Do you think a business should be able to discriminate against the LGBTQI+ Community?

[Anonymous]

Most people have heard of the viral story of the business that refused to bake a cake for a gay couple because they felt in doing so, they would be supporting, I guess, the so called gay agenda.

As a business owner myself, I have several issues with that, the first being MONEY is green, and your patrons are the ones paying your bills and refusing people arbitrarily doesn't help the bottom line.

Second, if you're going to play moral high ground and start cherry picking who you sell to, are you ALSO investigating others and not selling to the guy who walked out on his son and his wife, or the woman who had 5 abortions, or the pedophile teacher sleeping with her student, or the man who beat his wife within an inch of her life, or the racist down the street?

Third if you're okay with posting a sign up like this one, are you okay with someone doing that to you at a business you frequent? This is apartheid. It's Nazi Germany. It's Jim Crow. None of these people had a choice in who chose to hate and discriminated against them either. They just woke up and found signs barring them from living their lives like dignified equal human beings.

I just don't get it really. I wasn't raised to hate people I don't even know that have done nothing to me.

[Lliam]

My thought is, social media companies can punish, de-fund, de-platform, block and censor people who share information that doesn't suit the company's ideology. They can even block the President if they don't like him.

It doesn't have anything to do with offensive language. The information can be factual, scientific, well reasoned, and well written. It merely has to do with the fact that the company doesn't want the public to see certain information.

I have seen that many times. Take covid and Israel as two examples.

So, if a social media company has a legal right to do that, why can't small business owners follow their own ideologies and run their businesses as they see fit?

Let people vote with their dollars. I do.

I don't buy Israeli products or from companies who support Israel.
I wouldn't patronize a business that discriminated against people based on race or religion.
I wouldn't patronize a company that wouldn't accept cash.
There are lots of reasons why I don't support certain companies.

But I have to say that I'm sick and tired of militant trans-genders, so I would gladly patronize a company that didn't want to serve them. Fuck their pronouns and their angry, delusional "identity" bullshit.

If you're obviously a man, I ain't addressing you as ma'am. And if you are obviously a woman, I ain't calling you sir. Take your shit out of my establishment.

[NamerOfStars]

Most people have, indeed, heard that story- catch is, it's not true. The bakery was perfectly willing to make them a cake; it was how it was decorated that was the issue. Does that make a sizeable difference in how it would've gone for a couple in more intellectually honest circumstances? No- but that's not what happened there. The bakery was known to be owned by people who expressed anti-gay views, and deliberately targeted to provoke a reaction that would prompt a lawsuit- and then all the setup is ignored to paint a nobler picture of the poor victimized gays. Much like how Claudette Colvin, and the fourteen men who were arrested before her, were ignored until Rosa Parks did exactly the same thing and "went viral", as a result of actions that were as impromptu and spur of the moment as the Great Wall of China. Even if the goal is admirable (or at worst, admirable-ish), the dishonesty of the way it's portrayed doesn't do the cause any favors.

See, when you walk into just about any business, you're going to see the sign; the sign that we all see pretty much every day, and all ignore: the one that says "We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone". There is no "except members of the following groups" addition, and if you stop and think for a moment, it's not hard to come up with reasons why doing away with that rule would be a really, REALLY bad idea.

You kinda have to take the bad with the good; it'd be less of an issue with a less monopolized market- just go to the business that's NOT run by a bigoted shithead.

[Asker]

I went to a wedding a few years back in a small town, and coming from a big city, it was a shock at how small the town was. I almost didn't get my dress in time for the wedding because there was literally one dry cleaner and they were closed with my dress inside. Sometimes going somewhere else isn't an option, and I don't know about you, but I personally don't possess the talent to construct or bake a wedding cake. Yes, I agree that saying you can't refuse say someone coming in your business and smashing up your windows, is a bad idea, but at the crux of this refusal, is typically an individual causing harm, using harmful or derogatory speech, someone demanding things that are impossible for your business to do like make 10,000 cupcakes in 2 days, etc. but where does being gay meet that criteria? All this person did was come in, like everyone else, and ask for them to bake a cake. You could hardly argue that this was abusive behavior, a crime, or that they did anything wrong as compared to all the other patrons. So then the question is the admittal that it is solely "because they are gay," and nothing more.

[NamerOfStars]

Right; I don't argue with any of that. But just like you can't combat food desertification by forcing people to grow crops, you can't force them to accept anyone. It's all or it's nothing, unpleasant as that may sometimes be.

