[The E]

Nevertheless, I can totally see a case or two propping up, due to very specific circumstances of some curious backstory or something to that effect. It's bound to happen. And the Christians are totally expecting it to happen and they are also expecting all sorts of media campaigns against their "bigotry" when it happens. It will be ugly to watch. Reasonable people won't do this, of course, but these campaigns are not leveled by reasonable people. And if some random judge happens to rule against one church or two, mayhem will occur. "Culture Wars" will rise to a whole new meaning.

In the particular case Goober was citing, the problem was that the Wedding Chapel in question was not openly affiliated with any church, but actually available for rent for anyone; Only after the city passed the ordinance that said that businesses may not discriminate against customers did the owners get worried that someday a gay couple would come and insist on renting their place (they had refused a gay couple before). So the simple solution was to get that business reclassified as a religious business, and all was well again.

What that tells me is that there are clear routes available for those who want to continue to discriminate against teh gays, and since those routes are founded on some clear principles laid out in the US Constitution, it's going to take some major doing to change them.

he Knapps' attorney said the city is about to be tested on its approach. He said the Knapps have been contacted by the police about a complaint filed on Thursday by a same-sex couple who were turned away at the Old West themed chapel.

Leo Morales of the ACLU of Idaho said the exemption makes sense as long as the Hitching Post primarily performs religious ceremonies.

“However, if they do non-religious ceremonies as well, they would be violating the anti-discrimination ordinance,” Morales said. “It's the religious activity that's being protected."

Filings with the Idaho Secretary of State show the Hitching Post became a limited liability company on September 12. Court documents in the Knapps’ federal lawsuit show they signed a business operating agreement on October 6 that lists the following as the purpose of their LLC:

“The Hitching Post is a religious corporation owned solely by ordained ministers of the Christian religion who operate this entity as an extension of their sincerely held religious beliefs and in accordance with their vows taken as Christian ministers. The purpose of the Hitching Post is to help people create, celebrate, and build lifetime, monogamous, one-man-one-woman marriages as defined by the Holy Bible.”

[NGTM-1R]

The Onion's take is as always hilarious, but also amusingly plausible.

I'd watch that movie. Probably end up critiquing the hell out of it, but my favorite gay marriage decision remains a federal district judge one anyways. Kennedy has an appropriate gravitas to his decision considering his position, but the Supreme Court's scope for flair is sorely restricted compared to lower-level federal judges.

[Goober5000]

If I tell you the world will end due to the bunnies gaining sentience and overthrowing mankind in five years, should you be required to accord that statement some kind of respect or weight until five years are passed?

Statements that go against the fundamental governing principles as we understand them, whether it be the First Amendment exercise of religion as enhanced by the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, or the idea that you can teach rabbits intelligence and the overthrow of mankind in a relatively short timescale, are not meaningful statements. They should not be taken seriously unless extraordinary evidence has been presented.

The scenario you describe is a paradigm shift.  The scenario I describe is merely an extrapolation of trends.

Not only did you fail to present such evidence, what you actually did was disingenuously present a case where the exact opposite of what you were arguing for happened.

That's a lie.  "A potential for X to happen where X did not occur" is not at all the same thing as "the exact opposite of X happened".

What that tells me is that there are clear routes available for those who want to continue to discriminate against teh gays, and since those routes are founded on some clear principles laid out in the US Constitution, it's going to take some major doing to change them.

"Those who want to discriminate" is a mischaracterization of the situation.  The principle here is whether or not people can be legally compelled to endorse an action that they object to on a religious basis.  To take the bakery as an example, the bakers would have no problem baking a birthday cake for a gay person, but they draw the line at a wedding cake.  Or recall Memories Pizza: "The O'Connor family told ABC 57 news that if a gay couple or a couple belonging to another religion came in to the restaurant to eat, they would never deny them service," but "'If a gay couple came in and wanted us to provide pizzas for their wedding, we would have to say no,' says Crystal O'Connor of Memories Pizza."

[Bobboau]

That's a lie.  "A potential for X to happen where X did not occur" is not at all the same thing as "the exact opposite of X happened".

"someone tried to X and failed, and that failure is now an on the books precedent making X far less likely in the future" is pretty close to the opposite of "X happened". Close enough that I would consider calling it a lie, somewhat hyperbolic.

"Those who want to discriminate" is a mischaracterization of the situation.  The principle here is whether or not people can be legally compelled to endorse an action that they object to on a religious basis.  To take the bakery as an example, the bakers would have no problem baking a birthday cake for a gay person, but they draw the line at a wedding cake.  Or recall Memories Pizza: "The O'Connor family told ABC 57 news that if a gay couple or a couple belonging to another religion came in to the restaurant to eat, they would never deny them service," but "'If a gay couple came in and wanted us to provide pizzas for their wedding, we would have to say no,' says Crystal O'Connor of Memories Pizza."

