Man Sues Bakery

[D_Yeti_Esquire]

No, proving a belief is central to proving religious descrimination. And help this person IF this twirp mentioned it was his religious belief at the bakery.

The baker refusing is uncontested. That the bakery was uncomfortable with the text is a given. Had the text read, "Jesus was a not the son"(Islam), or some horrible law from Leviticus, etc., no jury is going to buy that it wan't for religious reasons being offensive.

The gray here is the phrase is political and bigoted. But the problem still remains that the law accounts for the gray area by erring on the side of the protected class. So if the baker even heard religion mentioned, defendant is dealing with Davis v. Fort Hood County which is an employment discrimination case that says in the courts it is up to the protected class to prove the sincere belief in court but is not required to prove it to the defendant. Essentially, under the law you take the word of the person telling you it's their religion.

Given that, the baker isn't really protected. I could claim I refused two Muslims a service because they were pushy but unless I have a provable history of doing that and there's some evidence to prove they were, legally it's more likely I'd lose that. Same thing here, the details are the case but if the baker is aware of a religious slant prior to the lawsuit(not whether it was believed), it's not up to them to make the call. Unless you have some sort of enforced rules against bad words you can point to and some history enforcing them, legally that looks arbitrary.

I'm not rooting for the guy, I'm just saying given previous cases I can see him winning it very easily. There may be exculpatory details I'm missing here, but the case didn't end at bigoted.

[Andara Bledin]

Based on actual case law of the statute in question, he would have to prove that, absent his display of creed, that he would not have been denied service.

Just like I said in my last two posts.

It is not enough to prove that he held a creed. That's undisputed. Nor that his request conformed to his creed. This is also undisputed, despite many people thinking he's a "detestable" individual.

The bar he must hurdle is to prove that, absent his creed, he would not have been refused.

The fact that the shop in question actually has an iPad filled with religious options for cakes one could order, that's going to be a really tall order. The fact that every objection by the shop has been about the words "hate" and "detestable" and "awful things about gays" indicates that they would have similarly refused any such order from any other hateful bigot, and that creed, or lack thereof, is a circus sideshow attempt to create a false equivalence to bolster the case of the shop that was prosecuted for failing to provide full accommodation to a gay couple in the making of their otherwise typical cake.

Bigotry, no matter what flavor of protection you attempt to gussy it up with, is not a protected class and his suit will likely be dismissed based on lack of grounds.

Here's an article from the Washington Post that says the same exact thing:

No, bakeries don’t have to take orders for cakes that say ‘God Hates Gays’

[HYHYBT]

The trouble is, winning isn't the point. Losing legally would even serve them better, since the point is to generate the kind of publicity that makes people feel like they're being persecuted.

[Anthony K. S.]

The bakery has won, for now.

Some good news, at least for the time being.

The Colorado Department of Regulatory Agencies has ruled that Azucar Bakery, and its owner, Marjorie Silva, were within their rights to refuse a request for cakes decorated with hateful anti-gay messages.

Washington Post - "Colorado bakery that refused to bake anti-gay cakes did not discriminate, state agency says"

Yahoo Politics - "Azucar Bakery did not discriminate by refusing to make anti-gay cakes : Colorado"

The department ruled that the bakery had refused service because the customer's request included "derogatory language and imagery," and not because the customer was Christian, as he had claimed.

The baker said "in the same manner [she] would not accept [an order from] anyone wanting to make a discriminatory cake against Christians, [she] will not make one that discriminates against gays," according to the decision.

"The evidence demonstrates that [Silva] would deny such requests to any customer, regardless of creed."

Not surprisingly, Silva received a huge number of letters and e-mails supporting her, including from Christians who say that William Jack's actions do not represent their faith.

It is very likely that Jack will appeal the ruling, but the bakery has won, for now.

[mjr]

I'm sorry, but I do have to wonder if this is a one-way street.

[Andara Bledin]

I'm sorry, but I do have to wonder if this is a one-way street.

What does this even mean in context?

[fireheart17]

What does this even mean in context?

I think I get it. What he(she?) is saying is that the "protected" classes get special treatment on both ends, while everyone else gets screwed. For instance, if a straight man walked into a gay bakery, asked for a cake for a wedding and was refused because he was straight, he'd get screwed over because being straight is not necessarily a protected class.

Another example, a woman walks into a Muslim bank (we have a few over here) and asks for a particular service. She's refused because she's not wearing hijab, accompanied by a man, married or some other criteria. The court, in theory, would rule in favour of the bank because of religion being a protected class.

Am I correct?

[Andara Bledin]

But... Everybody is the protected class. The class is 'sexual orientation' and absolutely every living organism on the planet has one, and if they're also human, they're protected from discrimination due to the status of said class.

So the straight guy being discriminated against because he isn't gay is just as protected as the gay guy being discriminated against because he isn't straight.

As for the Muslim bank, unless they are a religious institution (they're not), then they're subject to the same regulations as every other bank in operation which means that they cannot refuse to serve a person based on that person's religion. However, it is worth nothing that 'mode of dress' is not a protected class, so that a shop can legitimately choose to turf anyone with an uncovered head. However, if they only turf women with uncovered heads, but serve men with uncovered heads, then they're guilty of violating the protected class based on gender.

[HYHYBT]

Exactly right. But the way fireheart17 put it is how those who WANT to discriminate love to portray such protections.

In practice, discrimination against people for being straight isn't really a thing, but that doesn't mean the protection isn't (or wouldn't be) there for straight people, only that they'd rarely need it.

[D_Yeti_Esquire]

Well the protection is there for men when women discriminate so I'm not sure why it wouldn't be there for straight people when gay people do it. Where you will probably see it eventually happen is in the job market where just about every group tends to do stuff like this because we all have idiots in our demographics. I know women have been caught firing men without cause to replace them with women historically. Certain state agencies break up so visually along racial lines it's actually comical.

Generally what holds up lawsuits like that (I hate the word reverse... discrimination is discrimination) is the dominant groups reluctance to go to court given the rarity. It seems so odd to believe that if/when it happens a jury will buy it, most just go about their business.