On My Allegedly Self-Contradictory Views Regarding Religious Liberty and Gay Rights

On My Allegedly Self-Contradictory Views Regarding Religious Liberty and Gay Rights June 21, 2017

Forum Romanum, at one end
Among some of the ruins of the ancient Forum Romanum (Wikimedia Commons)

A week or so ago, maybe a bit longer, somebody sent me a “meme” that, I expect, was intended to demonstrate to me my supposedly gross inconsistency in defending religious liberty while opposing requirements that cake decorators decorate cakes for same-sex weddings, etc., etc.

 

I would provide an image of the image, but I don’t know who created it nor whom to credit for it, and I worry about copyright.  Nonetheless, I can describe it adequately enough to illustrate what I’m about to say:

 

A rather overenthusiastic looking woman with a blank stare and a smile and clutching a “Children’s Illustrated Bible” explains “If I discriminate against or criticize you, it’s called ‘Religious Freedom.’  If you return the favor, it’s called ‘Persecution.'”

 

But this has virtually nothing to do with any position that I actually hold.

 

My position is that private persons — whether religious or irreligious, whether heterosexual or homosexual — have every right to criticize whomever they wish, and to associate or not associate with whomever they wish.  Period.

 

My position is also that the government should not force anybody to praise or to criticize anybody, and that the government should not compel anybody to associate with anybody or not to associate with anybody.

 

The vital difference to me is that between freedom and coercion.

 

Private citizens have rights that the government does not.  Private individuals, for example, can support religious and partisan political causes, while government agencies should do nothing of the kind.  Private individuals can choose to associate only with, say, Asian people, or Methodists, or members of the Green Party.  Government cannot legally or morally do anything of the kind.

 

My objection to State coercion mandating that photographers must cover gay weddings and that cake decorators and florists must help to celebrate them in no way contradicts my commitment to religious liberty.  I would also be fine with a gay photographer’s refusing to cover straight weddings, and with hypothetical gay cake decorators and gay florists who might choose to celebrate only same-sex ceremonies.

 

They might or might not take a hit from the market for their actions, or draw adverse comment from their community or their society at large.  That would be fine.  And that would be very different from State coercion.

 

Finally, to answer the obvious question yet again, yes, I absolutely grant the right of, say, an Evangelical photographer, cake decorator, or florist to decline participation in the festivities accompanying a Latter-day Saint temple wedding.  Would I be unhappy about it?  Yes.  Might I consider such a person a jerk?  Very possibly.  I would certainly maintain my right to criticize him or her.  But I do and would deny that the State should coerce such a person to serve Latter-day Saints.  Or Presbyterians.  Or Republicans.  Or surfers.

 

Posted from the Tyrrhenian Sea

 

 


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