Same Sex Marriage Thread - Part III

[INDY500]

Originally Posted by KhanadaRhodes

and regarding the bakery, I basically agree with what most have said: the bakery absolutely should legally be required to provide service to all clients. refusal to do so is discrimination, as the ruling judge said.

Reading the article would illuminate that he was not, and had not, discriminated against gays (he would gladly provide cakes for their birthdays or other celebrations) only their marriage cake was at issue because of his religious beliefs. Furthermore SSM is not even legal in Colorado.

And if you're so enamored with these types of laws should a baker who is Jewish be forced to provide cakes for a Nazi skinhead convention? Should clergy be required to perform SSM's if requested?

[PhilsFan]

Originally Posted by INDY500

Who said the earth was going to open up and swallow the population or whatever you expect to occur in ten years. But we could start with this; even though many people including yourself are sincere about SSM and the want for fairness in marriage, SSM is only one part of a larger agenda to the radical left. That agenda being making sex (gender) inconsequential and meaningless.

That is why any argument that men and women are different must be rejected despite its obviousness to the vast majority of the population. And that is why this is now the law in Massachusetts and California and will proceed after legalization of SSM in other states.

Maybe you're cool with boys in girl's locker-rooms and totalitarian mayors "banning" national companies but some of us have yet to evolve on those issues. And they are a direct result of who is at the vanguard of the SSM movement.

Oh my God. What are you even talking about?

This agenda is made up. Period. None of the rest of your post even remotely points to an agenda. You have no argument. At all.

Originally Posted by INDY500

Reading the article would illuminate that he was not, and had not, discriminated against gays (he would gladly provide cakes for their birthdays or other celebrations) only their marriage cake was at issue because of his religious beliefs. Furthermore SSM is not even legal in Colorado.

"He had not discriminated against gays, except for when he discriminated against gays."

Originally Posted by INDY500

And if you're so enamored with these types of laws should a baker who is Jewish be forced to provide cakes for a Nazi skinhead convention? Should clergy be required to perform SSM's if requested?

How is that the same thing? Nazism is a choice. Homosexuality is not. Jesus Christ.

These are two horrific posts when it comes to, you know, logic.

[ImOuttaControl]

Originally Posted by PhilsFan

How is that the same thing? Nazism is a choice. Homosexuality is not. Jesus Christ.

What about if a Jewish man opened a kosher restaurant and refused to serve pork or anything else unfit for consumption according to Jewish dietary laws? Bad business decision, yes, but he wants to live by his code of right and wrong. Should the government and/or a judge force him to serve it against his religious beliefs? Or should the patron that insists on eating pork just go across the road to the Famous Dave's order some delicious baby back ribs?

[PhilsFan]

Originally Posted by ImOuttaControl

What about if a Jewish man opened a kosher restaurant and refused to serve pork or anything else unfit for consumption according to Jewish dietary laws? Bad business decision, yes, but he wants to live by his code of right and wrong. Should the government and/or a judge force him to serve it against his religious beliefs? Or should the patron that insists on eating pork just go across the road to the Famous Dave's order some delicious baby back ribs?

What are you talking about? The government didn't force anyone to serve anything they don't already serve. The government is just saying you can't pick and choose your customers based on discrimination.

[ImOuttaControl]

Originally Posted by PhilsFan

What are you talking about? The government didn't force anyone to serve anything they don't already serve. The government is just saying you can't pick and choose your customers based on discrimination.

I know the 1st Amendment is a pretty big deal, and the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution declares that in cases when federal and state law clash, the Constitution always is supreme. I have a feeling that this case will end up before the Supreme Court at some point.

[PhilsFan]

... Are you conceding that point and moving on to another one? I sincerely haven't a clue what you're on about.

[Irvine511]

Originally Posted by INDY500

Who said the earth was going to open up and swallow the population or whatever you expect to occur in ten years. But we could start with this; even though many people including yourself are sincere about SSM and the want for fairness in marriage, SSM is only one part of a larger agenda to the radical left. That agenda being making sex (gender) inconsequential and meaningless.

That is why any argument that men and women are different must be rejected despite its obviousness to the vast majority of the population. And that is why this is now the law in Massachusetts and California and will proceed after legalization of SSM in other states.

Transgender Access to Public School Bathrooms Now Required in MA by Commissioner - Massachusetts Family Institute


And of course who can forget this from Massachusetts two years ago:



Maybe you're cool with boys in girl's locker-rooms and totalitarian mayors "banning" national companies but some of us have yet to evolve on those issues. And they are a direct result of who is at the vanguard of the SSM movement.

well, at least you aren't blaming me for black poverty anymore.

but i'm confused -- do you think i'm transgendered?

[Irvine511]

Originally Posted by INDY500

Reading the article would illuminate that he was not, and had not, discriminated against gays (he would gladly provide cakes for their birthdays or other celebrations) only their marriage cake was at issue because of his religious beliefs. Furthermore SSM is not even legal in Colorado.

