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Supreme Court Seems Ready to Back Web Designer Opposed to Same-Sex Marriage (Article)

It's. Providing. A. Service. There is no speech involved in baking a generic wedding cake for a gay couple, yet the baker refused. Again - he claimed that act of making a wedding cake for a gay couple was a violation of his religious views. This ain't hard.

No I agree if the cake was generic with no recognizable words or symbols on it then he should have provided it.
 
For discussion purposes, let's change the scenario a little bit. Let's say Ye wanted the web designer to create a site that was plainly anti-Semitic. Should the web designer be able to refuse?

But:
1) this isn’t a good comparison, no one has asked her to design a site that she refused to do for reasons - this was a preemptive lawsuit filed by her
2) you’re offering a free speech scenario, this case is on religious grounds. Separate conditions apply.
 
You're really off the beam here. He refused to bake ANY wedding cake for them. He had sheet cakes and layer cakes in the cases that he offered them. Ever been to a wedding where the cake was a sheet cake? They wanted a WEDDING CAKE so, yes, he refused to serve them. Period. Your idea of "service" is a bit odd...."No, I won't sell you what you want but you can buy anything in the bargain bin over there".

If the wedding cake has no message on it...no little people on top...no indication of who is getting married...a cake that he would make for a hetero couple with no questions asked, why wouldn't he make that SAME CAKE for these people? That's what he refused to do. He claims the act of making a wedding cake for a gay couple - even one with no message at all - violates his religious beliefs. His claim is that the cake itself is a message.
“I didn’t want to use my artistic talents to create something that went against my Christian faith,” he said in an interview with CNN last year, noting that he has also declined to make cakes to celebrate Halloween.

In 2012, David Mullins and Charlie Craig asked Phillips to bake a cake to celebrate their planned wedding, which would be performed in another state. Phillips said he couldn’t create the product they were looking for without violating his faith.

“The Bible says, ‘In the beginning there was male and female,’” Phillips said.

He offered to make any other baked goods for the men. “At which point they both stormed out and left,” he said.


He would have declined the request to make a same sex wedding cake from a straight person as well. He declined to make a Halloween cake in the past for the same reasons.

Bigots like the baker are a pox on society, but they still have rights. IMO, they should not be forced to use their creative energies for anything they don't want to. A bigger question is why would a gay couple want a bigot like this to make their cake? It's obviously not about their wedding but to make a societal point. By doing so I think they hurt the cause more than help it.
 
LOL...basically yes...and if a pattern of behavior is established demonstrating that she refuses to do work for any candidate because that candidate is black, she can be sued and she will lose. How do you think that's different from refusing to rent to black people because they are black?
Because renting isn't creating something unique. If she refused to sell a sign that was already created for general sale it would be unlawful.
 
Huh? That just means the govt can't directly regulate it. A private business has no such restriction.

Do you people not understand how this works?
Which means a private business/person can't be forced to create a message.
 
Huh? That just means the govt can't directly regulate it. A private business has no such restriction.

Do you people not understand how this works?
"You people" ? Racist.

I understand 1A.

Once again, who gets to decide what hate speech is? You used that as the standard for being able to reject doing business with someone.

The government in Colorado is trying to force a private business to promote speech the business disagrees with. That's regulating free speech.

This case is about conflicting constitutional rights.
 
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At a basic level: where’s Ms. Smith’s standing in this suit? She hasn’t begun the business but wants the court’s permission to refuse future hypothetical business from gay couples?

No question which way this court will rule. It’s already been decided.
This is what should scare Americans. The Federalists went looking for this case. They want to create law from the bench.
 
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Which means a private business/person can't be forced to create a message.
Good lord…baking a f’n wedding cake does NOT represent a “message”. And if your business is baking f’n wedding cakes you can NOT refuse to serve a protected class while providing that service to everyone else. If your business is creating wedding web sites, you can NOT refuse to serve a protected class while providing those same services to everyone else. You can’t refuse on racial grounds. You can’t refuse on religious grounds. You can’t refuse on gender grounds. That’s why they are called “protected”.
 
Do you think you have a ‘right’ to compel anyone to perform a service for you?
I thought the 13th amendment was created to quash that notion.
If their public accommodation business is predicated on providing that service and you are being refused service solely because of your protected class status…yes, you have a right under the law to compel them to provide that service. Do you honestly think otherwise?
 
Good lord…baking a f’n wedding cake does NOT represent a “message”. And if your business is baking f’n wedding cakes you can NOT refuse to serve a protected class while providing that service to everyone else. If your business is creating wedding web sites, you can NOT refuse to serve a protected class while providing those same services to everyone else. You can’t refuse on racial grounds. You can’t refuse on religious grounds. You can’t refuse on gender grounds. That’s why they are called “protected”.
Didn’t the SCOTUS rule that a baker could refuse to bake a cake to a “protected class”?
 
