A Place of Safety
I expect simple behaviours here. Friendship, and love.
Any advice should be from the perspective of the person asking, not the person giving!
We have had to make new membership moderated to combat the huge number of spammers who register
















You are here: Home > Forum > A Place of Safety > General Talk > Non Discrimination and the provision of services
Non Discrimination and the provision of services  [message #74972] Wed, 10 October 2018 21:01 Go to next message
timmy

Has no life at all
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13739



I'm very interested in the UK Supreme Court ruling in the UK Gay Cake Case. It is worth a read, perhaps in more detail than in this news article.
Quote:
In the court's judgement (case reference [2018] UKSC 49), president of the Supreme Court Lady Hale ruled that the bakers did not refuse to fulfill the order because of his sexual orientation. "They would have refused to make such a cake for any customer, irrespective of their sexual orientation," she said.

"Their objection was to the message on the cake, not to the personal characteristics of Mr Lee."She added: "Accordingly, this court holds that there was no discrimination on the ground of the sexual orientation of Mr Lee."


This is an interesting distinction, and one that makes sense, as one would expect from the level of legal scrutiny. Equally, it is obvious that the outcome will be disliked.

It seems to me to be entirely reasonable that a baker may refuse to create a cake with a message on it that runs counter to their beliefs provided that they do not discriminate because the gentleman ordering it is gay.

If you need a clearer example of a cake where one might refuse a message, perhaps one that says "All [certain group of people] must die!" would be useful. No right minded person would be concerned if a baker refused to produce that item.

Similarly, if a gay gentleman ordered a cake that said "Happy Birthday" as the sole message and the bakery refused to do so because he is a gay gentleman, then any right minded person would say that the baker was in error, and has broken UK law.



Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
Re: Non Discrimination and the provision of services  [message #74973 is a reply to message #74972] Thu, 11 October 2018 12:13 Go to previous messageGo to next message
The Composer is currently offline  The Composer

Toe is in the water

Registered: September 2018
Messages: 87



The message was actually: "Support Gay Marriage"

The refusal wasn't down to the person who ordered it but the message that was requested.
Re: Non Discrimination and the provision of services  [message #74984 is a reply to message #74973] Sun, 14 October 2018 01:50 Go to previous message
Mark

Likes it here
Location: Earth
Registered: April 2013
Messages: 275



That's what I stated in another thread.  As I noted there, the problem with forcing someone to make something specific could open the door to people like bakers being forced to make a cake with literally any message on it, even a message like "God hates fags."  People often talk about "Freedom of speech" here in the U.S. without realizing that the courts (including the U.S. Supreme Court itself) have long recognized that free speech isn't universal, and that there are limits on how far one can go with that.
Previous Topic: Blue Can of Paint
Next Topic: A non scientific study
Goto Forum: