Obama to Nominate First Openly Gay Leader of Army

Here. The primary motivation of the left is sex, particularly sexual deviancy from the norm.  That would explain why they are more than willing to sacrifice millions of babies on the altar of Dionysus.

Mike Huckabee, Kim Davis, and "The Law of the Land"

Mike Huckabee is making news regarding Kim Davis saying that Dred Scott is still the "law of the land":

Michael Huckabee has permanently lost his mind.  On Michael Medved’s radio program yesterday, Huckabee said the United States Supreme Court’s 1857 ruling in Dred Scott v. Sandford — which held that all blacks, free or enslaved, could not be American citizens — is still the law of the land.

[Huckabee] Michael, the Dred Scott decision of 1857 still remains to this day the law of the land which says that black people aren’t fully human, said Huckabee. Does anybody still follow the Dred Scott Supreme Court decision?

Huckabee states that the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Dred Scott is still the law of the land, yet no one follows it. Thus, Huckabee argues that no one should follow the U.S.  Supreme Court decision saying same-sex marriage is constitutionally mandated.

There is a major problem with your argument Mr. Huckabee. The Dred Scott decision was overturned by the 13th and 14th amendments to the Constitution in 1865 and 1868. Thus, the Dred Scott decision is no longer the law of the land. It was superseded by specific amendments to the Constitution.
If you no longer want same-sex marriage to be constitutional, then you and your bigot friends need to get the votes for a constitutional amendment. 

I think Huckabee's major point is correct, though what he says is slightly misleading.

Justice Kennedy: Pro-Polygamous "Marriage"

Here are some of the most memorable quotations from Kennedy's recent SCOTUS opinion.  I have taken the liberty of modifying his words to fit with polygamous marriage.  As an exercise for the reader, see what other types of marriage you can come up with.  Once the reader gets a feel for the point of this little exercise, feel free to skip to Scalia's remarks below.

“The ancient origins of marriage confirm its centrality, but it has not stood in isolation from developments in law and society. The history of marriage is one of both continuity and change. That institution — even as confined to opposite-sex relations — has evolved over time.”

“Until the mid-20th century, polygamous intimacy long had been condemned as immoral by the state itself in most Western nations, a belief often embodied in the criminal law. For this reason, among others, many persons did not deem polygamous people to have dignity in their own distinct identity. A truthful declaration by polygamous people of what was in their hearts had to remain unspoken.”

“The nature of injustice is that we may not always see it in our own times. The generations that wrote and ratified the Bill of Rights and the Fourteenth Amendment did not presume to know the extent of freedom in all of its dimensions, and so they entrusted to future generations a charter protecting the right of all persons to enjoy liberty as we learn its meaning. When new insight [what insight?] reveal discord between the Constitution’s central protections and a received legal stricture, a claim to liberty must be addressed.”

“The nature of marriage is that, through its enduring bond, at least two persons together can find other freedoms, such as expression, intimacy, and spirituality. This is true for all persons, whatever their sexual orientation…There is dignity in the bond between at least two men or two women who seek to marry and in their autonomy to make such profound choices.”

“Marriage responds to the universal fear that a lonely person might call out only to find no one there. It offers the hope of companionship and understanding and assurance that while both still live there will be someone to care for the other.”

“[W]hile Lawrence confirmed a dimension of freedom that allows individuals to engage in intimate association without criminal liability, it does not follow that freedom stops there. Outlaw to outcast may be a step forward, but it does not achieve the full promise of liberty.”

“Without the recognition, stability, and predictability marriage offers, their children suffer the stigma of knowing their families are somehow lesser.”

“Polygamous people are consigned to an instability many monogamous couples would deem intolerable in their own lives. As the State itself makes marriage all the more precious by the significance it attaches to it, exclusion from that status has the effect of teaching that polygamous people are unequal in important respects. It demeans those who seek polygamy for the State to lock them out of a central institution of the Nation’s society.”

“Especially against a long history of disapproval of their relationships, this denial to polygamous people of the right to marry works a grave and continuing harm. The imposition of this disability on polygamous people serves to disrespect and subordinate them. And the Equal Protection Clause, like the Due Process Clause, prohibits this unjustified infringement of the fundamental right to marry.”

“It is of no moment whether advocates of polygamous marriage now enjoy or lack momentum in the democratic process. The issue before the Court here is the legal question whether the Constitution protects the right of people seeking to be in a polygamous relationship to marry.”

“No union is more profound than marriage, for it embodies the highest ideals of love, fidelity, devotion, sacrifice, and family. In forming a marital union, at least two people become something greater than once they were. As some of the petitioners in these cases demonstrate, marriage embodies a love that may endure even past death. It would misunderstand these men and women to say they disrespect the idea of marriage. Their plea is that they do respect it, respect it so deeply that they seek to find its fulfillment for themselves. Their hope is not to be condemned to live in loneliness, excluded from one of civilization’s oldest institutions. They ask for equal dignity in the eyes of the law. The Constitution grants them that right.”

Now Scalia:

“The world does not expect logic and precision in poetry or inspirational pop-philosophy; it demands them in the law.”

“If, even as the price to be paid for a fifth vote, I ever joined an opinion for the Court that began: ‘The Constitution promises liberty to all within its reach, a liberty that includes certain specific rights that allow persons, within a lawful realm, to define and express their identity,’ I would hide my head in a bag. The Supreme Court of the United States has descended from the disciplined legal reasoning of John Marshall and Joseph Story to the mystical aphorisms of the fortune cookie.”

