Gay Marriage as an attack on Christianity

To be more precise, they pointed out that the state failed to show a legitimate interest in denying the advantages and obligations of marriage to same sex couples, and that the only conclusion the court could reach is that the denial is based on an irrational animosity toward a certain group.Being singled out for unfair treatment because of animosity and not because of a legitimate state interest is against everyone's civil rights.In fact, the court also decided that Philips of Masterpiece Cakeshop received unfair treatment due to animosity rather then legitimate state interest, so it kind of protects everyone.

But the First Amendment prohibits the state from using that as a reason for any policy. Hence, no legitimate state interest.

Thought experiment:Colorado law also prohibits discrimination based on religion.Suppose a baker is willing to bake a wedding cake for Christian weddings but not for Jewish weddings?Is that illegal under Colorado law? Or can the baker claim a First Amendment protection against being compelled to express support for a religious wedding he does not recognize as valid?

I'm pretty sure that it's a standard reading of the First Amendment and I suspect that even a lot of conservatives would disagree with you here.

Well, you see, here's the thing: it is not the government's place to determine what is or is not a "biblical ordinance." The First Amendment requires the government to treat all religions and all relgious beliefs on the same basis -- again, not a twisted interpretation but a pretty standard understanding.If your standard conservative Protestant can use their religious beliefs to refuse to serve a same sex couple, then an anti-Semitic Christian can use their beliefs to refuse service to a Jewish couple, and a follower of the Christian Identity movement can use their religious beliefs to refuse service to an interracial couple. The government is not allowed to determine which religious beliefs are correct or justified. The government can only treat them the same and allow all these people to discriminate or to allow none of them to discriminate.

Even if that were the case, you do realize that only a minority of Americans today accept what you consider to be the "correct tenets" of the Christian faith, don't you?It would certainly be an odd sort of democratic republic if the citizens based their constitutional principles on a foundation in which the majority did not believe.

The Constitution does not protect Islam or Roman Catholicism. It protects the rights of individual Muslims and Catholics to believe and worship as they will -- an important distinction, in my opinion. And the Constitution definitely does not grant anyone the right to stab people with swords or to put anyone through an auto-da-f.Come to think of it, it protects Jack Phillips' right to believe that same sex marriage is wrong but doesn't grant him the right to violate the civil rights of same sex couples.In fact, vigorous protection of people's First Amendment rights is what prevents things like the Inquisition from happening. If the Roman Catholics ever can institute an inquisition, it would be because conservative Protestants would have already weakened First Amendment protections.

Huh. Many decades ago I was a Baptist, and this certainly describes Baptists. And the Religious Right in general.- Are you talking about the Middle East or Indonesia? 'Cause here in the US, where our Constitutional laws apply, Muslims don't have "areas." And Muslims have the same right as Jews to enter into personal contracts with each other consistent with their religious codes, and it's possible that state and municipal agencies may give the same consideration to the beliefs of Muslims as they do to Jews and Amish and such.But in all cases, no contract or special consideration can violate the ordinary secular law, including the US or state constitutions.Fun fact: if a Muslim bakers gets to refuse to bake a wedding cake for a same sex couple, it won't be because they live in an "area" where Sharia is protected; it'll be because they live in a state that hasn't added "sexual orientation" to their anti-discrimination statute.- Already? In a previous post (Message 1092) you stated: As you rightly point out, all sorts of people all over the place have always criticized this or that part of the Constitution or even the whole thing. I don't really see a worrisome trend here just because some Jesuit somewhere said something.

This week's issue of The Nation has published an opinion column by a reporter, Sarah Posner.She's less optimistic about the implications of the Masterpiece Cakeshop ruling. She fears that Justice Kennedy is prepared to open a "religious exception" to anti-discrimination laws.Personally, I think Posner is misreading the decisions and seems to not have gotten the point made by Justices Kagan and Breyer.Nonetheless, it could very well be that Kennedy himself is on the fence here and might end up swinging either way if and when a more definitive case comes before the court. I mildly surprised if he would rule in favor of a religious exemption in a similar case as this, but I admit I wouldn't be very, very surprised.

