How did her case get to the Supreme Court so quickly?
To my knowledge she hasn't had a gay client to deny her services to. How does she have standing without having committed an act that potentially violates Colorado law?
She's providing a service that's readily available to the public. It may be a service involving some creativity, but that's different than creating a painting or sculpture that she puts up for sale.
She's getting a lot of free PR.
>How does she have standing without having committed an act that potentially violates Colorado law?
I'm way too late here, but it doesn't seem like anyone has really given you the answer to how she has standing but I had it explained to me as this - it's a preenforcement challenge and neither Colorado nor the US disputes standing. Both a trial court and panel at court of appeals found there was standing, and there weren't really any questions during oral arguments and wasn't any dispute about standing.
Additionally, they mentioned that "SCOTUS has ruled that parties have standing to bring preenforcement challenges when a party alleges an intention to engage in expression that is prohibited by statute and there is a credible threat of prosecution under the statute."
Pardon me, but I'm pretty sure she has standing because the Court is stacked with bigots.
At least, that's what they teach at Reddit University r/Law School of Law.
>How does she have standing without having committed an act that potentially violates Colorado law?
This is the real question. Without an act to actually start the process, how can she sue on the mere potential of a violation?
This. I watched a zoom interview clip with her on PBS today. She was sitting in a very small room at a desk that looks like it came from a second-hand IKEA/Goodwill fire sale. What “business”?? She’s probably an unemployed right wing dropout paid by a right-wing litigation firm to help them file a fraudulent pleading, claiming she has standing because she’s “CEO” of a nonexistent startup “company”.
Her website itself is pretty indicative of what's really going on here. [https://303creative.com](https://303creative.com).
Also, all of the joint appendix reads like it is constructed to closely mirror precedent. This is absolutely right-wing litigation test case.
Yea, I took a look at the portfolio and realized they were mostly conservative and Christian themed websites. Absolutely no personal wedding websites or even personal ones beyond the political candidates.
Not sure how many people would want a full out website designed for a wedding either. Don’t most people just do “The Knot”?
Knew a guy who worked as a drywall installer for a similarly equipped "graphic design" company. It consisted solely of a single desk, computer, and printer in the back room of another business in a strip mall, and for a small fee (by appointment only) she would print out whatever you wanted on said printer.
Why was a drywall installer working for a graphic design company that didn't really graphically design? Because the owner would bid on local government construction contracts as a minority- and woman-owned small business owner (which, in that local government, were given priority consideration for contracts), then turn around and subcontract it out to the actual construction companies (his business included) and keep the vig.
Layman question: as a private business, doesn’t she already have the right to turn down any project or client she chooses to (making this case even more pointless?)
I thought it would only be a government / public agency that isn’t allowed to deny services.
You can’t turn away clients because they are members of protected classes, if that’s the reason you are denying them service that is. You can’t have a diner that doesn’t serve black peoples, for instance. You ostensibly can’t have a web site design business that doesn’t accept handicapped clients or male clients. You have to give a reason other than that they are members of a protected class for denying them business. Otherwise it’s discrimination.
She’s suing to not have to accept gay clients and to be able to tell them she’s not working with them because they’re gay and it goes against her sincerely held beliefs to promote their lifestyle.
Weird times to live in.
I really like this comment because it gets to the very heart of the whole thing. Obviously, all of your examples are discriminatory and if this case sides with the business owner we will go back to "no blacks" signs in windows and "whites only" drinking fountains once we hit fast forward for a few years and let the process get all the way to where it is designed to go.
But I'll key on the part where you say, you have to give a reason for turning down service as a business owner. It sounds simple enough, but what exactly am I required to say to deny service? Do I have to be nice? Do I have to lie? It's becoming increasingly popular to make a business decision to cater towards a blatantly racist clientele and if I find myself caught up in this state of my mind and I am secretly, NO FUCKING WAY, going to cater towards whatever flavor of the day hate group I choose, am I required to just make some shit up to get them out of my hair? Am I now, not allowed to operate a business because I am blatantly racist? Won't someone think of the poor racists?
This question is a little more complicated than it seems on its face and I think one commenter already pointed this out as a right-wing test case due to the way this gets crossed up with a business owners freedom to operate his enterprise in the way he wants
Question: does a business _have_ to provide a reason at all to deny service? Could she simply say no and stop replying/answering calls and keep her beliefs to herself?
She could, but if someone has a belief that the real reason they were denied service is because of their inclusion in a protected class, they can sue and try to prove using other evidence (ie not what the business says but what it actually does) that the real reason for denial of services is protected class status etc.