The Social Meaning of Marriage

A must read from Keith Burgess-Jackson with several useful links:

Ralph Wedgwood on the Social Meaning of Marriage

Marriage is more than just a relationship that is publicly avowed, or a cluster of concrete legal rights and obligations. It is a legal relationship that has a generally-understood social meaning of a certain kind. None of the options currently available to same-sex couples—'commitment ceremonies' with sympathetic clergymen, private contracts, or 'registered domestic partnerships'—has a social meaning of this kind; none of these options is as familiar and widely understood as marriage. As a result, these options will be less effective than marriage for couples who want to affirm their commitment in a way that the community will readily understand. To fulfil this desire effectively, same-sex couples need to enter a relationship that has a social meaning of the appropriate kind. For this, they need the legal status of marriage, since, as I have argued, the social meaning is tied to this legal status. In effect, they need to be able to say that they are married. Suppose that same-sex unions had a different name—as it might be, 'quarriage'. There will presumably be many fewer same-sex quarriages than opposite-sex marriages; so the term 'quarriage' would be much less familiar and widely understood than 'marriage', and for this reason quarriage would be less effective at fulfilling this serious desire than marriage.

There is no reason to doubt that same-sex couples could have access to a relationship that has the social meaning of marriage. True, the current social meaning of marriage involves the assumption that marriage is the union of one man and one woman. But if same-sex couples could legally marry, it would presumably soon become common knowledge that some marriages were same-sex marriages. So introducing same-sex marriage would change the social meaning of marriage. But there is no reason to think that it would change society's core expectations of marriage (that marriage involves sexual intimacy, domestic and economic cooperation and a voluntary mutual commitment). Thus, we may presume that the legalization of same-sex marriage would give same-sex couples access to the social meaning of marriage.

(Ralph Wedgwood, "The Fundamental Argument for Same-Sex Marriage," The Journal of Political Philosophy 7 [September 1999]: 225-42, at 241 [italics in original])

Note from KBJ: Wedgwood and other supporters of homosexual "marriage" are in for a shock. They think that the social meaning of marriage will transfer automatically to anything the law deems a marriage. To see why this is unlikely, suppose the law decreed, today, that human beings are married (or can becomemarried, by taking proper steps) to their companion animals, such as cats and dogs. Are people likely to start thinking of these relationships as marriages? Obviously not. What they'll do, almost certainly, is reserve the word "marriage" for unions of one man and one woman. If people refer to the new relationships as marriage at all, it will be with a modifier, such as "animal-human marriage," or "animal-human 'marriage'." You can't (thank goodness) change the social meaning of a thing through legislation or court decree. I predict that very few people will refer to homosexual "marriages" as "marriage." The language will be either (1) "traditional marriage" (a retronym) and "homosexual marriage" or (2) "marriage" and "homosexual marriage." If you think this is unlikely, consider how often you hear the term "male nurse," many years after men went into nursing.

Note 2 from KBJ: My friend Bill Vallicella (a.k.a. Maverick Philosopher) has some thoughts about terminology.

Note 3 from KBJ: Perhaps "real marriage" and "homosexual marriage" will catch on. By the way, don't you love it that progressive elites can go only so far in ramming homosexual "marriage" down our throats? They can confer a bundle of legal rights on two men or two women (just as they can confer rights on chickens by requiring that egg-laying chickens be given so much cage space), but (1) they can't change people's minds (beliefs, values, attitudes), (2) they can't change the way people speak, (3) they can't change church doctrine (in Roman Catholicism, homosexuality is "a disordered sexual inclination"), and (4) they can't make something that is morally unacceptable (or widely believed to be morally unacceptable) morally acceptable. How long ago was it that homosexuality was a diagnosable mental disorder? Here is the text from page 44 of Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 2d ed. (Washington, DC: American Psychiatric Association, 1968), commonly known as DSM-II:

302 Sexual deviations This category is for individuals whose sexual interests are directed primarily toward objects other than people of the opposite sex, toward sexual acts not usually associated with coitus, or toward coitus performed under bizarre circumstances as in necrophilia, pedophilia, sexual sadism, and fetishism. Even though many find their practices distasteful, they remain unable to substitute normal sexual behavior for them. This diagnosis is not appropriate for individuals who perform deviant sexual acts because normal sexual objects are not available to them.

302.0 Homosexuality

302.1 Fetishism

302.2 Pedophilia

302.3 Transvestitism

302.4 Exhibitionism

302.5* Voyeurism*

302.6* Sadism*

302.7* Masochism*

302.8 Other sexual deviation

[302.9 Unspecified sexual deviation]

How many of these sexual deviations are already normalized? Which will be next to be normalized?

Note 4 from KBJ: Homosexuality was removed from the DSM in 1974 as a result of political protests by homosexual activists and their sympathizers. The psychiatric community caved. Think about that.

The Case for Gay "Marriage" & Against Polygamous "Marriage"

That case is rarely argued for.  The left is driven largely by emotion, fluctuating between misguided empathy and outrage, as can be seen over and over by the lack of understanding when someone makes the comparison of homosex with incest and polygamy.  There is a ubiquitous failure to understand that the comparison is made because the reasons being given for the permissibility of homosex and for mandating homosexual "marriage" also entail the permissibility of certain incestuous and polygamous relationships.  Instead of offering an argument for the one which excludes the others, the proponent of gay marriage reacts with offense and indignation ("How DARE you compare them!").  As the saying goes, truth hurts.

