Supreme Court is increasingly putting Christians’ First Amendment rights ahead of others’ dignity and rights to equal protection
by Redacted_rendition
Supreme Court is increasingly putting Christians’ First Amendment rights ahead of others’ dignity and rights to equal protection
by Redacted_rendition
41 comments
Americas highest legal authority is a handful of cult members who believe in 2000 year old mythical tales from the middle east. No wonder the country is such a mess.
Religion is a choice, even though the law treats it as something inherent to a person, like their sexual orientation or their skin color. This will inevitably result in legal conflicts.
It would be cool if people who are going to write articles about the constitution had a fucking clue about it. The 14th amendment and equal protection only applies to state action. You do not have a constitutional right to not be discriminated against by private entities.
The three cases cited in the article inarguably have broader applicability beyond Christianity. It’s more accurate to describe it as “elevating religious first amendment rights over equal protection rights.”
Ironically the first amendment calls for the separation of church and state
Christian extremists*
Frank Zappa said it in the 1980s: America is becoming a fascist theocracy.
BuT tHe pErSeCuTiOn
Supreme Court is bullshit
If only christians ever actually faced persecution in this country. Maybe then they’d understand how privileged they’ve been treated.
Let’s be clear –
These cases don’t actually have anything to do with the First Amendment.
These are businesses that want the protection of the government without having to take on the responsibility of providing service to all, as required by law.
Companies do not have First Amendment rights in this way, no matter what the corrupt conservative members of the court say.
Edit: I’m getting some pushback, but … it’s also worth noting that there is no basis for anti-gay bigotry in Christian doctrine, so there’s no basis for a “freedom of religion” claim either.
“These core rights and freedoms are placed at risk when anyone is exempted from the constitutional requirement to treat their fellow Americans as equal citizens under the law.” -sect. entitled ‘Snowballing threats’.
This statement from the article is fear-mongering.
The constitution does not protect your dignity, or compel private citizens to act in certain ways. The laws of a free nation may only restrict certain actions of the free peoples, never compel them to act under threat of law. These restricted action being limited to physical or monetary threats, whether effective or not, and national security. We as free citizens are under no obligation to ask the government what we are allowed to do, only to know what we cannot, and what we cannot do is actively harm our fellow citizens, and no, having your feelings hurt because they wouldn’t betray their morals for yours, is not actual harm. The constitution works in the opposite way for the government, they must ask the constitution what they are allowed to do, and forcing actions under threat of law, in any way other than punitive requirements, such as fines or jail time, is not allowed, regardless of the morality of the parties involved.
The government cannot compel a person to act against their personal moral code, whether to make a certain group feel protected, or abandoned. If the supreme court ruled that the government had the power to compel actions, then they could compel this businessperson to act against their moral beliefs, and just as easily compel the sexual minorities to act against their moral beliefs. We cannot grant that type of power to government, the greatest threat to human freedoms in the history of mankind.
Further proof that religion is a divisive element and should be put to the side. The law comes first. If God doesn’t like it he can come down here and tell me himself, but until that happens the law comes first.
As Hitchens used to say, “Religion Poisons Everything”
Freedom of Religion ; **Freedom from Religion**
They seem to forget the second part of that saying.
At what point do we not follow the decisions of a cartoonishly corrupt group of people?
Like if something is observably evil, then why follow rules made by it? Like if Hitler knocks on my door right now and orders me around, I’m not going to do what he tells me to do.
We deserve the oncoming extinction.
It’s not a coincidence that the only rights they care about are the ones that involve them treating people like shit
Yeah it needs to stop too.
Imagine if we had this Supreme Court during the civil rights movement. My guess is we would still have segregated schools and businesses if they argued that integration violated their religious freedom.
There is a difference between;
Denying a homosexual customer to commission a piece of random art
and
Denying a random customer to commission a piece of homosexual art
The former is discrimination against a person, the latter is discrimination against an ideology.
The constitution says we can’t discriminate against people. At least I’m unaware of anything saying we can’t discriminate against an ideology.
Of course today’s Supreme Court favors Christian “rights” over the freedoms of others. It’s not like we didn’t see this coming prior to the 2016 election.