How is that not discrimination? But I suppose it's irrelevant, the distinction in question here centered around businesses vs establishments of religion.

[Grizzly]

To add some info to this: The Netherlands, which was one of the first countries to allow gay couples to marry (or removed the men-women restrictions on the law to save on printing costs and administrative overhead) also have a policy that states that any government official in charge of the marrying process is allowed to walk away from it and let somebody else step in if they feel the marriage violates their own beliefs.

 There's currently a bit of a discussion going on whether or not the "refusal officials" should let their personal beliefs sway them that much or that they should just enact the government's laws (as that is what they're being paid for), but as it stands currently, no one is forced to marry people they don't want to marry, let alone the churches, and this is coming from a country where the first article of the constitution forbids discrimination.

By Dutch law the marriage ceremony in church is simply a ceremony and is not legally binding. If you want to marry via church you esentially marry twice: First in front of God and then in front of the law, or vice versa, but you *have* to marry in front of the law whilst the religious institution is, and always has been, optional. As such, the dutch simply don't care about who or who doesn't marry there. It's a private institution and they can do what they want.

Obviously NL is rather different to the US, but I think this an important footnote.

[NGTM-1R]

Obviously NL is rather different to the US, but I think this an important footnote.

Actually it's not. That church/state thing is very much present here as well, though as a practical matter you don't have to have a civil ceremony, merely acquire a license. (And the issue of an otherwise valid license cannot be refused without being both cause to terminate your employment and at the very least a civil court matter.)

That's a lie.  "A potential for X to happen where X did not occur" is not at all the same thing as "the exact opposite of X happened".

Of course, you're lying about what happened and how it works when accusing me of lying, which is both inevitable and hilarious.

It was not a potential for X to happen, for starters, considering the statements of the officials who passed and would have enforced the law.

What was it? It was a preemptive attack by a religious institution on a law that wouldn't effect them anyways resulting in a court decision that stated exactly the opposite of what you are proposing, and thanks to the concept of stare decisis that court decision has legal weight for the future. It is harder to overturn law then it is to interpret or create law.

You'll doubtless make some kind of argument about how stare decisis doesn't count because of what just happened in the Supreme Court, but the problem with that argument is that it does. Previous legal decisions inform new ones; every Circuit Court but one in the US and dozens of District Courts made decisions that mirror that of the Supreme Court, long before we arrived to Obergefell v. Hodges. If not for the Sixth Circuit we would never have been here at all; gay marriage would have swept the Circuit Courts and become the law of the land without the nine supposedly wise souls in Washington.

Was the Supreme Court going to reverse the decisions of a half-dozen Circuit Courts and dozens of District Court judges? It can, of course, and this has been done before. However, all that decisionmaking is not automatically invalidated by the existence of a review by the Supreme Court; it still has weight and still remains law until the Supreme Court decides otherwise, and it has weight in how the Supreme Court considers the questions before them. Even a contrary opinion does not necessarily wipe away all those decisions, depending on how narrowly it's construed; parts of them can survive.

When we turn to the rights of religious institutions to turn away those who do not believe or are not living what they consider sufficiently pure lives, these have been challenged in court thousands of times. People have tried to arrest their Mormon excommunications via the courts, tried to force a Catholic annulment through the actions of the courts, challenged changes in doctrine or eschatology through the courts.

They don't get farther than the front door. They never get farther than the front door. There are hundreds of years of American jurisprudence that make it clear that is, was, and forever shall be their fate. (As opposed to basically twenty-five years of American jurisprudence regarding same-sex marriage, if that much. The argument that hundreds or thousands of years of marriage logic has been overturned here is an obvious lie; same-sex marriage as an idea hasn't existed for that period of time, and nobody's arguing legally about regular marriage here.)

[Bobboau]

Texas seems to be trying to go the Netherlands route, apparently the attorney general there is saying clerks do not have to issue a license if they don't want to. That's probably not going to stand long.

[Goober5000]

"someone tried to X and failed, and that failure is now an on the books precedent making X far less likely in the future" is pretty close to the opposite of "X happened". Close enough that I would consider calling it a lie, somewhat hyperbolic.

Not at all.  The occurrence in question is "someone tried to X and failed".  "The opposite of X" would mean that either X "unhappened" or Not-X happened.  Events which occurred after "someone tried to X" are irrelevant to this point.

How is that not discrimination? But I suppose it's irrelevant, the distinction in question here centered around businesses vs establishments of religion.