But occasionally one does come across an argument for gay "marriage" but against polygamous "marriage."  Here is one such argument.

Some excerpts with commentary interpolated:

Why Same-Sex "Marriage" Advocates Can Be So Intolerant

David Mills:

It’s basic good manners not to ask people to do something they don’t think they can do. They’re happier and you’re happier if you find someone else who wants to do the job. You might call this “anticipatory tolerance.” It’s one of the things that makes a diverse society work. I don’t push you if I can help it, you don’t push me if you can help it, and we can keep saying “hello” to each other when we pass on the street.

Not everyone does this. Bakers, wedding photographers and bed-and-breakfast owners, are being abused for declining to support causes and behaviors they can’t support. Some homosexual activists, and their allies, can’t leave them be.

I can understand being hurt or annoyed or even angry, but their reaction to disagreement is often excessive, even hysterical. The rest of us would just shrug and go to another baker or call another photographer. If a local baker has a big picture of Richard Dawkins in his window, I’m not going to ask him to make a cake saying “God Loves You!” or “Jesus is Lord” or “Atheism is stupid.” I definitely won’t ask him to do it and then sue him if he doesn’t.

The Way People Rub Along Together

Most of us see the dangers of taking unnecessary offense. Live and let live, give and take, different strokes for different folks, even turn the other cheek: these are the slogans of a mutually respectful society. Being courteous may inconvenience me from time to time, but it’s a fair trade, since being nice to me will sometimes inconvenience others.

But, as I say, not everyone feels this way. Some same-sex attracted people and their allies refuse to practice the anticipatory tolerance that others find a natural part of living with people who are different from you. You must do what they want or else you’ll hear from their lawyers and any state agency they can pull in. They could just walk down the street and find another baker, but no, you’re going to suffer for saying no. You Can’t Be Allowed To Refuse Them What They Want. You Will Submit.

This strikes me as odd. I understand that their sexual attraction is for them part of “Who I am” and that they don’t like someone implying “There’s something wrong with who you are.” I wouldn’t like it either. But the extremity of their reaction, that’s a little puzzling, especially their siccing the law upon the poor baker who hasn’t done anything to hurt them.

St. Paul helps explain this kind of reaction. 

Jesus: If Someone Asks You to Bake One Cake, Bake for Them Two?

Jessica Kantrowitz answers the question in the affirmative:

“If anyone forces you to go one mile, go with them two miles.” ~Matthew 5:41

If you believe gay marriage is immoral (I don’t, myself) and a gay couple comes into your shop and asks you to bake a cake for their wedding, what should you do? If God causes the sun to rise and the rain to fall on the wedding days of straight and gay couples, then what is our responsibility? If it is against the law to discriminate against people based on their sexual orientation, but you believe strongly that their lifestyle is immoral, what should you do?

Christians, our Jesus said, “Go with them two.”

If someone forces you to bake a cake for a gay wedding, bake for them two.

The author is confused on more than one count.  Exegetically, we should start with the fact that Jesus says that he has not come to abolish the law but to fulfill it.  Whatever Jesus says, it is in accordance with the Old Testament law ("anyone who sets aside one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do likewise will be called least in the kingdom of heaven.")  Marcion was a heretic.  Second, Jesus ups the ante on sexual morality including divorce.  His sexual ethics are stricter than anything on offer; it is less permissive not more. For example, one can commit adultery in one's heart even before committing the external act. Third, on the traditional, orthodox view in Christianity, adultery, incest, homosex (yes, it's a word), bestiality, etc. are intrinsically wrong.  This entails that there are no circumstances in which they are morally permissible.  Some think that participating in a gay wedding is participating in something that condones homosex which is intrinsically wrong.  Whereas, it is not intrinsically wrong to slap someone, to give one your cloak, to go an extra mile when forced to go one, or to give to someone who asks.  Finally, her view seems to entail the following absurdities when her argument is taken to its logical conclusion: If someone asks for aid in having an affair with one person, you should aid and abet in two affairs; if someone asks you to bake a cake for a Westboro Baptist demonstration, you should bake two.

Her argument is supposedly based on a Christian ethic of love; but love takes on many forms and some ways of loving are appropriate and others inappropriate.

If we “snatch one person from the fire” by refusing to condone behavior we believe is immoral, but send hundreds and thousands of others fleeing churches and Christianity entirely, what have we really accomplished? Someone else will make that cake and fewer and fewer people will look to Christianity for love and hope. We will have won a battle that we were never called to fight in the first place, but lost the war.

The tacit empirical claim here, that by not participating in some actions which appear to condone certain sexual practices many will flee Christianity, is dubious.  Christianity flourished from the very beginning in a culture and against a background that was sexually promiscuous and in many ways like our own.  In fact, one of the things that stood out about Christians was their strict, sexual ethics (such that the slur against Christianity was that it was "a religion for women.")

"Two Faces of Tolerance"

Ed Feser:

What is proclaimed and practiced as tolerance today, is in many of its most effective manifestations serving the cause of oppression.

Herbert Marcuse

Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.

