Shugart's 'Gay Basher' Article

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
181

[quote]smh_23 wrote:

[quote]pushharder wrote:

[quote]smh_23 wrote:
no slippery slope exists.[/quote]

But it does. We’ve dun slipped. The Oregon baker’s gag order is an example.[/quote]

There is no necessary logical connection between same-sex marriage and the bakery question. This is not to say that there won’t be (enormous) overlap among those happy to let gays marry and those happy to infringe upon the rights of bakers – there will be, and this is not a good thing. However, it is perfectly valid for a person to – as I do – support gay marriage while also supporting the right of a Christian (or whatever) baker to refuse to bake a cake for a wedding between two men or two women. Thus, the two are not logically entwined, and there is no valid (i.e., logically necessary) slope down which to slip.

But anyway, I was referring to the gays-to-polygamists argument. I’m not denying that polygamists will try (or are trying). What I’m saying is that the anti-gay-marriage arguments always move away from gay marriage, arguing instead that what might come later (e.g., polygamy or plural marriage or whatever) is harmful to the public good for this or that reason. What we never get – and this is telling – is a direct, positive, valid-and-sound argument in support of the proposition that gay marriage itself is specifically harmful to the public good.

Now, if you can convincingly argue that polygamy is harmful to the public good, but you cannot convincingly argue the very same thing about gay marriage, then the two are not qualitatively comparable – they are not cases of the same kind. Therefore, no reasonable slippery slope connects the one to the other.[/quote]

If there is a slippery slope to polygamy I think it started with either divorce or state recognized marriage. Gay marriage is just a step along the way as a result of marriage being “devalued” by one of the other two.

182

[quote]pushharder wrote:
…except to agree that Deb’s meme is a futile, irrelevant one in that being black and being gay ain’t comparable. Deep down inside folks understand this. If they don’t they haven’t put their thinking caps on.

I think you, smh, understand this.[/quote]

Push,

I’m not sure any of what you posted actually makes sense (not that this is a huge change for you) so I am going to try and take a whack at it.

  1. The picture is about rights and discrimination. In fact it is also about the rights of WHITE people as well as people of color. The protest pictured is against inter-racial marriage, which seems to imply that it impacts people of ALL colors. Your rush to score an internet touchdown has once again been hampered by your inability to think clearly.

  2. Being black and being gay are clearly not the same thing, much like being black and being disabled are not the same or being black and being a woman aren’t the same thing but you know what is the same thing in all those cases? Discriminating against people based on skin color, sexual orientation, gender etc is still discrimination, even if you want to say it isn’t.

  3. My favorite part is where you look for validation “Deep down folks understand this, if not…” You know who believes what you do in this argument, those same goons in that picture fighting to stop the white race from being “polluted” by intermarriage with “lesser” races. You can be as anti-gay marriage as you want, but it just makes you look silly, of course after 40,000+ posts on here you are probably used to that.

183

[quote]pushharder wrote:

[quote]smh_23 wrote:

[quote]pushharder wrote:

[quote]smh_23 wrote:
no slippery slope exists.[/quote]

But it does. We’ve dun slipped. The Oregon baker’s gag order is an example.[/quote]

There is no necessary logical connection between same-sex marriage and the bakery question. This is not to say that there won’t be (enormous) overlap among those happy to let gays marry and those happy to infringe upon the rights of bakers – there will be, and this is not a good thing. However, it is perfectly valid for a person to – as I do – support gay marriage while also supporting the right of a Christian (or whatever) baker to refuse to bake a cake for a wedding between two men or two women. Thus, the two are not logically entwined, and there is no valid (i.e., logically necessary) slope down which to slip.

But anyway, I was referring to the gays-to-polygamists argument. I’m not denying that polygamists will try (or are trying). What I’m saying is that the anti-gay-marriage arguments always move away from gay marriage, arguing instead that what might come later (e.g., polygamy or plural marriage or whatever) is harmful to the public good for this or that reason. What we never get – and this is telling – is a direct, positive, valid-and-sound argument in support of the proposition that gay marriage itself is specifically harmful to the public good.

Now, if you can convincingly argue that polygamy is harmful to the public good, but you cannot convincingly argue the very same thing about gay marriage, then the two are not qualitatively comparable – they are not cases of the same kind. Therefore, no reasonable slippery slope connects the one to the other.[/quote]

OK, I’m wore out.

