The issue is in the creation of private clubs made for specific purposes. This is done all the time. Even in the corporate world, you can have a parent company with all sorts of associated companies that do specific things. And just because someone deals with one associated company, doesn’t mean they can deal with any other associated company.
Well, the same thing can be done with clubs. Yes, there are laws about what a club is and isn’t. Mainly the club has to stick to its proclaimed purpose, and not be used as a cover for something else. That’s why being up front abot this is so important. As for the money, again, if the money is for the stated purpose, everything is fine.
And this shouldn’t affect competition at all - the same people are buying the same things for the same purposes in the same marketplace. Some are doing it through clubs, some are not. The public is free to choose what they want to do.
This is nothing but a buyer’s club that serves certain churches. You don’t have to join a church or believe a certain religion to “get in.” It’s the reverse of that. If you’re alread IN these churches, then you can make use of the club.
I would assume that a Christian Baked Goods Club could be organized one of two ways:
1) It could be a bunch of amateurs baking cakes for one another, in which case you aren't going to help any local Christian bakers stay in business. If anything you would hurt their business as the amateurs would most likely start baking other types of baked goods to share among themselves and not just wedding cakes, or
2) A member who happens to run a Christian bakery and a bunch of non-bakers. In this case the only way to help the Christian baker compensate for loss of business would be if he ended up pocketing most of the club dues. This might be seen by the feds as a false front tax dodge and the whole thing shut down.
In the case of the baker there might not be any need to get money to him. It could be that 99.9% of his business is baking things other than wedding cakes. However, there are other businesses which are much more dependent on weddings to keep themselves afloat. What if a tuxedo rental shop, wedding dress manufacturer, florist, or photographer decided to be part of forming such a club? What if his open and proud membership in this club cost him some of his regular customers who were put off by what the press told them was a cynical con to get around serving gays? Those business owners would need to collect most of the dues in order to make up for lost income. The IRS might be interested in investigating such clubs.
But let's say that your club idea works for companies that provide products and services to weddings. What about those companies that provide a hall? I don't see how you could form a club such that the hall could end up being rented out for anything but gay weddings and gay wedding receptions. I was hoping you could think of a valid way to protect such organizations as well.
In one of your earlier posts you implored Freepers to think more deeply and clearly about these issues. I hope it is now obvious that I have done some deep and clear thinking on these issues and I would appreciate a true response and not just a restatement of your original post.