How far should political correctness take us?

[dennishoddy]

Do we force Muslim t-shirt store owners to print shirts that defame Allah?

Do we force Catholic t-shirt store owners to print shirts showing support for abortion?

Do we force liberal t-shirt store owners to show conservative values on their shirts?

When is enough, enough?

 

[TwoForFlinching]

I think any business that turns away business deserves to take that risk... but I wouldn't necessarily lump religion into the same boat as civil rights...

 

[dennishoddy]

I think any business that turns away business deserves to take that risk... but I wouldn't necessarily lump religion into the same boat as civil rights...

What if the two cross?

 

[TwoForFlinching]

Which two?

 

[penismightier]

This basically goes with the subject... The Cake Lawsuit in Colorado: Cake shop owner won't make wedding cakes for homosexuals, gov't says he's discriminating...... Owner went to other businesses and asked them to make things against their beliefs, they said no, and gov't said its okay.


http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2015...-should-not-be-forced-to-make-anti-gay-cakes/

Bill Jack wants to make one thing perfectly clear: Bakers should not be forced to make a cake that would violate their conscience or freedom of expression.

Jack, of Castle Rock, Colo., is making national headlines over an experiment he conducted in the wake of attacks on Christian business owners who refuse to provide services for same-sex marriages.

Last year, the Colorado Civil Rights Commission ruled that the Masterpiece Cakeshop in Lakewood unlawfully discriminated against a gay couple who wanted a wedding cake. Jack Phillips, the owner of the cake shop, is a devout Christian, and his attorneys argued that to force him to participate in the gay wedding would violate his religious beliefs.
The Civil Rights Commission saw it differently.

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So if Christian bakers who oppose gay marriage are compelled under law to violate their beliefs – what about bakers who support gay marriage? Would they be compelled to make an anti-gay marriage cake?

Jack, who is a devout Christian, asked three bakeries to produce two cakes – each shaped like an open Bible.

On one side of one cake he requested the words, “God hates sin – Psalm 45:7.” On the other side he wanted the words, “Homosexuality is a detestable sin – Leviticus 18:22.”

On the second cake he asked them to write another Bible verse: “While we were yet sinners Christ died for us – Romans 5:8” along with the words “God loves sinners.”

And finally, Jack wanted the bakers to create an image – two grooms holding hands, with a red “X” over them – the universal symbol for “not allowed.”

Now if you read the national news accounts of Jack’s experiment – you would’ve read that he wanted gay slurs written on the cakes. But that wasn’t true.

According to the commission’s own report, there’s no mention of Jack using any gay slurs – unless you consider Bible verses to be gay slurs.

Mark Silverstein, the legal director for Colorado’s chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, accused Jack of wanting obscenities written on the cakes.

“There’s no law that says that a cake-maker has to write obscenities in the cake just because the customer wants it,” he told the Associated Press.

Does the ACLU consider the Bible to be obscene?

As you probably guessed, the bakeries rejected Jack’s request for what some would call “anti-gay” cakes.

“If he wants to hate people, he can hate them not here in my bakery,” Azucar Bakery owner Marjorie Silva told 7NEWS. She called the writing and imagery “hateful and offensive.”

So Jack filed a discrimination complaint with the Colorado Civil Rights Commission – just as the gay couple did in the Masterpiece Cakeshop case.

Using the commission’s logic – if a Christian baker is forced to violate his beliefs, shouldn’t all bakers be forced to violate theirs, too?

Absolutely not, says the Colorado Civil Rights Commission.

It ruled that Azucar did not discriminate against Jack based on his creed. It argued that the bakery refused to make the cakes because of the “derogatory language and imagery,” The Denver Channel reported.

Jack told me it’s a double standard – pure and simple.

“I think it is hypocritical,” he said. “It’s unequal treatment before the law. The Colorado Anti-Discrimination Act is being used to coerce businesses to participate in events that violate their consciences.”

Jack said he decided to conduct his experiment to prove the Colorado law was “only being applied to Christian business people.”

“Christians need to understand that this is the state of Christianity in the United States,” he said. “We are now second-class citizens. Our free speech is being censored.”

To be clear, Jack believes the bakeries had the right to deny him service. His point was to draw attention to the hypocrisy.

“I stand for liberty for all, not liberty for some,” he said. “If we don’t have liberty for all, then we have liberty for none.”

