no, I think it was protecting individual rights. How is outlawing Christianity protecting individual rights?
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well, considering Christians seem to spend an awful large amount of time tryin to tell other people what they can and can't do, I'd say it would help everyone else. but Im not willing to go that far, I just want no laws to be made to enforce christian dogma. Christians are more than welcome to practice their religion to their hearts content, just dont force me, as a non-christian, to comply with your dogma. Believe it or not, not everyone in this country is a christian.
Give me some examples. Are they forcing their views on other people, or are they defending them? There's a difference.
Defending them from who/what, exactly? There is no 'war on Christianity' in America, the persecution complex is not endearing.
When it comes to homosexual issues there's no defense of Christian's values. Nobody is trying to force heterosexual Christians to marry men, or anything else they don't want to do (except discriminate).
Exactly. The "sanctity of marriage" argument, from a religious aspect, falls flat when you take the national divorce rate into consideration and the fact that we allow both couples of other religions and atheist couples to marry in non-Christian or civil ceremonies. Society at large as a different valuation of marriage than the Church. That's not a bad thing.
I don't disagree that disagreement can come from a place other than bigotry. However, I do think his disagreement comes from a place lacking common sense. Such uninhibited faith that economics will "work it all out" and that blanket "freedom" is an unassailable virtue is naïve. When one group's "freedom" to discriminate inhibits the freedom of the oppressed to attain equitable living status, that is a bridge too far. When this "freedom" to segregate and demean is based upon religion, that to me would seem like a violation of the freedom from religion clause in our Constitution. Kansas has passed legislation banning Sharia law. Not only is such a measure superfluous, but it reeks of hypocrisy. How come their religion, in a society that values freedom to worship as you please, can be used by both businesses and government officials to discriminate, but a Muslim's cannot? The moment a Muslim grocery store cashier denies to sell a Christian pork is the moment that they realize the double-standard at play here.
Yes a business can refuse the right to refuse service to anyone if there is a reason that can be shown to be business related. The "No Shirt, No Shoes, No Service" works because that could be a health hazard. A bar can refuse service to someone who they think has had too much or has had a history of trouble on the grounds that that person is going to scare away other patrons or because of liability concerns about drunk driving. A hotel can choose not to rent out a room on the basis that they don't think the room is ready or even that they are saving the rooms for a more lucrative client. Obviously this isn't a perfect system and if a business owner really wanted to discriminate they could do so and claim some other reason for not giving service. This is where the realm of civil rights enforcement has to show a pattern. For example if most of the people a bar claimed were trouble makers and refused service to happened to be Asians while evidence was shown that non-Asians patrons who were visibly drunk they continued serving. Since someone else brought it up about fat chicks and clubs and retailers that discriminate against them. I am not so clear about what the rules are regarding that and how doormen decide who get's in and who doesn't. My own view is that there is probably a lawsuit in there somewhere but no one has figured it was a big enough deal to sue Studio 57 for discrimination. That said discrimination over weight or unattractiveness has gotten executives in trouble such as with what happened with Lululemon and Ambercrombie & Fitch when their CEO's made comments that fat and ugly people shouldn't buy their products or shop their stores.
True segregation created parallel communities and economies. In some cases these segregated communities became relatively successful such as the 5th Ward in Houston. Desegregation though caused capital flight and as the 5th Ward shows didn't work out well afterwords. While that was a negative unintended consequence of desegregation I doubt many would say that keeping segregation would've been worth it. In the 1940's black professionals had no choice but to live and work in places like the 5th Ward and while they may have done well by the standards of that population their professional growth was stunted. Overall the economy of Houston wasn't reaching its potential as long as institutional and cultural barriers remained preventing the movement of customers and capital across diverse groups.
Really? Here's an example. I live in a state where I can't buy alcohol on Sunday mornings. I cannot count the number of times I've wanted a drink on a Sunday morning, but couldn't have one because I happened to run out that weekend. This is just a mild example of a petty inconvenience. There are many examples of much more impactful laws rooted in Christian tradition throughout various state and federal codes. Not to mention the constant social pressure on non-Christians to adopt the mainstream religion and the annual rows over teaching creationism, restricting abortion, gay marriage, etc.
No one is putting a gun to anyone's head. If I don't want to serve X group because I don't like them, find them immoral, or just smelly then I don't have to start a business. You and Tallnover are still making an argument an argument where you try to have it both ways without understanding what it means to open a business. You are saying that businesses should be able to operate in the public realm without actually serving the public. They should be able to have the advantages of a public storefront, advertize, get the protection of business licensing, tax breaks, corporate structure and etc. without the responsibility of serving the whole public. That is the tradeoff that businesses make when they enter the public realm. That doesn't mean that you can't do what you want and even make some money doing it. If I wanted to serve food only to people I like I could just cook at home for family and invited guests. They could even give me money for doing so. What I can't do though then is call my house a restaurant and write off my cooking expenses as business expenses on my taxes. I find it ironic that people who complain about political correctness and the culture of victimhood now adopt the same language to defend discrimination. It is now you can't criticize discrimination because it is victimizing those who want to discriminate. In a lot of places yes but even in many states that didn't have official segregation there was still segregation enforced through culture. This is why Jackie Robinson was a big deal in all of baseball not just Southern states.
when you or your religion view homosexuality as morally wrong then it's reasonable that not discriminating against homosexuality is morally wrong
ah yes, the classic use of religion to justify hate and insecurity. So easy, so basic - the last retort of desperate closed-minded bigots. You should see what the bible says about greed! (a lot more) And that never stops the masturbating to Reagan, "free market" and "f**k the poor" principles. Why the hypocrisy?
That's actually just your own prejudice stereotypes. All Objectivists and most Libertarians are not religious. But by all means attack people views of the supernatural to demean their views on scope of government. Those are relevant Just out of curiosity what does your Bible (or whatever your religious beliefs are) say about forcing your views on others? All these posters screaming 'bigot' and what not are fighting strawmen. No posters have approved of discriminating gays. So much Christian hate in theses threads discussing homosexuals issues. Where do you think Muslims stand on homosexuality?
When Muslims in the US try to pass a law to codify discrimination against gays then they'll be plenty said about it. Stop whining about this imaginary Christian hate when Christians are trying to codify hatred into the law. Take responsibility for your own bigotry.
What about when they cut off heads of homosexuals? no? imaginary? someone in this thread already argued Christianity should be outlawed. what bigotry do you refer to? I already called discriminating gays deplorable and wrong.
Did that happen in Kansas? What happens in Kansas affects and concerns me a heck of a lot more what some backwards ass culture thousands of miles away is doing in their own country. That's his opinion. When someone proposes it as a law in some legislature then it'll receive it's rightful scorn from 99% of posters in this forum including me. Then why do you support the legal right to do it as evidenced by your comments in this thread under some guise of freedom? It's like some of you have no concept of history. Some of you, Commodore in particular, advocate positions that were already held at one time in US history and they didn't survive because they failed.
