Whatever you feel about homosexual rights ( and isn't every person due full respect as a human being/) , if you value the right to free speech and freedom of religion, you have to be disturbed by the recent decision of the New Mexico Human Rights Commission (HRC) .
A lesbian couple went to an evangelical Christian husband and wife photographic team to hire them to take their wedding photographs. They refused to photograph the same-sex ceremony for reasons of religious conscience. The New Mexico HRC
fined them $6600. Fortunately hat decision is being appealed
Mr. and Mrs. Huguenin was represented by Jordan Lorence, senior counsel with the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF), who argued that photography was a form of artistic expression, thus forcing the couple to photograph the wedding was a form of compelled speech prohibited by the First Amendment.
"It was a very short order [with] absolutely no reference to the First Amendment defenses that we raised," Mr. Lorence told the Washington Times. "I find this a stunning disregard for the First Amendment issues in this case."
"This is compelled speech; this is forcing a photographer to advance a message with her artistic skills that she would not do absent government coercion," Mr. Lorence said.
Would it be so hard for the lesbian couple to tolerate and respect their views and just go somewhere else?
Aren't we all obligated to do so in this rich, variegated society of so many different peoples, practice tolerance.
via Kathy Shadie
Posted by Jill Fallon at April 15, 2008 10:59 PM | PermalinkWould you feel the same if the photographer refused to photograph the wedding of an inter-racial couple? I know there are those who support racist beliefs with the bible.
Sorry, but if you go into business, you serve the public. You don't get to pick and choose to serve just those people that you like or with whom you agree. I find it not only laughable but highly offensive that you would defend the bigoted photographers with a pea for tolerance.
Posted by: Clay at April 16, 2008 8:07 AMClay has conflated public accommodations laws that affect all hotels, motels, public transportation and restaurants with all business, saying that once you go into business must serve everyone.
It's quite different when it comes to personal or artistic services. A lawyer can turn down a prospective client, so can ad agencies who refuse to advertise tobacco. You can't force a ghost writer to pen a book for a pedophile, or a printer to put together a brochure for a white supremacist. People who sell their personal artistic services can not be compelled to do so against their wishes.
Highly offended by my plea for tolerance - to live and let live -
is a new one for me.
Well, Jill, apparently the human rights commission agrees with my "conflated" view, as they have ruled against the photographers.
Your examples are irrelevant, as they are not about businesses refusing to serve clients based an immutable, protected characteristic. If an attorney refused to accept a client simply because of that client's race, I guarantee you that would not be acceptable. And I have little doubt that if anyone refused to serve an individual because he or she was christian, folks like you would be up in arms.
A plea for live and let live -- please, you are calling for carte blanche to discriminate at will.
Posted by: Clay at April 16, 2008 3:43 PMClay
The decision of the HRC in N.M is such an outrageous decision, made without any regard to the defendants first amendment rights, and without knowledge of the law that it is being appealed as it should be. I have faith that, on appeal, a proper U.S. court will overturn it quickly.
There is a major distinction between public accommodations and contracting for personal artistic services in fact and in law. You have conflated the two as if they were one and the same.
I come with a bias against and a deep suspicion of human rights commissions as I witness the farcical, dangerous behavior of the HRCs in Canada and the takeover of the Human Rights Commission in the U.N by the worst abusers of human rights in the world.
I also distrust the plaintiffs' good faith. They suffered no legal injury except perhaps some hurt feelings, nothing was taken from them, they could have easily found another photographer in New Mexico, the state crawls with photographers, gay, straight, conventional, cowboy, Indian and Christian. The defendants on the other hand are faced with going against their religious convictions and their conscience or be faced with government coercion. This is quite extraordinary. If you can force photographers to photograph what they don't want to or force writers to write what they don't want to, or singers to sing what they don't want to, you are already sliding down the slippery slope when the government can control what you say and what you do.
First amendment rights trump the hurt feelings of the plaintiffs who, I suspect, brought the suit "to teach the photographers a lesson". When I read the opinion I became convinced of that. The entire communication between the plaintiffs and the photographers was by email and the plaintiffs found another photographer who did photograph the ceremony anyway.