Author Topic: Here it comes again: Arizona Christian Artists May Face Jail Time for Refusing to Service Gay Wedding  (Read 29262 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Offline Jazzhead

  • Blue lives matter
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 11,593
  • Gender: Male
@Jazzhead Thanks for the explanation about what you meant by civil. I agree with that part. I guess I would challenge the reason someone has the right to receive a service. What you are dealing with are the tacit agreements that unlie the transaction. For example if I go to the store a tacit agreement exists that the prices on the items are correct and that the clerk will tally them correctly ect.

The problem here in dealing with a service is just how many of these agreements carry over into this market. If you view it as a more contractual market then I think it is clear the rights of the producer trump the expectations of the seller. The basis of free exchange is one person trading two willing participants trading goods or labor hours. Artist can hold out for jobs that they want, just because they say they are artist doesn't mean anyone can hire them to slap up a billboard. Think of movie stars they don't have to do just any movie; it's a different market. If you have watched The Fountainhead there are some great examples of this thought. You might look into this, Ayn Rand was no great proponent of Christianty by any stretch. 

So I think we are dealing with different market rules than at the grocery store. The tacit agreement that the customer is going to get the standardized product they expected is certainly not as strong. Does their expectation of a service to be provided give them the right to call in the government and force someone to enter into a sale against their will? Given the clear first amendment applications and the fact that such coercion runs counter to the concept of voluntary free trade that the market is built on I do not think the government has the right to force someone into labor against their will.
Just my dos centavos. Thanks for the discussion. You certainly challenged me to think beyond any knee jerk Bible thumping. Not that I discount the religious arguments here, but I wanted another way to skin the cat.

I think as a practical matter you've enunciated a key difference between establishments that are barred from discriminating, and those which effectively can.   The nondiscrimination laws are aimed at "public accommodations",  which generally mean businesses, including private businesses,  that are open to the public.   One federal law,  42 U.S.C. section 12184,  limits the reach of that general definition by requiring a "public accommodation" to fall into one of twelve prescribed categories:

 
Quote
Public accommodation.    The following private entities are considered public accommodations for purposes of this subchapter, if the operations of such entities affect commerce—

(A)   an inn, hotel, motel, or other place of lodging, except for an establishment located within a building that contains not more than five rooms for rent or hire and that is actually occupied by the proprietor of such establishment as the residence of such proprietor;

(B)   a restaurant, bar, or other establishment serving food or drink;

(C)   a motion picture house, theater, concert hall, stadium, or other place of exhibition or entertainment;

(D)   an auditorium, convention center, lecture hall, or other place of public gathering;

(E)   a bakery, grocery store, clothing store, hardware store, shopping center, or other sales or rental establishment;

(F)   a laundromat, dry-cleaner, bank, barber shop, beauty shop, travel service, shoe repair service, funeral parlor, gas station, office of an accountant or lawyer, pharmacy, insurance office, professional office of a health care provider, hospital, or other service establishment;

(G)   a terminal, depot, or other station used for specified public transportation;

(H)   a museum, library, gallery, or other place of public display or collection;

(I)   a park, zoo, amusement park, or other place of recreation;

(J)   a nursery, elementary, secondary, undergraduate, or postgraduate private school, or other place of education;

(K)   a day care center, senior citizen center, homeless shelter, food bank, adoption agency, or other social service center establishment; and

(L)   a gymnasium, health spa, bowling alley, golf course, or other place of exercise or recreation. 

You'll note that a bakery is specifically listed, and more generally a "sales or rental establishment".   Also listed is my own profession, although what's interesting is the choice of words used: the "office of a lawyer".    Now we all know that lawyers can and do pick the cases and clients they take.   And they do that by resort to the method you describe in your post - they enter into an individualized contract with each client,  describing the terms and conditions of service.    So while I cannot ostensibly turn away from the office door a potential client based on skin color or religion or sexual orientation,  because each engagement is customized I can effectively choose my clients and have a facial defense on that basis to a charge of discrimination.

So I agree with the import of what you're saying.   If I go into a store and request a service that is posted and priced on the storeowner's wall or menu,  I better not be turned away because I'm white or straight or Christian.   But if the service is customized to the needs of the client/customer,  that very process provides a means for the business owner to effectively discriminate.   If he's smart he won't say he's discriminating for unlawful reasons, but for reasons based on the job he's been asked to perform. 

