I’m sorry - but, when you decide to operate a “fee-for-service” business in the public arena, you must serve everyone.
However, you do have a choice - provide the service, or close the business. It is black letter law.
In the example in the article - it would work both ways for both the heterosexual and the homosexual.
Otherwise, it would be akin to refusing to serve blacks at the lunch counter ...
If I owned a bakery I wouldn't make a cake with a swastika on it either.
Sure you are required to serve black people at your Woolworth's but you shouldn't be forced to make something custom made, if it's not on the menu no matter how much it was "demanded".
Gimme an ice cream cone with 8 scoops!
Sorry, we don't make those.
You HAVE to, I'm black!
I can offer you a triple scoop cone, any flavors.
Not good enough, I'm suing!
Bullshit. You wouldn't have to serve the Ku Klux Klan or the Nazi Party. Hell, I'll bet you wouldn't have to serve the Tea party, and if you were muslim, you wouldn't have to serve homos.
Some animals are more equal than others.
Otherwise, it would be akin to refusing to serve blacks at the lunch counter ...
Not even close. The people who refused blacks at their lunch counters could not cite Biblical or constitutional reasons.
Tell that to the Muzzie cab drivers who refuse to drive customers with alcohol.
What is namely the service? Too provide a cake? Or to provide a "wedding cake" ? I think there is a distinction. In the second case the question naturally presents itself, "What is a wedding?"
That’s just it, businesses do not serve everyone. Your lefty local rag is under no obligation to print conservative letters to the editor or even sell ad space to conservatives.
And it will never go both ways. A business that refused to do business with Christians will never face a problem
>> I’m sorry - but, when you decide ...
You do realize it’s okay to take a stand on principle, right?
The moral challenges won’t go away by searching for justifications to grant exceptions. This is not about discriminating against the color of one’s skin.
Actually, you don’t have to close the business. You simply drop wedding cakes from your list of services. You can sell many more birthday cakes, cookies and cupcakes than wedding cakes anyway.
The baker didn't refuse to serve homosexuals....he undoubtedly has served thousands. He just refused to bake a specific type of cake.
There’s a point where, and the article makes this clear, where normal business operations cross the line into “art”, which is a form of protected expression.
Run of the mill baked goods don’t really cross that line. Specialties such as wedding cakes do. The baker has every Constitutional right to refuse to produce art that he disagrees with. To compel him do so is both a violation of the 1st Amendment AND the 13th’s prohibition on involuntary servitude.
Had he refused them service in general, that is one thing. He said he would sell them anything else, he just balked at the “custom order.” You seemed to miss the point. So, Ill pose you the question.....should a gay printer be forced to take and order to create a 100 foot banner that says “Homosexuality is a sin before God.” Should a black painter be forced to accept a contract to paint a portrait of a KKK leader? That is the point.
I dont see this so much as a gay/straight issue, rather as a matter of the state dictating the work that a craftsman must accept.