A: Yes. Yes you do. And for any reasons you choose.
Because as the man says, we have a right to be wrong: doing what is right is a personal responsibility, not a legislative one.
Law gives you the moral space in which you can do right. Or wrong.
And it affords us the moral space to judge you for it.
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16 comments:
Unfortunately it seems this right wasn't upheld in the US courts decision around baking a wedding cake. Whilst the decision came down rightly on the defendants side, it was over a procedural matter in the complainants conduct, rather than a matter of individual rights.
Who cares about the Courts. Serve unservice to whoevever you like . and Free Tommy Robinson by stroming the citadel.
Paul Scott, what does your unhealthy obsession with a British criminal have to do with this thread?
Here's my question: If someone is willing to take you to court to avoid making you a cake, do you really want that person to make it? How stupid do you have to be to think that they will give you tolerable service? I know that if someone were that hostile to me I wouldn't want to do business with them!
The cases of declined service I'm aware of all relate to activists selecting a provider (out of several available) they know will decline their request so the activist can stick it to the service provider on ideological grounds. Its not about service, its about nasty people compelling people to do what they don't want to.
3:16
Probably correct, but irrelevant. The decision went against the activists only because they were shown to be nasty people with an agenda, and didn't respect their opponents religious beliefs. This should have been irrelevant. Whether they were nasty or not, and whether they had any respect for the religion of others or not shouldn't matter. The point is nobody has an obligation to serve someone if they don't want to.
Unfortunately it took legislation to bring an end to establishments having a "no niggers or Irishmen" policy.
So sometimes such laws are necessary.
Necessary for what? Necessary to make others do things that you and I don't consider objectionable? Why is this necessary?
You think it should be legal for a restaurant to have a "no niggers" policy Mark?
With principles like this it's no wonder most libertarians are white men.
What about if a restaurant had a "no fat chicks" policy and your wife was refused entry? I bet you'd get the point then.
Unsurprisingly you're evading the question, so I'll ask it again - why is stopping private property owners doing something objectionable "necessary"? I'd suggest not only is it not necessary, it's also undesirable.
Firstly, you ignore the problem of giving the state authority to decide what is and isn't objectionable - which may not concern you when the targets are racist pigs, but it's unlikely to stop at racist pigs once they have that power. Consider for instance the way the term "racist" is increasingly thrown around by the purveyors of identity politics to describe anyone who doesn't accept their agenda, and the abuses that empowering the state with this authority allows.
Perhaps in fact you are one of these purveyors, and that's why you want the state to have that power. You start with examples that almost everyone finds disgusting to try and justify that power, then you proceed to use it for your own nefarious ends.
As a secondary matter, if I was black and encountered a sign advertising "no niggers" I'd be grateful there were no laws stopping them. Whether the sign was there or not wouldn't change the racism of the owners, but the sign would at least alert me to their racism, and tell me there's no way I'd want to go in there. Their business would also suffer as a result.
Feelings of disgust at what someone does is not a substitute for reason Ben, nor a justification for force - and that's a principle not limited to white men.
I'll say it again in clearer terms Mark, because you're clearly a little slow on the uptake.
Back in the early 20th century, it wasn't just legal to refuse entry to restaurants on the basis of race; if you were a property developer you could create 'whites only' communities if you wanted.
Anti-discrimination laws were necessary to stop this. And they were necessary to (very slowly) reverse racial prejudice in society.
There is a world of difference between 'the state' in totalitarian regimes and modern democracies. In NZ we vote for people who enact laws that we by and large agree with. 'The state' is us. It's not perfect but it's better than the alternatives. Including the way things used to be for ethnic minorities. Stop with the dystopian fiction.
"As a secondary matter, if I was black and encountered a sign advertising "no niggers" I'd be grateful there were no laws stopping them."
What a load of clueless, conceited horseshit. See if you can cite a single black person who lived in those times who agrees with that. Not that you'll bother looking, because you're nice and comfy in that libertarian echo chamber.
"Anti-discrimination laws were necessary to ….. reverse racial prejudice in society".
All that ad hominum and irrelevant anecdotes, and we finally get to some sort of answer. But it's offered as bald assertion without justification.
To the extent prejudice can be removed, it's removed by reason and persuasion, not force. Economic motivations also play a significant role in a free market. Force does not change someone's mind, it just sends the prejudice underground.
You don't have to imagine dystopian fiction to appreciate the slippery slope I've patiently explained, when you give the state that role. You just need to look at where it's already gone, in the case alluded to in this post (a Christian being told they have to bake a gay wedding cake, contrary to their religious beliefs). Or consider the news all around us of companies being under-attack for "under-representing" women or minority races - which usually means employing the best person for the job. In the conventional SJW narrative this is also "prejudice".
"The state is us" you say. In other words we all need to try and agree what is acceptable conduct, find consensus, and then force any remaining dissidents to knuckle under. Well you go fuck yourself, and your state that represents "us".
On that note, why on earth do you comment on this blog? The majority of ideas expressed on this blog are clearly alien to you, and your obnoxious style of argument suggests you're not here for honest debate and engagement (or if you are you need to change the obnoxious way you convey your views). If you think the ideas on this blog are so ridiculous, and you're so confident of that, why would you waste your time here; rather than just fucking off and leaving us?
"But it's offered as bald assertion without justification."
Bars/restaurants/shops with "no niggers" policy lasted many years in the absence of anti-discrimination laws. When the laws were introduced, such policies stopped. And the flow-on effect included children no longer seeing overt discrimination, which improved their outlook for the better, and so on. Without a doubt, there is far less prejudice today than there used to be, because of such laws.
If you don't believe me, then travel to places like Eastern Europe, where no such laws were passed, and prejudice remains basically the same as it was decades ago.
"Well you go fuck yourself, and your state that represents "us"."
I've got bad news for you Mark. In a democracy, if you have a problem with trivial politically correct issues it's YOUR JOB to go fuck YOURSELF. Or move somewhere with no such policy. Off you go.
"On that note, why on earth do you comment on this blog?"
I read widely Mark. You should too. There's no cure for stupid but you really should nonetheless.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5847827/Activist-claims-Officeworks-refused-let-print-posters-criticising-Islam-Ramadan.html
So, obviously, Officeworks and their manager need to be punished for their discrimination.
To paraphrase a famous saying, a government big enough to ban everything you don't like is big enough to ban everything that you do.
The state you praise, Ben, for banning discrimination based on race is the same state that, just a short while before, was enforcing Jim Crow laws.
Just one reason that doing what is right is a personal responsibility, not a legislative one. And not just because it's not the state's job to prescribe morality, but because good law should give you the moral space in which you can do right or do wrong -- because without that moral space, no act is truly even moral.
Good law affords you the moral space within which to act, and to reveal who you really are -- and it gives us the moral space to judge you for what you do.
"To paraphrase a famous saying, a government big enough to ban everything you don't like is big enough to ban everything that you do."
The government isn't big enough to ban "everything." You're confusing the kind of governments western democracies have with authoritarian states.
"The state you praise, Ben, for banning discrimination based on race is the same state that, just a short while before, was enforcing Jim Crow laws."
It was an unusual amount of progress in a short period of time, so what? Jim Crow laws are gone and aren't coming back.
It's not as if we don't have moral space to do right and wrong - laws banning racial discrimination are a pretty low bar. In any case, it should be up to those affected by such policies. See if you can find a black who thinks we should return to the good old days.
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