There's ample for why it's illegal to discriminate against classes of people. Imagine business in the 20s with signs saying "Irish need not apply" or "No dogs or Jews". The recent case with the baker was extending the protection of human rights to gay couples.

Any "conservative" content that has been kicked off of platforms like YouTube has been specifically targeted not for political reasons but because they were spreading hate speech and/or dangerous disinformation. Things like racism, sexism, religious intolerance, specific accusations (ie Joe Scarborough is a murderer) or dangerous disinformation (ie 5G causes Coronavirus) are not intrinsic to any group of people. There's still plenty of content around mainstream conservatism that can be viewed freely.

I think any attempt to argue a slippery slope isn't valid. People aren't computers and just because you can't apply a mathematically rigorous distinction between these kinds of speech doesn't mean that a reasonable person can't easily distinguish them.

> The recent case with the baker was extending the protection of human rights to gay couples.

He offered to sell them a pre-made cake (in compliance with non-discrimination laws). The question was whether he could be compelled to perform an act of speech (custom-making a cake) that violated his sincerely-held religious beliefs.

It was a work for hire service that he refused, the speech argument is pretty flimsy (to me at least). To me it's like trying to say that your hedge trimming service is a creative act, and thus speech, so your landscaping company can deny service to a same-sex couple. I guess reasonable people can disagree, but we wouldn't be as conflicted it it was an interracial couple that he was denying services to. I doubt history will be kind to that SC decision.

Hedge trimming can be done by anyone with a hedge trimming machine. This baker made beautiful unique artistic cakes that were a product of his own life and experiences and sensibilities. Also, a wedding cake specifically celebrates a matrimony whose existence the baker would deny. Any hedge trimming service that satisfied those qualifications would indeed possibly be subject to the same controversy.

Regardless of the context of this case, it's odd that the state can now seemingly force someone to engage their creativity and artistic sensibility for any reason. It is now federal judicial precedence that he must lawfully create a satisfyingly beautiful cake for anyone who= asks. What if it's not beautiful enough? Is that punishable by law? Who judges the beauty?

Probably the baker should have just made a half assed cake...

> Regardless of the context of this case, it's odd that the state can now seemingly force someone to engage their creativity and artistic sensibility for any reason.

No, the state (because the citizens wanted it that way) can merely require you to treat people the same regardless of race, gender, religion, or sexual orientation if you are offering services to the public. If you offer services to the public you can't pick and choose based on that criteria. You're free to create whatever you like, for whomever you like, if you're not a public business. Plus you can still refuse services to lawyers, people without shirts or shoes, or people who indent with spaces if you're a public business.

I fail to see how the state not enabling bigotry in services offered to the public constitutes oppression.

> I fail to see how the state not enabling bigotry in services offered to the public constitutes oppression.

If you really can't see it, there has to be some kind of observational defect in your model of the world. Forcing people to do work they don't want to do is bad because compulsory labor is bad. It blows my mind that this is not immediately obvious to people who live in a society that (reasonably) vocally opposes slavery.

Also, "not enabling bigotry" is an insanely stilted way of saying "forcing people to perform labor they don't want to".

> Forcing people to do work they don't want to do is bad because compulsory labor is bad

This is the same tired argument that every bigoted person whines about when they're 'forced' to treat human beings like human beings.

You'll be extremely relieved to know that nobody forced them to open a business that sells products and services to the general public. They made that choice. The only thing they are 'forced' to do is follow the extremely reasonable "don't discriminate" requirement.

If you really can't see it, there has to be some kind of observational defect in your model of the world.

It's a fact, not disputed by either party, that he offered to sell them a generic cake or one with a different message. So it's not true that he denied them service "because" they were gay.

Thought experiment: Imagine an individual woman went into the store and said to him "My son is marrying his boyfriend this weekend. Can you make a custom cake for them?" The baker says no. Should that be illegal?

Thought experiment #2: Imagine an alt-right troll goes into a Jewish bakery and asks for a cake that says "Jesus is Lord". The baker says no. Should that be illegal?

> So it's not true that he denied them service "because" they were gay.

So it's cool to discriminate if you offer something that's separate but equal?

Sorry, I don't think this is a good-faith reply. Would you consider answering my thought experiment questions?

> You'll be extremely relieved to know that nobody forced them to open a business that sells products and services to the general public.

Same goes for Twitter. By your logic, Twitter has no grounds to complain when Trump screws them over for censoring conservatives, because no one forced them to go into business.

Are you really thinking about this? I feel like you're just responding with bad-faith platitudes.

In general, trimmed hedges don't inherently convey a meaningful message, but if you asked someone to trim the hedges into a message that violated your sincerely-held religious beliefs then I think the same principle would apply.

> we wouldn't be as conflicted it it was an interracial couple that he was denying services to

I don't believe you would be able to make a "sincere religious conviction" argument against it - I'm not aware of any mainstream religions that prohibit interracial marriage as part of their doctrine (as opposed to an epiphenomenon of the cultural practices of the people who make up the group).

