Setting aside that I have thought that gay couples deserve familial rights for many years, Washington sets aside First Amendment rights (no, we're not talking even about hate speech or some dislike of gays here, but a religious idea about marriage) in the name of "equality" of marriage. The rainbow White House was stupid. This is shameful.
The courts have informed us, as with the recent bakery lawsuit that ensured that bakery would have to close down, that if you have any issue with servicing a gay marriage, you better lie about it. Why? If you're honest, as both the florist and the baker were to their longtime customers, about religious views that you believe direct you to not do work for gay marriages, no matter your business, then the law will embrace that with a rope and hang you.
The following argument was rejected by the Wash. Supreme (from NY Times):
A lawyer for Ms. Stutzman, Kristen Waggoner, said the court had erred both in interpreting the law and in the specifics of the case. The same-sex couple were not refused service because they were gay, Ms. Waggoner said, but only turned away for a specific ceremony that Ms. Stutzman could not abide because of the dictates of her conscience. Voters in Washington approved a same-sex marriage law in 2012.
Because a flower arrangement is an artistic expression, Ms. Waggoner said, the court effectively ruled that the state could regulate, with punitive government authority, what artists may sell.
“All creative professional expression is at risk,” Ms. Waggoner said in a telephone call with reporters.I reiterate that this florist, with no hateful intent, was honest about why she didn't want to prepare the flowers. And for that honesty, she paid the price.
This is not an orchestrated denial of services and threats, and vitriol. This is not lunch counters in Alabama in the 1960s. The irony, of course, is that the Wash. Supreme says that it is, in their decision.
Florist Discriminated Against Gay Couple, Washington Supreme Court Rules - The New York Times
- jR, aka AirFarceOne (Twitter)