And that's the heart of the wedding calligrapher's argument -  that his task is artistic and inherently customizable,  and so he can accept or turn down business on an arbitrary basis.  Is that a winning argument in court?  I guess we may find out - and a lot may ride on the interaction between the calligrapher and his customer.   A SMART calligrapher won't get on his high horse and cite religion for his refusal to provide invitations that say Bob and Ray.   A STUPID calligrapher will spout a religious rant and get sued for his efforts.  A SMART calligrapher will say he's too busy and can't schedule the work, and will recommend another calligrapher that the customer can turn to.   And that's how it usually goes in the real world, in which folks of good will get along without the intercession of lawyers.   
« Last Edit: December 14, 2016, 01:23:36 pm by Jazzhead »
It's crackers to slip a rozzer the dropsy in snide

Offline skeeter

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 26,717
  • Gender: Male
No, I don't. And the bigotry involved in MAKING ME is unconscionable. I took no money. I shook no hand. there is not a contract verbal or otherwise. Until there is, it is a simple matter of MY PROPERTY. I have every right to refuse to do business with ANYONE.

@roamer_1

The person who can sum up their point compellingly using just a few powerful words wins the debate every time.

Thanks for cutting through the sophistry and fashionable double talk to expose the basic issue here. Unless more people begin to understand whats at stake for the individual, and whats being lost in the name of whatever the progressives are calling it today, all really is lost.
« Last Edit: December 14, 2016, 02:16:16 pm by skeeter »

Offline Jazzhead

  • Blue lives matter
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 11,593
  • Gender: Male
@roamer_1

The person who can sum up their point compellingly using just a few powerful words wins the debate every time.

Thanks for cutting through the sophistry and fashionable double talk to expose the basic issue here. Unless more people begin to understand whats at stake for the individual, and whats being lost in the name of whatever the progressives are calling it today, all really is lost.

The customer's an individual too, and he's the one being victimized by a storeowner who degrades him by refusing to provide an advertised service.

 
It's crackers to slip a rozzer the dropsy in snide

Offline Sanguine

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 35,986
  • Gender: Female
  • Ex-member
The customer's an individual too, and he's the one being victimized by a storeowner who degrades him by refusing to provide an advertised service.

 

Oh, please!  "Degrades"?

The customer would know that this is a controversial issue and that religious people in particular will have a religious objection to his "service" request. He wants to be accommodated without any regard to the beliefs of the person he wants to accommodate him.  By that measure, he is degrading the business owner.

Offline skeeter

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 26,717
  • Gender: Male
The customer's an individual too, and he's the one being victimized by a storeowner who degrades him by refusing to provide an advertised service.

 

I'd say being threatened with jail time constitutes a higher level of degradation than having one's feelings hurt.

Offline Jazzhead

  • Blue lives matter
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 11,593
  • Gender: Male
Oh, please!  "Degrades"?

The customer would know that this is a controversial issue and that religious people in particular will have a religious objection to his "service" request. He wants to be accommodated without any regard to the beliefs of the person he wants to accommodate him.  By that measure, he is degrading the business owner.

Why shouldn't a customer expect the service that the business owner advertises that he provides?   What's unreasonable to expect the business owner to live up to his word?  Religion is a bullshit excuse for arbitrary discrimination in this situation.

 
« Last Edit: December 14, 2016, 03:05:13 pm by Jazzhead »
It's crackers to slip a rozzer the dropsy in snide

Offline Sanguine

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 35,986
  • Gender: Female
  • Ex-member
Why shouldn't a customer expect the service that the business owner advertises that he provides?   What's unreasonable to expect the business owner to live up to his word?  Religion is a bullshit excuse for arbitrary discrimination.

Arbitrary?  Nothing arbitrary about it.


Offline Jazzhead

  • Blue lives matter
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 11,593
  • Gender: Male
Arbitrary?  Nothing arbitrary about it.

From the customer's perspective, it's arbitrary, insulting and degrading.  This is a commercial business, open to the public, and advertising specific wares or services.  Religion is no excuse for discrimination.   Thank goodness the law provides a remedy.
It's crackers to slip a rozzer the dropsy in snide

Offline skeeter

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 26,717
  • Gender: Male
Religion is a bullshit excuse for arbitrary discrimination in this situation.

Wow. I can only pray that your point of view never gain complete ascendency here. I wouldn't want to live in such a place.

Offline TomSea

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 40,432
  • Gender: Male
  • All deserve a trial if accused
"Religion is a bullshit excuse for arbitrary discrimination in this situation."

Come on, if one says the 14th amendment of the Constitution settles it, what does the 1st amendment mean?  Freedom of religion.


Online roamer_1

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 45,593
The customer's an individual too, and he's the one being victimized by a storeowner who degrades him by refusing to provide an advertised service.

 

How is he degraded? HOW? Because someone called him a bad name, or made him feel not-so-special? He then goes on his way. He is not sullied, nor bloodied, free to engage in a contract with someone who wants to serve him....