It's not discrimination because it's not a blanket refusal to serve gays whatsoever the circumstance.

By Dutch law the marriage ceremony in church is simply a ceremony and is not legally binding. If you want to marry via church you esentially marry twice: First in front of God and then in front of the law, or vice versa, but you *have* to marry in front of the law whilst the religious institution is, and always has been, optional. As such, the dutch simply don't care about who or who doesn't marry there. It's a private institution and they can do what they want.

Are churches exempt from taxes under Dutch law?  I suspect the legal lever that will be used in the US is that churches will have to perform same-sex marriages to retain their tax-exempt status.

Of course, you're lying about what happened and how it works when accusing me of lying, which is both inevitable and hilarious.

It was not a potential for X to happen, for starters, considering the statements of the officials who passed and would have enforced the law.

What was it? It was a preemptive attack by a religious institution on a law that wouldn't effect them anyways resulting in a court decision that stated exactly the opposite of what you are proposing, and thanks to the concept of stare decisis that court decision has legal weight for the future. It is harder to overturn law then it is to interpret or create law.

[...]

Expounding at length about stare decisis is quite irrelevant to the point I made, which was the threat that Hitching Post would be compelled to perform the cerermony.  It is not the case that Hitching Post was compelled not to perform the ceremony.  It is not the case that Hitching Post was not threatened.  Therefore, your statement "the exact opposite of what you were arguing for happened" was a lie.

And considering the statements of the officials, as you say, this is what you find prior to the court decision:

“Those have all been addressed in various states and run afoul of state prohibitions similar to this,” he said. “I would think that the Hitching Post would probably be considered a place of public accommodation that would be subject to the ordinance.”

“The Hitching Post might still have an obligation to figure out a way to officiate at that ceremony,” he said.

"He" refers to Coeur d’Alene city attorney Warren Wilson.  Source: http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2014/may/15/ministers-diverge-in-opinion-on-lifting-of-idahos/

EDIT: And from here, this quote: "The city of Coeur d’Alene made it clear at least three times this past year — both publicly and twice privately to me — that we would be breaking the law if we declined to conduct a same-sex ceremony. I was told we could face criminal prosecution, with a jail sentence of up to six months and/or a fine of up to $1,000 each time and each day we declined to perform a same-sex wedding ceremony."

[Bobboau]

Ok, if you really want we can be super legalistic and pedantic, but your actual and legitimate concern is that houses of worship will be forced to act against their principals. You called me and others out when we said no one was going to try to do that. Our intention was to say that's never going to happen, but you focused on the attempt, and you showed that someone attempted it. As soon as you called me on my wording I realized what I said was technically incorrect, as it is obvious that someone would try. But the important point, and the point it feels you are trying to lawyer your way around, is that is that the legitimately troubling prospect of religious establishments being forced to act against their principals has no conceivable path to fruition. The first amendment is quite potent, and has quite a few people who support it. Many of the people who are your enemies on gay marriage are your allies when it comes to the first amendment and the shielding effect it has for religions. This isn't the end of the world (I'm sorry I know you are looking forward to that) this is simply a reaffirmation that it is not the government's job to compel people to follow a particular religion, this is a good thing for you and your decedents, please try to think about the long game.

[Goober5000]

Ok, if you really want we can be super legalistic and pedantic, but your actual and legitimate concern is that houses of worship will be forced to act against their principals. You called me and others out when we said no one was going to try to do that. Our intention was to say that's never going to happen, but you focused on the attempt, and you showed that someone attempted it. As soon as you called me on my wording I realized what I said was technically incorrect, as it is obvious that someone would try. But the important point, and the point it feels you are trying to lawyer your way around, is that is that the legitimately troubling prospect of religious establishments being forced to act against their principals has no conceivable path to fruition. The first amendment is quite potent, and has quite a few people who support it. Many of the people who are your enemies on gay marriage are your allies when it comes to the first amendment and the shielding effect it has for religions. This isn't the end of the world (I'm sorry I know you are looking forward to that) this is simply a reaffirmation that it is not the government's job to compel people to follow a particular religion, this is a good thing for you and your decedents, please try to think about the long game.

That's a good summary.  The only "lawyering" I was doing was correcting people who said the attempt wasn't actually an attempt.  But yes, the important point here is first amendment protection.  For now it remains intact, and has even been reaffirmed.  I hope it stays that way.

(I'm not especially looking forward to the end of the world per se.  The Bible calls it "terrible", as in "causing terror".  I'm looking forward to what comes next.)

[Bobboau]

Well, the tribulation isn't 'The End' it's the pregame show. God's way of showing man that he can't work without God. So it's all just part of the plan, and if you're right you'll be raptured before that anyway. You'll get to watch the fireworks form a nice air conditioned luxury box in the sky, right?

