Muslim bakers don't want to bake wedding cakes for gays, either. http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/apr/5/video-puts-muslim-bakeries-florists-in-gay-rights-/
They're not participating in a Muslim ceremony, they're baking a fucking cake. While I know nothing about Muslim ceremonies I very much doubt the baker gives away the bride. If your business is to bake cakes then bake the fucking cake.
They view baking the cake, the symbols on the cake, etc., as participation. Who are you to decide if it is participation or not?
You probably can open up a bakery and not make it available to Democrats (I don't know how you'd usefully define "liberals"). As far as I'm aware, neither Democrats nor Republicans are protected classes anywhere in the country. Again, there's no law specifically prohibiting Nazis or KKK members from bakeries. Bakeries and businesses by default can discriminate. Just not against protected classes, which aren't selected arbitrarily. Protected classes are groups that have been unfairly and unreasonably disadvantaged in society and, if such prejudices were allowed to be normalized in society, would lead to those groups being marginalized. Blacks aren't the only ones who meet that (and the federally protected classes include much more than just black people). The "agenda" is protecting groups who have experienced a society inimical to them, despite not being harmful to others.
Like I said earlier in this thread, if they don't have the symbols in stock tell the customer that, offer to bake the cake without them and the customer can add whatever symbols they want. But refusing to do business with someone based on their religion is against what this country is about.
You'd think it would be that easy but obviously from this long thread it isn't! The reason I mention never seeing it is because (and Denny is getting what I'm asking) when you use the religious conviction argument to deny gay people services but don't use those convictions to deny another religion services the argument falls apart. It's has to be an all or nothing kind of deal to have any credibility as a real reason, see what I mean?
I see what you mean. But their response (and Denny's, apparently) would be, "Who are you to tell us how to practice our religion?" Once you start enshrining "religious reasons" as inviolate, you can pretty much use any standard you want. I do wonder--Denny seems to agree that black people ("former negro slaves") should be a protected class. So what happens if someone doesn't want to serve black people "for religious reasons?" Who are you, Denny, to tell them how to exercise their Constitutionally guaranteed right to practice their religion?
That's very reasonable and it would be easy for most of us to do that... but there's a lot of passion behind religious convictions and I can see why a business owner would feel their 1st amendment rights are being stepped on.
Still going on about persecuted Nazis. Please tell me how many people were murdered under the rainbow flag.
You're inventing a right and denying the bakers their 1st amendment right to exercise their religion. The bakeries do not discriminate. They bake cakes for gay people all the time. They don't want to bake "Wedding Cakes" for the same reason a Jewish bakery shouldn't be forced to make a wedding cake adorned with swastikas. That's the distinction. Gays are not a protected group, but you keep making an argument as if they were. The state already has laws against discrimination against gays for housing, hiring, etc. Forcing bakers to participate in a ceremony that's in opposition to their faith is over the top.
Straw man, and not on topic. I am asking about the legal requirements you want to impose on people of faith that is counter to their faith. I bring up whether a Jewish baker should have to bake a wedding cake for Nazis and you seem stupefied by it. The question is meant to get you to realize either the hypocrisy of your demands or the consequences.
They are--you said it yourself here: They just aren't a federally protected class. They're a protected class in many states. We'll have to agree to disagree, both on whether it's "participation" and whether it's over the top.
Freely exercising one's religion is what this country is about. Separation of Church and State, too. Yet you want to get the government involved in peoples' religious views.
Yes, you quoted the federal classifications. I already told you that they're not protected by federal law about protected classes. You should really just learn from what I tell you, it'll save you Wikipedia search time.
Please understand that I revile the bakers who won't bake the cake, and religion in general. I can see how a gay baker wouldn't want to make a wedding cake for people of religion who are bigots against gay people.
I know I'm going semi OT here but the subject is very interesting and it got me to thinking where you would or could draw the line. What if you owned a Christian/Muslim book store and had a Satanist come in to buy Bibles/Korans? You know that they are going to be defiled... can you refuse services?
I never said they were federally classified as protected. I've said the opposite. Quite a few times. You just haven't been reading in your desire to ask about Nazis.