You and I’ve been over this before. We’d just be recycling.
[/quote]

To be honest, I don’t ever recall discussing how gay marriage itself is harmful to the public good – only the slippery slope argument that polygamists will come calling in the wake of gay people. What I’m saying here is that if you can convincingly argue that polygamy is harmful to the public good, and cannot convincingly argue the same for gay marriage, then the slippery slope argument is invalidated.

184

[quote]smh_23 wrote:
it is perfectly valid for a person to – as I do – support gay marriage while also supporting the right of a Christian (or whatever) baker to refuse to bake a cake for a wedding between two men or two women.[/quote]
Where do you draw the line in refusing service to members of the public? How about if I don’t like Jews and don’t want to bake a cake for a bar mitzvah? Or a cake to celebrate Ramadam? How about if a newly married gay couple wants to honeymoon at a cozy resort? Can you refuse to allow them because you don’t agree with gay marriage and don’t want to be part of the extended celebration? What about if a single woman is having a baby. Do you turn her away from your hospital because your religion sees premarital sex as a sin?

185

[quote]PonyWhisperer wrote:

  1. The picture is about rights and discrimination. In fact it is also about the rights of WHITE people as well as people of color. The protest pictured is against inter-racial marriage, which seems to imply that it impacts people of ALL colors. Your rush to score an internet touchdown has once again been hampered by your inability to think clearly.
    [/quote]

I took the meme to mean if you are against interracial marriage you are a bigot and if you are against gay marriage you are a bigot.

The meme is wrong. The first picture is about interracial marriage and is absolutely discriminatory and frankly absurd. The second picture; however, features Christian’s defending what we believe is the sanctify of marriage ordained by God.

As a Christian, I think we’ve taken the wrong approach to this topic. The Government should not protect / offer benefits to one class of person and not another. We should be defending marriage from a religious stand point, but not from a contractual standpoint, imo. To that end, I’m fine with the SCOTUS ruling; however, how we achieved this end, ie bastardizing the judicial process, is a whole different ball game. It is a slippery slope without question.

186

[quote]usmccds423 wrote:

The meme is wrong. The first picture is about interracial marriage and is absolutely discriminatory and frankly absurd. The second picture; however, features Christian’s defending what we believe is the sanctify of marriage ordained by God.

[/quote]

Someone should probably note that the picture in the first meme is actually from a rally to prevent integration at Little Rock High School in the wake of the Brown v. Board decision in the late 1950s, and it has been featured in textbooks and such since that time. I get what the person who created the meme was intending to represent, but it wasn’t from an anti-miscegenation protest. This point isn’t really germane to the discussion as a whole, but, the more you know I guess…

187

[quote]debraD wrote:
But either way I think it makes enough of a point that it’s got you rustled.
[/quote]

Projection… It’s a hell of a thing.

188

[quote]usmccds423 wrote:
The second picture; however, features Christian’s defending what we believe is the sanctify of marriage ordained by God. [/quote]
You do realize that all religions believe the actions they carry out are ordained by their God, right? Things like ethnic cleansing and the taking of multiple wives. All edicts from God.

I took Deb’s picture to mean that people in a moment cannot see outside of themselves. All of those people truly believed racial mixing (whether for schooling or marriage) was a travesty. And that in 50 year’s time, most people will look back on the gay marriage issue in the same light: that is was ridiculous to harbor so much fear and loathing.

189

[quote]kpsnap wrote:

[quote]smh_23 wrote:
it is perfectly valid for a person to – as I do – support gay marriage while also supporting the right of a Christian (or whatever) baker to refuse to bake a cake for a wedding between two men or two women.[/quote]
Where do you draw the line in refusing service to members of the public?[/quote]

When it’s a religious ceremony. The whole point of bringing up the politicians to Deb’s post, which se subsequently incoherently ranted on in personal insults rather than actually address anything I said, was to show how opinions change over time.

There was a time when divorce wasn’t happening, and the church would be ultra pissed. Over time, attitudes changed (for better or worse, depending on the individual’s opinion) and now divorced people litter pews every Sunday, and can even get their second and third marriage in that same church.

Same-sex marriage will be similar. It will likely take more time than some like, but forced compliance is tricky.

