Oh, Indiana. You know you have problem when even NASCAR doesn’t support your ridiculous policies. In fact, there has been so much backlash to the religious freedom law that Governor Mike Pence is starting to backtrack:
Mr. Pence has said he wants to modify the law, but he has not indicated how he could do so without undermining it. He rejected claims that it would allow private businesses to deny service to gay men and lesbians and said the criticism was based on a “perception problem” that additional legislation could fix. “I’ve come to the conclusion that it would be helpful to move legislation this week that makes it clear that this law does not give businesses the right to discriminate against anyone,” Mr. Pence, a Republican, said at a news conference in Indianapolis.
Good luck on clearing up that whole “perception problem.”
Team Blackness also discussed troublesome tweets from the new host of the Daily Show, comedian Trevor Noah; rules for the team’s second marriages and we breakdown the delightful drug-fueled song “Trap Queen” by Fetty Wap.
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Brachiator
Taking a page from the movie quote thread, I’m sure that Governor Pence is just trying to say:
What we got here is… failure to communicate.
JPL
Thanks to Governor Pence, it appears that the religious discrimination bill is tabled in GA and the Arkansas governor refuses to sign it.
Bobby B.
Sometimes there’s too many things going around to hate at the same time, so conservatives’ opinions may jam into eachother like a big booger meteor.
beltane
@Bobby B.: Their hate is so wide, their brains are so small.
Mike E
@JPL: Same with NC Gov McCrory, he won’t sign it should it cross his desk but the Speaker will study it first…
gf120581
Hutchinson in Arkansas just left Pence out to dry.
Villago Delenda Est
Or, as they say in Georgia, gut it by specifically saying that you can’t use this law to discriminate against LBGT people.
This law needs to be undermined. And then buried, along with the offal who favor it.
Punchy
@JPL: Careful…he refuses to sign it today. Tomorrow, after the Ark leggy makes some cosmetic “fix” that changes nothing, he’ll declare the nearly-identical bill acceptable and sign it. And Our Broken Media will fall over each other trying to fellate the man who “fought” discrimination with this “new” bill.
Belafon
@Punchy: And people and businesses will still boycott like they did in Indiana. The one nice thing is that the reaction to the law in Indiana was not media driven.
Aleta
Modify ? He ‘s stalling until ALEC et al compose something that will somehow divert attention to the courts while Fox proclaims the problem solved and that there was no problem anyway.
Roger Moore
It certainly is a perception problem. We have good enough perception to see through the bigots’ transparent lies about what the bill is and does. If we just took them at their word, they wouldn’t be in this mess.
Jonny Scrum-half
It’s my understanding that the whole RFRA issue boils down to conservatives trying to find a way to permit businesses to deny service to gay people. What I don’t understand is the point of the law, if Indiana doesn’t have a law prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. Doesn’t the absence of such a law mean that businesses already are permitted to deny services to gay people? Is this just a case of conservatives overplaying their hand?
Mandalay
@gf120581:
Not really – I doubt if Pence is even on Hutchinson’s radar at the moment.
The Republicans in Arkansas managed to piss off Walmart, and if Hutchinson hadn’t vetoed the hate swill that was sent his way he would have become dead meat politically. Hutchinson understands very well that when the Godfather asks you for a favor you don’t tell him to fuck off.
Villago Delenda Est
@Jonny Scrum-half: It’s not enough that they can get away with it, silently. They need to be able to broadcast it with impunity.
Belafon
@Jonny Scrum-half: If the SCOTUS heads in the direction it looks like its going to, gays will be getting the right to marry this summer. This law, and those like it, are meant to override the SCOTUS ruling.
boatboy_srq
@Jonny Scrum-half: Specifically (as I’ve seen it said elsewhere); it’s not that the RFRA permits discrimination (that’s already baked into the books, both in the lack of SOGI protections and covered under “right of refusal to provide service to anyone for any reason”) – it’s the permission to discriminate and be a##holes about it.
Mandalay
@Punchy:
There is absolutely no way that is going to happen. Walmart and Axicom have publicly opposed the legislation. The mayors of Little Rock and Fayetteville have publicly opposed the legislation. The Fayetteville and Little Rock Chambers of Commerce have publicly opposed the legislation.
Hutchinson will be committing political suicide if he signs a “fix” that changes nothing.
beltane
@Mandalay: Walmart has spoken. The religious bigots of Arkansas will just have to be content to boycott all those gay weddings they were never invited to in the first place.
Roger Moore
@Jonny Scrum-half:
I think there are two points to such a law:
1) It lets the bigots prove just how much they hate Teh Ghey.
2) It gives them an out if part of the Supreme Court ruling on marriage equality is that gays are a protected class.
Punchy
@Mandalay: Then why didn’t he just veto it and make it final? Why ask for changes to a bill he has no intention of signing?
beltane
@Punchy: Hutchinson, like all Republicans, is deathly afraid of the people who voted for him.
Southern Beale
Meanwhile, Memories Pizza in East Bumfug, Indiana, has said they won’t serve gays:
You know what ELSE is a choice? Being a bigoted Christian. Also: what the fuck is it about the pizza business that brings out the haters?
beltane
@Southern Beale: Irish pizza’s the worst. Meh.
Mandalay
@Punchy:
Because then he’d become another spineless RINO to wingnuts. He has no good options, so he’s taking the one that is least bad: he’s quite reasonably hurling the shit back to the bozos who caused the problem in the first place. It’s up to them to clean up (or not) the mess they created.
The bottom line is that if Hutchinson is forced to choose between his party and big business he’s going with big business every time.
fuckwit
I find it deeply ironic that the market forces which so reliably fuck over the poor and make the 1% into the new aristocracy, also help fuck over religious bigots and protect equal rights for LBGT people.
As a lefty, I’m usually cheering AGAINST capitalism, but in this case it’s the voracious greed of capitalism of the 1% variety (Wal-Mart! Salesforce!) that is swooping in to save the day in Arkansas and Indiana, and, I guess yay for that.
