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It is the baker's right to bake a cake for who ever they feel like baking a cake for. You can't force someone to do something.
by dorp 8y ago
It is the baker's right to bake a cake for who ever they feel like baking a cake for. You can't force someone to do something.
- pstuart 8y ago“We don’t serve coloreds here”
- cmonreally 8y agoThat's a disingenuous argument. They didn't say "we don't serve gays here", they said "we don't want to make a custom cake as requested". If a gay person walked in, picked a cake off the shelf and said "I'd like to buy this cake" and was refused for being gay, that's a different story. As in that would literally be a completely different story than what happened.
- lev99 8y agoCake shops do custom cakes very often, it's standard business for them.
- wang_li 8y agoThey do, but I imagine there are quite a few (all?) cake shops that would refuse to make cakes with particular messages. What if, for example, a gay owned bakery was asked by a Muslim Imam to make a cake with the message "Thank Allah for the Pulse nightclub shooting"? Would the bakery be in violation of the CRA as they are discriminating on the basis of religion? The question in this case was not whether the baker would sell a cake to a gay person (he was willing to do so), it was whether the baker had to make a cake with a particular message that he felt violated his personal and deeply held beliefs.
- paulmd 8y agoNo, per the article the baker was not refusing to "make a cake with a specific message", he refused to make any custom cake for gay couples. >The Colorado Court of Appeals ruled that Mr. Phillips’s free speech rights had not been violated, noting that the couple had not discussed the cake’s design before Mr. Phillips turned them down.
- cmonreally 8y agoAt the time the cake was requested, state law afforded storekeepers some latitude to decline to create specific messages the storekeeper considered offensive. In fact, during the time this case was making its way through the courts the Colorado Civil Rights Commission upheld 3 other bakers' rights to decline to make cakes with messages that they thought were demeaning to gay persons or gay marriage.
- drenvuk 8y ago"We don't serve whites here" "We don't serve women here" "We don't serve Chinese here" "We don't serve emacs users here" "We don't serve zerg rushers here" "We don't serve pubg players here" "We don't serve Ayn Rand fans here" "We don't serve sex offenders here" "We don't serve bearded fellows here" "We don't serve tank top wearers here" "we don't serve smokers here" "We don't serve short people here" "We don't serve underhand servers here" "We don't serve pedophobes here" "We don't serve <subset of humans> here" It doesn't matter. It is his choice and his business.
- jhall1468 8y agoNo, actually it does because we have laws that says it does. The hell is with all the trolls coming in like the Civil Rights Act doesn't exist.
- drenvuk 8y agoIt seems I'm wrong then, I didn't know the contents of the Civil Rights Act. Thanks for letting me know.
- dorp 8y agoTBH emacs users shouldn't be allowed /s.
- cdelsolar 8y agoYou can if they're providing a service for the public. Wtf are you talking about?
- samueldavid 8y agothey are not forced too, it's their business
- cdelsolar 8y agoYes they are, this is what the civil rights movement was all about, you can't discriminate based on a large number of protected classes
- samueldavid 8y agoare gays a protected class?
- rawTruthHurts 8y agoExactly. That's why I don't bake for asians.
- overcast 8y agoBaking isn't a public service.
- Finnucane 8y agoIt is a 'public accommodation' within the meaning of the legal definition: i.e., a place where the general public may freely enter and do business. Civil rights law forbids discrimination in public accommodations on the basis of race, religion, or national origin. If a Christian baker said, we don't serve Jews, they'd get sued in a minute.
- overcast 8y agoCorrect, it's not a human rights violation, it's a cake. The baker is an asshole, but they don't have to sell to anyone.
- marpstar 8y agoLet the market decide which bakers stay in business.
- staplers 8y agoThis argument is a lot like saying "Let God decide" when in reality it is people doing the deciding.
- kennywinker 8y agoThe markets didn’t decide to only allow bakers that served all races to stay in business - the federal government passed a law that required bakers to serve all races and the market complied. Capitalism actially straight up sometimes requires regulation. Sorry.
- lev99 8y agoI'm coming to the conclusion that when the economic system is Capitalism the goverment will become a Plutocracy, regardless of how well regulated it is. Money is power, and nothing concentrates wealth like capitalism.
- otterley 8y agoThese laws exist because the market doesn't work the way we want them to. If discriminatory businesses failed because they were discriminatory, we wouldn't need such laws.