And if you're so enamored with these types of laws should a baker who is Jewish be forced to provide cakes for a Nazi skinhead convention? Should clergy be required to perform SSM's if requested?

Originally Posted by ImOuttaControl

What about if a Jewish man opened a kosher restaurant and refused to serve pork or anything else unfit for consumption according to Jewish dietary laws? Bad business decision, yes, but he wants to live by his code of right and wrong. Should the government and/or a judge force him to serve it against his religious beliefs? Or should the patron that insists on eating pork just go across the road to the Famous Dave's order some delicious baby back ribs?

so, for real: do you guys not understand how anti-discrimination laws work?

[Pearl]

Originally Posted by ImOuttaControl

What about if a Jewish man opened a kosher restaurant and refused to serve pork or anything else unfit for consumption according to Jewish dietary laws? Bad business decision, yes, but he wants to live by his code of right and wrong. Should the government and/or a judge force him to serve it against his religious beliefs? Or should the patron that insists on eating pork just go across the road to the Famous Dave's order some delicious baby back ribs?

The difference here is that the baker was refusing to make and sell food to one certain group. A Jewish man who opens a kosher restaurant is simply refusing to sell one certain food item to all groups. By what you're saying, anyone who opens a vegetarian restaurant is discriminating against meat eaters.

[Irvine511]

Originally Posted by INDY500

Reading the article would illuminate that he was not, and had not, discriminated against gays (he would gladly provide cakes for their birthdays or other celebrations) only their marriage cake was at issue because of his religious beliefs. Furthermore SSM is not even legal in Colorado.

And if you're so enamored with these types of laws should a baker who is Jewish be forced to provide cakes for a Nazi skinhead convention? Should clergy be required to perform SSM's if requested?

well, here's what the judge said about the Nazi comparison:

"Respondents argue that if they are compelled to make a cake for a same-sex wedding, then a black baker could not refuse to make a cake bearing a white-supremacist message for a member of the Aryan Nation; and an Islamic baker could not refuse to make a cake denigrating the Koran for the Westboro Baptist Church. However, neither of these fanciful hypothetical situations proves Respondents’ point. In both cases, it is the explicit, unmistakable, offensive message that the bakers are asked to put on the cake that gives rise to the bakers’ free speech right to refuse. That, however, is not the case here, where Respodnents refused to bake any cake for Complainants regardless of what was written on it or what it looked like. Respondents have no free speech right to refuse because they were only asked to bake a cake, not make a speech."

i will say that i think this is the first time in this thread that gays have been compared to Nazis. so good on you for that.

but let's take this wild, irresponsible comparison, only in the other direction.

should the baker be able to fire an employee for being gay? should a baker be able to beat his wife if she has an affair because the Bible tells him it's okay? is it okay for you to refuse to rent a hotel room to me and Memphis? do the religious get to pick and choose the laws they obey because they answer only to a higher power? should we acquit people who murder others engaging in deemed sinful behavior because the wages of sin are death and those sinners, by choosing to sin, have in effect chosen death, so the responsibility lies with the sinners?

it's happened.

talk about your slippery slopes.

in the public sphere everybody is equal before the law. that means, i have the right to service you volunteered to provide to the public at large.

the regulation of commerce is not a violation of free speech or religious expression.

just ask the people who wanted to sit at the Woolworth's lunch counter.

[Galeongirl]

Originally Posted by INDY500

Who said the earth was going to open up and swallow the population or whatever you expect to occur in ten years. But we could start with this; even though many people including yourself are sincere about SSM and the want for fairness in marriage, SSM is only one part of a larger agenda to the radical left. That agenda being making sex (gender) inconsequential and meaningless.

That is why any argument that men and women are different must be rejected despite its obviousness to the vast majority of the population. And that is why this is now the law in Massachusetts and California and will proceed after legalization of SSM in other states.

Transgender Access to Public School Bathrooms Now Required in MA by Commissioner - Massachusetts Family Institute


And of course who can forget this from Massachusetts two years ago:



Maybe you're cool with boys in girl's locker-rooms and totalitarian mayors "banning" national companies but some of us have yet to evolve on those issues. And they are a direct result of who is at the vanguard of the SSM movement.

Ehh, what does SSM have to do with transgender kids?


And SSM is not part of any specific political agenda or whatnot. It goes much further than political parties or taking sides, it's a matter of discrimination.

Originally Posted by ImOuttaControl

What about if a Jewish man opened a kosher restaurant and refused to serve pork or anything else unfit for consumption according to Jewish dietary laws? Bad business decision, yes, but he wants to live by his code of right and wrong. Should the government and/or a judge force him to serve it against his religious beliefs? Or should the patron that insists on eating pork just go across the road to the Famous Dave's order some delicious baby back ribs?

