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Michael Roberts
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 20 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 14812
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| Posted: 17 June 2019 at 4:59pm | IP Logged | 1
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There are limits to religious freedom. The Supreme Court decided long ago that anti-bigamy laws don't infringe on LDS members' free exercise of religion, for example. They were free to believe all they wanted about polygamy, but that did not give them the right to violate civil law.
These bakery cases are not simply about freedom of religion/expression. They are freedom of religion/expression vs anti-discrimination laws. Having a belief doesn't necessarily mean you get to ignore the law.
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 132240
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| Posted: 17 June 2019 at 5:06pm | IP Logged | 2
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Any time you want to tear down the Bible—root of so many of our most bigoted laws—put me down for a contribution of $1000.
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Neil Lindholm
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 12 January 2005
Location: China
Posts: 4940
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| Posted: 17 June 2019 at 6:15pm | IP Logged | 3
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To me, this is a simple and non-controversal concept that should have never gone to the supreme court.
Your life and your life's work are for the sake of yourself and not for the sake of others. No person or government has the right to tell you that you have to sacrifice yourself or your beliefs for someone else. If your business suffers as a result, so be it.
If I demand that JB draw me a picture with the character exclaiming "White Pride!", he has every right to refuse. I have no right to demand him to make it for me with the threat of government intervention if he doesn't. Same with baking a cake or any other service. Nobody has a right to force you to do something you are fundamentally opposed to doing.
There is only one fundamental freedom, and that is individual freedom. Taking freedom from others in support of your cause is morally wrong.
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Rebecca Jansen
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 12 February 2018
Location: Canada
Posts: 4499
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| Posted: 17 June 2019 at 6:32pm | IP Logged | 4
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Back to cake as a personal artistic statement? That seems really out there to me.
The U.S. has tended to err on the side of individual liberty and rights in ways other nations haven't, there's some good and some bad with that, but mostly to now there has been a majority religion of more or less Christianity. Canada has been more about law and order I would say, which means enforcing laws, regulations and rules. In western Canada where I am there has been a lot of hostility between Sikh Pakistanis/northern India origin people and other people from India and sometimes within the Sikh community itself (differing sects) for decades which often includes violence (the most extreme being the blowing up of an Air India flight with a Japanese baggage handler as collatoral damage as well as the entire plane). We have given a lot of leeway on religious freedoms in modern times to a fault as in the past 'big government' up here took native and minorty religious children away for proper education. Pastafarians (a recently invented parody religion centered on worship of the flying spaghetti monster) has even been given rights like allowance to wear a 'sacred' colander on their heads in photo ID pictures. Our pendulum has swung fairly widely on this in other words.
Perhaps a good comparison case of some gravity might be found in the folks opting their children out of inoculations based on belief grounds and did this harm others with the return of measles outbreaks and whatever else we might see returning like polio and tuberculosis. They can also point to the top of U.S. government in that Trump has commented about his belief in the link between vaccination and autism. Is the freedom for the individual to not vaccinate superior to the community freedom to not have a loved one's life shortened because of the resultant carriers of virus (seniors in fragile health, people with compromised immune systems).
If the U.S. ultimately goes with every minority for itself and the rest shrugging and saying, well, it's not effecting me, is that really empowering the individual or the spiritual, or is it in fact undermining such values? There was some offer from the baker to sell a non-Christian wedding cake, perhaps that really ought to have been accepted and altered as the new owners saw fit? It's hard to say which side is splitting hairs, so it may even be both sides? Something that might've been resolved in a community court setting ends up escalated to the upper reaches, but perhaps like in Joseph, Missouri it's not exactly about that particular victim, that particular cake. I'll have to think about that aspect. It seems on the surface religion versus consumer but it could be about the inability to compromise for two polar extremes? If we keep going to us vs. them over each thing is anyone going to win? So maybe they are both sides equally at fault and equally wrong. Where is Solomon with that knife?
Cake is cake. I'm not going to elevate it to the status of a signed statement by it's creator nor personal expression legally or otherwise. Am I the right kind of person from the right group with the right beliefs to eat chef's creation? Sorry, chef might do well to stay in the kitchen or a lot of people could go hungry.