Can a baker refuse a same-sex couple a cupcake if they stop in on a Tuesday for a treat? No. And I doubt that more than 0.00000001% of bakers would. Shit, likely they wouldn’t even notice they were a couple or not unless they started making out with each other.

But should the baker be able to say “I’d prefer not to make a cake for your wedding”? I think that, yes they should. Do I think that makes the baker a dumb-dumb? Yes. But I also think the KKK, Westboro and the Black Panthers are dumb-dumb’s… Doesn’t mean they don’t have rights to think, speak and live how they wish, as long as they aren’t breaking any laws.

Should you be able to force, through lawsuit, a Jewish or Muslim caterer to make scallops wrapped in bacon for your wedding?

Should a Kosher Deli be forced to serve cheeseburgers?

Again, we didn’t have this issue in MA. So if the rest of the nation can’t figure this shit out, it’s on you other 49 states. (I think VT was also pretty smooth sailing.

You can’t refuse in that instance. The honeymoon isn’t the traditional religious ceremony.

[quote]What about if a single woman is having a baby. Do you turn her away from your hospital because your religion sees premarital sex as a sin?
[/quote]

Considering Catholic hospitals (or now former) are some of the best in my area, I’d say this isn’t a concern in reality. They just won’t tie tubes after a birth as a birth control method.

190

[quote]JR249 wrote:

[quote]usmccds423 wrote:

The meme is wrong. The first picture is about interracial marriage and is absolutely discriminatory and frankly absurd. The second picture; however, features Christian’s defending what we believe is the sanctify of marriage ordained by God.

[/quote]

Someone should probably note that the picture in the first meme is actually from a rally to prevent integration at Little Rock High School in the wake of the Brown v. Board decision in the late 1950s, and it has been featured in textbooks and such since that time. I get what the person who created the meme was intending to represent, but it wasn’t from an anti-miscegenation protest. This point isn’t really germane to the discussion as a whole, but, the more you know I guess…[/quote]

I stand corrected. I will now replace the word marry with educate. I believe it still functions as discrimination though, regardless of the actual type (marriage, education, housing etc.).

191

[quote]countingbeans wrote
Should you be able to force, through lawsuit, a Jewish or Muslim caterer to make scallops wrapped in bacon for your wedding?

Should a Kosher Deli be forced to serve cheeseburgers?
[/quote]
No. But that’s not the service they provide. I never said vendors should be forced to provide services they don’t normally offer. I do believe vendors should be forced to provide services equitably for all people.

I understand your point about forced compliance. But wasn’t there forced compliance in segregation issues?Didn’t business owners have to be forced to allow blacks to use the same facilities (drinking fountains, bus seats, bathrooms) in the push toward desegregation?

192

[quote]kpsnap wrote:

[quote]smh_23 wrote:
it is perfectly valid for a person to – as I do – support gay marriage while also supporting the right of a Christian (or whatever) baker to refuse to bake a cake for a wedding between two men or two women.[/quote]
Where do you draw the line in refusing service to members of the public? How about if I don’t like Jews and don’t want to bake a cake for a bar mitzvah? Or a cake to celebrate Ramadam? How about if a newly married gay couple wants to honeymoon at a cozy resort? Can you refuse to allow them because you don’t agree with gay marriage and don’t want to be part of the extended celebration? What about if a single woman is having a baby. Do you turn her away from your hospital because your religion sees premarital sex as a sin?
[/quote]

I tend to believe that most private service-providers (this, for me, excludes private organizations that exist in order to perform duties enumerated in a significant public contract, such as the operators of NYC taxis) should not be compelled by law to provide their service to any other private citizen. In certain cases – e.g., hospitals – the public has an overriding interest in assuring that people in need of medical attention are not turned away for being single mothers, to use your example.

I believe this for a couple of reasons:

  1. Freedom of conscience. I am uncomfortable with the idea of compelling a private citizen to provide a service to another private citizen. Don’t get me wrong – you and I, I suspect, think exactly the same thing about religious objections to gay marriage. I think that they are complete – complete – nonsense. But if I were a baker, I would refuse to bake a cake for a gathering of the (fictional) Society for the Celebration of the Confederate Battle Colors (SCCBC). I of course believe that the fictional SCCBC is not remotely comparable to a gay wedding, but I tend to want government to deal in universally applicable principles wherever possible, and I think that we’re better off if Washington D.C. minimizes the amount of time it spends ranking its citizens’ beliefs (times change, after all, and I wouldn’t want, to take a fantastical example, a President Trump at the helm of a government apparatus that is too interested in my personal opinions).

  2. If I were black, for example, I’d rather know which moral earthworms would refuse me service, given the opportunity. I certainly wouldn’t want to unwittingly contribute to the financial well-being of their moral-earthworm families.

  3. Related to [2], I don’t think that in 2015 there would be much of any problem at all. If a restaurant refused to serve black or gay people, its operators would be deservedly shamed in the national spotlight. I would rather see bigotry get beaten to a paste in the court of public opinion than have it merely hidden from view by government mandate. Most places would close after a (deserved) boycott. Some probably wouldn’t, but it doesn’t matter to me, on balance, that there are certain backwards places in this country where the people are stupid enough to continue patronizing a racist’s explicitly racist eatery (this would, at least, expose the community for what it is). Then again, I don’t spend much time in those places, so maybe I’d care more if I didn’t live where I do.

One note: If this were 1966, or even 1989, I might not feel the same way. I am not one of these people who fails to see that practicality is a core principle of its own, and in 1966 much of my argument wouldn’t have applied. Here in 2015, I think the practical is aligned with the more abstract principles.

193

[quote]kpsnap wrote:
No. But that’s not the service they provide. I never said vendors should be forced to provide services they don’t normally offer. I do believe vendors should be forced to provide services equitably for all people.

I understand your point about forced compliance. But wasn’t there forced compliance in segregation issues?Didn’t business owners have to be forced to allow blacks to use the same facilities (drinking fountains, bus seats, bathrooms) in the push toward desegregation?[/quote]

This is pretty much valid. No one to my knowledge has ever been able to successfully sue a private business in order to force the business to provide a good or a service that the business doesn’t normally offer or carry.

All of these cases have revolved around a legitimate business refusing to provide a good or service that was normally offered, usually for opposite-sex weddings, to a same-sex couple for their own wedding or civil union (e.g., flowers, cakes, photography services, private wedding chapels or catering services). So while the business was legally ‘forced’ by law to provide the service that it didn’t want to provide, it was a good or service that they already provided for heterosexual matrimonial arrangements. In other words, discrimination against the customer “on the basis of…”.

That having been said, I hold the libertarian viewpoint that, while well-intended, anti-discrimination laws shouldn’t generally be applicable in the private marketplace, and if they are going to be, there are legitimate cases where religious exemptions should apply in narrow circumstances like this. Nevertheless, as the laws are presently written, enforced and interpreted, these businesses are in violation.

194

[quote]kpsnap wrote:

[quote]usmccds423 wrote:
The second picture; however, features Christian’s defending what we believe is the sanctify of marriage ordained by God. [/quote]
You do realize that all religions believe the actions they carry out are ordained by their God, right? Things like ethnic cleansing and the taking of multiple wives. All edicts from God. [/quote]

I can only speak to what my religion believes, which is that marriage is between a man and a woman. I’m pretty sure we don’t believe in ethnic cleansing or taking multiple wives. If other religions believe these actions are ordained by their God it is up to them to defend those beliefs.

[quote]
I took Deb’s picture to mean that people in a moment cannot see outside of themselves. [/quote]
That seems like a pretty broad generalization to me.

[quote]
All of those people truly believed racial mixing (whether for schooling or marriage) was a travesty. [/quote]
Again though, that is based off nothing more than bigotry were as a Christian has something more substantial (at least in our minds) to back the position.

[quote]
And that in 50 year’s time, most people will look back on the gay marriage issue in the same light: that is was ridiculous to harbor so much fear and loathing. [/quote]

It’s certainly possible. I imagine it will be abortion that gets this sort of 20/20 reaction.

Anyway, like I said, the government has no business discriminating when it pertains to a contract between two consenting parties. That doesn’t mean a Christian can’t be against “gay marriage” for lack of a better term, a small business owner can’t refuse service based on their beliefs, or a church’s can’t refusing to perform a ceremony against their religion.

