A year or two ago, there was a story from Colorado, regarding some baker's refusal to bake a wedding cake for a homosexual couple's wedding, because the baker didn't approve of homosexuality. Very recently, there was an almost identical story about some other baker's refusal to bake a cake for someone's transsexual "coming out" party.
Federal laws prohibit this kind of discrimination, but only in the public sector. These were private sector bakers, and if they wanted to pass up business because of their own personal beliefs (no doubt religiously-motivated), they could. And did.
Some people (prospective and hopeful/joyful customers) were left frustrated and insulted. Other people got to feel smug and self-righteous.
And now, there's this: Another conservative faces public shunning. Liberals grow bolder with their intolerance. (msn.com). So, if you're a "conservative," and some private establishment doesn't want to have to deal with you, or listen to your spoutings off, it's suddenly oh, so unfair. "No matter your politics," the offended Gianno Caldwell sputtered, "you should not be discriminated against." And then, Caldwell, who is African-American, suggested this treatment was somehow racist. The restaurant Caldwell and his posse were asked to leave was in North Miami. As best I know, there are at least a few other African-Americans in North Miami. And the reason the proprietor gave for asking them to leave was that "the language they were using was unwelcome in our space." That was essentially exactly what the bakers argued. I wonder if Caldwell, or anyone else with whom he associates, complained about that argument when he wasn't downwind of it.
And a similar incident was noted from just last month in Virginia. Restaurant staff felt uncomfortable having to serve a bible-toting right wing group, so the get-together at the restaurant was canceled by the restaurant.
The argument made by Caldwell and others, and supported in the USA Today report, was that unless someone is "causing a scene," they should be allowed to think, and say, what they like. Sort of like First Amendment guarantees. The question is why is spouting right wing rhetoric not "causing a scene," but ordering a cake that says "Happy Wedding, Steve and Bob" is causing a scene? It's notable that the USA Today mentioned only the instances in which conservatives were limited, or expelled, or denied, and none of the instances where those identical things happened to people who were perhaps, or presumably, not conservatives.
And if the partisanship wasn't screamingly obvious enough, the USA Today column author said "All this is happening against a backdrop of progressives pushing for tolerance and measures to ban discrimination based on gender identity and sexual orientation." That's generally true. Progressives do make that tolerance argument. But they get a lot of pushback from people like Gianno Caldwell, who suddenly doesn't like it when the shoe is on the other foot. Have conservatives dumbed down liberals, or at least gotten them so filled with resentment that they give conservatives a taste of their own medicine, even though they don't believe in it? Maybe. So, conservatives' suggestion is what? That liberals keep turning the other cheek, and wind up with a badly bruised face? How about conservatives match their behavior to their rhetoric? And if they won't do that, I'm still waiting for someone to tell me I'm wrong to think conservatives are hypocrites, dishonest, or both.
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