Battlers for tolerance engage in actual persecution

Post Reply New Topic

What if we don't support their views, but are opposed to threats of violence and harassment against them, would you still weep for us then? If so, then I would weep for you.

Make people angry and then get angry when they get angry.

It's always fun to attack people who stand for something.

Actually business is against the discrimination law (oh sorry, "religious freedom act") in Indiana. It's one of those splits that are occurring more frequently on the right wing. The family values voters want it, but the business conservatives don't want it. The businesses don't want it because they learned back in the 90s that the demographic with the largest disposable income was/still is gay men-- two male wage earners, generally no kids, and a boatload of money to spend.

Business minded conservatives ought to remember that it's the family values crowd running Republican politics in Indiana next time they cast their vote in their state.

What I don't understand is if you are gay and someone says that homosexuality is wrong, why would you then go to their business and pay them money and support them? Why would you not take everyone you one to the competitor down the street and try to make the anti-gay establishment lose business? Now they are making money and not even having to work for it.

I think you have misread the article. What you suggest should happen is what actually happened.

I'm not sure how that's relevant to this story since the co-owner made the statement about catering gay weddings to a news reporter, rather than a client.

Personally, I consider giving someone my business and my reaction their objectionable ideas or statements to be two separate things. As long as they don't seem to be trying to harm people, foment mobs, or disseminate public statements of intolerance, I see no reason why I should purposefully try to disrupt their means of survival or why another business should get my money instead. People who merely disagree with me need food, shelter, and clothing just like anyone else. I don't want them to suffer economic deprivation just because of some thoughts they have.

And whether other people join in and their business collapses, or they simply continue with the knowledge that they've lost one customer, they aren't likely to change their opinions because of either, so ultimately there'd be no point in abandoning their business, especially if they produce a good product. Whatever happens, somebody has to give them money to survive, if not me, then other shoppers in that area, or taxpayers if they lose a lot and end up on benefits or accessing charity. So I don't see how it would matter that a single person (me) stopped buying things from them, because I'm intertwined in the same economy that's going to support them anyways.

I can imagine not wanting to go into some businesses because, given their views, I just feel uncomfortable around the employees or owners, but not because I don't want to give them my money.

Last edited by starkid on 04 Apr 2015, 3:25 pm, edited 1 time in total.

This is what some people are doing. My point is that what need is there even to be mad about something like this? Just give your money to someone else and the punishment to the first place will be the loss of business. I would think for a small business like this if they had several patrons stop coming then it would have a significant impact on them.

Well, you could make the same argument for why blacks during segregation didn't just refuse to give Woolworth their business, and just take their business elsewhere. Blacks protested outside of such businesses the for the same reason why gays do it today - because it's wrong to openly and blatantly discriminate against people, even if the business people justify their discrimination with religion.

I found the while thing to be rather selfish on behalf of the offended party. If you are offended by the policy please take your business elsewhere, no one is forcing you to go to their restaurant. However I am not happy about someone loosing a job, over a difference of opinion. How do we know for certain or not some of the people who work there don't share the same ideas, but perhaps are just working there merely to make ends meet? I for one would not be proud that not only did I cost someone their job, but possibly their only source of income and much more. I may disagree, however that never gives me the right to harm another person in any way or form.

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/arc ... ed/389489/

I DO wish that every liberal and their first cousin would stop using "what if they'd been black!" as a counter-argument ALL THE TIME. It's creepy as hell for a group of people to so consistently be the go-to example just to prove a point. It's a form of tokenization and screams privilege. It's as if people think that "blacks" are some sort of lowest common denominator of social justice, so that, whenever inserted into the place of whatever other group is allegedly being wronged, the wrong somehow becomes obvious.

It's especially inappropriate when the circumstances are quite different (there is no legally-supported gay and lesbian segregation providing a wider context to this incident, and there was no actual incident of discrimination, just a hypothetical conversation with a journalist).

Since nearly every frequent poster here has ample reason to respect and coexist with most of the 'social justice warriors', I have basically no take-out moral conclusion from this thread.

All I know is I want good pizza at the reception if I ever get married. This is a sufficiently bright idea to render everything else we're discussing moot. If one can find a nice Sicilian in Indiana, color me highly impressed.

Contrary to your insinuation, it has nothing to do with race, it has to do with success. This is a boycott (aside from the moron with the arson idea), and the reason we bring up "black" is because they utilized boycotts to great success to fight discrimination and win equal rights. So yeah, would you have denied the civil rights movement of the sixties one of their best tools in the fight for equal rights? LGBT people are using the exact same tools to affect change, they're just using modern communication and technology.

As for segregation, that's only one issue, it was merely a catalyst-- they were fighting for full EQUALITY. By that logic you're saying that the LGBT community can't fight for equality until they get knocked down a bit more, which is completely asinine.



The owners exercised their freedom of speech (hence the reason it was a hypothetical to a reporter), the boycotters are merely exercising theirs: money is a form of speech (don't believe it, look up Citizen's United). The fact that you don't want to exercise your freedom of speech doesn't mean that they have to forfeit theirs as well. The owners could have exercised said speech as a personal opinion against the bill on purely moral grounds, they chose to inject their business into a political discussion so it's fair game to use political tools.

As for economic deprivation, the article states they made 70k in donations, probably the best month they've ever had-- and they didn't even have to do work since everyone boycott them (hmm, almost like lazy socialists, where is John Galt to save us).

If the owners were so naive that they thought injecting their business into a hot-button social issue wouldn't have blow back then they probably weren't clever enough to stay in business much longer anyhow. It's either that or they were planning on playing martyr for the cause, which if that's the case I say bravo-- they've done a masterful job and are actually not naive, but quite clever.

Last edited by Aristophanes on 05 Apr 2015, 3:42 am, edited 1 time in total.

How would you know?! I was addressing Kraichgauer's post, not yours.