195

[quote]smh_23 wrote:

[quote]kpsnap wrote:

[quote]smh_23 wrote:
it is perfectly valid for a person to – as I do – support gay marriage while also supporting the right of a Christian (or whatever) baker to refuse to bake a cake for a wedding between two men or two women.[/quote]
Where do you draw the line in refusing service to members of the public? How about if I don’t like Jews and don’t want to bake a cake for a bar mitzvah? Or a cake to celebrate Ramadam? How about if a newly married gay couple wants to honeymoon at a cozy resort? Can you refuse to allow them because you don’t agree with gay marriage and don’t want to be part of the extended celebration? What about if a single woman is having a baby. Do you turn her away from your hospital because your religion sees premarital sex as a sin?
[/quote]

I tend to believe that most private service-providers (this, for me, excludes private organizations that exist in order to perform duties enumerated in a significant public contract, such as the operators of NYC taxis) should not be compelled by law to provide their service to any other private citizen. In certain cases – e.g., hospitals – the public has an overriding interest in assuring that people in need of medical attention are not turned away for being single mothers, to use your example.

I believe this for a couple of reasons:

  1. Freedom of conscience. I am uncomfortable with the idea of compelling a private citizen to provide a service to another private citizen. Don’t get me wrong – you and I, I suspect, think exactly the same thing about religious objections to gay marriage. I think that they are complete – complete – nonsense. But if I were a baker, I would refuse to bake a cake for a gathering of the (fictional) Society for the Celebration of the Confederate Battle Colors (SCCBC). I of course believe that the fictional SCCBC is not remotely comparable to a gay wedding, but I tend to want government to deal in universally applicable principles wherever possible, and I think that we’re better off if Washington D.C. minimizes the amount of time it spends ranking its citizens’ beliefs (times change, after all, and I wouldn’t want, to take a fantastical example, a President Trump at the helm of a government apparatus that is too interested in my personal opinions).

  2. If I were black, for example, I’d rather know which moral earthworms would refuse me service, given the opportunity. I certainly wouldn’t want to unwittingly contribute to the financial well-being of their moral-earthworm families.

  3. Related to [2], I don’t think that in 2015 there would be much of any problem at all. If a restaurant refused to serve black or gay people, its operators would be deservedly shamed in the national spotlight. I would rather see bigotry get beaten to a paste in the court of public opinion than have it merely hidden from view by government mandate. Most places would close after a (deserved) boycott. Some probably wouldn’t, but it doesn’t matter to me, on balance, that there are certain backwards places in this country where the people are stupid enough to continue patronizing a racist’s explicitly racist eatery (this would, at least, expose the community for what it is). Then again, I don’t spend much time in those places, so maybe I’d care more if I didn’t live where I do.

One note: If this were 1966, or even 1989, I might not feel the same way. I am not one of these people who fails to see that practicality is a core principle of its own, and in 1966 much of my argument wouldn’t have applied. Here in 2015, I think the practical is aligned with the more abstract principles.[/quote]

Well said.

196

the number of serious replies in this thread is hilarious.

197

[quote]kpsnap wrote:

[quote]countingbeans wrote
Should you be able to force, through lawsuit, a Jewish or Muslim caterer to make scallops wrapped in bacon for your wedding?

Should a Kosher Deli be forced to serve cheeseburgers?
[/quote]
No. But that’s not the service they provide. I never said vendors should be forced to provide services they don’t normally offer. I do believe vendors should be forced to provide services equitably for all people.[/quote]

One example caters and the other sells food. They both provide the service of “making food in exchange for money”. Those examples are asking them to make food. Now the food they are being asked to make is one that they religiously can’t provide. The cake for the same sex WEDDING is a cake they religiously can not provide.

The baker can make 686,482 cakes for the same-sex couples children’s birthday party, or sell them 18 dozen cookies a day, and everyone wins. I’d also say there is compelling reason that the baker should make the cake for a non-religious ceremony.

My wedding, for example, had no flairs of religion, and I don’t care if a church recognizes if I’m married or not. To my wife and I we are married, and I’m excommunicated anyway now, lol.

The major difference here is religion. There is no valid case to be made that black people should be seen as non-persons in any religious sense.

(As a side note, and to why that meme addressed earlier is dumb, is there is zero need to compare Civil Rights in the 60’s for Black Americans to Civil Rights in the 2000’s for LGBT communities. Not only does it cheapen both struggles, but it opens up the flood gates for other comparisons that will only further erode accomplishments of the Black Americans in the mid 20th century. I mean, I can make that same meme, but with pro-choice people rather than anti-SSM people.)