Indiana's governor signs bill allowing businesses to reject gay customers

[Zymologist]

That's not a comparable situation. American Christians are the powerful majority who can easily find an alternative and are given all sorts of affirmations of their superiority throughout their lives. Of course you would shrug.

So you would defend a business discriminating against me because I'm a Christian? Is discrimination and bigotry only wrong, in your opinion, if it's done to a minority?

Also, I find your second sentence highly exaggerated.

Edit: I wasn't the first one to make the comparison, anyway. I was responding to Starlight's insinuation that we're all hypocrites.

Edit 2: You appear to be saying two things here: first, that it's ok to discriminate against a "powerful majority" (which would make it ok to discriminate against liberals, would it not?); second, that it's ok to discriminate against people who can easily find an alternative (which I'm pretty sure would make all discrimination ok, since it's so easy for people to find alternatives nowadays). Are you sure you want to say that?

[CMD]

That's not a comparable situation. American Christians are the powerful majority who can easily find an alternative and are given all sorts of affirmations of their superiority throughout their lives. Of course you would shrug.

As someone who is not part of this "powerful majority" (I'm a non-theist in a particularly religious area) I would also shrug and just go somewhere else if a business had a problem with me not being Christian.

[KingsGambit]

I wouldn't shop at a store that didn't allow non-Christians. I think many Christians would have such an issue. Such a business would probably not be commercially viable.

[Spartacus]

A friend passed along this link comparing Indiana's RFRA with the federal law:

http://joshblackman.com/blog/2015/03...-indiana-rfra/

The bill is broader than its Federal counterpart in several ways. [1] It explicitly protects the exercise of religion by entities as well as individuals. Its enumeration of entities includes “a corporation”, without limiting this to closely-held companies. [2] The bill’s protections may be invoked when a person’s exercise of religion is “likely” to be substantially burdened by government action, not just when it has been burdened. [3] The bill also permits the assertion of free exercise rights as a claim or defense in judicial or administrative proceedings even if the government is not a party to the proceedings.

[Psychic Missile]

I wouldn't shop at a store that didn't allow non-Christians. I think many Christians would have such an issue. Such a business would probably not be commercially viable.

I think there are plenty of small towns where "No gays" or "No transgenders" signs wouldn't get a local blowback or even challenged at all, at least until a group like the ACLU is tipped off. As a comparison, there are still public schools violating the 1st Amendment's freedom of religion.

[Teallaura]

I wouldn't shop at a store that didn't allow non-Christians. I think many Christians would have such an issue. Such a business would probably not be commercially viable.

It depends. I wouldn't knowingly sell altar furnishings to Satanists so I can see the possibility of special cases. Otherwise it would be an irrational position for a Christian business anyway.

[Teallaura]

I think there are plenty of small towns where "No gays" or "No transgenders" signs wouldn't get a local blowback or even challenged at all, at least until a group like the ACLU is tipped off. As a comparison, there are still public schools violating the 1st Amendment's freedom of religion.

The Warren Court was high when they came up with that nonsense... No public school could establish a religion in Congress' stead.

[KingsGambit]

It depends. I wouldn't knowingly sell altar furnishings to Satanists so I can see the possibility of special cases. Otherwise it would be an irrational position for a Christian business anyway.

I would classify that as sort of an individual case by case thing just like the florists or bakers, and wouldn't object to it. I also wouldn't sell live animals to a Santeria practitioner.

[Psychic Missile]

The Warren Court was high when they came up with that nonsense... No public school could establish a religion in Congress' stead.

That interpretation was established before the Warren Court. It goes all the way back to Jefferson, after all.

[Spartacus]

That interpretation was established before the Warren Court. It goes all the way back to Jefferson, after all.

Jefferson wasn't part of the discussion of the 1st amendment; he was in France at the time, and a private letter (as opposed to any sort of direct executive action) he wrote as president shouldn't be our primary guide for interpreting the 1st amendment, especially when we have the transcripts of the actual congressional debates about the 1st amendment.

[Psychic Missile]

Jefferson wasn't part of the discussion of the 1st amendment; he was in France at the time, and a private letter (as opposed to any sort of direct executive action) he wrote as president shouldn't be our primary guide for interpreting the 1st amendment, especially when we have the transcripts of the actual congressional debates about the 1st amendment.

You should reread my reply and what I was replying to, because your response, even if true, is irrelevant. I mentioned Jefferson to show the interpretation existed at that point.

[Spartacus]

You should reread my reply and what I was replying to, because your response, even if true, is irrelevant. I mentioned Jefferson to show the interpretation existed at that point.

Jefferson's interpretation was, even at the time he wrote it, just one interpretation, and one of the least authoritative interpretations possible, given that he wasn't part of the legislative debates surrounding the first amendment. The Warren court was wrong to lean on Jefferson to justify their interpretation of the establishment clause.

[Psychic Missile]

Jefferson's interpretation was, even at the time he wrote it, just one interpretation, and one of the least authoritative interpretations possible, given that he wasn't part of the legislative debates surrounding the first amendment. The Warren court was wrong to lean on Jefferson to justify their interpretation of the establishment clause.

It wasn't his interpretation. He didn't come up with it and other people espoused it.

[Spartacus]

It wasn't his interpretation. He didn't come up with it and other people espoused it.

Which still doesn't make it authoritative. The Warren court leaned on Jefferson as an authority and tried to extrapolate from that interpretation to a point where they could pretend the founders were monolithic on that point. They were wrong to do so.

The founders were anything but unified on what they thought the relationship between church and state should be. Nonetheless, we can know precisely what they meant-- what they could agree upon-- when they wrote "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion," and it isn't nearly what the modern SCOTUS interpretation of establishment takes it to mean. It certainly doesn't create a right or immunity that can be incorporated via the 14th Amendment. All it does is prevent Congress from making any laws regulating state or local establishments, and a close reading of the language and of the congressional debates proves it.

[Psychic Missile]

Which still doesn't make it authoritative. The Warren court leaned on Jefferson as an authority and tried to extrapolate from that interpretation to a point where they could pretend the founders were monolithic on that point. They were wrong to do so.

The founders were anything but unified on what they thought the relationship between church and state should be. Nonetheless, we can know precisely what they meant-- what they could agree upon-- when they wrote "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion," and it isn't nearly what the modern SCOTUS interpretation of establishment takes it to mean. It certainly doesn't create a right or immunity that can be incorporated via the 14th Amendment. All it does is prevent Congress from making any laws regulating state or local establishments, and a close reading of the language and of the congressional debates proves it.

You make a lot of claims here, and rather than drag this out into the tangent you want it to be, you should take a step back and realize that you are arguing against a position that is unrelated to what I've said. In fact, everything you said could be correct and it would not contradict my original point you took issue with.