Maine legalizes gay marriage

I notice it states "individual" not a "businesses", so it doesn't actually give the right to the business itself, right? More so to an independent person, perhaps working for the company?In this case I would say that CS is on point about individual rights, both for the couple, and the individual photographer, caterer, trumpetist, etc.I guess my question is, does this law protect the "businesses" rights or just an "individuals" right to choose to deny service on the basis of religious beliefs?Surely a company can't claim religious affiliation, right?- Oni

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"I smoke pot. If this bothers anyone, I suggest you look around at the world in which we live and shut your mouth."--Bill Hicks"I never knew there was another option other than to question everything"--Noam Chomsky

That's the way I talk, so bite me. I'm not suggesting we force the photographer to be at your gay wedding at all. I'm saying we treat it like we treat racism. As I understand it, if you're a KKK member or for whatever reason you don't like black people and you're a photographer, no one can force you to take a job at a black wedding. But if you're a restaurant or a catering business and refuses to serve a black wedding, we'd be seeing nothing but that on CNN for the next month.This brings me back to the original question. Why does religion get a free pass on hate? Did you click on my link to Tyra Hunter? Are you proposing we allow professionals to not give us service simply because it's against their religion? We as a society don't allow them to do it based on attitudes of racism. Why then should we allow them to do it based on religious beliefs? Why does religion get a free pass? I'm sure there were those that were against interracial marriage for sincerely held religious beliefs. We as a society got over that. To loosely paraphrase Rrhain, if it was a crap argument then, why does it suddenly have merit now?

They allow them to sign and witness the marriage, but you still have to goto the Clerk of Court or some other government office yourself to get the marriage license to hand over to them to sign. They are more like a public notary then anything else as far as the government is concerned.

True, but being a PUBLIC notary and acting as an agent of the state means they should not be allowed to discriminate. So if they want to discriminate then they should not be allowed to act in that position. Besides I think the point of the thread was more about the businesses involved in marriage, not the churches themselves, which makes my point off topic anyway.Edited by Stagamancer, : redundancy

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We have many intuitions in our life and the point is that many of these intuitions are wrong. The question is, are we going to test those intuitions?
-Dan Ariely

for the most part good points. I disagree here, I dont think you can ever prove that business X who refuses to do a Gay wedding is being discriminatory, nor waste time trying to force them to do something, well maybe in some socialist commie country, but not here.Say you are a Judge who signs marriage certificates, it is you job to determine if the requesters should be married or not. its your conscience, and your opinon, if you happend to be a judge who held strong religious feeling against gay marriage, then dont sign the marrige liscense, you are not discriminating, and the law can force you from your religious beliefs. wow now that i think of it this point is crucial.similar things happen in other states. Technically California is a consealed carry state, but you ahve to get the sherrif to sign your paper work, most sheriffs in CA are against it and refuse to sign it. so while its technically legal and your could have the right, in reality very few do.the people of Maine are lucky. where i grew up in the People's Republic of Illinois, they have a "morning after" abortion pill, and the Great Democratic Governor CORRUPTavich (Blagojevic), made it illegal for pharmacists to refuse to give out the drug even on religious grounds. I count my lucky stars to be out of that liberal corrupt communist blue state all the time.

quote:

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made it illegal for pharmacists to refuse to give out the drug even on religious grounds.

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If they want to impose their morals they need to find a different profession. Try some sort of lame ass ministry maybe. They are licensed by the state so they need to to what ever is legal, not what they feel is moral.

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Facts don't lie or have an agenda. Facts are just facts

Sounds like you belong in Iran or should have been in Nazi Germany.

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There is no better love between 2 people than mutual respect for each other WT Young, 2002Who gave anyone the authority to call me an authority on anything. WT Young, 1969Since Evolution is only ~90% correct it should be thrown out and replaced by Creation which has even a lower % of correctness. W T Young, 2008

sure you are, you're just discriminating based on your religious beleifs.

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soon I discovered that this rock thing was true
Jerry Lee Lewis was the devil
Jesus was an architect previous to his career as a prophet
All of a sudden i found myself in love with the world
And so there was only one thing I could do
Was ding a ding dang my dang along ling long - Jesus Built my Hotrod Ministry
Live every week like it's Shark Week! - Tracey Jordan
Just a monkey in a long line of kings. - Matthew Good
If "elitist" just means "not the dumbest motherfucker in the room", I'll be an elitist! - Get Your War On
*not an actual doctor

I'm confused??? I had you pegged as being gay. Why else would you have a gay pride flag as your avatar? Are you trying to be ironic?

It's not a gay pride flag. It's a christian symbol that god would never flood the entire Earth again.

WOW, Big difference! Thanks Taz, for clarifying that for me.

What if you happened to be a judge who held a strong religious belief against Buddhism? Should you be allowed to determine that 2 Buddhists shouldn't get married so the religion is not spread through their children? What if the judge had a religious conviction against interfaith marriage?Let's broaden this a bit. Substitute any other discriminating parameter for "gay" in the argument.Should a caterer be held accountable for refusing to provide service for an interracial wedding because of his personal religious objections?Should a caterer be held accountable for refusing to provide service for an interfaith wedding because of his personal religious objections? In this case a pastor would probably be well within his rights to refuse to officiate at the marriage.In both cases I think that the caterer in question would be vilified in the press. Do you believe that he should not?For the others who are undecided about the caterer-and-gay-wedding issue. Are you also undecided about the two cases I proposed above?

I'll do my best to not let the fact that you are a dick affect my analysis of the substance of your argument. Granted, but only part of the story.You are correct that nobody will force a KKK member of perform services for anyone. You are also probably correct that a restaurant or a catering business that refuses to serve a black wedding would garner a lot of press. In both cases, however, each offending party would be subject to civil liability and sanctions from the state's anti-discrimination agency. Also, for purposes of anti-discrimination legislation, the distinction between a part-time business person and a full-time business person is irrelevant. If someone holds himself out as providing a service for the general public, even part-time, they are subject to anti-discrimination laws. Yes, I did. It's an outrageous situation. Were I involved, those responsible would have faced criminal charges as well as civil liability.You alluded to that outrage in response to my question about what effect it has on the calculus when the burden suffered by the offended party or parties is slight. I'm quite certain you don't think that the burden suffered by Ms. Hunter was slight. Are you ignoring my question? Or are you equating what happened to Ms. Hunter to a refusal to cater to a party? Or do you not comprehend that there are different levels of burden?Regardless of your answer (or lack thereof) to the immediately preceding questions, please answer this one: Finally, you repeatedly ask: I believe I've already given an answer to that question; our country's deep commitment to accommodating religious diversity. At this point, I'm trying to explore the limits of that accommodation. You repeating the question really isn't advancing the analysis, so this is the last time I'll address it.

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For we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and non-believers. -- Barack ObamaWe see monsters where science shows us windmills. -- Phat

Wrong. A judge has no discretion to determine whether applicants should be married. In theory, I suppose, a judge would be justified in refusing to marry if he was aware that the applicants were not legally entitled to marry. In fact, I've never heard of a judge refusing to perform a marriage ceremony. I suspect you haven't either and are simply talking out of your ass about things you know nothing about. Wrong again. A judge, in his official capacity, is an agent of the state. As such, he has no more right to discriminate than the state does. What's more, judges are expected and required to put their personal feelings aside when acting in their official capacity and administer the law. 0 for 3. Assuming a state that has allowed gay marriages, if a judge refused to allow a gay couple to marry, of course he would be discriminating. What else would you call depriving someone of something that they have a legal right to just because of their sexual orientation?

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For we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and non-believers. -- Barack ObamaWe see monsters where science shows us windmills. -- Phat

Irrelevant to the topic. We all have the right to do innumerable things that would we be vilified in the press for doing. I can see no principled basis for making an distinction between the two in the analysis of the issue.

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For we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and non-believers. -- Barack ObamaWe see monsters where science shows us windmills. -- Phat