The individual's belief is a matter of right, and, in fact, this decision in this case we're talking about right here, Masterpiece Cakeshop, shows that belief is a protected right; it's so protected that it's not allowed to use belief to decide whether an action should be legal or illegal.An action can be illegal in the US only after considering how the action itself affects the parties involved, not the religious beliefs of the participants. The Supreme Court here ruled in favor of Jack Phillips because there is a reasonable suspicion that the lower court was basing its decision on its opinion of Phillips' belief not solely on how compelling him to create a wedding cake or not creating a wedding cake will affect Phillips on one hand and Craig and Mullins on the other in there free exercise of their civil rights.-Once a person moves from belief to action, that's when the state can take action. That's was happened in Obergefl. It had nothing to do with whether certain beliefs about marriage were reasonable or offensive. It was about how the actual laws denying same sex couples affected the citizens of the state. It turns out that the benefits to the general public of the state (and actually, there were no benefits whatsoever, or almost none) did not outweigh the harm it was doing to the same sex couples.- In a few decades? How about starting centuries ago? In the US, there have always been people who advocated and even engaged in violence to enact their beliefs. Protestants, Mormons, white supremacists, Anarchists, and so on.How did we deal with this in the past? Not be generally suspending Constitutional norms. In some cases, we were able to successfully use the usual methods of law enforcement to catch the perpetrators before they were able to put their plans of violent action into effect; a few others were regrettably able to carry out their acts of violence, but ordinary law enforcement was able to catch the perpetrators and bring them to justice or, at the very least, force them to live long periods underground, running from the law, showing that whatever ordinary citizens believe, they cannot act with impunity.In fact, the group that was the most successful in carrying out their violent beliefs into action were the white supremacists. The were able to elect their white supremacists leaders into public office, enact white supremacist laws, try people in white supremacist kangaroo courts, and engage in white supremacist extrajudicial violence with impunity.At least for a while. How did this end? By the people using their Constitutional rights to free expression to convince the majority that such violence was wrong, and then using these majorities to remove white supremacist laws and white supremacist procedures, to bring perpetrators of white supremacist violence to justice, and to break up the organizations that were actively engaged in white supremacist violence, all within Constitutional norms.Not that this was perfect, but it seemed to produce the necessary results in the end.What would make Jesuits or Muslims any different?-But then, it can't be denied that white supremacist violence is making a come back. Maybe if Constitutional norms were suspended in the fight against white supremacist, we could have rooted them out more completely.But, I fear that there would have a cost of creating the type of society I would find less pleasant to live in. Interesting, even those most at danger from white supremacist violence don't seem to be advocating a suspension of Constitutional norms.Edited by Chiroptera, : No reason given.

I've noticed that when people complain about a "failure of logic", they're not really pointing to a failure of the logic itself but that the other side doesn't just accept their premises without question.

Which consequences? Sell wedding cakes to people you don't like? Or not sell wedding cakes at all?

Of course, the Alliance Defending Freedom is being disingenuous here. Six justices on the Court clearly stated that Colorado does have the authority to protect the rights of gay, lesbian, and transgender citizens to buy goods and services on the same terms as others. Regardless of who fills Kennedy's seat, if Chief Justice Roberts was sincere in joining the majority opinion, then there is at least a five justice majority that will uphold Colorado's Civil Rights Commission's decision. (Unless Trump gets to replace another justice, say Ginsburg.)But a majority ruled that the comments made by Civil Rights Commission and the Colorado Supreme Court showed their rulings were tainted by (anti-)religious bias; the fact that the Court ruled in favor of Trump's Muslim ban in Hawaii v Trump despite Trump's comments showing obvious religious bias makes me doubt Roberts' sincerity. The issues in that case were significantly different, though, so who knows?At any rate, here are the possibilities I see if this case makes it to the Supreme Court:The Tenth Circuit upholds the Civil Rights Commission's decision and the Supreme Court refuses an appeal from that ruling.Roberts was sincere when he joined the majority in Masterpiece and Ginsburg lives long enough to take part in the decision when this current case reaches the Supreme Court. The Court rules against Phillips.The Court rules in favor of Phillips but decides that this case is more like the anti-gay cakes requested by William Jack than it is like Craig and Mullins' wedding cake.The one I think is most probable (but I would only bet even money): The court rules once again that Phillips' religious beliefs are special, and that Christian social conservatives have special privileges to pick and choose which laws they have to obey.

A similar thing was an important point in Ginsburg and Sotomayer's dissent in Masterpiece Cakeshop. They pointed out that not only did Philips refuse the request before any discussion about what text would be put onto the cake, but in Masterpiece Cakeshop's advertisements none of the wedding cakes have any text or figures or anything that would indicate any kind of marriage.Their point is that without any visible identification about what kind of wedding the cake would go to, the cake itself cannot be considered any kind of message, and so requiring Phillips to create such a cake for a same sex couple in accordance to the state's anti-discrimination laws do not constitute a violation of Phillips' First Amendment rights.

Sorry for the late reply, Hyro. Since the semester began in August, I've been bouncing between too busy to do much more than lurk, or so sleep deprived to do much more than lurk.It's been an enjoyable semester, though.I hope you've been well.- I kind of understand that. But then that goes to the heart of why we have anti-discrimination laws. After all, why would African Americans want to give a restaurant that discriminates their hard earned money? Why would women want to work for an employer who discriminates?The problem is that without anti-discrimination laws, there may be no businesses that will cater to the discriminated class. Having anti-discrimination laws that are enforced prevents that type of situation from arising.Sometimes a business owner may want to do the right thing and let African Americans eat in their fine dining establishment. However, they know that if they do that then they'd be out of business because the majority white customers will go else where. Or worse, rocks will be thrown through their windows at home in the middle of the night. By forcing everyone to serve the discriminated classes, it gives cover to those who would want to do the right thing.Finally, being in all the majority demographics, I can't imagine the constant indignity that members of the discriminated classes must endure every single day of their lives. Being told by a public accommodation that they won't be served must be one more indignity in a constant stream, and I feel that it is just that the law will, in this case, allow them to get some justice.- I definitely understand this one; I've used it myself.But I suppose that it's possible that Phillips has maxed out his wedding cake baking capacity and can afford to be choosy.Also, even though I understand that business owners need to make a living, I never bought into the notion that making as much money as possible in any way possible is really a legitimate way to behave. I think that business owners should sometimes put values and ethics above making that next dollar.I'm just disappointed that Phillips chose the wrong side of this issue to engage that principle.