H. L. Mencken

Given current events in Indiana, I suppose it is time once again to recall a post first run on the old Right Reason blog in March of 2007, and reprinted on this blog in December of 2009.  Here are the relevant passages, followed by some commentary:

To the charge that liberals are (or, given their principles, should be) in favor of X [where X = legalizing abortion, liberalizing obscenity laws, banning smoking on private property, legalizing “same-sex marriage,” outlawing the public advocacy of traditional sexual morality, etc. etc.], the standard liberal response goes through about five stages (with, it seems, roughly 5-10 years passing between each stage, though sometimes the transition is much quicker than that).  Here they are:

Stage 1: “Oh please. Only a far-right-wing nutjob would make such a paranoid and ridiculous accusation - I suppose next you’ll accuse us of wanting to poison your precious bodily fluids!”

Stage 2: “Well, I wouldn’t go as far as X. All the same, it’s good to be open-minded about these things. I mean, people used to think ending slavery was a crazy idea too…”

Stage 3: “Hey, the Europeans have had X for years and the sky hasn’t fallen. But no, I admit that this backward country probably isn’t ready for X yet.”

Stage 4: “Of course I’m in favor of X - it’s in the Constitution! Only a far-right-wing nutjob could possibly oppose it.”

Stage 5: “You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can be used against you in a court of law…”

…

Fortunately, though, we can rely on conservatives to hold the line, and indeed to turn back liberal advances. Right?

Well, no, of course not. (You can stop rolling your eyes, I was being facetious.) For conservatives - or maybe I should say “conservatives” (since there’s very little that they ever actually manage to conserve, unless money is somehow involved) - seem to go through five stages of their own. Here they are:

Stage 1: “Mark my words: if the extreme left had its way, they’d foist X upon us! These nutjobs must be opposed at all costs.”

Stage 2: “Omigosh, now even thoughtful, mainstream liberals favor X! Fortunately, it’s political suicide.”

Stage 3: “X now exists in 45 out of 50 states. Fellow conservatives, we need to learn how to adjust to this grim new reality.”

Stage 4: “X isn’t so bad, really, when you think about it. And you know, sometimes change is good. Consider slavery…”

Stage 5: “Hey, I was always in favor of X! You must have me confused with a [paleocon, theocon, Bible thumper, etc.]. But everyone knows that mainstream conservatism has nothing to do with those nutjobs…”

End quote.  Now, where X = curtailing the free exercise of religion, at the time I first wrote those words I estimated that liberals were at about stage 2.  At this point it seems that many of them are at about stage 4, and a disturbing number of hotheads among them seem willing to push for stage 5 vigilantism.  Conservatives, meanwhile, seem mostly to be at about stage 3 of their own progression, and I suspect that not a few are at least flirting with Stage 4.

And so here is where we find ourselves in the land of the free and the home of the brave in April of 2015:

Prominent conservative politicians and churchmen have all essentially caved in on the substance of the dispute over “same-sex marriage.”  None of them will publicly express the slightest moral disapproval of homosexual behavior, and few even bother anymore with social scientific arguments supporting the benefits of children being raised by both a mother and a father.  Indeed, all of them are eager to express their deep respect for their fellow citizens who happen to be homosexual, vigorously to condemn “homophobia” and discrimination, etc.  Some of them are even happy to affirm “same-sex marriage.”  All they ask is that religious believers who on moral grounds disapprove of “same-sex marriage” not be forced to cooperate formally or materially with it.  The circumstances where this might occur are, of course, very rare.  No one is proposing that business owners might refuse to serve a customer simply because he or she happens to be homosexual.  What is in view are merely cases where a business owner who objects to “same-sex marriage” would be forced to participate in it, say by providing a wedding cake or wedding invitations.  Nor would his refusal to participate inconvenience anyone, since there are plenty of business owners who have no qualms about “same-sex marriage.”

In short, what conservatives are proposing is not only extremely modest, but is being defended in the name of their opponents’ own principles, the most liberal of principles, viz. the Jeffersonian principle that it is tyrannical to force someone to act against his conscience, and the Rawlsian principle that a pluralistic society should strive as far as possible to respect and keep a just peace between citizens committed to radically different moral, philosophical and religious views. 

And for taking this paradigmatically liberal position, they are widely and shrilly denounced by liberals as… “bigots,” “haters,” “intolerant,” comparable to the Ku Klux Klan and the upholders of Jim Crow.

Meanwhile, some liberal business owners fire employees who take this conservative position, while others refuse to do business in a state that adopts it.  Other liberals routinely refuse even to discuss the merits of the conservative position but merely hurl insults and try to shout down and intimidate anyone who dares to disagree with them.  And when a particular business owner affirms that customers who happen to be homosexual are welcome in her restaurant, but also says that she would not agree to cater a hypothetical “same-sex wedding,” she finds herself suddenly subjected to a nationwide Two Minutes Hate, with an online mob actively seeking to destroy her livelihood and reputation -- some of them even proposing to burn down the restaurant or kill its owners.  Even some mainstream liberals, while not condoning such violence, suggest that the restaurant owner had invited this abuse.

And liberals have winked at or even embraced the ethos and tactics of the lynch mob in the name of… tolerance, freedom, and pluralism, of love and compassion and opposition to bigotry.

How have we descended into such Orwellian insanity? 

It’s all about sexual equality

Read the rest.

The Wrongly Named "Human Rights Campaign" in Arkansas

Here is a link to the website of the so-called "Human Rights Campaign" which has been waging a war against the Religious Freedom Restoration Act in Arkansas.