Elections DO have consequences.
I’d love for all religious exemptions to be invalidated by the Supreme Court because they are clearly violations of the equal protection clause of the Constitution for failing to equally protect people of no religious faith … but nope, no surprise a bunch of elite Catholics are enshrining special rights for Christians.
It’s weird because I’ve read the Bible and found that it doesn’t make any sense. “Salt is good, but if it loses its saltiness, how can you make it salty again? Have salt among yourselves, and be at peace with each other.” Mark 9:50
It’s not even Christians in general, it’s a very specific (albeit large) brand of Christianity which is getting elevated. A lot of Christians who genuinely believe abortion is permissible, or that there’s nothing wrong with being gay or trans, or who believe Jesus commanded us to care for the poor, are also having their rights trampled.
I really think a big problem with fighting this crap is that most people have decided to just roll-over and accept that Christianity(and typically religion more broadly) is indeed inherently tied to right wing politics.
The country is somewhere around 65% Christian, and something like 75% of the country is in some way spiritual or religious. Elections routinely come down to a 50/50 split in the electorate. Effectively mobilizing even 1% more of the religious folks whose rights are being trampled could make all the difference.
This is before we even get to the reality that if a conservative judge is at all persuadable and not just a straight up fascists(which with SCOTUS specifically IS a bit questionable, at this point), pleadings of religious oppression are most likely going to be one of the more effective avenues to reaching them.
Yet we have left all of that potential on the table for a long time now, mostly because it simply isn’t as cathartic as saying “fuck all religion,” turning this into a simple us-vs-them narrative, and maybe occasionally turning to organizations which everyone can see are mere parodies(like the Satanic Temple) to make our points about how the Christian right is trampling on others’ religious freedoms.
This is part of a recurring issue the left has had for decades, where we just kind of accept the ideological claims made by the right as the starting point for any argument, ceding rhetorical ground before we even really begin, and then act all surprised when shit goes sideways for us. As though we didn’t basically just roll over and let it happen.
You can see another great example of this in how most people have adopted the Pro Life vs Pro Choice nomenclature, even though Pro-Life was a term created by the right with a very clear intent to cast its opponents as pro-death(if they’re pro life, then we’re pro choice to….do what? Kill?). It’s the political equivalent of “did you stop beating your wife?” and we’ve just been answering “yes” for decades.
And the same damn thing happens across issue after issue after issue. Sometimes out of sheer incompetency, and sometimes like in the case of government overreach in the name of “religious freedom” just because it feels better.
White Christian nationalism is here. Think Handmaids Tale.
This wouldn’t have happened if more rational people didn’t sit on their ass instead of voting. You want somebody to blame? There’s a good chance you know a bunch of people that didn’t vote.
Well yeah, the US is headed towards a fascist theocracy… its what happens when we allow these fascist to exist…
Freedom *of* religion is ALSO freedom *from* religion…
Isn’t the whole idea of rights is that they cannot trample the rights of others?
That is the mandate they were given when they took Charles Koch’s money.
We should protect religious rights, even unpopular ones
I keep waiting for someone testing these out from the other side. “We won’t cater, photo, DJ your wedding since you are getting married in the evangelical church and some of our owners and employees are LGBTQ.” Seems to me there’s a face eating leopard in here somewhere.
Weird headline. I think the point is that, we disagree with the Supreme Court’s interpretation of the First Amendment, not with the concept of them defending it.
Might need to be reminded that people from South America are mostly Catholics, so no it’s not true that the usa is simping for Christian’s, there simping for WASP.
Remember actually neutrality is bias , you must favor minorities to be equal
Tax the church.
What a dangerously wrong headline.
The first amendment is protection against government overstep. Not a granting of special privileges
We need another word for these guys since they have no similarity to large chunk of America’s Christians values.
Supply Side Judases.
Surprised pikachu face.
Not with the corrupt/conservative leanings currently in power.
Even this headline is misleading. They don’t have these supposed rights. What scotus is doing is declaring that these things are part of their 1st amendment rights when they aren’t.
You force religion is going to lead to violations of constitutional rights and be a big mess . Fucking hate religion it’s a cult