[osmanthus]

It might not be legally enforceable for a 'heterosexuals only' sign to hang upon the door of a business but seeing as how many small businesses are privately owned in the US it might get a pass—regardless whether an uproar occurs. Your logic and rational is sound. There ought to be no reason why this business won't provide a service in exchange for monies. The only time it could ever be an issue is if thr cake in question were to have specific imagery, symbols, iconography, or words that are perhaps vulgar; in such case it is fine to refuse to bake the cake but it still not viable for a business to refuse service to bake a cake if the customers are willing to pay for it. Research the laws of the state as well as federal statutes regarding this before marching outside to protest, if this is the choice you're willing to make to instigate changes.

[Asker]

I don't actually think that is a real sign that someone has put up in their business, but it makes the point and reminds us of some other signs put up through history that have sought to prohibit people from patronizing businesses based on skin color, area of birth, religion, etc. It just really bothers me when people use their religion as a smoke screen for their distaste or outright hatred of others. You want the privilege to be able to go and shop where you want, but you are unwilling to let others do the same, and if the situation was reversed and someone was say denying his daughter the ability to buy a dress, for something she hasn't done/or said, just by her existence, that cake shop owner probably would have been livid. As I said elsewhere, I will concede there are certain things like you mention, hate symbols and the like, that I would not put on a cake if I were a baker because everyone is well aware what those mean and what they represent, but "just being gay" doesn't fall into that category or justify refusal of service.

[osmanthus]

If such an instance were to escalate into unprovoked assault, the customer has right as a citizen to audio and video record the anticipatory or pending assault for authorities to press charges.

If, however, they are simply explaining to you their refusal—then a customer may not assume retaliatory action in this way with intent to harm either the business owner and or their employees, contractors, etc.

A human rights complaint may be created and henceforth issued to the appropriate body, if in such case, after a verbal negotiation between customer and owner has not yielded a compromise or if there is obvious evidence of discrimination the grounds of a protected status as this. One may allude to filing a complaint against a business or Owner about their employees, verbally or otherwise, though not without wording such a statement as a declaration or point negotiation rather than an ultimatum of veiled threat (expound further). By doing so, an Owner may be more willing to concede that either they have been descriminatory or else may be willing to immediately remedy the situation at the behest of risk of public defacement (bad review).

I'm not saying this is a good route to go but for the sake of upholding one's unalienable rights, it may be necessary to assume an offensive—rather than defensive stance on this issue—that could become the cause of unnecessary lawsuit in which the customer may end up unable to pay or severe financial loss in the case of losing the case.

[mandyfire98]

If they refuse to do business with anyone in the LGBTQ community, what next? Are we going back to pre civil rights too? Not serving anyone that isn't white? Where does it end? Separate water fountains again?

You don't have to partake in something and still not hate. That's all it is, hatred.

[abc3643]

Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission was the US Supreme Court (SCOTUS) case during "October Term 2017" ("OT 2017") in which the baker refused to make a wedding cake for a gay couple.

That case was decided 7-2 in favor of the baker because it felt the state had excessive animus toward the baker's religiosity.

So, I won't say that the Supreme Court ruled on the cake case incorrectly, but that ruling was consistent with their incorrect ruling in the SCOTUS OT 2014 case, Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores. In that case, Hobby Lobby was against providing birth control as part of their responsibility in the Affordable Care Act. Of course, the Opinion of the Court was written by that religious zealot, Samuel Alito who we discovered this week by his own words, is a zealot for "godliness".

As far as I am concerned, your relationship with your deity/dieties is your business and is in your home. Once you are out in the world with the rest of us, you operate under the same laws as everyone else does; you don't get exceptions because of your "deeply held personal religious beliefs".

[Asker]

It's such a slippery slope. "Religion" can AND has been used to justify literally anything---burning people at the stake, racism, homophobia, sexism, etc. because at the crux of it when you say, "I don't support these people," my question is what exactly aren't you supporting? It's a cake, not a donation to GLAAD and ironically to say, a Christian religion doesn't support that, is hypocrisy, because how does one love thy neighbor and shun them at the same exact time. Don't get me started....

[patois]

Businesses refuse service for all kinds of reasons. I don't know why you commies think campaigning on indentured servitude is a winning play. People that don't want to work aren't going to work. You can't do well trying to force people to work. Your Nazi pals even tested the theory in WII and they found that slave labor was half as productive as paying people a reasonable salary man per man. Certain Nazi factories that depended on slave labor were not productive enough to stay profitable and were forced to close.

[BetaBucks]

There's a big difference between refusing to bake a cake for people because they are gay, and refusing to bake a gay-themed cake. No one should ever be forced to create something they don't agree with. Imagine demanding an LGBT person make gay conversion therapy material for a church. And likewise, I shouldn't be forced to make anyone's religious material, ever. Denying them ANY service because of their religion is a different concept, and entirely unacceptable. Just like denying an LGBT person ANY service is also unacceptable. The court only sides with the material argument and not the person argument. It's not legal to deny the person a service. But you can still dictate the type of service.