What are the human rights that the HRCampaign is hell-bent to protect (or enforce)?  Exactly what they are is not at all clear from their website.  For sure, one of the human rights is not a right against the government such that the government cannot "substantially burden" a person's religious beliefs unless the government is pursuing a "compelling government interest" and does so in a way that is "narrowly tailored," or pursues the "least restrictive means" to accomplish the task of fulfilling the government interest.  Nor is it the right to private property.

A human right is a species of a moral right.  A human right is not a legal right.  One might have a human right to life even if there are no laws in one's sorry government  on the books for a time protecting such a right (a government, say, run by certain utilitarians. Perhaps it protects such right de facto but not de jure).  Or if that example does not suit you, substitute another human right that the government fails to legally afford one by governmental means.

A human right is a right that all humans have.  A right to receive a social security check might be a legal right.  It might also be a moral right (say, if the government promises to give you one by an act of legislation), but it is not a right that all humans have.  It is not even a right that all U.S. citizens have.  It is only a right for those sixty-five and older.

One of the alleged rights that the HRCampaign appears to be trying to uphold is a right to be made a cake for a gay-wedding.  But this certainly is not a human right, since, for one, not all humans are gay.  Is the relevant right a right to have a baker bake you a cake?  That cannot be a human right either, for some small societies have no bakers.  First note, that an alleged right to have a baker bake you a cake is a positive claim right, not a negative right.  A negative claim right is  a right against your doing something to me.  (Most moral rights are negative rights).  A positive claim right is a right to your doing something for me.  But in the absence of bakers there is no positive right to the baker's services because there are no bakers.

Is the human right a right to having-a-cake-baked-for-you-by-a-baker-if-there-were-bakers?  If that is the case, then it would seem that all moral rights are human rights, since similar conditional clause could be added to almost any right.

I suggest that human rights are basic rights which are not expressible in the gerrymandered way above which I have placed in bold.  If that is correct, then what is or are the relevant human rights which the HRCampaign is promoting?

Is it a human right to respect?  In the baker-type court cases there is no evidence that any of the gay couples were not afforded the basic respect that comes from being a human.  None were treated as if they were not human beings.

What then?

A right to have a business treat one like everyone else?  But businesses do not treat everyone the same.  Businesses justly discriminate against thieves who want to steal their goods, liquor stores discriminate against people who look young and do not have proper identification, and so on and so forth.

When Opposing Laws Like Arkansas's and Indiana's Cost Lives

Once again, First Things' R.R. Reno:

None of the dire outcomes predicted by those campaigning against the Indiana RFRA have materialized in jurisdictions that already have versions of the law. Aside from the specific matter of participation in a gay wedding, there has not been a single case in which someone has claimed a religious right to refuse to serve or sell to gays or lesbians. Employment? There exists only one case from 1985—and in that case the court denied the claim to a religious exemption from anti-discrimination laws. Facts belie the outcry and expose it for the propaganda effort that it is.

This campaign of misinformation comes at a cost. For some people, RFRA protection is a matter of life and death.

Take Mary Stinemetz, a Jehovah's Witness in Kansas who needed a liver transplant but would not accept a blood transfusion for religious reasons. To get such an operation, she would have to go a hospital in Nebraska. Kansas Medicaid, which had a policy of only covering in-state procedures, refused to cover the transplant (even though the Omaha procedure would have cost less than the in-state one with a blood transfusion).

Americans Split on Private Property versus Marxism

This is frightening.  A virtual majority of Americans now hold a belief which entails that someone who, for religious reasons, refuses to serve a same-sex couple for their wedding (on and with their own property) should be fined and ultimately imprisoned (which is what happens if you don't pay your fines).  49% seem to hold (perhaps not consciously) that they have a right to your working for them and to your property.  They have a right to your forced-labor even if you object on religious grounds.  They have partial ownership in your labor, your goods, and over you.

Oh, but you are free not to have your business.  We'll throw you a bone (hippies are heroes after all).  As a commenter on Facebook writes:

PEOPLE need to be protected, not businesses. If you don't want to serve customers, don't open a business. 

Got that?  If you own your own business, apparently you don't count as a person.  BAKERS don't need protection, PEOPLE do.  If you own a business, you have no need for government protections.  (We run on the Democratic loot and pillage economic model).  If you don't want to serve somebody, too bad.  You'll be forced to do it or "free" to close up shop.

We are moving towards a society that does not believe in private property.

Suppose I decide to start selling cakes from my house.  Does everyone then have a moral right to come into my house such that I have a moral obligation to let you in?  Of course not.  It's MY HOUSE not YOURS or the GOVERNMENT'S.  As long as I am not harming you and your most basic needs can be met without coming into my house, it is up to me and my family to determine who comes in and when.  (Sure, I can have morally illegitimate reasons for not letting you in, but we're not talking about my reasons but the right to let you in or not apart from whatever reasons I have for or against).

You have no right to come in as you please, no right to my doing business with you in my house, nor do I have an obligation to let you in or do business with you (again, aside from extreme cases.  If you get into a wreck outside my house when there's an impending tornado going down the street, and I'm the only one with the available means to assist you, I have a duty to give you safety and shelter.  Your value as a person gives you a right to life which trumps my desire to watch TV such that, in that case, I have no right not to let you in.  In fact, I have a duty to get off my butt and lend a hand).