Roger Moore
@Mandalay:
He isn’t choosing between his party and big business. He’s choosing one part of his party (big business) over another (religious wingnuts). The whole RFRA business is effectively a wedge issue that the religious wingnuts are launching against their own party.
Southern Beale
@beltane:
Love love love.
shortstop
@fuckwit: Think of it this way: Money always rules the day. So it’s really not about capitalism suddenly becoming more beneficent. What’s different is that public opinion has changed so much that it’s now financially dangerous to be anti-gay…so economically perilous, in fact, that Walmart Has Spoken.
(And it doesn’t matter, Mandalay, whether Hutchinson meant to leave Pence out there all alone; whatever his motivation, he has, and I plan to fully enjoy watching the hilariously dumb chief exec of Indiana continue to flail and wail.)
Southern Beale
@fuckwit:
I’m not on a whole against capitalism, and I think the “free hand of the market” can sometimes be harnessed in advantageous ways. I’m just not so deep into the Ayn Rand cult that I think it’s the be-all and end-all of everything. As someone articulated to me recently, capitalism is great for things we want, not so great for things we need. If you want pizza and the only pizza monger in town is a religious bigot, fuckit. I’ll eat a goddamn taco. If you NEED healthcare and the only healthcare monger in town is a religious bigot, you’re screwed.
shortstop
@Roger Moore: And may it ever be thus (it can’t be, I know, so may it be so for as long as possible). As long as the yield-no-quarter fringe digs in on this stuff, the GOP stays fractured. Just imagine what it’d be doing to America right now if it could present a united front.
Mandalay
@Roger Moore:
Not really – he’s choosing between the commercial world outside of the Republican Party (i.e. Walmart et al), and Republican legislators. And the legislators lose.
Bitter Scribe
Dumbest politician in Indiana history: Mike Pence or Dan Quayle? Discuss.
Steve
I don’t think its hate to deny baking a cake for a same sex marriage based upon a religious objecting thereto
shortstop
@Steve: That’s because you don’t like to think of yourself as a hateful person. But you are. Own it. We’d have more respect for you.
shortstop
@Bitter Scribe: Pence, I think. But you know, potatoe, potahtoe.
Bitter Scribe
@Jonny Scrum-half: Indiana doesn’t have a state law prohibiting discrimination, but Indianapolis and other cities have anti-discrimination ordinances. This law would allow a bigot who is sued under one of those ordinances for refusing service to gay people to present Jeebus as a legal defense.
This post by an Indiana University law professor does a great job explaining the situation in more detail.
Steve
Short…I don’t care if you respect me or not.
shortstop
@Steve: Of course you don’t. That’s why you’re here telling us how not-hateful you are for defending discrimination.
Steve
My scenario is hardly discrimination. It only is to the intolerant
shortstop
@Steve: Naturally! If you can’t stand thinking of yourself as discriminatory, you’d want to give your discrimination a different name and lash out at the people who call it by the right one. I think we all agree the important thing here is that you be able to think of yourself as a good guy.
Hal
A friend on Facebook argued yesterday that this was a matter of one person’s rights trampling on another persons rights. Which makes absolutely no sense to me. What she was really trying to say is her right to discriminate is being impeded by those pesky non-discrimination laws.
What I find irritating is that this person keeps invoking the constitution in the most infantile ways. “The constitution says I can’t be forced to serve people if it violates my personal or religious beliefs.” Um, no, that’s not how it works.
aimai
@Steve: It doesn’t really matter whether its hate or not. It is, or should be, illegal. It is illegal to refuse to perform business services, by a business, to people who lawfuly present themselves as customers with the money to pay for the service. So, ever since the Civil Rights Act (s) as a country we have settled the matter of who is entitled to service (everyone) in this country. Not having Kings, or Princes, or an Aristocracy, or Castes we decided everyone would get service in any Business that was open to the public.
What is new here is that Businesses, and individuals doing business, are claiming that their commercial enterprises have a religious component. That is entirely new and really disturbing. And, of course, no Business would tolerate an individual employed by the business taking a job and refusing to do the work because of a “religious objection.” Employers whose employees follow a different religion from the owners do not have the right to refuse to work on Sunday and still get paid for Sunday, or refuse to dispense alcohol because they took a job as bartender but they converted to being a very judgmental tee-totaler.
So why should (some) Business people have the legal right to refuse service to any other person–regardless of their moral status within the BP’s religion?
Brachiator
@Hal:
This person is confusing the Constitution with little signs that say “We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone.”
aimai
@Hal: What I particularly hate about this formulation is that its obvious these people are lying–lying about their beliefs, the dogma of their religions, and how much they are willing to do for those supposed beliefs. Because these assholes never refuse service to adulterers, murderers, rapists, liars, or thieves and they do accept money for other services from gay people. So why is one specific kind of person at one ceremony going to be refused service while all other comers are offered the service? It simply can’t be that these people actually think that their religion forces them to this behavior or their religion would be the most incoherent on earth. Its just that they want to grandstand and posture.
Brachiator
@Steve:
I respect your provocation, even if it just trolling.
You no what. It might not be hate. Not really relevant. The question is what kind of social contract do we have with fellow citizens. We pretty much have decided that for the good of society, we sell anything and provide services to all customers.
We no longer have restrictive covenants that prevent us from selling our homes to Jews, Blacks, Mexicans, Chinese, Gay people.
We no longer use religion as an excuse to single people out and not serve them.
Or at least we didn’t until these noxious laws came along.
Steve
Brach- glad you agree it’s not hate. Notwithstanding please tell short he is intolerant of people’s religious convictions. Thx.
Steve
Oh and it’s not that the bakers refused service. They refused participation in a wedding they objected to. The fact that a particular service was requested is not material to their refusal to participate.
shortstop
I appreciate the fact that some are trying to give Steve the benefit of the doubt. But you know…I’ve been active in marriage equality efforts for a long time. I’ve heard all the antigay arguments (there aren’t really that many, they aren’t complex, and folks mostly cut and paste them), so I’ve gotten pretty good at telling who’s looking for a good-faith conversation and who’s just a bigot disgruntled by being called a bigot. It’s a fairly close parallel to the “Blacks are the real racists for mentioning my racism!” crowd: The people who lead with “Let’s not talk about what I’m doing to restrict other humans’ civil rights; let’s talk about the nasty names you’re calling me for doing it” are universally not listening, not interested in anyone but themselves and decidedly not willing to participate in a social contract of any kind. I’m pretty much done with allowing them to feel better about their own rank immorality.