In the mean time, the Christian MUST, under color of law, bend to serve him against moral constraint... Participating in sin. Supporting it. Endorsing it. And not just him, but any other like him that might wander into the shop.

Who then is being degraded?

Online roamer_1

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 45,593
Why shouldn't a customer expect the service that the business owner advertises that he provides?   What's unreasonable to expect the business owner to live up to his word? 

Again, an advertisement is not the business owner 'giving his word'.
'Giving his word' is a handshake on a deal, or money changing hands, or a signed order or contract.

Quote
Religion is a bullshit excuse for arbitrary discrimination in this situation.

And there it is.

Just because religion is bullshit to YOU, does not mean likewise for everyone. Some people actually live by it. And this government is supposed to protect their right to do so. It is an egregious betrayal of the Constitution itself, and a direct assault upon property rights.

Online roamer_1

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 45,593
@roamer_1

The person who can sum up their point compellingly using just a few powerful words wins the debate every time.

Thanks for cutting through the sophistry and fashionable double talk to expose the basic issue here. Unless more people begin to understand whats at stake for the individual, and whats being lost in the name of whatever the progressives are calling it today, all really is lost.

When a subject such as this is even an arguable item on a Conservative site, all is already lost - Or pretty close to it. Since business is simply an extension of the rights of a person or group, I would wager this will cross the artifice they have constructed to invade the home and church as well... soon enough.

Offline Jazzhead

  • Blue lives matter
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 11,593
  • Gender: Male

And there it is.


Note my wording - "Religion is a bullshit excuse for arbitrary discrimination in this situation ."    That situation is the running of a commercial business subject to the laws of the community.   Don't give me this malarkey that it's your religion that allows you to humiliate your customers of the wrong skin color or sexual orientation.   You set the rules of engagement, you decide what you'll sell, now do the honorable thing and live up to your word. 
« Last Edit: December 14, 2016, 03:52:05 pm by Jazzhead »
It's crackers to slip a rozzer the dropsy in snide

Online roamer_1

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 45,593
Note my wording - "Religion is a bullshit excuse for arbitrary discrimination in this situation ."    That situation is the running of a commercial business subject to the laws of the community.   Don't give me this malarkey that it's your religion that allows you to humiliate your customers of the wrong skin color or sexual orientation.   You set the rules of engagement, you decide what you'll sell, now do the honorable thing and live up to your word.

Of course it isn't my religion. It is my right on my property to conduct myself as I see fit. I can humiliate any other customer with abandon, for any reason I might choose. What makes skin color or sexual orientation sacrosanct?

And that is just what I am arguing - I can no longer 'set the rues of engagement', as you put it. I now MUST sell to these folks, forced under color of law, when no such prerequisite exists with any other people whatsoever.

And as I have stated over and over, there is no 'word' given, whatsoever. Just because you cross my threshold does not give you (or anyone else) the right to buy from me. Nor does it give you the right to be treated pleasantly.

Offline Jazzhead

  • Blue lives matter
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 11,593
  • Gender: Male

 Just because you cross my threshold does not give you (or anyone else) the right to buy from me. Nor does it give you the right to be treated pleasantly.

No, but you have the legal obligation to not arbitrarily discriminate.  Ignore the law at your peril.  God won't help you; you'll need to lawyer up.   
It's crackers to slip a rozzer the dropsy in snide

Offline Idaho_Cowboy

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 4,924
  • Gender: Male
  • Ride for the Brand - Joshua 24:15
Why shouldn't a customer expect the service that the business owner advertises that he provides?   What's unreasonable to expect the business owner to live up to his word?  Religion is a bullshit excuse for arbitrary discrimination in this situation.
An expectation is hardly a basic human right. You won't find it protected by the bill of rights, which is the highest law in the land.
“The way I see it, every time a man gets up in the morning he starts his life over. Sure, the bills are there to pay, and the job is there to do, but you don't have to stay in a pattern. You can always start over, saddle a fresh horse and take another trail.” ― Louis L'Amour

Online roamer_1

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 45,593
No, but you have the legal obligation to not arbitrarily discriminate.  Ignore the law at your peril.  God won't help you; you'll need to lawyer up.

Nonsense. I arbitrarily discriminate all the time. If I don't like the way a deal feels, I will kill it dead. For whatever reason. I don't do business with jackasses. But now, if that jackass happens to be a homo, I'd better scrape and bow, and give him a whale of a deal, and hope like hell he doesn't run off and sue me out of house and home anyway, just because he can... Regardless of how he was treated.

My religious beliefs should be enough. This is precisely the same thing as forcibly making me eat pork. But even without the religious angle, it tips the playing field all the way in the direction of the homo, in every case. All he has to do is claim abuse.


