Judge rules Orlando bakery didn't discriminate against anti-gay customer

[markpkessinger]

33. Not really, it didn't

The primary product a baker produces and sells is baked goods, not the message that may (or may not) be used to adorn a cake. She didn't refuse to sell cake to the guy. She simply refused to put a particular message on it. Bakers have never, so far as I know, been under a requirement that they put any message at all on any cake they sell, let alone one they disapprove of, just because a customer wants it. I can imagine many things a baker might refuse to put on a cake, either because the baker strongly objected to the message, or because he didn't want his product, and hence his business, associated with a hateful message. This baker did not refuse to sell products to this guy, or even provide products for whatever event the guy had in mind. They simply refused to put a particular hateful message on their product. I'm pretty sure an anti-gay baker would be free to refuse to put the words, "To the happy couple - James and Joseph" on a cake (ridiculously petty though it would be to refuse to do so), so long as they didn't refuse to provide cake for a gay wedding

This guy obviously thought this was the inverse of those bakers, florists, etc., who have been 'forced' to 'participate' in or 'support' gay marriages. But the notion that such vendors, when selling their products or services, necessarily support, let alone participate in, gay marriages merely because they supply cake or flowers to a gay wedding is a red herring in any case. For these vendors regularly sell products to customers while having no bloody idea how,and in what context. that product will be used. These vendors no more 'participate' in gay weddings than a florist 'participates' in the adultery of some dude who orders flowers to be sent to his mistress.

Fortunately, the Court also saw right through the guy's attempt to create a definitive association between Christianity and the message he wanted on the cake. Anti-gay bigots, after all, come in all flavors of religion and of non belief. And even IF he could provide chapter and verse in the bible that contained the text exactly as the text of his cake message was worded, those parts of the Bible that are assumed (often wrongly, thanks to mistranslations of mistranslations over many centuries), none of them are exactly core teachings of Christianity.,.

But we shouldn't really be surprised by this coming from evangelical fundamentalists. These are the same folks who think they are being 'persecuted' merely for being denied a cultural hegemony and being asked to stand on the same footing as other faiths and of non-belief..