Now suppose I buy the property next to my house.  I make another building with living quarters.   Half the time I bake at one house and half the time I also sleep in that house.  Do you have a right to come into that other building (whenever you want or during the hours I've posted) such that I have a moral obligation to let you in now?  Why think that?  The other building is as much mine as the previous one.  Suppose I start sleeping in the other building only one night a week and selling cakes out of it six days a week.  Do you then have a right to my selling you a cake such that I have an obligation to do business with you?  Why then and not before?  Suppose I stop sleeping in the building entirely and put a sign up on the building which says "Bakery."  Do you then have a right to my selling you a cake such that I have a correlative moral duty to sell you the cake?  Why then and not before?

Does a black businessman have a moral right not to sell to China?  Yes (though it might be prudent to do so).  He has that right and we have a duty not to force him to sell to China.  Does a black businessman have a moral right not to sell to Americans?  Sure, why not? Does a black businessman have a moral right not to sell to Chinese women?  If he has a right not to sell to China, then surely he has a right not to sell to Chinese women.  Does a black businessman have a moral right not to sell to American women?  If he has a right not to sell to Chinese women then surely he has a right not to sell to American women.  Does a black businessman have a moral right not to sell to white American women?  If he has a right not to sell to American women then surely he has a right not to sell to white, American women (though our friend at this point might not have much of a business!)

Does he have a right not to sell to white women simply because they are white and (as he believes) all whites are white-devils?  No.  No one has a moral right to act on the basis of racist and thus immoral reasons.  No one has a moral right to act on the basis of immoral beliefs.  Nonetheless, in a free, non-Orwellian country, we should not want the Thought Police regulating all of our beliefs, especially our religious beliefs which do not harm others or infringe on their basic rights.  The black business owner is a racist, but racists who do not harm others should not go to jail.  Instead of using brute FORCE, one can (if one is able to) use reasons.

There is no basic moral right to have a baker bake you a cake (more on this in a later post).  If you want a cake baked, you are free to BAKE ONE YOURSELF.

Gay Marriage Isn't About Justice, It's About Selma

Lutheran pastor, Hans Fiene:

Why do so many young adults paint absurd caricatures of Christians who request government protection of their religious freedoms, arguing their true goal is to ban gay men from sitting at the local lunch counter? Why do they spread falsehoods about legislation, insisting that bills like the one recently signed by Indiana Gov. Mike Pence will unleash a Republican-led Jim Crow revival aimed at the LGBT community? Why do so many people, Gen Xers and younger, invent a monster of anti-gay bigotry and keep screaming the monster is real despite a mountain of contrary facts standing before them?

The answer is “social studies.” My generation engages in straw men, misinformation, and lies because, in every year of social studies class, we studied the civil-rights movement not as history, but as hagiography. We didn’t just learn what events happened on American soil, we were encouraged to mimic the segregation-defeating holy ones and merit for ourselves a place alongside them in glory. Combining that admonition with our general aversion to hard work, we concluded that the only thing necessary to be as righteous as the saints who fought racial injustice was to decry an injustice that no one else was. And we became so desperate to find that injustice, we lost our minds in the process.

[...]

Don’t Let Facts Sully Our Self-Righteousness

But after all those years of waiting for that diamond to arrive, we weren’t going to let anyone to tell us what we held in our hands was really a cubic zirconia. This cause made us righteous. We were certain of it, so no opposition was allowed. No debate on the issue could be tolerated. No damn, dirty facts would take our saintly status away.

Of course we know that politely telling a customer you’ve served for nine years that you can’t, in good conscience, provide flowers for his wedding isn’t in the same moral universe as murdering a black teenager for talking to a white woman.

So when you argued that disapproving of gay marriage didn’t deserve to be mentioned in the same breath as oppression of black Americans, we knew you were right. Of course we know that politely telling a customer you’ve served for nine years that you can’t, in good conscience,provide flowers for his wedding isn’t in the same moral universe as murdering a black teenager for talking to a white woman. Of course saying “you don’t get to vote because your skin has a different amount of melanin than mine” is logically indefensible, while saying “I don’t think a union that’s biologically incapable of procreation fits the definition of marriage” is an argument that needs to be fairly considered, even if we don’t agree with it. But we wouldn’t consider it, wouldn’t even let your words embed in our ears because we would not risk having to surrender our halos in the offhand chance that you maybe, sort of, kind of had a little bit of a point.

Here is the rest.

Religious Freedom Restoration Act: A Time for Testing

First Things editor R.R. Reno:

We’re in a moment of mass hysteria, one that vindicates Indiana Governor Mike Pence’s decision to sign his state’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA). This law establishes a strong standard for religious liberty: A person’s free exercise of religious can be “substantially burdened” by a law only if that law advances a “compelling government interest” in a way that involves “the least restrictive means.”

It was immediately denounced as an unprecedented assault on gay rights. Apple CEO Tim Cook described the law as part of “something very dangerous” that “would allow people to discriminate against their neighbors.” Many others have joined the frenzy. Gays aren’t going to be served at restaurants! They won’t be allowed into hotels!

What world is Tim Cook living in? At present, Indiana has no legislation prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity. As a result, no matter what one thinks of the recently passed RFRA, when it comes to gay rights this legislation does absolutely nothing to allow people to do things they’re not already allowed to do.