- ams6110 8y agoIf people didn't recognize discrimination, we wouldn't have enacted those laws. The market would have eventually driven these discriminatory businesses to bankruptcy. Majority public opinion had changed. That's why we were able to pass the laws. Would there be some holdouts? Maybe, but they probably wouldn't have lasted in the face of protests and pickets and lack of customers. Those that did would not be numerous enough to matter.
- deanCommie 8y agoTry opening a bakery with a sign that says "Cakes for Whites only".
- artursapek 8y agoThe cake was meant to be a celebration of the gay marriage; the two are directly related. It's not the same as all of the racial segregation comparisons people are so quick spew on here.
- zrail 8y agoIt's exactly the same. "The cake was meant to be a celebration of a Black marriage, and the plaintiff's religion doesn't accept Black people as human."
- geofft 8y agoOK, can I refuse to sell a house to a gay couple who's getting married, then? That's also celebrating their marriage, in a much more meaningful way.
- deanCommie 8y agoWhat if your religion says that "black people are inferior to white people?" This is at the very nature of the debate: Are people of different sexualities HUMAN rights, in EXACTLY the same way that people of different ethnicities are. Because if they are, civil rights supercede religious rights. ("Your fist's freedom ends where my face begins") Time and time again the US falls on the side that "no, gay people are not entitled to civil rights", diametrically opposite from every other western nation.
- artursapek 8y agoThat would have nothing to do with characteristics of their marriage, that'd be simple racial discrimination. The marriage would be an arbitrary detail in that scenario. I don't hold the same position as him, but if the guy genuinely believes he'd be punished in the afterlife for celebrating a same-sex marriage, then leave him alone. A wedding cake is not a basic human right.
- qntty 8y agoThis is patently false per the Civil Rights Act of 1964
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- Matticus_Rex 8y agoPatently false if you're talking about legal rights, but I doubt he's talking about legal rights.
- christophclarke 8y agoCivil Rights Act extends protections to "protected groups" As of now, does not include sexual orientation (as far as I can tell), although other bodies have interpreted sexual orientation to be protected (Equal Opportunity Employment)
- qntty 8y agoYes, not relevant in this case, but the GP wasn't talking about this case, he was talking about all cases.
- Animats 8y agoThat only prohibits discrimination based on "race, color, religion, sex or national origin."
- qntty 8y agoWhich would mean that a baker cannot discriminate against "who ever they feel like" as GP said.
- rblatz 8y agoI tend to agree at a high level, but what if the baker refused to bake for black people? Is that still ok? What if it wasn’t a baker, but a grocer or a pharmacist? What if it’s the only baker in town? Where should the line be drawn, and why there?
- overcast 8y agoThis Latino place down the street serves the best rice and beans ever, they also wont server you if you're wearing pants falling off your ass(literal sign). The 7-11 won't serve you unless you're wearing a shirt, and shoes. Businesses can server whoever the hell they want.
- toiletfuneral 8y agoSo if a person stops being gay while they’re in the bakery, do they get a cake? Everything you just described as criteria for refusal was by personal choice.
- wang_li 8y agoThey could have gotten a cake if they had been willing to get one that didn't specifically express the homosexual nature of the wedding. The baker had no problem selling them a generic cake, the issue was that he didn't want to make a cake that expressed a message he disagreed with.
- overcast 8y agoReligion is a personal choice, and protected. Sexual orientation is not protected by law.
- givinguflac 8y agoYour statement is quite ignorant. There is a massive difference between business-specific dress codes (both of your examples), and discrimination based on the way a person was born.
- dangoor 8y ago
- adamcharnock 8y ago> You can't force someone to do something. From a legal perspective you absolutely can. That is the purpose of having a legal system after all. If someone behaves otherwise then that's where the justice system comes in.
- dahdum 8y agoIf the custom cake was an expression of free speech, forcing the baker to do so would be compelled speech. The principle you use to compel that speech would have broad implications for artists, writers, and all other creators.
- davorak 8y ago> If the custom cake was an expression of free speech, forcing the baker to do so would be compelled speech. This overstates it some. The baker is not forced to run a business that sells cakes to the public. > The principle you use to compel that speech would have broad implications for artists, writers, and all other creators. Not clear what the implications would be. I am not coming with broad results or impacts in a few minutes of thought. I get examples like: * An artists that sells couple portraits to couples can not refuse a gay couple. * A writer who sells obituaries to the public can not refuse to write one about a gay person. * A baker who sells cakes to the public can not refuse to bake a cake for a gay couple.