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 132240
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| Posted: 17 June 2019 at 6:32pm | IP Logged | 5
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Still painting with too broad a brush, I think.
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Eric Jansen
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 27 October 2013
Location: United States
Posts: 2291
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| Posted: 17 June 2019 at 6:37pm | IP Logged | 6
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I don't even see this as a religious matter, but an ARTISTIC one! Should any artist (and baking and decorating a one-of-a-kind specialty cake IS a form of art, especially to the baker) be forced to use his/her artistic skills to promote an issue/idea/event that he/she disagrees with? Or even just doesn't FEEL like doing?
Every artist should have the right to say "No thank you" to a commission request, no explanation necessary.
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Neil Lindholm
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 12 January 2005
Location: China
Posts: 4940
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| Posted: 17 June 2019 at 6:44pm | IP Logged | 7
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QUOTE:
| Back to cake as a personal artistic statement? That seems really out there to me. |
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I imagine there are lots of cake designers who would disagree with that statement. And with this entire debate, it is irrelevant.
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Peter Martin
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 17 March 2008
Location: Canada
Posts: 15782
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| Posted: 17 June 2019 at 6:52pm | IP Logged | 8
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If I demand that JB draw me a picture with the character exclaiming "White Pride!", he has every right to refuse ------------------------------------------------------------ --------------- But what if you asked JB to draw a picture of a character that he has drawn for lots of other people and he refused because of your sexual orientation? That would be discriminatory.
The baker objected to making any cake the complainants might have commissioned. Anything at all.
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Koroush Ghazi
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 25 October 2009
Location: Australia
Posts: 1646
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| Posted: 17 June 2019 at 6:55pm | IP Logged | 9
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John Byrne wrote:
| Would you find it acceptable for the Government to force you to do what you don’t want to do? And if your answer should happen to be “yes” (Dog knows why!) how far do you want to allow the Government to go in dictating what you can or cannot do? |
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My answer is yes, and whether for good or ill, this is part and parcel of living in a society.
Example: I may "believe" that vaccines are harmful to my child. My belief is irrelevant; as a society, we simply cannot allow children to go unvaccinated. Ergo, the Government must force me to comply, for the good of society. That means sanctioning the government to do something physically intrusive, for the good of society.
The problem with the classic "laissez-faire"-style model is that it does not take into account any externalities. Government exists precisely to take action in the longer term interests of society as a whole.
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Neil Lindholm
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 12 January 2005
Location: China
Posts: 4940
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| Posted: 17 June 2019 at 7:04pm | IP Logged | 10
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QUOTE:
| The baker objected to making any cake the complainants might have commissioned. Anything at all. |
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And again, that is is right. If the community choses to punish him by refusing to use his services, that is also their right. Government has no place stepping in to the argument.
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Koroush Ghazi
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 25 October 2009
Location: Australia
Posts: 1646
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| Posted: 17 June 2019 at 7:09pm | IP Logged | 11
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Neil Lindholm wrote:
| And again, that is is right. If the community choses to punish him by refusing to use his services, that is also their right. Government has no place stepping in to the argument. |
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People should have the right to discriminate? You can't see that escalating from something relatively frivolous like baking a cake to something far more critical like providing life-saving treatment, particularly in places where there are no alternatives?
At best, the baker has a right to refuse to bake a cake, but the Government, equally, has a right to refuse to allow that baker to run a business, in the interests of the community.
Edited by Koroush Ghazi on 17 June 2019 at 7:10pm
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Neil Lindholm
Byrne Robotics Member
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Location: China
Posts: 4940
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| Posted: 17 June 2019 at 7:18pm | IP Logged | 12
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Huge difference for providing an optional service and providing a life-saving service. Before you were hired, you would have needed to sign a contract stating that you were not allowed to refuse service to anyone for personal reasons. No such contract eists for baking a cake or being a wedding singer or any other optional service.
"In the interests of the community". Now that is a slippery slope. Which community? Who decides the interests? The majority?
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