And what were people doing? At this point nobody has identified any pattern of discrimination in Indiana that, somehow, this legislation will empower. No gay person has complained of being denied a hotel room. None have reported being denied service at a restaurant. Gays and lesbians are not prohibited from voting or holding public office. Nobody is lobbying to prevent Elton John from performing in Indiana. There are no reports of discrimination in hiring.

But today is beside the point. Let me repeat that: Today is beside the point. The controversy in Indiana is about the future.

Christian conservatives in Indiana pressed for a RFRA because they anticipate the establishment of a thoroughgoing gay rights regime in America. The Supreme Court is very likely to find a right to gay marriage in the Constitution. Moreover, the reasoning used to justify the discovery of this right is only too likely move along lines that equate any objection to same-sex marriage with bigotry.

This is what I call the Selma Analogy. 

READ THE REST.

"Stop the Hate!! Don't Discriminate."

Does refusing to bake a cake for a gay wedding constitute or imply hating homosexuals or hatred more generally?

This is a follow-up post to the previous one.

A commenter on Facebook writes:

You mention the example of the cake for a wedding, but might it be the case that individuals are afraid they might be refused service in a variety of ordinary situations? For example, an individual walks into a family-run sandwich shop and is refused service because they are gay? While I do believe that it is completely wrong to make a religious cake designer make a wedding cake for a gay couple, might it be the case that gays are more worried about the everyday interactions as opposed to the few special exceptions?

Yes, it might be the case that some individuals are afraid they might be refused services such as the ones mentioned.  It could also be that others are motivated by wanting to see business owners who, for example, discriminate against practicing homosexuals (or homosexual weddings), punished by the government or forced into acts they object to for other reasons (such as changing their beliefs.  Acts breed habits and habits sometimes change beliefs.  Belief formation is a grab-bag mysterious thing).  LGBTQETC... activists know full well that court decisions have the effect of shaping people's beliefs--since for better or worse people's moral beliefs are (in part) codified by state laws and court decisions.

Of course, those in favor of the Religious Freedom Restoration Acts not only have similar fears, but also fear the government fining and ultimately imprisoning them.  It seems to me that this is not an unreasonable fear (especially given the fact that religious objectors already, rarely win in court versus the government which can usually manufacture a "compelling interest" for what it does...except when it takes a moral interest as in Lawrence vs. Texas.).

Here is a good primer on Religious Freedom Restoration Acts.

Let me ask the readers this: would you have similar concerns if, for example, a baker is asked to bake a cake by a religious person with an anti-homosexual-sex message as was the woman pictured above?
If so, why in this case but not in the other?

In an email to WORLD, [the man asking for the cake] wrote that he requested two cakes in the shape of an open Bible. He asked that the first cake show on one page, “God hates sin—Psalm 45:7,” and on the facing page, “Homosexuality is a detestable sin—Leviticus 18:22.” He requested that the second cake have on one page, “God loves sinners,” and on the facing page, “While we were yet sinners Christ died for us—Romans 5:8.”

As for me, I think we are long past the time when many positive Civil Rights laws (i.e. laws which make it illegal for businesses or other groups to deal with whomever they see fit) have served their usefulness.  There is a such a plurality of races, religions, ideologies, etc. in the U.S. that one can find the necessary services for one's needs.  And as far as racism goes, we've come a long way.  I see many laws today as further polarizing people, while at the same time keeping lawyers gainfully employed as well as race and gender baiting politicians.  Instead of seeking the government to coerce people by fines and imprisonment to deal justly and fairly with others, I favor education and free association, compelling people with arguments rather than brute force.  (Still, I see reason for ordinances which would, say, ban the KKK from parading in black neighborhoods.  One should feel safe in one's homes, and banning organizations from using public places for demonstrations which have a history of violence and suppression makes sense.  This is the conservative in me, not the libertarian).

Moreover, there is a serious business interest to deal with as many people as possible.  In addition, "everyday transactions" (as the commenter above mentions) should not be as much of a worry to homosexuals as (e.g.) blacks, since one need not advertise what one does in one's bedroom with people who one does business with in most instances.  The slippery slope argument here is baseless.

Nonetheless, if one cares to sign a petition asking the Arkansas governor to veto HB 1228 (as I was recently asked to do by a colleague) one can do so here.  After all, it is a free country.  But I won't be signing that petition.  I neither hate nor discriminate.

"Anti-LGBT[QQIAAP] Religious Freedom Bill Passes Senate"

I'd be willing to bet that whoever made this sign is a moron.

That's the title of the latest Arkansas Times propaganda report.

So, let's get this straight:  a bill which would more or less make clear what the Constitution already protects--the free exercise of religion-- and which isn't about the glorious '60s or sex--is ANTI-LGBTQQIAAP?  A law which would protect people from going against whatever they conscientiously believe is good or right based on their religion and WITH THEIR OWN PROPERTY [!!!] is evil?  I would love to hear the argument for that.

Apparently, the left is coming out of the woodwork over this bill, characterizing it as anti-LGBT...and discriminatory.  For instance, here is a typical post from Facebook:

Anyone who supports this bill or has had a hand in its creation and potential passage should be ashamed. I am disgusted by what I have seen recently regarding Arkansas on both a state and national level, but this takes the cake. [No pun intended.]  I thought we were moving past state sponsored discrimination, but I guess I was wrong. This is another reason I cannot wait to leave this backward excuse for a state ASAP.  [Your backward state has the highest taxes of any of the seven states in which I've lived. I can see why yer itchin' to leave.  I'll see you in Saskatchewan.]

