dtucker300 wrote:
I have to disagree. Maybe I am missing your point. Isn't the argument you are putting forth the same argument segregationist used to keep Blacks out of white businesses? Please explain how your point is different. This is not simply a "No shoes, no shirt, no service" policy.
This opens another can of worms. Are Homosexuals born this way or do they choose to be this way and therefore can change. A black person cannot change their ethnicity, so discrimination results when people are bigoted. On the other hand, refusing to provide a service that goes against one's religious beliefs may or may not be different. Slavery was justified by some in the 18th and 19th centuries through scripture.
I have a feeling that this topic just became a hot potato. Get ready for the onslaught.
I have to disagree. Maybe I am missing your point... (
show quote)
Let me explain it another way.
Phillips did not and doubtless would not refuse service to somebody for being gay. That was not the issue. The issue was that Phillips, being a devout Christian who, as is his right as an American in America, adheres to his beliefs -- and the Bible definitely states that homosexuality is forbidden by G-d.
Not everyone believes that or
has to believe it, but it is Phillips' right to do so.
Back to the gay guy; he enters the shop and orders a cake. Phillips would love to bake him a cake, that's what pays the bills, right? However, the customer then tells him it's a wedding cake for a same sex marriage.
According to his religious beliefs, Phillips can't bake the cake now that he knows it's for something Christianity doesn't condone. Had the customer simply said he wanted a wedding cake baked and not indicated it was for a same sex marriage, even knowing the guy was gay probably wouldn't have stopped him -- the customer could've been buying it for someone else.
So he wasn't refusing to bake a cake for the man on the grounds that he was gay, he just wasn't about to bake a cake knowing it was for something he, as a Christian, couldn't condone.
So at what point does one draw the line where someone else's religious beliefs are concerned? And at what point can the government, be it city, state or federal, tell a private citizen that he has to ignore the tenets of his religion to satisfy a request he considers sinful?
SCOTUS was right to rule in Masterpiece Bake Shop's favor, it's not like it's the only bakery in Lakewood, Colorado.
There are at least 18 bakeries in town, and at least ten will bake a custom wedding cake.
The only reason this is even an issue is because the gay dude and his fellow Democrats wanted to ruin Phillips for not dancing to their tune.
No, the day government can punish a citizen for not yielding his Christian beliefs for something like that will be the day America is no longer a free country.