If their public accommodation business is predicated on providing that service and you are being refused service solely because of your protected class status…yes, you have a right under the law to compel them to provide that service. Do you honestly think otherwise?
Yes. I think the notion behind ‘public accommodation’ negates the rights and agency of the person willing to trade a service with whomever they want.
I don’t think of any other person as a ‘public good’ to which I’m entitled in any sense.
My opinion, not the law.
 
"You people" ? Racist.

I understand 1A.

Once again, who gets to decide what hate speech is? You used that as the standard for being able to reject doing business with someone.

The government in Colorado is trying to force a private business to promote speech the business disagrees with. That's regulating free speech.

This case is about conflicting constitutional rights.
SMH. The business owner gets to decide. Anti-Semitics - in case you didn’t get the memo - aren’t a protected class. Nor are Nazis. Nor are the Klan. Why is this so hard for you people to understand? To recognize to whom I’m referring, look up.
 
Yes. I think the notion behind ‘public accommodation’ negates the rights and agency of the person willing to trade a service with whomever they want.
I don’t think of any other person as a ‘public good’ to which I’m entitled in any sense.
My opinion, not the law.
I’m struggling to make sense of that opinion. You agree they can’t refuse service to a protected class? But you don’t think YOU’RE entitled to their service?
 
What was it then? It was a Colorado baker who refused to bake a cake for a gay wedding. The court ruled 7-2 in that case.
The court booted it back to Colorado based on animosity and bias supposedly displayed by the commission toward the baker. They made no determination as to the actual case. That’s why we’re back there now.
 
I’m struggling to make sense of that opinion. You agree they can’t refuse service to a protected class? But you don’t think YOU’RE entitled to their service?
I think we agree with what the law says, and the court says about the law.

But I disagree with the reasoning underpinning what you called “a right under the law.”

Turn it to another subject. We both probably agree what the Supreme Court ruled is your right under the law to have an abortion. Agreeing what the ruling is isn’t agreeing with the ruling itself.

I think a law that dictates a person must provide services to a “protected class” violates that servicer’s rights to freedom of association.

I’d further disagree with the notion of “protected classes” having different rights, but that’s a wholly separate discussion.

"It is often asserted that the world has made a great deal of progress since 1776, that we have had new thoughts and new experiences which have given us a great advance of the people of that day, and that we may therefore very well discard their conclusions for something more modern. But that reasoning cannot be applied to [the Declaration of Independence]. If all men are created equal, that is final. If they are endowed with inalienable rights, that is final. If governments derive their just power from the consent of the governed, that is final. No advance, no progress can be made beyond these propositions. If anyone wishes to deny their truth and their soundness, the only direction in which he can proceed historically is not forward, but backward toward the time when there was not equality, not rights of the individual, no rule of the people. Those who wish to proceed in that direction cannot lay claim to progress. They are reactionary."
-Calvin Coolidge
 
Good lord…baking a f’n wedding cake does NOT represent a “message”. And if your business is baking f’n wedding cakes you can NOT refuse to serve a protected class while providing that service to everyone else. If your business is creating wedding web sites, you can NOT refuse to serve a protected class while providing those same services to everyone else. You can’t refuse on racial grounds. You can’t refuse on religious grounds. You can’t refuse on gender grounds. That’s why they are called “protected”.
Of course it does. Otherwise what is the point of a wedding cake vs any other cake? GTFOWTS.
 
SMH. The business owner gets to decide. Anti-Semitics - in case you didn’t get the memo - aren’t a protected class. Nor are Nazis. Nor are the Klan. Why is this so hard for you people to understand? To recognize to whom I’m referring, look up.
LOL. Except when they decide not to make a cake or sign.
 
I’d further disagree with the notion of “protected classes” having different rights, but that’s a wholly separate discussion.
Different rights? What “different rights”? Being part of a protected class means you have exactly the same right to service as everyone else. Why? Because these classes have routinely and egregiously been denied their rights in the past. When “all men are created equal” does become the reality, there won’t be the need. No offense to Silent Cal, but the Declaration isn’t a governing document. It’s aspirational and we’re nowhere close to its stated truths. They aren’t “final” still.
 
Of course it does. Otherwise what is the point of a wedding cake vs any other cake? GTFOWTS.
It’s. A. Cake. Nothing. More.

Explain please. How does providing a wedding cake with fancy icing differ from providing a birthday cake with fancy icing? There was no “message” requested on the cake. There was no Adam & Steve topper requested. Just a specific style of cake.
 
Different rights? What “different rights”? Being part of a protected class means you have exactly the same right to service as everyone else.
Do you have the same right to be denied service as anyone else?
Freedom of association has to be a two way street, or it's compulsory.

No offense to Silent Cal, but the Declaration isn’t a governing document. It’s aspirational and we’re nowhere close to its stated truths. They aren’t “final” still.
I'd agree the efforts of reactionaries to create and maintain caste systems seems never ending.
But I tend to find myself in Silent Cal's company.