And this pretty well wraps it up with a bow on top.
Brachiator
@Steve:
This is America. We have the right to be intolerant of stupidity, including people’s religious convictions.
We just would not persecute you. Or refuse to sell you a wedding cake.
shortstop
@Brachiator: It’s true. Despite Steve’s demonstrably poor judgment and bad behavioral choices, she can buy cake from my bakery any time.
Cervantes
@Southern Beale:
From the article you quoted:
What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?
@Mandalay: I just think it’s funny that republicans in the Arkansas house looked at what Indiana’s dealing with and said “give us some of that!”
beltane
@Brachiator: Yes, freedom of religion means we can believe whatever we want. It does not mean our beliefs must be respected or honored by others. If these people feel they are entitled to special respect for their religious beliefs, they should move to whatever country will have them.
beltane
@Cervantes: I wonder if they would cater a heterosexual BDSM-themed, Wiccan wedding.
gwangung
People may disclaim that they are bigoted or discriminatory.
However, others are always free to make up their own minds.
Gin & Tonic
@Steve: They refused participation in a wedding they objected to
A baker does not “participate” in a wedding any more than the person who rents out the tables and chairs. In fact, the baker isn’t even *at* the wedding.
beltane
@Gin & Tonic: Exactly. These bakers seem rather full of themselves. They are selling a cake, not themselves. For all it matters to the customer, the cake could be baked by a troop of Howler monkeys as long as it was up to specs.
scav
Poor Steve. Being told he’s a person we don’t respect in public. The unendurable, never before experienced and entirely un-American horror of it all. And watching public opinion and judgement that he doesn’t agree with become commonplace and overtly expressed in not only public spaces and, worse!, adopted as policy by corporations (corporations should just shut up and sell things, right?). He is not religiously free unless his is the only voice heard in the moral and public marketplace. Don’t you all fake “Internet” people go expressing your moral judgements about the bigotry embedded in his belief system.
Gavin
So… Where is the line? Do we preemptively step in and prevent all possible bigotry everywhere, or do we let people express their beliefs and the market identify and punish the bigots? At what point do you own your own art and will?
The same is true the other way, remember: A Jewish patron cannot demand kosher food in a restaurant. This also applies to a church. The Catholic Church, for example, demands that (1) marriage be between one man and one woman, (2) both parties by confirmed Catholics and (3) neither have a previous deemed valid, non-annulled marriage.
If you want to argue that the wedding cake baker should be forced to make that cake (even though he is a deeply-convicted fundamentalist christian and wedding cakes are purchased primarily for artistic value — if not you’d buy your wedding cake at WalMart, right?) then tell me why I can’t force the Jewish restaurant to stock, cook and serve up my side of bacon or the Catholic Church to marry gay couples?
Is a Christian woodworker mandated to carve some Wicca saying into an ornate headboard, or the dedicated Steelers fan required by law to paint a Ravens mural on the ceiling? Could I be sued because I refuse to make a desk [due to my pride in my craftsmanship] from stupidly cheap CDX plywood and particleboard just because a gay couple proposed it?
Where is the line?
Cervantes
@beltane:
To get an accurate and useful answer, you’d have to ask them directly, I think.
My summary of their position is this:
And they’re not (in this instance) saying they want to stop gay weddings; they’re just asking that they themselves not be forced to help make one happen (by providing pizza for the (at this point hypothetical) participants).
That’s my summary of their position; I could be wrong, and I have no idea what they feel about Wiccan weddings.
Cervantes
@Gavin:
I saw the same comment in the other thread. I appreciate your re-posting it here. Thanks.
scav
@Gavin: Certainly the restrictions upon corporate entities and their so-called deeply held religious convictions should be different than those placed upon individuals, and it is exactly this distinction that the Indiana effort is blowing all to pieces.
Kathleen
@aimai: Excellent point, Aimai.
shortstop
Persecuted believers..
Gvg
I have noticed that sometimes religious people really think that an action is different if the reason is their religion, not something they came up with themself. for instance a very nice seeming women sincerely told me that because the Bible said women should obey their husbands, that is wasn’t sexist for her church not to have women leaders etc. I had to explain to her that treating women differently and as less important was the definition of sexism and it didn’t change anything that the reason was religious nor that she and her friends chose to go along with it. she actually seemed to understand afterwards, although she didn’t change her own choices, she stopped arguing with us about what to call it. Most people don’t understand though.
Steve seemed to me to be starting from a similar mistake. he thought it mattered that the reason was religion. It isn’t. It’s bigotry. doesn’t get any excuse points for being religious.
Germy Shoemangler
@Gavin: “then tell me why I can’t force the Jewish restaurant to stock, cook and serve up my side of bacon ”
Is the Jewish restaurant advocating and voting for republicans who want to make the sale of bacon illegal?
Because the religious right wants to make certain marriages illegal.
Bitter Scribe
@Gavin: A Jewish patron cannot demand kosher food in a restaurant.
No, but a Jewish patron can demand to be served in a restaurant that’s open to the public and cannot be denied service due to his or her religion.
This also applies to a church.
No it doesn’t. Churches are not “businesses” and are consistently excluded from such laws.
tell me why I can’t force the Jewish restaurant to stock, cook and serve up my side of bacon
For the same reason you couldn’t “force” a baker to cook up a side of bacon: Because they don’t stock or sell it. Not to anyone.
Is a Christian woodworker mandated to carve some Wicca saying into an ornate headboard
Not if he has a reason besides “I only service people whose religious views I find compatible”
or the dedicated Steelers fan required by law to paint a Ravens mural on the ceiling?
