Posted on 03/11/2014 10:01:51 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
As innocuous as they might seem, bakeries have been the center of controversy in America for some time. Oregon and Colorado bakers have been told recently that refusing to make a cake for a same-sex wedding is tantamount to discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and therefore punishable by fines or other sanctions. These kinds of cases were the cause of the controversial changes to the Arizona Religious Freedom Restoration Act that Governor Jan Brewer vetoed in February.
But there are some services a bakery is still free to deny, and no sane person would deny them the right to do so.
Keep in mind that the bakeries that got in trouble — Masterpiece Cakeshop in Colorado and Sweet Cakes in Oregon — did not refuse service because of their customers’ sexual orientation, but because of ethical opposition to participating in a particular act, namely a same-sex wedding. Judges in both cases declared the bakeries had unjustly discriminated and delivered an ultimatum: Bake the cake or else.
National Review wanted to find out what happens when you ask a bakery for a sugary tribute to an institution just about nobody likes. Would bakeries be willing to make a cake with a Nazi swastika on it?
This was done not in an effort to imply some false moral equivalency between Nazism and same-sex marriage, but rather to show that bakers may have good faith objections even to reproducing a symbol.
Big Apple bakers were admirably unwilling to bake a Nazi cake.
“I’m so sorry, we’re not able to do something like that,” City Cakes responded to our request.
“I don’t know. I might have moral objections,” a baker at Sugar Flower Cake Shop said.
A CMNY Cakes representative said the shop couldn’t bake such a cake because “it doesn’t sound politically correct.”
Snooky’s bakery replied resolutely, “No.” When asked why, the employee replied, “Because of the symbol of the swastika.”
National Review eventually called bakeries in Brooklyn, thinking that perhaps outer-borough bakeries are looser in their baking practices.
“No, sorry,” replied Essential Cakes Inc.
“I think we’ll pass on that,” Betty Bakery said.
Last call: Made in Heaven Cakes. The woman at the other end of the line said that baking such a cake would be “serious” and she was not sure. Ultimately she gave neither a “yes” nor a “no” but seemed so uncomfortable with the question that we thanked her and said goodbye.
So what have we learned from this little no-tether ride down the slippery slope?
First, that bakers, like all Americans, don’t check their consciences at the door. We’re not going to sue any of these establishments for refusing service, and the nation has an overwhelming anti-Nazi majority. But the social acceptability (or unacceptability) of an event or a viewpoint should not determine whether individuals are forced to violate their consciences.
Second, that we should think twice before forcing people to share our ideas of what is or is not offensive. Even an enthusiastic supporter of the right of gays to marry (and bear in mind that support for gay marriage has become a majority position only within the last few years) should shudder at the prospect of a professional’s being sued because he or she doesn’t want to participate in a gay-marriage celebration. “Some people like broccoli; some don’t” used to be considered a reasonable, even liberal position on personal beliefs; we can’t mandate opinions just because everybody likes cake.
Third, and most important: If you want a Nazi cake, you’ll have to look somewhere other than these fine establishments. They don’t want to bake it, and they have that right.
— Alec Torres is a William F. Buckley Fellow at the National Review Institute.
There is a larger point that he missed
The gay couple could have gone to any of a number of bakeries who would have been willing to make their cake and been happy to get the business.
They chose THIS bakery in order to force them to bend to the gay minority’s will.
When they come for your business next, what will you do?
RE: When they come for your business next, what will you do?
I spoke to one Christian baker I know regarding this theoretical possibility... he said he’d bake them the cake but tell them in no uncertain terms that he’s doing it because the government forces him to do it, not because he wants to.
This is where the demonstration failed. If a bakery was uncomfortable with the question, the pink mafia would persist until the issue was litigated.
Find a Muslim bakery and see if they would make a cake with a star of David.
You can bake the cake or not, its up to you
But I don’t think they would like the cake very much if i was forced to make it.
I can imagine the delivery too “And don’t worry- we made ALL the workers who touched this cake PROMISE to wash their hands when they left the bathroom, expecially if they went number two.”