...maybe this isn't the best thread for this line of conversation...

[pecenipicek]

I for one welcome our secular overlords.

For what its worth, i think that most of europe has a similar to NL separation of "church marriage" and "state marriage", as in, church officials dont get to declare the marriage legal for all matters worldly, the poor schmuck clerk who ended up on the other side of the table when you waltzed in to his office does. Personally i know its like this in Croatia, Slovenia and i'm fairly certain its also like this in Austria as well.

As a side note, we had a referendum recently in Croatia, about this retarded notion that the term "Marriage" should be interred in our constitution as "union of a man and a woman". Guess who pushed that through and basically ****ed our constitution over sideways to the point its utterly contradictory?

Also, guess who got the rights granted to them by "marriage" but under a different name (something akin to "civil union", if memory serves) a month later after the constitution was raped?
(gay marriage rights "fights" here in croatia were more to allow all the same rights, inheritance, tax and medical-care wise, than for the actual term of "marriage")

[666maslo666]

Dont worry, there is still one way left to legally prevent gays from marrying: get rid of marriage altogether!

http://wgntv.com/2015/06/27/utah-lawmaker-drafts-bill-to-do-away-with-marriage/

Now I am not sure how realistic this is to pass, however legal marriage abolition is something I can get behind. In a way, this makes Utah the most progressive state, lol 

[Bobboau]

yeah, I'll agree this would have been the optimal solution, though it's funny how now that gay marriage is a thing some want to go all scorched earth thermonuclear over it.

[Dragon]

You can't just get rid of marriage without overhauling, inheritance, child and taxing laws. Possibly others as well. Getting rid of non-religious marriage may also remove an incentive for people to get together and have children (a costly endeavor even with tax breaks), unless there is some replacement policy.

I'd be in favor of it if it came with additional laws that provide similar "pro-family" benefits. The Western society is growing old, and this puts a huge strain on the retirement system. It's not too bad in the US right now, but it's going that way, just slower than Europe.

[Grizzly]

Are churches exempt from taxes under Dutch law?  I suspect the legal lever that will be used in the US is that churches will have to perform same-sex marriages to retain their tax-exempt status.

Religious institutions in the Netherlands are subjected to special tax laws just as charities and worker's unions. This has also not changed.

Another way of thinking, perhaps: Are marriages conducted *solely* by the church legally binding in your state?

[Bobboau]

...incentive for people to get together and have children...

we barely have enough jobs for the people we have now and the future is automating away most of those, do we really need that many people?

[X3N0-Life-Form]

^ Somebody told me once that the incentive states puts on producing more children was more about increasing the chances of having the next Einstein scientist or Bill Gates businessman or something, than producing workers, for which there aren't enough jobs for, or can be brought in from abroad.

Not sure how true that is, but it was notable and interesting enough for me to remember it.

[Dragon]

...incentive for people to get together and have children...

we barely have enough jobs for the people we have now and the future is automating away most of those, do we really need that many people?

Yes. Who else is gonna support us when we grow old? The next generation, of course. The entire retirement system in most European countries (dunno about the US) depends on there being a lot more young people than old. The country can gain money on young people and spend it on the old ones. If that assumption is violated, things go downhill, fast. It doesn't seem that bad in the US, but that's because it's not getting as old as Europe, there are still plenty of young people to go around. Breaking this is a very bad idea because of huge inertia inherent in the issue. Break it once and by the time you notice the effects, the problem is very hard to fix and effects will again take a long time to show.

Even if not state-based, private retirement fund companies would face the same problems. If there are more people to be paid than paying, they'll go bankrupt. Retirement systems I know about are very vulnerable to distortions in the age pyramid.

Also, automation isn't going to happen if human workers are cheaper. Jobs are already taken away by outsourcing, with the effects inside the country being the same. It's not that there isn't enough work for humans in the US. It's that using humans from other places is more economical.

[666maslo666]

Getting rid of non-religious marriage may also remove an incentive for people to get together and have children (a costly endeavor even with tax breaks), unless there is some replacement policy.

You could tie the benefits to actual parenthood and pregnancy instead of marriage. So there is no need for marriage just to incentivize children.

we barely have enough jobs for the people we have now and the future is automating away most of those, do we really need that many people?

I do not believe absolute number of people matters much for employment. Because if you have more people, then there will be more to employ but also more to create demand. Similarly, with less people there is less to employ but less to create demand. It cancels out in the end.

But what is important is demographic trends (rate of change), because of troubles with retirement and such. Stabilised population would be ideal. However most first world nations are well below that number, therefore we should incentivize children.