Posted on 03/03/2014 8:55:22 AM PST by Kaslin
Albert Einstein once said, Never do anything against conscience even if the state demands it.
He was right.
In the aftermath of the Arizona religious freedom skirmish, I have a few questions for those who would presume to compel religious business owners, under penalty of law, to provide goods and services to homosexuals in a way that violates that business owners conscience.
To wit:
If you said no to any of the above, and you opposed Arizonas cowardly vetoed SB1062, then youre logically inconsistent and need to re-evaluate your position.
To clarify liberals, I know you have a difficult time understanding the Constitution with its outdated Bill of Rights and all Im not talking about refusing business to someone just because he appears effeminate or she appears butch, or even when that someone is an out and proud homosexual.
Ive never even heard of a case where a Christian baker randomly refused to provide baked goods such as a birthday cake to any homosexual, absent a scenario in which those goods endorsed a message the baker finds repugnant (rainbow pride cupcakes, gay wedding cakes and the like). Ive never heard of a single instance in which a Christian business owner arbitrarily said to a homosexual: We dont serve your kind here.
And neither can the left provide such an instance. Because it doesnt happen. If it did happen, it would be front-page news for a month.
No, Im specifically referring to scenarios that have occurred and continue to occur with alarming frequency. Situations in which Christian business owners are being sued, fined or even threatened with jail time for politely declining to apply their God-given time and talent to create goods or services that require they violate deeply held and constitutionally protected religious beliefs.
It really is that black and white. This was never about the person. It was always about the message. It was never about discrimination. It was always about liberty.
Freedom, man.
Because Merica.
While from a constitutional standpoint its not even necessary, thats all the drafters of SB1062 and similar such bills have endeavored to do. Because government has begun alienating unalienable rights at a level unparalleled since passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, legislators have attempted to merely re-affirm the already existing right for religious business owners to live out their faith without fear of persecution or government reprisal.
Seriously, unless youre fascist, who could disagree? Nobody should ever be forced to spend their time and talent to endorse whether directly or indirectly a message or event that he or she finds repugnant. I dont care if youre Christian, pagan, black, white, gay or straight. Thats your God-given right as an American.
As a constitutionalist, Ill remain consistent will you? If youre a homosexual photographer, for instance, and, for whatever reason, you oppose natural man-woman marriage, and you choose to exercise your right to only photograph gay weddings, then knock yourself out. If I come knocking and want you to photograph my wedding, and you tell me to pound sand, Ill suck it up and take my business down the street.
And I wont even demand you be thrown in jail for it.
See how easy that was? I mean, youre a liberal. Youre "pro-choice, right?
Starting to get it?
Well, let me be clear so theres no misunderstanding. If Im a business owner and someone comes in requesting goods or services that would require me to violate my conscience especially my biblically-based, sincerely held religious beliefs I will not, under any circumstances, provide those goods or services. This is my absolute, non-negotiable, constitutionally guaranteed right.
No debate. No question. No compromise.
Martin Luther King Jr. once said, An individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for the law.
Those are wise words from a wise man. For purposes of todays debate, however, those words require a slight contextual modification. No anti-discrimination law that presumes to remove the constitutional right of business owners to operate their business according to conscience is worth the paper its written on.
Poo paper for puppy.
So, liberals, knock off the Alinskyite obfuscation and conflation. Quit throwing around all this Jim Crow crap. It belittles the legitimate civil rights struggle and makes you look stupid. Youve created an ugly and offensive straw man and beat the stuffing out of him.
I rarely agree with gay activist Andrew Sullivan, but on the subject at hand, he at least has a remedial understanding. Gloss over all the obligatory homophobe and bigot nonsense, and he recently made a few good points on The Dish:
I favor maximal liberty in these cases. The idea that you should respond to a hurtful refusal to bake a wedding cake by suing the bakers is a real stretch to me. There are plenty of non-homophobic bakers in Arizona. We run the risk of becoming just as intolerant as the anti-gay bigots [read: Christians], if we seek to coerce people into tolerance. If we value our freedom as gay people in living our lives the way we wish, we should defend that same freedom to sincere religious believers and also, yes, to bigots and haters. You do not conquer intolerance with intolerance. Im particularly horrified by the attempt to force anyone to do anything they really feel violates their conscience, sense of self, or even just comfort.
And besides, as constitutional law expert Jan LaRue recently observed in an email: If they believe their own rhetoric, that were hateful bigots, why would they even risk eating our cakes?
Why indeed?
Yuck.
If Jan Bewer’s gay hairstylist can refuse her business, why can’t Christians do that too?
Let me put it this way, homosexuals and Muslims will have the right to refuse your business but Christians won’t
I have the right to refuse service to anybody I deem a MARXIST/LIBERAL/COMMUNIST.
I also have the right to refuse them employment.
Catastrophic logic beautifully argued!
EXCELLENT illustrations!
I had heard it was the hair dresser of the governor of New Mexico, not Arizona.
It would have/should have made the national headlines if it were Jan Brewer.
And whatever happened to “no shirt, no shoes, no service” ? seen at many shops at resorts
Or “only two children with backpacks in the store at one time” - sign near a middle school.
I guess he'd make an exception about the Mormons and polygamy.
Most here are loathe to admit it, but we sacrificed the “absolute right to refuse service” with the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Business owners have not actually had such a right since the day it was signed.
We did it for the most noble of reasons. But put ourselves on a very slippery slope in the process. Unintended consequences.
> I have the right to refuse service to anybody I deem a MARXIST/LIBERAL/COMMUNIST.
I also have the right to refuse them employment.
You just found a more qualified candidate for the job...
Wait a minute, if her hair stylist is gay, who styles her hair then?
The article is from 2012, would have thought it would have been in the commentaries about Arizona.
The fellas at the filtered News Services are always on the job.
Good counter illustrations, but in offering them up, you must assert the truth about the agenda.
The agenda is anti-Christian. All answers to your scenarios will be given within this agenda.
The goal is the criminalization of Christian belief and the punishment thereof by the State.
And we need to call them out on it, not pussyfoot around with counter-examples to point out their “hypocrisy”.
Pointing out hypocrisy is a “shame” tactic, and it does not work with the left.
I heard it wrong, I also didn’t know it was years ago
Bttt
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