I wasn’t aware that Ravens fans were a protected class in any antidiscrimination statute.
Could I be sued because I refuse to make a desk [due to my pride in my craftsmanship] from stupidly cheap CDX plywood and particleboard just because a gay couple proposed it?
Not unless your “pride in craftsmanship” is an excuse to discriminate, and you have no problem making crappy desks for people of whose sex lives you approve.
Where is the line?
The same place it’s always been: Easily visible once you take your head out of your ass.
A Humble Lurker
@Gavin:
You think the market’s going to identify and punish the bigots every time? I certainly don’t.
The difference is a Jewish restaurant being forced to serve bacon would never happen (When has a restaurant ever been forced to serve something they themselves didn’t want on the menu?) and it wouldn’t be telling a person that because of what they were they couldn’t eat there, just that they couldn’t get what they wanted there, which is just life. The difference is the Church is a church, and can perform whatever marriages it wants. It’s not a public institution like a restaurant.
If he wants to get paid. You’re also conflating religion and sports team preferences to sexuality. Uh, no. They are in no way the same, dude.
Honestly everything on your list just strikes me as either ‘never gonna happen’ or ‘not that big a deal anyway’.
shortstop
@Gavin: You’re making the common mistake of confusing houses of worship with businesses that are open to the public and, as such, have agreed to follow their states’ and municipalities’ laws regarding discrimination. Additionally, you’re confusing the decision not to offer a specific product with the act of refusing to sell an already offered product to a member of a protected class.
Simply put, no church can be forced to marry a couple that doesn’t meet its specifications. The Catholic church will not marry divorcees, and some fundamentalist churches still won’t marry interracial couples. That is their legal right and it’s not going anywhere. (However, people retain a right to criticize these institutions outside force of law for these decisions.)
Similarly, a business cannot be forced by law to provide a good or service it doesn’t want to offer. However, once it does offer a good or service, it cannot decline to provide it to a customer based on that customer’s race, gender, religion, orientation or anything else for which that business’s specific jurisdiction has antidiscrimination laws on the books. So a kosher butcher can’t be forced to sell bacon. However, a shop that does sell bacon can’t decline to sell it to, say, Christians while offering it to people of other religions.
Some members of the religious right are arguing rather ludicrously that a “gay wedding cake” is a special sort of product, and are trying very hard to make an argument that public-accommodation bakeries being forced by law to sell a new product they don’t want to sell. The courts are rightfully rejecting the idea that these businesses are being asked to create a new product: in fact, wedding cakes are products that these businesses already offer, and it’s a specific class of person who is being discriminated against when trying to purchase this product.
Mandalay
I can’t find a single prominent Republican publicly supporting the legislation in Arkansas and Indiana today. In particular, there is a deafening silence from all the Republicans presidential contenders who were so gung ho a few days ago. Even Cruz has STFU.
Jeb Bush was saying Pence did “the right thing” on Monday, but today he is in SF begging for cash donations from Silicon Valley. Good luck with that you nasty, stupid, worthless fuck.
Jamey
Yeah, pretty much this. Totally using that quote, EJW.
muddy
I love this blog. John’s actual cat came in the thread to troll. Where else do you get this sort of personal attention?
germy shoemangler
this just in:
Memories Pizza — the first Indiana business to declare it would refuse LGBT business — got blasted on the Internet and by phone, but the owner says there’s been a huge misunderstanding … sorta.
Kevin O’Connor tells TMZ he’s had to temporarily close his business after he told a reporter he would refuse to cater a gay wedding under Indiana’s new Religious Freedom Restoration Act. O’Connor says he was immediately flooded by threatening phone calls, and social media postings.
O’Connor wants to clear up one thing: He says he would never deny service to gay people in his restaurant. However, due to his religious beliefs, he does not believe in gay marriage … and that’s why he wouldn’t service one.
Meanwhile, he says the threats have been serious enough that he’s closing his pizza joint … at least until the dust settles.
Roger Moore
@Gavin:
Because these are not equivalent events. In the case of the Catholic Church, they are actually a religious organization, so the government forcing them to marry somebody against the tenets of their religion would be a violation of the 1st Amendment. That’s a different thing from a secular business being required to serve any customer who walks through their doors. In fact, when a church acts more like a private business than like a church, they can be forced to serve anyone in exactly the same way. So a Catholic church that rents out its hall to non-members isn’t allowed to refuse to rent it to a couple who want to be married there, even if their marriage wouldn’t be approved of by the Church.
And the restaurant is a completely different case from the wedding cake baker. Refusing to serve kosher food (or pork in a kosher restaurant) is about what the business is doing; a restaurant is perfectly within its rights to refuse to change its menu to the arbitrary demands of its customers. What it is not allowed to do is to refuse to serve some potential customers because it objects to who those people are.
@Cervantes:
It still seems like a deeply stupid position. They are not making a gay wedding happen; the couple getting married isn’t going to give up on being married because the specific caterer they want won’t work for them. They aren’t, strictly speaking, even doing anything for the wedding itself; they are actually catering for the wedding reception, which is a separate but connected event.
Brachiator
@Gavin:
Why is this so difficult? The presumption of our civil society is that we treat all citizens, and most noncitizens, as equal when they come before you. So, you sell to any customer who has the money to buy your goods or services. We don’t generally care about your beliefs, or your religion, or your deeply held convictions. So, an Irish Catholic and an Irish Protestant could hate each other because of history and The Troubles, but when one comes into the business of the other they still have to do business with one another. Now, the store owner can still refuse, and get the shit sued out of him. Or he can move his ass and his business to a country that approves the expression of sectarian hatreds.
But here, despite all the wild ass attempts to do so, we don’t make an exception to this under cover of deeply held religious bigotry, uh, I mean beliefs.
So, it’s simple. You don’t have to open up a business. You can sit in a corner and mull any bitterness you want. But the minimal standards of our civil society is that if you open a business you agree to sell to customers.
Cervantes
@Roger Moore:
Like I said, I don’t pretend to understand it, either.
But if I’m going to not understand it, at least let me not understand the correct “it,” not an “it” that I make up for my own entertainment.
