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TheMastersNemesis

(10,602 posts)
Sun Mar 20, 2016, 10:37 AM Mar 2016

Ultimately "Religious Freedom" Laws Can Mean The Refusal Of ANY Service Based On Conscience.

This post is an addendum to my post about refusal of medical or life saving services to LGBT individuals.

When you look at these "religious freedom" laws they ultimately mean in principle that services of ANY kind can be refused by persons of ANY faith for reasons of moral or personal conscience. These new laws open up a "Pandora's box" that would paralyze a civil society. What would happen if a Moslem doctor refused to treat a Christian or allowed them to die during a medical emergency? Christians are implying that they would let a nonbeliever suffer or die because of conscience. One US doctor refused to treat the infant of a gay couple and nothing was done about it.

In order to understand what I am say you must carry out the logic of the evil fools. Yes it is about baking cakes now, but the actual laws do not define what services can be denied. In actual by their structure theoretically ANY service even life saving ones can be denied based on religious conscience.

What the GOP is saying is that you can really persecute anyone who does not share your religious beliefs in reality. And they must be stopped because eventually they will be a disaster for the country as a whole.

Religious freedom laws are a fraud because they have NOTHING to do with religion.And we face the same cultural, civil and social "Balkanization" that haunts and destroys the Middle East.

Remember "religious freedom" bullshit laws are evil no matter how they are cast.

And "religious freedom" can go the other way by claiming legitimacy for allowing religious practices like child marriage, genital mutilation, sacrifice, unwanted proselytizing, virginity tests, and other practices. During one session in the Colorado legislature the GOP apposed "anti genital mutilation laws" because they were true government intrusive.

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katsy

(4,246 posts)
1. Religious freedom laws condone the worst
Sun Mar 20, 2016, 10:44 AM
Mar 2016

offenses: misogyny, bigotry, racism... You named them all.

Great Op

TreasonousBastard

(43,049 posts)
2. While I generally agree that these laws are to legitimize forms of bigotry...
Sun Mar 20, 2016, 11:01 AM
Mar 2016

I'm still in a quandary.

If I were a baker and someone came in with an order for a cake with a swastika on it, what would be my legal reason for refusing? Same problem with someone asking for a wedding cake with "We're God-Sanctioned Heterosexuals".

Now, I fully agree that a licensed professional, such as a pharmacist, should never be allowed to refuse services due to personal beliefs and these laws are to allow these people to refuse. And that they also do not insist that these professionals provide local and immediate assistance by some one not so inclined is a tragedy.

 

Bluenorthwest

(45,319 posts)
5. And yet the issue is not about the content of the cake decor but about who is asking for the cake.
Sun Mar 20, 2016, 11:30 AM
Mar 2016

By claiming it is about the content, you miss the entire point. Any business can refuse service individually, but not to a class of people. None of the refusals of service have been about content, but about the sexual identity of the customer requesting the cake.
It's the same principle as any other discriminatory policy. If you offer a service to the public that means everyone.

 

fasttense

(17,301 posts)
11. I could see where these religious freedom laws could be used against a class of people.
Sun Mar 20, 2016, 12:22 PM
Mar 2016

Suppose I think a skin color is the mark of evil and I refuse to serve people with that skin color at the counters in my restaurants?

Is that religious freedom?

These religious idiots are not asking for the freedom to do something. They want the freedom to stop others from doing something. They want to stop different sexual oriented people from having decent weddings or at least make it difficult for them to find the trappings of a typical wedding. They want to be able to stop you from getting birth control or getting an abortion. They also wanted to stop black Americans from sitting in restaurants and lunch counters. These fools who think no one but them deserve the freedom to be comfortable in a fair market place also want to be able to scream insults and throw rotting tomatoes at anyone they find to be different.

These religious freedom laws are the camel getting his head under the tent. It just another way to discriminate against minority groups.

Lordquinton

(7,886 posts)
16. It's a false analogy
Sun Mar 20, 2016, 01:29 PM
Mar 2016

If a neo nazi came in and wanted a cake that said "happy birthday" would you be in a moral quandry?

That brings these arguments into a whole different perspective.

Bernardo de La Paz

(48,790 posts)
8. Refuse to bake a swastika on the basis of refusing to participate in a "hate crime".
Sun Mar 20, 2016, 11:35 AM
Mar 2016

That is sufficient and would be without reference to the ethnicity of the buyer. It would surely be more than sufficient defense should it ever come to court.

Two LGBT getting married is not a hate crime. Refusing to bake a cake that says "Happy Marriage" simply because the buyer is LGBT is a hate crime or, more exactly, discrimination based on sexual orientation.

mac56

(17,561 posts)
9. You set a policy that says you will not create a product that includes imagery
Sun Mar 20, 2016, 11:42 AM
Mar 2016

that is inflammatory or intended to incite anger.

You post a statement to that effect on the wall of your shop.

There. You're covered. You're not singling out any individual persons.

 

tk2kewl

(18,133 posts)
3. Hillary helped get the ball rolling on this crap
Sun Mar 20, 2016, 11:18 AM
Mar 2016
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2007/09/hillarys-prayer-hillary-clintons-religion-and-politics

Unlikely partnerships have become a Clinton trademark. Some are symbolic, such as her support for a ban on flag burning with Senator Bob Bennett (R-Utah) and funding for research on the dangers of video games with Brownback and Santorum. But Clinton has also joined the gop on legislation that redefines social justice issues in terms of conservative morality, such as an anti-human-trafficking law that withheld funding from groups working on the sex trade if they didn't condemn prostitution in the proper terms. With Santorum, Clinton co-sponsored the Workplace Religious Freedom Act; she didn't back off even after Republican senators such as Pennsylvania's Arlen Specter pulled their names from the bill citing concerns that the measure would protect those refusing to perform key aspects of their jobs—say, pharmacists who won't fill birth control prescriptions, or police officers who won't guard abortion clinics.

Clinton has championed federal funding of faith-based social services, which she embraced years before George W. Bush did; Marci Hamilton, author of God vs. the Gavel, says that the Clintons' approach to faith-based initiatives "set the stage for Bush." Clinton has also long supported the Defense of Marriage Act, a measure that has become a purity test for any candidate wishing to avoid war with the Christian right.
 

sulphurdunn

(6,891 posts)
7. The expression 'religious freedom'
Sun Mar 20, 2016, 11:35 AM
Mar 2016

once meant only the right to worship or not as one chose. It was never meant as a cover for piously pissing all over the Fourteenth Amendment.

paleotn

(17,781 posts)
10. I have no problems with such...
Sun Mar 20, 2016, 11:54 AM
Mar 2016

....unless they harm others or trample on others rights. One's rights end exactly where someone else's begin. But in practice, most of these laws are meant specifically to harm others and curtail their rights. They have no other purpose.

The Wizard

(12,483 posts)
15. When Scalia ruled
Sun Mar 20, 2016, 01:23 PM
Mar 2016

deeply held religious beliefs trump the law he opened a can of worms that can potentially shred the Constitution and institute Sharia Law.

Lordquinton

(7,886 posts)
17. Along the west coast the RCC has bought up hospital chains
Sun Mar 20, 2016, 01:33 PM
Mar 2016

And then impose their views on patients, mostly women. All kinds of services are stopped, and women's lives are put in danger because of their beliefs.

meow2u3

(24,746 posts)
18. "Religious freedom" laws can also come back to bite conservos
Sun Mar 20, 2016, 01:36 PM
Mar 2016

What if some liberal business refuses to serve a fundie Christianist because of the owner's religious convictions against dealing with hypocrites?

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