Eh, that's not discriminating anything, except the pigs maybe. I don't get the comparison. If a restaurant owner doesn't want to serve pork, he doesn't serve pork. He can serve whatever he wants, but he cannot discriminate between customers. If he doesn't want to serve black people or gays, he's discriminating against other human beings and therefore acting against the law. Imagine the outrage if a restaurant refused to serve black people..

[PhilsFan]

It's a narrative tool. Keep changing "civil rights" to "political agenda."

[LJT]

The transgender complaint is a bit off too. As far as I am aware female loos tend to be all cubicles and of those transgender people I know they are not exactly going to wander through a locker room naked but remain behind a curtain or a cubicle, unless you equate transgender people with sexual predators sneaking into toilets. Though at least in the UK, they are more likely to be the victim of a sexual assault than the rest of the general population.

How meaningful is your sex to anything, other than reproduction? Gender is different to your biological sex and the purpose of us on the left is not that it is meaningless or inconsequential, why else would transgender people get so rightfully upset at people treating them like shit for feeling like a different gender to their sex? Gender remains an important part of our identities hence the offence at those that belittle it.

Anyway as others have said this is bugger all to do with SSM and gender.

[digitize]

To play the devil's advocate a bit:

If you accept the premise that a family with a husband, wife, and kids is an ideal to be desired in America, as the best way of raising kids to inherit the country, SSM can fit into a wider narrative. Being pro-SSM is just one view of many that removes the aforementioned view of a family from its pedestal, from its position of being the core institution around which society should revolve. In a view where men and women are biologically assigned, generally speaking, somewhat different personality traits, and it is their duty to work together to unite those traits and raise a family (or their duty to themselves, or to God, to unite those traits as an ideal way to live even without children), acceptance of SSM, like normalization of being transgendered, can seem part of a wider narrative that makes what should be deemed sacred less so.

I don't agree with this, but, taking INDY's premises, I can see how there is a narrative here at work beyond that of human rights.

[anitram]

Originally Posted by digitize

I don't agree with this, but, taking INDY's premises, I can see how there is a narrative here at work beyond that of human rights.

What I find interesting is the hypocrisy of actions coming out of that narrative. If you think the family is the ideal, why spend your time and legislative efforts to ban SSM (which seeks to create families, albeit not of the hetero variety) instead of banning divorce? Or banning single motherhood - should it be okay to be sexually active when not married, should fertility clinics treat single women, should sperm banks dispense sperm to single women, etc? Or criminalizing deadbeat dads?

The truth of the matter is that it is only SSM that brings out the sort of passion and vitriol from many of the fans of the "narrative", thus suggesting there is a lot more at play here than the relatively simple ideal which you described.

[Irvine511]

Originally Posted by digitize

If you accept the premise that a family with a husband, wife, and kids is an ideal to be desired in America, as the best way of raising kids to inherit the country, SSM can fit into a wider narrative. Being pro-SSM is just one view of many that removes the aforementioned view of a family from its pedestal, from its position of being the core institution around which society should revolve. In a view where men and women are biologically assigned, generally speaking, somewhat different personality traits, and it is their duty to work together to unite those traits and raise a family (or their duty to themselves, or to God, to unite those traits as an ideal way to live even without children), acceptance of SSM, like normalization of being transgendered, can seem part of a wider narrative that makes what should be deemed sacred less so.

so we need to deliberately target gay people for discrimination in order to promote an ideal?

the denial of civil marriage rights to gay people accomplishes none of these goals.

[PhilsFan]

All this seems to go back to a fear that we're gonna put young boys in dresses or something. Same sex marriage, this "gender role" panic, transgender restroom controversies ... conservatives think the endgame is the feminizing of young boys. That's the fear.

[the iron horse]

This is part of what Irvine511 posted of the judge's ruling:
"Respondents have no free speech right to refuse because they were only asked to bake a cake, not make a speech."

I think the judge is wrong.

Is art considered free speech?

I have heard freedom of speech related to free expression of art all my life. All of us here have.

Indy500 posted that Mr. Phillips, the baker was ready to bake the couple cakes, muffins, cookies, or whatever.

It was when they specified what the cake was for and they wanted the plastic figures on top of the cake to be the same gender, that is when Phillips kindly told them that because of religious convictions he could not bake the cake.

Masterpiece Cakeshop is the name of his bakery and he has always considered his creations works of art. I think all of us here have also heard decorated edible food as works of art.

The couple instead of simply going up the street to another bakery(there are dozens in the city) were in a lawyer's office within an hour.

[BVS]

Originally Posted by the iron horse

I think the judge is wrong.

You also thought the definition of marriage has never changed. Should we really trust your knowledge of the law?

[the iron horse]

Originally Posted by BVS

You also thought the definition of marriage has never changed. Should we really trust your knowledge of the law?

I stand by my statement. I meant that the traditional view of marriage as being between persons of the opposite sex has been a long held understanding
throughout history.

I replied to your question.

Now could you reply to my question about art being a free expression of art and your thought on edible creative foods being an expression of art?

Thank you