Again, their position (here) is not that they’re trying to stop the wedding from happening. It’s simply that they don’t want to help make it happen.
Er … “separate but connected”?
Mike E
@muddy:
He’s wearing a pirate costume, scratchin’ out blog posts in his dad’s basement!
/LOL(cats)
germy shoemangler
@Cervantes: The thing we’re trying to avoid here is a person walking into a business and asking “can you do this thing for me?” and the guy behind the counter says “sorry, no.” And then the customer next in line steps up and asks “can you do this thing for me?” and the counter guy replies “yes, immediately!”
all the other stuff about jewish restaurants being forced to sell bacon is just nonsense.
boatboy_srq
@germy shoemangler: Love the sinner, hate the equality that the non-religious-affiliated state’s law endows.
WaterGirl
@germy shoemangler: absolutely. keep it simple.
Brachiator
Can I oversimplify this? Gay people are human beings and citizens. As such, they are not just like everybody else. They are us and everybody else.
So, if someone “doesn’t want to help make a gay wedding happen,” serve a gay person, or otherwise treat a gay person the way that they would want to be treated themselves, this means simply that they have to move somewhere else, to some other country, where they can exercise discrimination.
Golden Rule and Social Contract. Deeply held convictions subject to change without notice.
beltane
@germy shoemangler: A much better analogy would be a Jewish or Muslim restaurant refusing to sell food to people who eat bacon and other forbidden items and who are therefore unclean.
shortstop
@Cervantes: It really has nothing to do with the event — you’re falling for a red herring. It’s about a business that’s open to the public refusing to sell a product already on its roster to a customer solely because of his or her sexual orientation.
germy shoemangler
I remember the old Groucho Marx anecdote: He was at a country club with his family. He was told he couldn’t use the pool, because he was Jewish.
“My daughter’s only half-Jewish. Can she go in up to her knees?” he asked.
Gavin
I appreciate it when posts are personally insulting – that way, I know what to avoid. Because hey, the only speech that might possibly have a salient point is the speech you already agree with, right?
Cervantes:
Per case law in Indiana, homosexuals weren’t a protected class prior to the recent law. Is that right? I’d say no. But that is the law, so that’s the starting point. Thus BEFORE this law, you could deny service in Indiana to gays and not be prosecuted for it. Sure, your business would be boycotted and shut down, but that’s the definition of a market reaction.
So Indiana didn’t have an anti-discrimination law for gays, but now everyone acts as if this new law would “allow” such discrimination when really it’s not even a “service” law anyway. It’s a dog and pony show. The law wasn’t needed, and at the same time it’s not likely to be harmful.
Amusingly, it looks as though the real effect of this law will likely be to allow some of the drug-using religions to use drugs there. First Church of Cannabis filed for religious status in Indiana this week :)
OH… and Angie’s List is threatening to leave Indiana. Let’s see: high debt, low profit company asking for $18 billion in tax breaks? Don’t let the door hit you on the way out.
Lost in all the furor is the fact that Indiana has no laws on the book that protect the LBGT community from discrimination but despite that, you can’t find a single case where someone cried discrimination against a business.
This is the point: the bakery in Oregon that was originally sued over the cake-baking issue did not fail because it was crushed by massive legal fees, or a huge punitive fine imposed by the court. No, it failed because the orders and referrals stopped coming in from its regular customers after the publicity that the owner was a bigot. In her own words, Melissa stated, “our community where we live is not the most conservative. We didnt get a lot of support from our fellow community people that lived in Gresham.” That’s.. the definition of a market reaction, just as above.
The essence of the good or service provided via the baker, much as with a painting or statute, is artistic expression. That is what gives the transaction value.
What is being glorified is the assertion that a person, in order to sell artistic expression, must provide that expression to everyone irrespective of whether or not doing so clashes with their religious convictions. The First Amendment says that’s crap – and the first amendment trumps social justice warrior princessness.
The result of anti-discrimination laws is to punish innocent people through lawsuits and often to actually hurt the groups they are trying to protect. For example, any employer knows it’s more risky to hire someone in a protected class because you may get sued if you need to fire them. RFRA shouldn’t be needed either: not only because a business should be able to use their facilities as they please, but because we shouldn’t be telling people what to put in their bodies. But we do. So a person who really wants individual freedom is in a quandary over supporting a law that gives religious preference, but does allow a bit more freedom at least for somebody.
Now, if a wedding cake or a photographer or a florist was a necessity… then we might have a salient point. This would be a very different discussion if they were refused a room at Holiday Inn. The entire price of the good in question is the effort of the SOUL of the worker in question.. the artistry, not the good or service itself. How can we know this? Pick up your cell phone and take a picture.. for free. If wedding photographers are any more than free, then they do NOT add anything essential.. it’s all in the artistry, the skill. [Don’t tell this to my girlfriend, of course.]
The Indiana law is nearly identical in word and form to the FEDERAL law passed by virtually unanimous acclaim — and, I might add, signed by none other than Bill Clinton.
The language of the Indiana Law is 99% identical in word, form and substance to the Federal Law. The law simply reinforces what is SUPPOSED to already be there in the form of the First Amendment.
So, here’s the challenge to anyone who wants to run insults: Cite the specific examples [using text] of where the Indiana law is more broad than the Federal RFRA.
The current wave of public opinion thankfully is to stop discrimination against gays. But there is a large section of that wave that has to aim their knife somewhere – and now, just as with me in this thread, they are going to choose the people that disagree with anything that is said during this mob mentality. This call of false bigotry feels inherently equal to the Christians who don’t want gays to marry.
germy shoemangler
It’s not an artistic expression. It’s a cake. And the sign on the window says “cakes for sale”
Calouste
@germy shoemangler: It’s essentially very simple. A businessperson has all the choice in what service or product they want to sell, but if they sell it to anybody, they will have to sell it to everybody.
And, no that doesn’t imply that a wedding cake with “Adam and Steve” on it is materially different from a wedding cake with “Adam and Eve” on it.
