I thought I'd finally reached a point where no right-wing "religious liberty" argument would surprise me enough to feel the need to write about it. Sadly, Texas Senator Ted Cruz proved me wrong.
In a recent interview with Newsmax's Ed Berliner, Cruz said the following on the matter:
"Imagine if this were inverted. Imagine if there weer a gay florist - now I know that's hard to imagine, a gay florist - but just go with the hypo[thetical] for a second. Imagine if two evangelical Christians came to a gay florist and they wanted to get married, and the florist said, 'You know what? I disagree with your faith. I have problems with your faith.' You have no entitlement to force that florist to provide flowers at the Christians' wedding. We are a pluralistic nation that tolerates diversity."
Actually, history would showcase otherwise, Mr. Cruz, for the Civil Rights Act of 1964 says that, "All persons shall be entitled to the full and equal enjoyment of the goods, services, facilities, and privileges, advantages, and accommodations of any place of public accommodation, as defined in this section, without discrimination or segregation on the ground of race, color, religion, or national origin." So while, according to Mr. Cruz and his ilk, it should be perfectly legal for Christian business owners to turn away LGBT customers based on their sexual orientation and LGBT business owners should be able to turn away Christian customers due to their religious affiliation, the latter is not permissible under federal law as the former is. So, from both a historical and logical standpoint, Mr. Cruz's argument fails, and he may want to try finding another.
Even if Cruz's argument held up logically, that would still set quite the disturbing precedent for customer service in this country. There's a good reason certain demographics are protected under the Civil Rights Act - to prevent discriminatory views from clouding one's judgment at the workplace, to the point where equal service isn't provided to people of all stripes. In Ted Cruz's world, sexist men should be able to refuse service to women, racist whites should be able to refuse service to blacks, Jews should be able to refuse service to Muslims, and Christians should be able to refuse service to homosexuals.
There's an old saying that says the customer is always right. According to Ted Cruz, it seems that business owners are always right, and in the country Cruz paints as the freest in the world, customers should only be as free as business owners allow them. It's a wonder if the Civil Rights Act had never been passed and Ted Cruz was turned away by a business owner due to that fact, he'd sing a different tune on the matter.
http://thinkprogress.org/lgbt/2015/08/25/3695060/ted-cruz-religious-liberty-civil-rights-act/
In a recent interview with Newsmax's Ed Berliner, Cruz said the following on the matter:
"Imagine if this were inverted. Imagine if there weer a gay florist - now I know that's hard to imagine, a gay florist - but just go with the hypo[thetical] for a second. Imagine if two evangelical Christians came to a gay florist and they wanted to get married, and the florist said, 'You know what? I disagree with your faith. I have problems with your faith.' You have no entitlement to force that florist to provide flowers at the Christians' wedding. We are a pluralistic nation that tolerates diversity."
Actually, history would showcase otherwise, Mr. Cruz, for the Civil Rights Act of 1964 says that, "All persons shall be entitled to the full and equal enjoyment of the goods, services, facilities, and privileges, advantages, and accommodations of any place of public accommodation, as defined in this section, without discrimination or segregation on the ground of race, color, religion, or national origin." So while, according to Mr. Cruz and his ilk, it should be perfectly legal for Christian business owners to turn away LGBT customers based on their sexual orientation and LGBT business owners should be able to turn away Christian customers due to their religious affiliation, the latter is not permissible under federal law as the former is. So, from both a historical and logical standpoint, Mr. Cruz's argument fails, and he may want to try finding another.
Even if Cruz's argument held up logically, that would still set quite the disturbing precedent for customer service in this country. There's a good reason certain demographics are protected under the Civil Rights Act - to prevent discriminatory views from clouding one's judgment at the workplace, to the point where equal service isn't provided to people of all stripes. In Ted Cruz's world, sexist men should be able to refuse service to women, racist whites should be able to refuse service to blacks, Jews should be able to refuse service to Muslims, and Christians should be able to refuse service to homosexuals.
There's an old saying that says the customer is always right. According to Ted Cruz, it seems that business owners are always right, and in the country Cruz paints as the freest in the world, customers should only be as free as business owners allow them. It's a wonder if the Civil Rights Act had never been passed and Ted Cruz was turned away by a business owner due to that fact, he'd sing a different tune on the matter.
http://thinkprogress.org/lgbt/2015/08/25/3695060/ted-cruz-religious-liberty-civil-rights-act/
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