I hate to break it to the guy, but almost every single time the state makes a law, it discriminates.  For example, the social security age is discriminatory by choosing 65 years of age against every other age. Gas taxes discriminate between people who drive trucks and people who drive lawnmowers across country versus people who just ride bikes or walk.  The author of the post apparently does not understand what discrimination is or how laws typically work.

Note: for the left, "discrimination" seems just to mean "unjust discrimination" or perhaps more likely "unfair discrimination," even though this disambiguation rarely occurs (i.e., between discrimination, and either unjust/unfair discrimination, or between unjust and unfair discrimination).  Still, watch out for it and don't be bamboozled.  Most cases of discrimination are not unjust; we make discriminations ALL the time (you've made several while reading this post).

Regarding the Anti-LGBT spin on this particular bill--the left, with religious indignation, apparently holds that "whoever is not for us is against us."  Jesus's meaning aside, it seems that there is a failure, here, to distinguish between an agent being free simply to refrain from doing business with someone for religious reasons and an agent doing something overtly harmful and against another party.

At any rate, none of this behavior from the left is surprising.  The left is by nature totalitarian. In the name of liberty it moves away from individual liberty and aims to control individuals by the coercive means of the state so that no realm of life is left untouched by politics.

If I bake cakes (heaven forbid) and don't feel like I want to bake them for a gay wedding, that is unacceptable to the left.  You must obey Big Brother.

The only property rights you have are the ones that the left allows you to have.  Your ingredients to your cake are not really your own.  Your labor is not really your own.  Whoever wants that cake (within the politically correct sphere) has a right to it, and has a right to your working for them.  They have part ownership over your goods, your labor, and thereby you.  You are free in the sense that you are free to serve them; if you don't, you will be fined.  If you don't pay your fine you will go to jail.  That is how government coercion works, Kemosabes.

I've written about this before.  But let's look back at the AR Times piece once more just for fun:

Sen. Joyce Elliott read from a letter from a gay constituent, who wrote, in part, that the bill was extremely unconstitutional, and "mutes those who like myself are a religious or denominational minority." 

I guess like blueness and pain--and unlike uniqueness--unconstitutionality comes in degrees.  Not only that, but if the bill is passed into law, Sen. Elliott's constituent will become mute.  Now that's some bill!  And apparently I "should be ashamed."

Instead, I find myself proud to support it--against the cultural elite and even though I am on the wrong side of history.

The 14th Amendment

Here is the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, wherein one will find a right to an abortion, a right to gay marriage, and in general, a right to whatever is deemed good and fitting by progressive jurists under the invention of substantive due process:

Amendment XIV

Section 1.

All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

Section 2.

Representatives shall be apportioned among the several states according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each state, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the executive and judicial officers of a state, or the members of the legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such state, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such state.

Section 3.

No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any state, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any state legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any state, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.

Section 4.

The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any state shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void.

Section 5.

The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.

Progress! The World's First Three-Way Gay "Marriage"

Excerpt:
Three homosexual men have “married” each other in Thailand in what is being billed as the world’s first three-way same-sex “marriage.” This was, of course, inevitable. It’s inevitable in every country that redefines marriage as anything but one man and one woman. When the culture’s only standard for “marriage” is that the parties love each other, then all sorts of novel configurations are possible. Look for this to come soon to a country near you.

Under the banner of the gay-rights rainbow, the new cultural revolutionaries are not only redefining marriage but also, to borrow from the popular term of 1960s radicals, “smashing monogamy.” What’s to stop these three non-monogamous married men from taking on added spouses? If three is fine, why not four? Or five?

This is, of course, a blatant I-told-you-so moment. This is what we gay-marriage opponents have been warning about. But it’s especially revealing of something else I’ve warned about for a while.
Those of us opposing same-sex “marriage” for reasons like this were told by gay-marriage advocates that we were nuts. Our claims that the redefining of marriage would lead to polygamous marriage and other arrangements were ridiculed. We were denounced as homophobes and bigots who simply hate. We were not just cold-hearted but hysterical. They shouted at us that they would never advocate arrangements like these. We were crazy to even suggest they would support anything but two gay people marrying one another.

But we know better. Those of us who have studied the ideological train-wreck called “progressivism” know better. We’ve watched how progressives “progress.” The only thing you really know about progressives, and that they know about themselves, is that they’re always changing, evolving. Where they stand now, on any given issue, is, by progressivism’s own definition, subject to change.
I often give the example of Margaret Sanger’s Planned Parenthood. It was launched in the 1920s as the American Birth Control League, with Sanger’s interests being birth control and eugenics. Sanger insisted that she and her organization were against abortion. “It is an alternative that I cannot too strongly condemn,” she wrote in January 1932. “Some ill-informed persons have the notion that when we speak of birth control we include abortion as a method. We certainly do not.”
Yet, for progressives, what began as birth control needed only a few decades to snuff out life after conception. They “progressed” to where Sanger’s organization rapidly became America’s largest abortion provider. And where do “pro-choicers” stand today on abortion? Now they tell you that you must not only support its legalization but pay for it. If you disagree with them, they smear you as favoring a “war on women.”

Read the rest.