Roger Moore
@Cervantes:
Yes. The reception is not the same thing as the marriage, i.e. they’re separate, but it happens because the marriage did, i.e. they’re connected. A birth and a baptism are separate events, but they’re still deeply connected. The same thing with a wedding and a wedding reception.
beltane
There are no gay cakes or straight cakes. This is about the customer, not the product. A baker who will not sell cake or bread or cookies to a gay person, or who will only sell to gay people on every third Tuesday of the month, is guilty of discrimination. If their faith mandates that they discriminate against gays or anyone else, they should consider the possibility that they really aren’t cut out for this “running a business” thing.
shortstop
@Roger Moore:
Just to clarify this a little further, there are secular businesses that are member-only, not open to the public. They operate privately and can choose their clientele within the limits of the law. A couple in, I think, Colorado was sued for refusing to make a cake for a same-sex wedding. They chose to (weren’t “forced to” as the wailing wingers pretended) close their shop and operate privately out of their home.
That’s fine if that’s the way people want to do things. But when someone opens a public accommodation, he or she agrees to obey the laws, including laws and ordinances relating to discrimination. Peri-fucking-od.
beltane
@germy shoemangler: It’s kind of funny that these people think a cake can be gay.
beltane
@shortstop: This is why there are different tax rules for businesses and hobbyists. A hobbyist who makes a little money on the side baking in their home kitchen for friends and family doesn’t have to sell a cake to anyone they don’t want to. Someone who runs a bakery and is registered as a business has to sell their usual product to anyone who can pay for it. Do they have to create a special cake that is not part of their regular product range? No. That is not what is being asked.
Some people seem to think that the cake at a gay wedding must be Village People themed or decorated with butt plugs.
muddy
@Mike E: Ha! I would love to see him in a pirate costume, or perhaps Viking would be more appropriate for his type.
muddy
@Gavin: tl;dr
germy shoemangler
@beltane: Maybe they can argue that they are inconvenienced by re-pairing the little bride and groom statues on top of the cake. “Now I’ve got fifty lady statues, and only fourteen man statues!” Maybe Justice Scalia will hear that.
Cervantes
@germy shoemangler:
And … ?
@shortstop:
What are you referring to? Where am I falling?
Are you talking about the Irish pizzeria?
muddy
@germy shoemangler: Whatever you do don’t google for images of tasteless wedding cake toppers. They have some opposite sex doozies. Somehow I don’t think this law is meant to crack down on that though.
germy shoemangler
Key & Peele “Gay Wedding Advice”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rtgY1q0J_TQ
WaterGirl
@germy shoemangler: That was really funny!
bmoak
The people bleating on multiple sites that this law doesn’t matter because gays are not a protected class in Indiana and can be legally discriminated against anyway are, IMO, willfully obfuscating, as they well know that Indianapolis and most of the state’s larger cities have laws on the books that prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation and that the Indiana RFRA would supersede any such local ordinances.
Roger Moore
@germy shoemangler:
Just an off-the-wall question: is your nym saying that you’re a germy mangler of shoes or a mangler of germy shoes?
germy shoemangler
Named after an old dog we had many years ago. Destroyer of slippers. We joked that he had germs, but he didn’t. He was a fine dog.
That wasn’t his name, it was his nickname. His name was Rex.
germy shoemangler
@WaterGirl: I like how the family isn’t overtly hostile, just clueless.
WaterGirl
@germy shoemangler: This is the kind of stuff I like. Not just a good idea, but well executed!
fuckwit
@germy shoemangler: I knew an Indian Hindu guy who was forced to work at Taco Bueno when he first moved to the USA. He was disgusted and horrified every day, but you know, he had to make a living. Cow meat everywhere.
Cervantes
@Roger Moore:
Sure, but in the minds of these people (the pizza folk), “connected” apparently trumps whatever “separate” you happen to perceive.
I suppose one could try explaining to them that the reception is something like a very fancy delivery order! Or one could argue that when they deliver pizza to a honeymoon suite, they may perforce be contributing to the happiness of a (still) very happy gay marriage!
Ask them where they draw their line. Since they say they have no compunctions about serving pizza to gay people (big of them, I know), maybe there is hope.
Cervantes
@muddy:
td;fw
Cervantes
@germy shoemangler:
Counter-productive, not to mention disgraceful, if true.
WaterGirl
@Cervantes: But did the calls come from the left or the right? Could just be stirring the pot for sympathy, coming from the right.
Cervantes
@Gavin:
One small point for now:
That’s $18 million, I think — but it only counts city/county funds; there’s another $6 million from the state. I’ve seen criticisms of these deals but don’t know enough about them to say anything useful — perhaps you do.
muddy
@Cervantes: ?
Cervantes
@WaterGirl:
Sure, that’s possible — just as it’s possible the O’Connors are Satanists trying to make Christians look bad. You never know!
Anyhow, you’re right: I should have been more precise. I meant that if anti-Pencers were really making threatening phone calls to these people, that would be counter-productive. And if anyone were really making threatening phone calls to these people, that would be disgraceful.
WaterGirl
@Cervantes: I have no problem if people were calling to say they are hateful racists and that their actions are not christian in the way that Jesus preached.
Threatening, though? I a free with you.
Cain
@germy shoemangler:
I find this intolerable. People shouldn’t be threatened regardless of their political stance. That is not how we change minds.
Cervantes
@Gavin:
I agree with this: it’s wrong that gay people have not been recognized as a protected class by the state of Indiana.
I disagree with your last statement because particular jurisdictions within Indiana have had local ordinances prohibiting discrimination against gay people:
The Mayor of Indianapolis, a Republican, has just affirmed and reiterated this policy, in clear defiance of what Mike Pence and his brain trust are doing.
Wasn’t needed? Could not agree more.
Not sure, though, why you think it’s unlikely to be harmful. It could easily be used by a court to invalidate local protections. If there were a state-wide law preventing discrimination based on sexual orientation, a court might find that a compelling state interest has been asserted to do just that. But in the absence of such a state prohibition, a court could use this new law to invalidate local protections. It’s not obvious which way the courts will go.