Offline SirLinksALot

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 4,417
  • Gender: Male
No, but you have the legal obligation to not arbitrarily discriminate.  Ignore the law at your peril.  God won't help you; you'll need to lawyer up.

These are two different things --- The existence of the law and whether or not the law in and of itself is constitutional.

If a law VIOLATES the First Amendment, it ought to be repealed.

Offline CSM

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 558
So what gives them the right to discriminate?     

I don't know about you, but my rights are unalienable.  No one "gives" rights.  I am free to associate with whomever I please, same for you and the same applies to all Free People.

Offline Sanguine

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 35,986
  • Gender: Female
  • Ex-member
No, but you have the legal obligation to not arbitrarily discriminate.  Ignore the law at your peril.  God won't help you; you'll need to lawyer up.

Again, @Jazzhead, there is nothing arbitrary about following the clear and unambiguous dictates of most of the major religions in the world.  I'm not sure how you can even type that with a straight face.   

Offline Jazzhead

  • Blue lives matter
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 11,593
  • Gender: Male
Again, @Jazzhead, there is nothing arbitrary about following the clear and unambiguous dictates of most of the major religions in the world.  I'm not sure how you can even type that with a straight face.

Failing to bake a cake for a civil wedding has nothing to do with following the "clear and unambiguous dictates" of Christianity.  If anything, the Bible teaches us to honor our promises and treat our neighbors as we'd like to be treated ourselves.

 If you believe homosexuality is an abominable sin,  don't indulge in the practice.  If you happen to be born gay (sexual orientation is not a choice, if you need proof just ask the question of yourself), then remain celibate and thank the Lord for your misery.

 
It's crackers to slip a rozzer the dropsy in snide

Offline Jazzhead

  • Blue lives matter
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 11,593
  • Gender: Male
I don't know about you, but my rights are unalienable.  No one "gives" rights.  I am free to associate with whomever I please, same for you and the same applies to all Free People.

You are part of a community and a nation.  The American republic is a nation of laws, not of men.   Indulge your selfish nihilism, but don't expect the Lord to assist when you're sued for breaking the rules that order a civil society.   
It's crackers to slip a rozzer the dropsy in snide

Offline CSM

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 558
Back when the law said that slavery was OK, slavery was OK, and it continued to be OK until the law said that it wasn't.

Just wow!  All I can say is that you have no concept of freedom, liberty or even our founding.  Just because "the law" said that slavery was OK, it was NEVER OK.  Today the law states that infanticide is OK, yet I contend that it is about as evil a thing that can be done!

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. ..."

This phrase specifically states that it is an unalienable right of every one of us to "pursue happiness" as we see fit.  That was specifically regarding property ownership and how one uses that property to pursue economic interests.  In other words, it is every individual's undeniable right to run a business as he sees fit!  The government may pass a law, or rule in court, but that is a God given right that cannot be denied to free individuals.

By advocating differently, you are willing to deny that right to others, at society's whims.  In other words, you are willing to trample a natural right that makes others free.  That is enslavement of your fellow man. 

Offline INVAR

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 11,961
  • Gender: Male
  • Dread To Tread
    • Sword At The Ready
Why shouldn't a customer expect the service that the business owner advertises that he provides?   What's unreasonable to expect the business owner to live up to his word?  Religion is a bullshit excuse for arbitrary discrimination in this situation….From the customer's perspective, it's arbitrary, insulting and degrading.  This is a commercial business, open to the public, and advertising specific wares or services.  Religion is no excuse for discrimination.   Thank goodness the law provides a remedy.

The only remedy you are espousing is TYRANNY.

You want to try come and force me to create homosexual wedding invitations and advertisement vehicles because I am a graphic designer - you can go ahead and cheer the government's agents putting a gun to my head to force me to comply, or have my business destroyed - and I will continue to state that I will obey God before I will EVER submit to tyrants like yourself.

I don't give a damn that pervert supporters like you demand I comply with supporting behavioral deviancy simply because you call it discrimination.

I am willing to DIE to refuse that imposition.

You willing to DIE to impose yours?

I want no part of a society that makes Sodom and Gomorrah blush, and I will resist it's attempted imposition on my life, business and family.

Better to obey God than men.
Fart for freedom, fart for liberty and fart proudly.  - Benjamin Franklin

...Obsta principiis—Nip the shoots of arbitrary power in the bud, is the only maxim which can ever preserve the liberties of any people. When the people give way, their deceivers, betrayers and destroyers press upon them so fast that there is no resisting afterwards. The nature of the encroachment upon [the] American constitution is such, as to grow every day more and more encroaching. Like a cancer, it eats faster and faster every hour." - John Adams, February 6, 1775