Alliance Defending Freedom is a religious liberty law firm that represents the Masterpiece Cakeshop.

It believes the Civil Rights Commission reached the right conclusion in Jack’s case, but it blasted the commission’s inconsistencies when it came to the case involving its client.

“The commission’s inconsistent rulings mean that the owners of these three cake shops may run them according to their beliefs, while Jack cannot,” ADF attorney Jeremy Tedesco said.

“These cake artists should not be forced to violate their conscience, but clearly the commission should have done the same for Jack Phillips,” he said. “He risks losing his lifelong business altogether if he continues to run it consistent with his faith. Such blatant religious discrimination has no place in our society.”

That’s a great point. If the owner of Azucar Bakery can run her business according to her beliefs – why can’t the owner of the Masterpiece Cakeshop?

 

[dennishoddy]

civil rights vs the right to be true to your religion.

I have another caveat, but will hold it for now.

 

[TwoForFlinching]

civil rights vs the right to be true to your religion.

I have another caveat, but will hold it for now.

I don't see how they can. Religion is a conscious, personal choice each person makes, choosing to have or not to have... Sexual preference isn't. A person can control their sexual orientation as much as a person can choose to be asian, hispanic, white, or black.

 

[yukonjack]

I don't see how they can. Religion is a conscious, personal choice each person makes, choosing to have or not to have... Sexual preference isn't. A person can control their sexual orientation as much as a person can choose to be asian, hispanic, white, or black.

What a crock of crap. Sexual preference is a choice just like being a bank robber or an arsonist is a choice. If your a man and you don't wanna be gay then don't bend over. Enough of this "oh, they are born that". Utter hogwash !!!!! Just look at all the men that go to prison and do homo stuff in their. They were straight before they went in and they'll be straight when they come out. But while they were in prison they chose to be involved in homosex. Chose is the key word.

 

[mugsy]

I don't see how they can. Religion is a conscious, personal choice each person makes, choosing to have or not to have... Sexual preference isn't. A person can control their sexual orientation as much as a person can choose to be asian, hispanic, white, or black.

This is an interesting discussion - but odd. A specified recognized right, that to worship and live in accordance with one's conscience's dictates, against what is essentially a newly created (from whole cloth) right. You, TFF, claim that one is essentially a natural right - and the other which I would claim expresses the innermost desires of man's heart and soul, to know the creator, understand him and do his will, is just a choice. Even more so our Constitution clearly recognizes one as of great importance and is silent about the other "right" which has been in existence for no more than a few short years and mostly by judicial decree.

You say that sexual preference isn't a choice, maybe so though I am not sure that is quite true as there is clearly a cultural training component, but even so what does that mean for marriage? Marriage as a legal institution is not a right but a legal construct (formerly) recognizing a natural institution for the creation and raising of children that served a social good. Now it has become a tool for validating one's "status" as an equal social grouping but has relatively little social importance. However, even if I grant all you've said - what does that have to do with a small business owner not wanting to participate in an act that directly supports what he or she finds odious being forced to do so against his will?

Are you really saying that anything one wants to do - as long as there is a current consensus (because that is all that the high sounding opinion of "experts" is) in its favor - must be validated by everyone with no expectation that an individual can just say "no, I will not participate in this"? To my mind we are rapidly approaching a thought crime era - where it isn't enough to simply obey reasonable laws but one is also expected to genuflect (religious symbolism intended) to whatever is the latest dogma proposed by social engineers - at peril of one's livelihood and freedom.

 

[Kyle78]

What a crock of crap. Sexual preference is a choice just like being a bank robber or an arsonist is a choice. If your a man and you don't wanna be gay then don't bend over. Enough of this "oh, they are born that". Utter hogwash !!!!! Just look at all the men that go to prison and do homo stuff in their. They were straight before they went in and they'll be straight when they come out. But while they were in prison they chose to be involved in homosex. Chose is the key word.

Those "Straight" men practiced gay/bisexual tendencies before they went to prison. They just hid it really well..\
I have a nephew who is gay, we all knew he was gay since about 4-5 years old. He was raised by Neo-Conservative Christian Parents.
They seriously brain f*&ked that poor child up by trying to "convert" him back straight. He's got serious emotional problems, and is just know shorting out his life.
If you want to blame anyone for gay people, blame GOD. He made them that way.