Well hello again! For the first time reader (I'm hoping there will be a few) let's start off with the standard boilerplate. This may be offensive. Your choice is to read on or close your browser. This is a decision with which I cannot help.
We just celebrated the 4th of July here in America. As I watched the floats go by in the parade and the fireworks boom, it felt more like being at the birthday party of a friend, thrown by the wife I know has served him with divorce papers. The country seems to enjoy the celebration of ignoring the divorce we're going through and standing outside for one day to scream "We have the best marriage ever, suck it England!" Jokes on us though, isn't it? (England rocks, BTW, but you see the point)
My latest heartburn comes from "Bakegate", and I felt again like putting thoughts on digital paper was better than having to stew over them in the shower. All around the country the LGBT community has been taking Christian bakeries to court claiming discrimination (and I understand that reasonable people don't apply one standard to an individual in a group, so I won't be doing that). There are a few deeper issues here that I want to address that all of Facebook and the world seem to be missing. For those who have missed it, I'll sum up what seem to be the arguments in the center of the issue:
LGBT community: "You HAVE to do this for us, you're the only Christian bakery in our town and we demand to not be discriminated against"
Christian bakeries: "Well, the part of the Bible I follow says you're wrong and it would be against my religion to bake you this cake"
Perspective is everything, so let me share mine to give you an idea about whether or not I'm just another fringe onlooker. I am a Christ follower, heart, mind and soul. I believe that homosexuality is absolutely not a choice and is absolutely not wrong in any way. I believe that we've gone too far down the rabbit hole even having to petition the government for a license to engage in a basic human right like marriage (which, by the way, is just a word. We were all fighting over those letters.)
2 weeks ago, the Christian community was using the government to prevent the LGBT community from "pursuing happiness" (where have I heard those words?). Now that they have won the fight, we're seeing cases all over of the LGBT community doing the EXACT SAME THING to Christian bakeries. The pursuit of happiness gets pretty desperate if you have to give up your life's work because you get sued for discrimination. I agree that the country needs to carefully look at the idea of discrimination, because it ISN'T fair. I get that. Let me present a couple arguments about this and see if we can all come to a middle ground here.
1. A cake is flour, eggs and butter. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but ISIS suicide bombers probably make a "see you in heaven" cake for their comrades that is just as good as a Christian's wedding cake. Don't get caught up in the idea that anyone HAS to have this particular cake. Christians didn't find a secret cake ingredient that makes their cakes THAT good. So logically, this is about a fight. It's about LGBT couples finding the one Christian bakery and going in hoping for a rejection. The odds that so many Christian bakeries around the country are just making the best cakes ever doesn't hold water. I could see it if it was once or twice, but come on......I even read an article where a couple comes right out and says that it's about fighting for what's right for their children's future. It's not about cake.
2. Where is the "discrimination line"?? If a white supremacist walked into a Christian bakery and said "I need a cake to celebrate us burning down a black persons house tonight", is it a rejection of the PERSON or the EVENT when the baker refuses? Would you support that lawsuit? I'm going to have to ask you to take emotions out of it here and just look at law and rights. We all know that this situation is wholly wrong for a myriad of reasons. Being a white supremacist is a choice, so that argument is weak at best. Being male or female is not. So how about this......a 16 year old girl comes in to a Christian bakery and wants a "losing my virginity cake". That's also a clear cut violation of the baker's religious principles. Would you support HER lawsuit??The baker isn't rejecting the person, he's rejecting the event. The line is razor thin here. What if you found out that 1 week earlier, one half of the LGBT couple had a birthday cake made for a friend, and the baker made it without objection? Would you STILL support the lawsuit a week later as "discrimination"?? If the baker makes an LGBT person every cake in the world EXCEPT a wedding cake, is it really discrimination?? Would you support a lawsuit brought by a heterosexual woman who was denied a "divorce cake" on the grounds of religious practice? Homosexuality is not a choice, marriage is. Can anyone see a world where a baker can say "I won't discriminate against your right to live a homosexual life, but my religion is as important to me as your future spouse and I don't feel comfortable helping with the celebration."?? It would be a little like asking a Jewish deli to make an Italian an Italian sub. It's not a discrimination against the Italian person, it's a stand on the grounds that Jewish people see pork as "unclean" for religious reasons (again, not ALL Jewish people, lets not get carried away in the details here). In an America worth celebrating, I see a baker having the freedom to say "I'll make a homosexual any cake in the world except a wedding cake because I don't support the choice they're making to marry". And go back to argument 1, there are PLENTY of cakes out there. The wedding will go off without a hitch with or without this particular cake and I wish the couple years of happily married bliss. (As a side note, the latest couple in Oregon who won the $135,000 HAD previously had a cake made for them by the company, and enjoyed it......discrimination against the lesbian or the wedding??? AND, it seems they didn't sue for the money, but once you take the money, that hardly seems worth discussing......)
This argument does have clear cut lines. You walk into a Christian bakery for a birthday cake for your same sex spouse and the guy says no, THAT'S discrimination. A Jewish person walks in and asks for a cake for a heterosexual wedding and is denied, THAT'S discrimination. A Black person walks in and asks for a graduation cake and is denied, THAT'S discrimination. A Hispanic person walks in and asks for an abortion cake........is it? This is the point we're at and THIS is the point where the nation needs to take a closer look at what is going on and decide who actually gets rights. I've been saying this for years, and I'll say it again. Freedom does come with a price. It comes with the price that your rights don't take precedent over someone else's rights. The country is falling apart at the seam labeled "I refuse for my existence to be infringed upon by your existence". Instead of just finding another baker (or insert other issue here), as a nation we are saying over and over "My right is to infringe upon your rights, and I'm going to exercise that right to the fullest". Wouldn't the country be headed in a better direction if the LGBT couple was denied the wedding cake, not because they were homosexual but because the baker didn't support the marriage and their response was to tell all of their friends, let the baker deal with the business consequences of his stand and just find another cake?? Live and let live, so to speak?? Maybe, maybe not. What do I know, I'm just a guy standing in a field......alone.
