Comments on: Culhane: Religion, equality and gay marriage – redux

By: John Culhane

John Culhane — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 19:49:52 +0000

NO! He can’t refuse to serve; he can only broadcast his view. I’m guessing and hoping that this would cost him business.

By: John Culhane

John Culhane — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 19:47:47 +0000

No, no, no — it’s not legal! I’m just calling attention to the fact that the merchant can choose to call attention to the fact that he opposes same-sex unions. Then the customer can either avoid this merchant or ignore the comment and use the services anyway.
It really is just a reminder that the freedom of speech is powerful here, even if the merchant doesn’t have the freedom to act on his or her prejudices.

By: truth be told

truth be told — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 19:21:35 +0000

I’d still like to know the legal reasoning that allows a merchant to require his customers to share his religious beliefs – on ANY topic (note my inter-faith example, my rental-car counter example and my fabric example, and my infant baptism example) – as a requisite for doing business.

Yes, it would probably end up being ruinous (tho those fundies DO like to support one another), but how is it legal? That’s what I don’t understand.

By: John Culhane

John Culhane — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 19:12:42 +0000

It looks like we cross-posted our latest comments, so just one more quick clarification: I’m not saying that the merchant’s belief trumps yours, or anyone else’s. You can ignore the message and choose to hire that person anyway. But I wouldn’t.

By: truth be told

truth be told — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 19:09:17 +0000

” How would I want to be treated if I were a religious person? ”

Well, I am a religious person, and MY religious beliefs are counter to the merchant’s. Please explain why the merchant’s beliefs trump a potential customer’s beliefs. Also, why must the customer change his/her beliefs as a requirement of doing business in the first place?

Example: A customer goes to buy flowers, and asks that the card read, “To baby Jessica, on the occasion of her baptism”. Should a staunch Pentecostal florist be allowed to say, “Sorry, I don’t believe in infant baptism. It offends my religion, so you cannot buy my flowers.”???

Frankly, with reasoning and logic such as yours, you deserved the deluge.

By: John Culhane

John Culhane — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 19:09:14 +0000

I just happened to find these late-breaking comments from truth be told, and thought I should at least clean up some misinterpretations that seem to have taken root.
First, I wasn’t saying that the business owner’s associational freedom trumps the customer’s right to be served — that was a summary of the libertarian position, with which I disagree.
Just to be clear: I don’t think that those who engage in commerce should be able to refuse to serve anyone.
A related point: by “private actor” I’m referring to non-government actors. Of course they’re not “private” in the sense that they’d get to avoid complying with anti-discrimination laws. I apologize for using the word in a sense that would be understood by lawyers, but maybe not by others.
No accommodation at all is full equality before the law. I like the way truth be told puts that.
As for my point about posting something that reveals the business owner’s discomfort with providing services in support of a gay or lesbian wedding, we just disagree. Personally, I’d rather know, up front, that a particular religious nut didn’t want to be my wedding singer than to have the whole thing be kind of weird. Of course, best of all would be for him/her to just deal with it. But we live in the real world.

By: truth be told

truth be told — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 19:00:17 +0000

” But I think the only real alternative is no accommodation at all. ”

Um, you seem to have forgotten the other real alternative – namely, FULL EQUALITY BEFORE THE LAW.

No wonder you got a deluge – this flood of Auntie-Tomism is so deep you could drown in it.

GET BETTER ARGUMENTS if you want to be allowed to continue to discriminate against us while pretending to serve or sell to the public.

By: truth be told

truth be told — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 18:56:22 +0000

Not “we don’t like the goys,” but “this establishment is owned and operated by the Cohen Family, who hold strong religious beliefs that marriage is the union of a man and a woman OF THE SAME FAITH.”

What inter-faith couple wouldn’t respect that, and go somewhere else – if they could?

Um, don’t you mean, ‘What SELF-RESPECTING couple would respect that?’ ‘Cuz that’s how insane your suggestion is.

By: truth be told

truth be told — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 14:58:43 +0000

Sorry, John, but you haven’t put much ‘thinking’ into your “ideas” …

“When it comes to private actors, there should be no such laws.”

B.S. This is NOT about “private actors”; it is about merchants who sell to and serve THE PUBLIC.

“A business owner’s associational freedom trumps the customer’s right to be served.”

The merchant is not being asked to perform or officiate at a same-sex marriage. The merchant is not being asked to attend a same-sex marriage. The merchant is beinng asked to do what s/he is in business to do – namely, sell their product.

This “associational freedom” is a new concept to me, as regards merchants who are OPEN TO THE PUBLIC. What of the customer’s own religious beliefs? By what reckoning can a merchant require a customer to agree with the religious beliefs of the merchant as a requirement of doing business?

Sorry, but this “idea” of yours solves nothing. Try again, but DO BETTER!

“Moreover, no one’s been able to explain why any of these suggested accommodations, once allowed, should be limited to events or businesses somehow “associated” with the wedding.”

I asked in the other column’s combox about Aunt Ethyl and Uncle Fred who fly into town for their gay nephew’s wedding. Does the ‘religious’ guy at the Hertz counter get to refuse to rent them a car because it is going to be used to drive the (presumably heterosexual) Aunt and Uncle to a queer wedding? what of the lesbian’s mother who wants to make the bride’s and bridesmaid’s dresses? Does the fabric merchant have the right to refuse to sell cloth because it will end up in a dyke’s marriage ceremony?

This gets preposterouser by the “idea”.

By: Wilson

Wilson — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 14:44:20 +0000

I starting to agree with the “No accommodations” folks, but I still have an emotional reaction to the hypothetical. Like if I owned a print shop and Gayle Ruzicka came in looking to print up some anti-gay literature. I would most emphatically not want to serve her.

I suppose, in the end though, it’s just a matter of doing unto others as you’d have them do unto you. We can’t expect to be able to refuse people business and then ask that we not get refused.