Putting the Amendment that banned slavery to the side for a moment....
What happens when the KKK forces a gay to bake them a cake for their annual founding party?
It's worthy of note that lil' Sandy Fluke picked Georgetown to matriculate because she wanted to sue them over birth control. That was her whole purpose in going there. She could have gone to lots of places that wold have accommodated her, but she picked the one that didn't want to just to force them to do it.
Everyone except for the state should be allowed to discriminate for any reason they want, as long as participation by the other party is voluntary.
“This was done not in an effort to imply some false moral equivalency between Nazism and same-sex marriage,...”
The whole premise of this piece proves the opposite. Those bakers don’t want to “sieg heil” the homosexual “god” that American is increasingly worshiping.
“couldn’t bake such a cake because “it doesn’t sound politically correct”
I cannot believe someone would actually use that term as a reason, like it is a virtue to be “politically correct”. New Yorkers can be so fascist.
As a consequence of parents not making sure that their children are being taught how rights are established in our constitutional republic, the bakery owners were not able to argue the following with the pro-gay activist judges. While the states have amended the Constitution to expressly protect religious expression as evidenced by the 1st Amendment, the states have never amended the Constitution to expressly protect so-called gay rights.
And states which make laws which criminalize people who exercise their constitutionally protected rights, the right of religious expression in this example, because they choose not to engage in commerce associated with the constitutionally unprotected gay agenda, are in violation of Section 1 of the 14th Amendment, imo, which prohibits the states from making laws which unreasonably abridge constitutionally enumerated rights.
He could always bake them a cake that tasted and looked like ^$## and then give them their money back when they complained.
Is there anything about the cake itself that they ordered that the bakers found offensive?
A number of the points above assume it was given their examples, but its not clear that was the case.
Its sounds like the law was protecting gays, but not mandating a specific type of cake.
To get around that sell the gays cakes with a bride and groom on top.
The only other possible detail is the names on the cake.
“Keep in mind that the bakeries that got in trouble...did not refuse service because of their customers’ sexual orientation, but because of ethical opposition to participating in a particular act, namely a same-sex wedding.”
Exactly. This point needs to be driven home.
Getting same-sex “married” doesn’t even presuppose that the two individuals are, in fact, homosexuals. Where such a concoction is allowed, there is no requirement that the individuals be sexually attracted to the same-sex to get “married,” and so two elderly same-sex roommate friend could just as easily take advantage of this designation solely for the benefits.
Governments should only compel private citizens or private businesses to put aside the right to withhold a service or the right to associate or not with another when there is an overriding constitutional interest.
The public accommodation laws passed to prohibit not renting or selling housing to minorities and not allowing them in restaurants is a good example. Housing is an important need, no hotel or restaurant made travel difficult for minorities as the available places were few or below standard. The denials greatly harmed minorities and were designed to make minorities stay second class.
Providing a personal service like catering or photography requires the provider to closely interact with the client. If the act goes against the provider’s religious beliefs, only a compelling public interest should trump the denial.
Cakes & caterers are available elsewhere, so the government should back off. An employer which will not allow an absence because he or she is against a particular religion is wrong, most business can operate with one fewer employee for a short time. To make the employee work on his holy day is a harsh effect, compared to the effect on the business. The absence can be unpaid and if repeated to the point there is a holy day time after time, almost weekly, could lead to a reasonable firing by the business.
What do you suppose would happen if two straight people of the same sex wanted to marry? Is it legal even in states that now permit gays to marry? After all, there could be certain tax or inheritance advantages to be had in such a union. I wonder if anyone would question a baker who refused to bake them a cake.
This whole can of worms should never have been opened.
Incidentally, I had this thought because my great aunt, whose husband been dead for many years, wanted to leave her estate to her best friend, a somewhat younger woman who had no family. They went to court and my aunt, who was well into her ‘80s, legally adopted her friend so she could pass the estate on to her “daughter” without losing a lot of it to the state in taxes. Clever old lady, my aunt.
So, it is possible to adopt someone who is about your age or even older than you are??
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