Denying someone a cake based on their unchangeable sexuality is not the same as denying someone a place to email unproven allegations about the son of a politician with an eye to unduly influence an election.

You can choose whether to be a QAnon'er. You can't choose to be straight.

> Denying someone a cake

It wasn't about denying someone a cake. The shop had many premade cakes available for purchase. It was about being forced to create a custom LGBT themed cake that the gay couple wanted baked.

If you believe they should have been forced to do that you are an authoritarian.

It wasn't about designing and LGBT-themed cake. They didn't discuss the design of the cake at all [1]. It was about making a cake that would be used by gays at their wedding.

[1] https://www.scotusblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/16-111...

From your linked court document: "In July 2012, Craig and Mullins visited Masterpiece, a bakery in Lakewood, Colorado, and requested that Phillips design and create a cake to celebrate their same-sex wedding."

"LGBT-themed" I suppose is too strong a description so I will grant you that given that they never got into design discussions.

No, they did not want a "custom LGBT themed cake", they requested a cake that happened to be for gay people getting married.

> If you believe they should have been forced to do that you are an authoritarian.

It's about as authoritarian as saying that businesses had to integrate and serve interracial couples despite business owners claiming that their religions forbid race mixing, which is exactly what they claimed several decades ago.

> they requested a cake that happened to be for gay people getting married.

From the court filing: "In July 2012, Craig and Mullins visited Masterpiece, a bakery in Lakewood, Colorado, and requested that Phillips design and create a cake to celebrate their same-sex wedding."

They requested that the bakers design the cake for their gay wedding yes. You can't make people design things for you if they don't want to. If you believe that people should be able to compel this sort of work then you are an authoritarian.

I'm not sure where you're getting "a custom LGBT themed cake" from "create a cake to celebrate their same-sex wedding".

The first claim elicits images of rainbows and positive affirmations of gay marriage, and the second is just a cake that's for two people getting married who happen to be gay.

> If you believe that people should be able to compel this sort of work then you are an authoritarian.

On a scale of 1 to 10, how authoritarian was it when the government forced wedding planners, wedding reception venues, photographers, dessert shops etc to plan and serve custom wedding plans and events for interracial couples despite business owners claiming that their religions forbid race mixing?

I retract my use of the term "LGBT themed", that was too strong a description. However at the very least common sense tells us it would have had some reference to the homosexual nature of the marriage (e.g. "Adam & Steve" written in icing)

> On a scale of 1 to 10, how authoritarian was it when the government forced wedding planners, wedding reception venues, photographers, dessert shops etc to plan and serve custom wedding plans and events for interracial couples despite business owners claiming that their religions forbid race mixing?

Do you have an actual example of this happening?

I'm on my phone, but here is a quote from the ACLU[1]:

> Instances of institutions and individuals claiming a right to discriminate in the name of religion are not new. In the 1960s, we saw objections to laws requiring integration in restaurants because of sincerely held beliefs that God wanted the races to be separate. We saw religiously affiliated universities refuse to admit students who engaged in interracial dating. In those cases, we recognized that requiring integration was not about violating religious liberty; it was about ensuring fairness. It is no different today.

This is a good write up about religion and Loving v. Virginia[2].

[1] https://www.aclu.org/issues/religious-liberty/using-religion...

[2] https://ir.lawnet.fordham.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=55...

I am aware we have these civil rights laws. I am asking if you can find a scenario where someone was forced to engage in creative work for someone under these laws.

For example, someone forced to be a wedding photographer of an interracial wedding when they didn't want to.

They shouldn't have to make the cake, but they should be open to legal challenge or fines for not doing it. Discrimination is voluntary, sexuality isn't.

If you replace gay with white/black/christian/jewish, does that still make you an authoritarian?

Yes. Just based on definitions. Are you trying to prove him right?

Yes and for the record I'm Jewish.

>unproven allegations

This entire thread concerns Mailchimp specifically. Not sure there is a clearer definition of advertising than "unproven allegations".

You can choose whether to be a muslim. Does that mean discriminating against muslims is ok?

@disown - There's so much truth in your comment. I see a lot of people calling out big tech trying to root their stance in the Constitution, when the Constitution was a chain designed specifically to restrain government -- not individuals.

As much as I hate what tech companies are doing in the free speech arena, my position is this: Legally, they can censor whomever they like; as perverse as that is, they're in their right. But to them I say, don't, and I repeat, don't, say you stand for freedom of expression when you have appointed yourself the arbiter of truth.

I am a work in progress when it comes to removing my own bias. I've had to confront and remove so much tribalistic, hypocritical bias from my own life; but today, a large segment of our society is pretending to actually have integrity in their analysis of current events.

But what do I know. I'm anti-censorship, so I guess that makes me a Nazi-sympathizing, white supremacist (#immexicanbro), right winger.

Edit: the #immexicanbro refers to the fact that I'm Mexican-American, por si no lo sabias.

> don't, say you stand for freedom of expression when you have appointed yourself the arbiter of truth

This is a great point. I always thought of the big tech companies as upholding classically liberal ideals; however, now that they’ve grown up they’re much more interested in stability that keeps the profit machine running (which we all benefit from in the short term). In a way they’re not so naive about the world anymore, nor should we be about them.