Gay Marriage as an attack on Christianity

This is so confused that it is probably not worth attempting to correct, but I will give it a try.Marriage is a civil union that is regulated by state law in ways that cannot conflict with the constitution.A wedding is a ceremony during which marriage vows, which do have legal effect are exchanged, but which also includes a bunch of rituals and celebration.Neither of those things involves the Bible in any way.Your religion may indeed have very strong things to say about marriage. But those things are beside the point of what those couples are doing. They just want a cake memorializing their choice to become a unit under the laws of whatever state they live in. Period. That's all the cake is for. They don't really want the sanction that you want to deny them.Viewed that way, what you want to do is reinterpret their ceremony under your view so that you can refuse to make a cake. That's idiotic. To demonstrate the fact that it is idiotic, we can note that even if the called the cake a civil ceremony cake, you still would not make it regardless of the fact that such a title would complete divorce it from whatever it is you want to call marriage.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

When people don't read the context and follow the argument what happens is posts that are something like a bait-and-switch. We're talking about one thing and then suddenly we're having to deal with something completely different because the same words have been moved into a new context.Mod pointed out that the Oregon couple were having a civil union, not a wedding. I answered that from the bakery's point of view it was presented as a wedding and the whole argument has been about a wedding.Now you seem to be introducing a completely different topic but I'm not really sure what it is.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

So you would have no problem baking a cake for that civil union ceremony? A wedding under state law is, in fact a type of civil union recognized by the state. I don't see any problem with my argument.It is you and not the participants who insist that folks are performing a Biblical ritual which you must actively resist.

What I said to Mod was that I hadn't thought through the situation of a civil union versus a wedding so I don't have an opinion about it. I don't know if there is enough of a difference to make a difference. I'm not and never have been talking about what the customers think they are doing, I'm only talking about the Christian's view of gay marriage.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

In what way is this discrimination at all. How is what you describe different from a pizza parlor deciding not to serve gyro sandwiches?There is one other important distinction I would make. A Christian bakery appears to be a bakery run by Christians rather than a bakery that caters to Christians, so the issue is not one of choice of cuisine but a choice of whom to serve.

It is not a matter of thinking. The customers know exactly what they are doing. They are following state and national law. You are recasting what they are doing based on your own beliefs, prejudices, or whatever into something you can whine about.

I think this topic has been done to death and now old issues that have already been thoroughly answered are just being recycled.But in the parallel discussion that has been going on with Modulous, Tangle and PaulK, Tangle quoted a gay activist in the UK who had been against a Christian bakery in a similar situation to those we are talking about here, and has since changed his mind on the ground that the bakers should have freedom of conscience. I haven't brought that up on this thread though I used to argue it. I think it needs to be brought up now.Tangle quoted the man in his Message 422 and I followed up in Message 434

That's fine. He is entitled to his opinion. But he is not entitled to require other folks to suffer the indignities he himself was not willing to suffer.

No, of course not, far far better that a Christian bakery suffer the indignities and even be put out of business.

You are right. Why do we make white bakeries serve niggers?

Race is not a sexual aberration. I'd happily punch you in the nose for that lie that has been answered dozens of times already. I'd happily get my hand broken for the trouble. I'd happily sit in jail for it.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

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But in the parallel discussion that has been going on with Modulous, Tangle and PaulK, Tangle quoted a gay activist in the UK who had been against a Christian baker

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I am not part of that conversation.

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Race is not a sexual aberration

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And out comes the bigotry.

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I'd happily punch you in the nose for that lie that has been answered dozens of times already.

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But it is not a lie and it hasn't been adequately answered. If you allow "Christians" to ignore anti-discrimination laws on the grounds of "conscience" then you set a precedent. You can't simply insist that the law has to follow your interpretation of the Bible or only endorse discrimination that you approve of.

Sure that's why I said this But there is a distinction in that they don't sell what they don't sell because of a religious belief - not a purely random thing like gyro sandwich, whatever that is. If we wanted to be utterly pigheaded and idiotic we could say that allowing a Jewish butcher to not serve pork because of his belief system in a majority Christian culture is indirect discrimination against Christians. But a Christian would look a total fool for demanding pork from a Jewish butcher. And that's my point. Why do we not think the same about a gay couple asking for a wedding cake with icing sugar models of Charles and Fred on it instead of Charles and Freda from a fundie Christian?There's also the problem that if I as a straight man had asked for a cake for a gay wedding I too would have been refused. The claim then seems to be nearer the non-pork butcher - it's not who they're selling the product to that matters, it's what the product means to the seller. They deny all comers indiscriminately. Ditto with the butcher. He's refusing to serve pork eaters which the law has decided is not a protected group. Or if not decided, then never imagined - for good reason - that they needed to be protected.One reason for that is that no-ones feels harmed by it. If you need pork, go next door. Why would you even think to ask a Jewish butcher for pork? You wouldn't unless you made a mistake, were ignorant of the belief or were out to make a point.I don't know, but I suspect that the majority of the cake-based incidents happened by mistake. Had they known that the baker had such beliefs they wouldn't have asked for the service. The argument is then one of principal, someone feels hurt by the refusal and it all gets very heated.Would the problem go away if all fundie bakers put a crucifix in the window or would that actract the activists still wishing to make their points?Very fine distinctions are now being drawn betwen a wedding cake for a gay wedding that might just be a normal looking wedding cake and a cakes for a wedding with a gay sounding message on it. The only distinction I can find that makes internal sense of this Alice in Wonderland world of religioun is whether the baker knows the purpose to which the cake is being put. If he does he can't make or sell it.It seems that society is able to allow diversity of opinion and belief in some spheres but not others. The most obvious to me being circumcision being allowed by jews but not by mulslims - albeit with radically different harm quotients.Sorry, this got a bit rambling.My main point is still that we risk becoming an increasingly intolerant society if such severe offence is taken on such trivial issues - such as where to buy a cake - such that it ends up in high courts across the globe and reported in international media. To my mind, highly principled stand-offs should be avoided if at all possible. In liberal cultures we need to be careful of such things.Edited by Tangle, : No reason given.

Well hopefully by now you'll have noticed that I'm not discussing individual cases?Individual cases will be decided on their individual merits and it seems to me that all attempts by the cake bakers to defend against the charges will fail in law. As they did with the case Tatchel changed his mind on. Not selling a cake with a supportive gay message or for a gay wedding is discrimination according to the decisions made so far.The more general question of whether it's right to bring these prosecutions at all is what I'm interested in discussing.I'm now finding it interesting that in simply bringing up the question, I'm regarded as the enemy and subjected to a torrent of abuse. While Tatchel's own contrary views, held wrong in law, are apparently valid and pefectly ok. Presumably he was right both when he railed against the baker's refusal and when he changed his mind and supported them? Intellectually sound arguments in both directions? (Personally I think so.)But could it be that the messenger matters more than the message? I dread to mention it again, maybe a little bit of a blind spot? You know, the 'p' word?
Despite your protestations, it's pefectly possible to question or disagree with some actions and still be supportive of the cause. It seems that Tatchell understands this.