good that is bought and sold.)
                          I actually agree from the legal standpoint but I will point out that it's the inequality of power that the CRA addresses here (actually, this is exactly why the CRA was passed). If Mary is blackballed from all transactions with any local seller due to the funny way she walks, that arbitrary decision inflicts considerable injury on Mary - the seller's don't need the business of funny walking people nearly as much as funny walking people need to buy goods without added transportation and labor costs.
                          "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose." - Jim Elliot

                          "Forgiveness is the way of love." Gary Chapman

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                          • Originally posted by carpedm9587 View Post
                            So back to "whites only" signs in restaurants and on toilets?

                            And then you wonder why Republicans are regularly accused of racism by the left...?
                            This is bull - the CRA didn't eliminate any of that - Brown did.
                            "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose." - Jim Elliot

                            "Forgiveness is the way of love." Gary Chapman

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                            • Originally posted by carpedm9587 View Post
                              No...they don't.

                              And I still have not seen anyone refute the basic argument that this is a moral position based on genetics.
                              Yes, they do - FYI genetics have ZERO to do with the legal issue. There is no 'if it's genetic, you can do it' tenet of law - a genetically predisposed kleptomaniac is still expected to not steal.

                              Also, there's no 'gay gene' anyway - the science on this is so flimsy that it's not actually argued seriously anymore. Same with 'once gay. always gay' - that's also been undermined by the 'spectrum' theory currently in vogue.
                              "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose." - Jim Elliot

                              "Forgiveness is the way of love." Gary Chapman

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                              • Originally posted by carpedm9587 View Post
                                The supreme court ruled on the basis of the actions of the Colorado agency hearing the case, leaving the door open for the issue to arise again. I agreed with their ruling.

                                But even if they had said, "no - the baker was in the right," I would have disagreed with their ruling, much as you disagree with Roe v. Wade.

                                You're not under the illusion that everything SCOTUS does is "right" or "moral" are you?

                                As for reading minds - no - I don't need to read minds. I am taking the baker at his word.
                                Whoa, what? YOU have been arguing for the right of refusal against other protected forms - creed, religion. You most certainly do NOT agree with the Court's actual finding.
                                "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose." - Jim Elliot

                                "Forgiveness is the way of love." Gary Chapman

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