> I don't believe you would be able to make a "sincere religious conviction" argument against it

People have used sincere religious arguments against interracial relationships for decades if not centuries. The reason it's not invoked now is because we've had a couple generations where the law of the land was obviously morally superior to the scriptures, to the point it's not seriously debated anymore.

As far as I am aware, there is nothing in the scriptures of any major religions regarding interracial marriage (which makes sense, since the modern conception of race didn't exist thousands of years ago when most of them were written). So I'm not sure what "sincere religious belief" those people would have been using in their arguments - just being a Christian doesn't automatically make any sincere belief you hold a religious one. Many religions do have scriptural prohibitions against homosexuality, however.

> So I'm not sure what "sincere religious belief" those people would have been using in their arguments - just being a Christian doesn't automatically make any sincere belief you hold a religious one.

There are absolutely sincere people whose religious beliefs are that interracial marriage is morally wrong[1].

> Reagan says many black athletic stars choose white wives in a willful attempt to make their offspring lighter, challenging God’s plan. “He don’t want them to be like him, so he’ll marry another. … It’s another defiance of God’s law, it’s a worldly way.” And the pastor condemns fellow ministers who perform interracial marriages. “Some of the men in pulpits should have a pantywaist instead of a preacher coat on!”

[1] https://www.splcenter.org/hatewatch/2014/02/19/tennessee-pas...

Arguably the most powerful Christian organization in the U.S., the Southern Baptist Convention, was founded to support slavery.

What's actually in scripture has very little to do with the religious beliefs many profess.

I'm not religious so I don't really support it, I'm just trying to play devil's advocate. It seems to me that there is a significant difference between "my religious organization was founded with the express purpose of supporting slavery, at a time and place when slavery was the most important political issue in the country" and "homosexuality is just one of a long list of things that are banned, but is not called out in any sort of special way"

> The recent case with the baker was extending the protection of human rights to gay couples.

So is it a "human right" to use a business's services even if they don't want you to, or not? Be consistent. If it is, it's a human right violation to politically deplatform people.

> has been specifically targeted not for political reasons

This is obvious bullshit to anyone who follows youtube/twitter/facebook censorship drama. Tons of people have been deplatformed without having e.g. harassed anyone.

> they were spreading hate speech

Is this supposed to impress us? That something someone said falls under this recently-made-up category that coincidentally includes a bunch of factual rightist talking points?

> There's still plenty of content around mainstream conservatism

I'm sure you feel that way, but conservatives certainly don't agree with you.

> I think any attempt to argue a slippery slope isn't valid

There's not a slippery slope argument here - YouTube, Twitter, and others have deleted content that many conservatives think is obviously fine and within the bounds of civil discourse.

Here are two related things that came up in my feed literally today:

https://www.theverge.com/platform/amp/2020/5/26/21270290/you...

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/ncna1201181

> they (correctly) observe that freedom of association (i.e. businesses get to choose their customers) only seems to apply when it benefits progressives

This can be mostly likely summed up as self-selection bias. Discrimination laws are not being applied unequally to people of differing political opinions. It is much more common that people's political identities are self-chosen based on their own personal identity and experiences.

The actual dominating selection bias is that "discrimination laws" were an authoritarian progressive political strategy, so they align most closely with authoritarian progressive beliefs and interests.

So was social security and a ton of other laws, but that's pretty irrelevant in today's politics.

As far as politics today is concerned, I would sure hope that both conservatives and liberals both agree that is it wrong to deny service based on someone's membership in a protected class.

> As far as politics today is concerned, I would sure hope...

Of course, as a progressive (I'm guessing), you would hope the overton window stays firmly within the progressive comfort zone. This has little to do with the fact that progressive laws do, in fact, generally work in opposition to conservative (rightist and/or libertarian) politics, even if we can retroactively come up with some clean-sounding justification like "it's about human rights". It's not self-selection bias.

But who get's to arbiter the content of one's character? And by what metrics are so perfect they won't be abused or change in 5 years?

> But who get's to arbiter the content of one's character?

Only you get to make the decisions that define your character. Others observe your choices and choose to associate with you, or not to.

> And by what metrics are so perfect they won't be abused or change in 5 years?

There are no metrics. The free, global, unfiltered publishing platform is free to decide that they just don't like you. Nobody is entitled to free unfiltered publishing of their content.

I should note that if you're willing to pay, there's basically nothing that you can't get published on the internet. For some reason people get the 'free' in free speech confused with zero-cost. You can publish whatever repugnant material you like, you just don't necessarily get the eyeballs that some believe they're entitled to.

And of course, "hateful" is unilaterally defined by your side and may change at any time.

So, discrimination on political lines is fine as it is based on the content of your character?

Btw, political discrimination is illegal.

> Btw, political discrimination is illegal.

The Levering Act disagrees with you. The government itself has been forcing people to swear they're not members of the communist party for decades.