- kennywinker 8y agoThis is completely false. The Civil Rights Act of 1964, “prohibits discrimination by privately owned places of public accommodation on the basis of race, color, religion or national origin.” https://www.legalzoom.com/articles/the-right-to-refuse-service-can-a-business-refuse-service-to-someone-because-of-appearance https://www.legalzoom.com/articles/the-right-to-refuse-servi...
- j16sdiz 8y agoThe act say race,color, etc because this law is specific. If we think this law is outdated and need to be expanded, there are due process to change the law. We don't extend law just because we feel right.
- kennywinker 8y agoActually, no. The courts frequently modify the interpretation of the law to adapt to a changing world. For example to handle new technology. I agree we should change the law for the sake of clarity, but laws change how they work in practice due to legal decisions all the time.
- 013a 8y agoWasn't the original case here something along the lines of refusing to bake a cake with homosexual imagery on it, not necessarily because the customers were a homosexual couple? The OP's point should be revised: It's the bakers right to bake cakes however they want. And that's mostly true. If a KKK member came in and asked for a cake with lynching imagery on it, its their right to refuse service. Everything more morally noble than that is just shades of gray, and you do not want the courts and law getting involved in that kind of shades of gray. Leave it to the markets. I'm increasingly convinced that the left is moving us toward a 1984-era world of pushing every little offense into the courts and law. They don't understand how important these fundamental liberties are, which doesn't mean they can't be tempered with things like the Civil Rights Act, but the spirit is still important. When the 2A goes, that's when its all over.
- 8y ago
- geofft 8y agoThat's not how the law treats, say, selling houses: it's not a homeowner's right to sell their house to whomever they feel like selling for and not whomever they don't, if that feeling involves discrimination on race. I think this discussion is likely to be more productive if folks who hold the belief you're holding also state what their agreement is with existing laws restricting how people can participate in the market: if you also disagree with housing anti-discrimination laws, that's fine, but it'll be easier to understand your position if you say you're advocating for those being unjust too. If you don't, I'm curious where you draw the distinction.
- zoba 8y agoThe counter argument being: what if instead of gay these people were African American? Could you refuse service then? Suppose it wasn’t cakes but a restaurant? In both instances, a minority is being refused service because of their specific minority status.
- cft 8y agoFalse analogy: Christianity is a common religion. The baker was a believer. What part of it mentions African Americans?
- jhall1468 8y agoThe literal definition of an analogy is that it uses a different scenario. That's not what false analogy means.
- geofft 8y agoIt was a common position in Christianity at certain points in this nation's history that black people should have less rights than white people. Literally the Southern Baptist Convention came into existence because the northern Baptists were too anti-slavery. "But religion" doesn't let you separate distinctions on sexual orientation from distinctions on race. (Disclosure, I'm Christian, but also I'm a non-white member of the whitest mainline Protestant denomination in the US....)
- RandomTisk 8y agoAnd it was Christianity that you can thank for the abolition movement.
- throwaway5752 8y agoYou're obviously not a lawyer. They are a public accommodation and laws apply to them. He isn't compelled to bake them a cake, but only in the sense that he isn't compelled to operate a company that sells cakes to the public.
- wilsonnb 8y agoYou can't force them to bake a cake for someone, but you can fine them, throw them in jail, or put them out of business for refusing. However, I suggest reading the Court's opinions to see what reasons they actually used in their ruling.[1] Their ruling focused largely on how they felt that the Colorado Civil Rights Commission (CCRC) didn't properly respect the baker's religious beliefs, and that the CCRC has demonstrated inconsistencies with their rulings on other similar cases. [1]https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/17pdf/16-111_j4el.pdf https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/17pdf/16-111_j4el.pdf
- sykh 8y agoActually you can and this is a good thing in many cases. Though in some cases you end up in a gray area where it’s not so clear what is right. We force doctors to treat people and in certain circumstances they are forced to treat people even if they can’t pay. We force pharmacists to fill prescriptions. We prevent landlords from discriminating against protected classes. In the case at hand I think the court got it right. I sympathize with the sentiment that a business owner ought to be able to turn down business but I don’t deny that there are situations where this shouldn’t be the case.
- 0xFFC 8y agoYeah, of course. It is baker right to not sell to Black, Latino, gay, lesbians, and others too. What a beautiful world would have been the German Nazis world. (sarcastic)
- justinator 8y agoWhat about a house? Is it OK to deny a gay couple the "privilege" of home ownership? 'cause that's where this is really going, http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/05/gop-congressman-dana-rohrabacher-housing-discrimination-against-gays-is-fine.html http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/05/gop-congressman...