Wouldn’t this law have made it legal to refuse service to someone based solely on the grounds that it was against their religious beliefs? What if I interpret my faith to mean that all of (insert race, creed, gender, etc.) are not worthy of being served by me? How loosely can it be interpreted? Isn’t that basically the same as Jim Crow laws? These situations arise all across a spectrum, and while there are easy cases on the ends, there are hard cases in the middle. I know I’m raising more questions than answers ... that’s how law often is, unfortunately.
“Religion” is so lukewarm today that it would be the rare odd case who would make himself a serious nuisance this way.
refuse “a particular” service is different than refuse service. I am sure the bakery would have made them a cake, it’s that they wanted a gay wedding cake. Why should they be forced to make that if it is against their faith. If a black person came in and ordered a “white people suck” cake, it wouldn’t be wrong for the bakery to say, sorry, hate is against our religion, find someone else. Would that be racial discrimination?
“Wouldn’t this law have made it legal to refuse service to someone based solely on the grounds that it was against their religious beliefs? What if I interpret my faith to mean that all of (insert race, creed, gender, etc.) are not worthy of being served by me? How loosely can it be interpreted?”
This is an anti-libertarian and anti – conservative view. It is better to have A business' discriminations out in the open so that the public can decide whether or not they would patronize such a place, citizens are perfectly capable in making such a decision – and businesses that overtly discriminate will go out of business very quickly. I personally would not patronize a homosexuals business if I knew he hated Christians, and not too many here at Free Republic would patronize such a place either – but we would all believe that the homosexual has a right to run its business the way it wants to!
“Isn’t that basically the same as Jim Crow laws?”
Here is a complete misunderstanding of the Jim Crow laws – these laws were from government and not businesses – they were government discrimination laws and not laws against discrimination. These laws FORCED businesses to discriminate!