Noteworthy if true, I agree.
But did you see the other day that someone, a restaurateur, announced on the radio that he has already been turning gay people away, and plans to continue doing so now that this new law exists?
Can you explain why you bring “artistic expression” into the argument?
Suppose I sell paintings. Suppose you are an alcoholic adulterer, just the kind of person my co-religionists and I might stone to death in the public square. Should a court be able to punish me for refusing to sell you a painting?
Suppose instead of paintings I sell groceries, or first-aid kits. What then? Should my refusing to deal with you be punishable in court?
Wait — anti-discrimination laws can’t produce good results? All they do is to punish the innocent? Are you sure?
First, I did not support every law that Bill Clinton supported.
Second, you’re simply incorrect: the Indiana law is not equivalent to the federal one. The latter is limited to actions taken by government (federal only, after 1997) — whereas the Indiana law allows individuals to assert their religious beliefs “as a claim or defense in a judicial or administrative proceeding, regardless of whether the state or any other governmental entity is a party to the proceeding.”
Do you see why this is not true?
The federal law provides a recourse only when plaintiffs argue that the government is either forcing them to do something or preventing them from doing it. Whereas the Indiana law inserts itself into conflicts between private individuals, “regardless of whether the state or any other governmental entity is a party to the proceeding.”
You continue:
Yes, and I am thankful for this as well.
Cervantes
@Mandalay:
Ashley Killough reporting for CNN:
Paul in KY
@aimai: Excellent point.
Gavin
Cervantes:
I didn’t see that restaurant guy saying he was going to discriminate.. interesting, i’ll have to look for that!
Laws (and governments generally) can only respect or disrespect rights; they cannot create them as government never had that power in the first place and you cannot grant that which you do not possess.
The Federal RFRA was passed in response to employer, State and Federal government action taken against native american tribe members who use peyote in their religious ceremonies. Despite the fact that they used said substance as an inherently ceremonial act both private employers and governments tried to ban them from the workplace and, in some cases, threatened to imprison them for exercising their religion.
Note carefully that a large part of the problem was private employers effectively enjoining someone from exercising their freedom of religion while not at work. Because drug tests detect not the psychoactive ingredient itself but rather metabolic byproducts these tests acted as a means of barring participation in a religious ceremony that had no bearing on work performance or safety.
The RFRA did not “grant” any new rights; those rights already existed but were being ignored. It merely reinforced the First Amendment and should have never had to be passed. It was necessary, however, due to what was being imposed on these people, and it put a stop to those practices — despite the screaming from the loony right (at the time) about their “drug abuse.”
What the RFRA said was this:
A government policy that infringes on religious freedom must be to address a compelling interest. That is, there must be a genuine compelling public policy matter under consideration that does real harm to real people if infringement of religious freedom is to be result
AND
The remedy via the law that addresses the compelling interest must be through the least-restrictive means available.
This standard is known as “strict scrutiny” in legislative jargon and it is inherently the only proper standard where any right is involved.
Consider applying this law to a sculptor. Let’s posit for a moment that this sculptor is a deeply-convicted Christian who believes that he is not to make any sort of graven image and if he does, he will go to Hell when he dies.
Now let’s further posit that you come to him as an adherent of the Church of Satan and wish to commission him to create for you a statute of Baal.
Without these RFRA laws, he would BE FORCED to create said work of art despite the fact that he fundamentally believes doing so would cause him to be irretrievably damned to Hell — or go to prison now.
This sort of crap is why the RFRA was necessary.
Consider a hotel. Let’s presume you have a religious requirement that your bed face East. The hotel is built in such a fashion that the beds all face North. You cannot demand that the hotelier allow you to move the bed. He must allow you to rent the room but he is not required to allow you to dictate to him how it is configured. The RFRA is necessary because both of these instances are entirely within what the current background in Indiana contemplates forcing upon proprietors!
As for a cake and a photographer.. it’s all artistry – every F/stop, ISO, camera, shutter speed, lens combination – and the ingredients that go into a cake may be close to the same but the assembly and decorating of each cake is individualized for each customer. Same with a florist: Each customer’s order is quite different from the last; while all are flowers the specific types and how they’re arranged is going to differ from one customer to the next.
And.. RFRA laws reinforce the right of those people to exercise their religious freedom by refusing to participate in acts that violate their religious convictions.
What RFRA underlines and reinforces is that in order for you to make such a demand and enforce it you must show that the there is a compelling state interest in forcing the production of that statute (or those pictures) by that individual (in other words you are substantially prevented from obtaining that good or service as a whole) and further, that forcing that singular provider to do so is the least intrusive means of you getting a statue or those images, flowers or cake.
The problem is that neither test succeeds — you not only have no compelling state interest (you have a selection of many places to get flowers, cakes and pictures and none of those are in any way necessary) but in addition since you can take pictures with your phone there is no argument to be made that demanding said photographer take them is the least-intrusive remedy for what you are complaining about.
Gavin
* Consider the restaurant.
The chef sets his menu and ingredients at his restaurant. You have no right to demand that he not use, for example, bacon fat as his cooking oil. Yet if you’re Muslim or Jewish such an ingredient in your food is utterly barred from you as a matter of religious law — period. While the restaurant does provide a public accommodation (that is, test #1 passes) strict scrutiny does NOT permit you to demand that he change the oil the chef uses for his cooking. He is required to serve anyone who is willing to pay the asking price for his dish, but you can’t dictate the ingredients.
Gavin
And:
“Suppose I sell paintings. Suppose you are an alcoholic adulterer, just the kind of person my co-religionists and I might stone to death in the public square. Should a court be able to punish me for refusing to sell you a painting?
Suppose instead of paintings I sell groceries, or first-aid kits. What then? Should my refusing to deal with you be punishable in court?”
First, please read the text of my replies above, because when you apply the legal doctrines, you may realize the answer.