The government of the United States is a device for maintaining in perpetuity the rights of the people, with the ultimate extinction of all privileged classes.
-Calvin Coolidge
 
Do you have the same right to be denied service as anyone else?
Freedom of association has to be a two way street, or it's compulsory.


I'd agree the efforts of reactionaries to create and maintain caste systems seems never ending.
But I tend to find myself in Silent Cal's company.

The government of the United States is a device for maintaining in perpetuity the rights of the people, with the ultimate extinction of all privileged classes.
-Calvin Coolidge
You’re all over the map here. The govt disallows the creation of privileged classes - which you applaud - by protecting specific classes from discrimination - and you boo. Weird.
 
It’s. A. Cake. Nothing. More.
This part I agree wholeheartedly on… Someone doesn’t want to make a cake for someone? Fine whatever, don’t bake a cake. Someone won’t bake a cake for you? Fine, whatever, go somewhere else.
giphy.gif
 
The govt creates privileged classes by protecting specific classes from discrimination
FTFY

I think I should be able to tell you I don't want to associate with you, whether the government thinks you're a regular citizen, or whatever privileged/protected classes you want to create.

Can you answer this question:
Does freedom of association require mutual consent?
 
FTFY

I think I should be able to tell you I don't want to associate with you, whether the government thinks you're a regular citizen, or whatever privileged/protected classes you want to create.

Can you answer this question:
Does freedom of association require mutual consent?
You form an association voluntarily with the public when you open a business. That means you serve THE PUBLIC. You don’t get to discriminate against a protected class. Are you seriously suggesting that businesses should be allowed to refuse to serve black people?
 
This part I agree wholeheartedly on… Someone doesn’t want to make a cake for someone? Fine whatever, don’t bake a cake. Someone won’t bake a cake for you? Fine, whatever, go somewhere else.
giphy.gif
Someone refuses to serve you food because you’re black? Fine? Whatever? Go somewhere else? You sure that’s what you wanted to say?

Can governments play? You can’t vote here, go somewhere else? smh I suppose we could bring back separate water fountains, too. Let’s just roll back 70 years of progress on civil rights.
 
Someone refuses to serve you food because you’re black? Fine? Whatever? Go somewhere else? You sure that’s what you wanted to say?

Can governments play? You can’t vote here, go somewhere else? smh I suppose we could bring back separate water fountains, too. Let’s just roll back 70 years of progress on civil rights.
That’s not what this was. And like you said… It’s. A. Cake. Nothing. More.
 
It’s. A. Cake. Nothing. More.

Explain please. How does providing a wedding cake with fancy icing differ from providing a birthday cake with fancy icing? There was no “message” requested on the cake. There was no Adam & Steve topper requested. Just a specific style of cake.
A wedding is different than a birthday. C'Mon, you know this. And the baker would not have made a wedding cake for a same sex marriage if a straight person was requesting it either.
 
A wedding is different than a birthday. C'Mon, you know this. And the baker would not have made a wedding cake for a same sex marriage if a straight person was requesting it either.
At least Tarheel, unlike most others, is making what is probably the best argument in these cases -ie, that in these contexts it is not reasonable to construe the purchased speech of the customer as speech of the baker-seller. It's a perfectly cromulent argument, and stronger than the "everyone has to serve everyone" broadside.

But hey, enough of this already. Time to start obsessing about Moore v Harper, about which I'm sure tarheel has some views.
 
Someone refuses to serve you food because you’re black? Fine? Whatever? Go somewhere else? You sure that’s what you wanted to say?

Can governments play? You can’t vote here, go somewhere else? smh I suppose we could bring back separate water fountains, too. Let’s just roll back 70 years of progress on civil rights.
You continue to conflate different things. Refusing to serve someone in a protected class is discrimination and illegal. Refusing to create a message that one disagrees with is not. If the baker refused to make a same sex wedding cake that a black straight couple wanted to buy for their friend/family it is not discrimination because they are black.
 
What religion would she be claiming that is part of their creed? I am not aware of any that would be recognized as a valid constitutional argument.
Religion was often used to justify Jim Crow Laws and segregation.

According to segregationist readings of the Bible, black people were inferior to white people, cursed by God and naturally suited to manual labor. Requiring white employers to hire black people would violate these sincerely held religious convictions and threatened once again to destroy the settled racial order of the nation.

 
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SMH. The business owner gets to decide. Anti-Semitics - in case you didn’t get the memo - aren’t a protected class. Nor are Nazis. Nor are the Klan. Why is this so hard for you people to understand? To recognize to whom I’m referring, look up.
You are missing the point. The web designer isn't refusing to create a generic website. The web designer is refusing to create a website with a theme she objects to.

"You people" again. Racist. Look it up.
 
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