[Chazmatazz269]

Every business owner should have the right to limit their revenues as much as they want in any way they like. If you don’t like how one company does business, go find one who does things to your liking. Easy breezy. I don’t owe you anything and you don’t owe me anything. We don’t have to agree to exist in the same world or even the same community. Thinking that your money gives you the right to tell someone else how to run their operation is no less ignorant than shorting yourself earnings due to ignorance and bigotry. In the end, it’s LIBERTY that matters most. Every idiot who thinks it’s okay to remove someone else’s freedoms needs to read Martin Niemoller a few times a day until they understand.

[AviatorTom]

When someone is in business, they must separate their personal opinions/beliefs from their commercial ones. Simply put, if a person or group is willing to pay the going rate for the business's product or service, then the business has no right to refuse it... unless what they're asking for is illegal.

[NaultD]

protected groups are protected for a reason. They have been in broad daylight murdered with zero connection to the murderers. The only clue to that murder was the victim exist being who they are.

Sherlock Holmes can't figure out this case because it's so cartoonistly evil lacing any form of logic. Yet they happen and will continue to happen without said anti hate discrimination laws.

[Berethor]

It wedding cake, they should have the right to not support gay marriage and not make it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Same-sex_marriage#Same-sex_marriage_around_the_world

[CrabCakes11]

I think businesses should be allowed to not sell “gay” stuff, but shouldn’t be able to discriminate against somebody specifically for being queer. There’s a difference between not wanting to sell pride themed items and not selling anything to somebody for being trans or gay etc

[andreasderjuengere]

It is not ''discrimination'' when a business owner serves only certain clientele.

Is a car dealer discriminating, when he does not want to trade with motorcycles?

Is a hair stylist discriminating, when they only 'style' ladies?

If the above story is true or not -

Most of the ABCDE+ people are just seeking attention or conflict.

My disclaimer: Homos and irritateds, please don't respond here :D

[Anonymous]

Yes and no. I don’t think you should deny service someone that is from any community. However you should be able to tell other people no. If we use the cake as an example if you’re -insert random religion here- and don’t want to make something -other random religion- themed then you should be able to say no to that theme, but if they just want a cake then you shouldn’t deny them the cake just because their religion is different or just have someone else make it.

[Anonymous]

"This is apartheid. It's Nazi Germany. It's Jim Crow." You left out "islamaphobic, xenophobic," and a few of the other names that the SJWs like to award to their enemies.

You condemn others for their obvious hatred but you seem to be guilty of the same thought-crime.

[Anonymous]

I think there are probably situations where you might want to discriminate against a certain group, whatever it may be. Perhaps where it pulls you into a world you don't feel comfortable or don't understand.
But baking a cake doesn't feel like one of those. Money is green. Seems pointless. But then if you truly are against what the customer represents, maybe you would have to take a stand. Would you provide service to a known and convicted child murderer, for example?

[Asker]

We had this debate amongst friends, and someone asked, "so if a guy came in and wanted a swastika cake, are you making that." Clearly, my answer was no, but we are historically aware that the swastika is a symbol of hatred, of the violent acts of the Nazis and we are aware there are still people who actively feel this way and seek to harm and discriminate against Jews. Glorifying them in actual Germany is illegal.

However, that doesn't compare for me in this situation because that is to imply that being gay means to me that they are seeking to harm, have harmed, or actively discriminate against others in the same way as your convicted murderer has been established in your premise. I do have to concede that there should indeed be limits for business owners, aka, no swastika cakes, but low and behold, with my business, I'm not checking the morality of my patrons. I don't actually have a way to do that and would find that incredibly time consuming and non profitable to decide to sell to only "the good ones that share my exact same value system."

[findacure4wokeness]

Cancel culture was born out of the left by the way but I wouldn't want to support anyone that is so hard into woke causes that they want to refuse service to me anyway.

[Agape93]

Yeah, it's their business. They can deny service to anyone they want. Get over it and move on.

[FunkyMonkee]

No more than they should be allowed to do so against other races or people with disabilities.

[Anonymous]

Of course, why would they let in pedos?

If I owned a business, I sure as hell wouldn't let them in

[Anonymous]

A business owner should have the right to refuse service to anyone they want, for whatever reason they want.

[Anonymous]

Nothing wrong with that. I understand fully.

[Pterodon]

Yes no shoes no service

[BarryLiverstone]

Nope

[MK1997]

No that's bigoted