1) I’m not sure what side you’re taking, because that choice by the painter [refusing to sell to the alcoholic] is exactly what the Indiana law is protecting. Even so, I would imagine that painters wouldn’t choose to turn the alcoholic away – if his name is Jim Irsay. [ba-zinga] The law doesn’t protect the stoning, of course.
2) Refusing groceries and/or first aid kits: I’m assuming it’s utilitarian goods that you’re considering – eg, the first aid kit is prepackaged and the groceries are eggs/bacon/OJ or some such. This does not pass the public accomodation argument: If you want to sell widgets, you don’t get to pick and choose who to sell to.. and the Indiana law as passed doesn’t allow the proprietor to do that.
Is Indiana articulate in EXPLAINING the intent and purpose of this law? No. Are they correct? YES.
Similarly, the Tea Party itself was in fact a grass roots organization actually critical of everything banking-abuse-related… for about 47 hours, before it was co-opted by Republicans.
Gavin
@Cervantes:
The problem with Angie’s asking for tax breaks….. that will be treated as straight profit for the C-suite pockets.
Consider the staff they employ…. they don’t employ any actual contractors, plumbers, or the like – it’s all IT/call center/backoffice types. That’s not a lucrative position, unless you’re one of the 30-ish manager/director/C-suite.
Consider the staff count: 1540 employees as of last year.
Consider the stock: Down 50% in the last year, down almost 80% from its 2013 peak, has not had a profitable fiscal year since its 2011 IPO.. something that should shock nobody considering it’s a glorified aggregator/bulletin board.
On Monday 3/30/15, Amazon launched a service that’s directly a competitor: They will create a list of service professionals that can perform around 700 different services, endorsing each one with an Amazon guarantee. They also will run background checks against each provider it endorses, and offers a 30-day price-matching guarantee. That’s death with a capital D, sportsfans….
And into this gaping maw, Indianapolis is seriously considering offering tax BREAKS to a company that hasn’t had positive net revenue [with which to pay back taxpayers] in years? Remember, tax breaks come off the balance sheet before taxes are paid… and Angies List does have significant revenue – go onto marketwatch, it’s $171k revenue per employee as of today.
Say they’re averaging 60k salary per each of those 1500 employees. That means they have 258M annual revenue of which only 90M is labor cost! What, precisely, are they doing with the rest of it.. considering it’s a tech startup? They burn thru MORE than 170M/yr in nonlabor expenses?
My guess, when you look at the books after it goes bankrupt… you’ll find the initial investors and first few employees were made very rich, and continued to funnel money to themselves [Stock buybacks! Bonuses! Mandated payouts!] rather than grow the business.
The city should save its ammunition for companies that actually have a shot at succeeding.
Monala
@Gavin: Here’s where I think you’re wrong: you’ve given all these examples of customers asking a service provider to provide something they don’t already provide. But the cases in question have involved people being denied service for a product the service provider does provide. The bakers already provide wedding cakes. The customers have not asked them to change anything about what they provide, and most likely, selected what they want from whatever book of options the baker has. (Three or four tier? Real rose petals, or rose petals made from icing? etc.).
So it still comes down to certain businesses not wanting to serve certain customers.
Btw, I mentioned this article yesterday, about a reporter who called the bakeries refusing to sell cakes for gay weddings, and learned that they had no problem selling cakes for divorce parties, baby showers for out of wedlock babies, pagan solstice parties, etc. So much for deep religious convictions.
http://www.wweek.com/portland/article-20698-the_cake_wars.html
Monala
@Gavin:
And why do those pesky black people need to eat at Woolworth’s anyway? They can eat lunch at home for free! Therefore, eating at Woolworth’s is not essential…
Gavin
@Monala:
Incorrect. The baker has PICTURES of cakes.. not the cake itself. The only way it’s discrimination is if the cake is already sitting there and the baker refuses to sell it.
Reread my text again, or look it up elsewhere – you have not applied the law correctly.
You have the right not to LIKE the law as it exists. But that’s a far, far different issue!
Gavin
@Monala:
Black people were refused service off the readily available menu the store offered other customers. That’s a very different issue.
The law is tough, even when you’re deliberately trying to be hyperbolic!
Are you saying that I don’t have the right to refuse to sell to you for any reason from my own business even if you’re deliberately being obstreperous to me within the square footage of the business I run?
Paying customers have been thrown out of stores since the beginning of time.. this isn’t the magical first time that anyone’s ever had their money refused..
Monala
@Gavin: You’re making a ridiculous argument. The baker sells wedding cakes. A gay customer has asked for a wedding cake. They have not asked for something the baker does not already sell. Whether the cake is made to order or customers select from something pre-made is irrelevant. The baker sells wedding cakes. They cannot deny a paying customer a cake based on who that person is.
Regarding the Woolworth’s sit-in example: you made the point that if you can take photos with your camera for free, then hiring a wedding photographer is not an essential service (and therefore being denied is no hardship). Well, likewise, someone back in the 1960s could have argued (and who knows? Probably did) that black people could eat at home for free, so getting served at the Woolworth’s lunch counter was not an essential service, and thus being denied was no hardship. There was no point in this analogy related to people being denied service for behaving obnoxiously in a store.
boatboy_srq
@Gavin:
So, a car dealer would have to sell something on the lot, but something ordered from the factory could be refused. That’s a crock. You can’t ascribe artistic meaning to a commodity depending on whether it’s purchased prior to manufacture, or afterward. And there may be “artistry” in baking, but a baked product is a commodity, not an artwork.
Gavin
@Monala:
Incorrect, as stated above already.
They did ask the baker for something he doesn’t already sell – if he did sell it, they’d walk in and buy it.. and he’d have to sell it to them. You don’t understand strict construction.. because what you have now asserted “is irrelevant” in multiple examples is in fact the definition of the statute.
Again: You may not like it, but you can now go get your case sent to the Supremes and get the law changed.
As for the woolworth, the menu is the commodity.
The point is that if the baked product is such a commodity, then you can go to WalMart and get it. If it’s not available, it’s not a commodity.. and that’s exactly the point.
Until you demonstrate that you understand strict construction, I’m done responding to you – because your comments are objectively wrong.