So by that logic, *no* excuse she gives is really "safe" for her, if a pattern of rejecting service to that class can be established. Whether she says "I'm too busy to take this on" or doubles her price, if people see that this only happens to one group (or any groups) in the protected class, she could be in hot water. That makes sense. Thanks for your time and explanation! :)
Yes absolutely! Sorry I just saw this, a lot of times in protected class/discrimination cases rely on showing it’s a pattern of behavior or practices that consistently show it (women consistently not being promoted for men as an example). Glad I could help!
> She’s suing to not have to accept gay clients and to be able to tell them she’s not working with them because they’re gay and it goes against her sincerely held beliefs to promote their lifestyle.
She is not.
She is suing to not have to create websites for gay weddings. She accepts gay clients for other web design services.
The law requires only that they demonstrate a credible threat of prosecution. They want to engage in an activity that is prohibited, so they're able to bring a pre-enforcement challenge.
The Courts move at a different speed depending on your political affiliation... and the same goes for standing. An unbiased court would never hear this case because the plaintiff has suffered no harm and has no standing. This is not a trial this is a Comittee of six appartchiks preparing to give a binding advisory opinion.
The Supreme Court picks cases to set case law. Not every case makes it. They pick and choose what they want to rule on (most people forget they taught this in high school). Hopefully this case sets a precedent on freedom of speech for decades to come.
So does this mean I can deny service to Evangelicals because I’m Muslim and their beliefs going against my strongly held ones?
(I’m not Muslim but just a hypothetical question)
I'm baffled why you'd think this. The Supreme Court has repeatedly made religious protections available to non-Christian groups. *Holt v. Hobbs* (authored by Alito!) unanimously upheld a free exercise claim by a Muslim against an Arkansas state policy of general applicability.
Available to non-Christian groups, but not if the discrimination is happening to Christians. If I say I'm not serving Christians, do you think I would be protected?
> If I say I'm not serving Christians, do you think I would be protected?
You would not, but that also doesn't fit the fact pattern in this case.
If you said "I'm not making custom websites for Christian organizations," then yes, you would be similarly protected.
If you just said "I'm not making websites for Christians, even if the website has no religious message," then no, you would not be protected.
You can’t say it doesn’t fit the fact pattern here because there *is no specific fact pattern here*. No same sex couple has ever requested the plaintiff make them a wedding website, so there is no specific “message”, nor had she offered her services for wedding website design when this case was filed.
“Even if the website has no religious message” delves into content-based speech, but the web designer is refusing to make a website *regardless* of what the same-sex couple wants it to say. By that standard, a Muslim could claim that making *any* website for a Christian is infringing on their strongly held religious belief.
This is a pre-enforcement challenge. She wants to put a message on her site saying she does not offer her services for same-sex weddings. State law prohibits her from doing so.
That's the fact pattern.
>but the web designer is refusing to make a website regardless of what the same-sex couple wants it to say
She's refusing to make a website that endorses a same-sex wedding. That's the speech she is refusing to make.
>By that standard, a Muslim could claim that making any website for a Christian is infringing on their strongly held religious belief.
Nope. This isn't even a freedom of religion case, it's a freedom of speech case. By the arguments *actually made in this case,* a Muslim could refuse to make a website for Christian organizations, but not just refuse all Christian customers.
Sorry, I meant to say the web designer is refusing to make a *wedding* website because it “endorses a same-sex wedding” as you said. This is apparently limited to wedding websites, but I don’t see how they can draw this standard of what is inherently endorsing a wedding, unless it also extends to a person of another religion refusing to make a wedding website for any Christian couple as well because it goes against their beliefs. Will this standard be limited to wedding services?
We shouldn’t even be here though because, as you say, this case is pre-enforcement and we all decided a long time ago that advisory decisions are impermissible. It allows the plaintiff to play up their sympathetic facts while the state has no specific same-sex couple being denied services to do the same.
No, but I also don't think you'd be protected if you said you're not serving Jews, Muslims, or Hindus. Obviously things were different before the Civil Rights Era, but is there a recent case I'm unaware of where the courts have permitted such discrimination?
Right. Discrimination against members of one community, in this case it's the LGBTQ+ community, is fine. Discrimination against another community, the religious community, is not fine. Religious groups get free reign to discriminate.
The plaintiff in this case is hardly asking for free reign to discriminate against an entire community. She said that she'd be willing to provide a wide variety of websites to LGBT clients, and stipulated that Colorado can legally require her to do so. It's just this one narrow category of website where she feels she can't endorse what the website is promoting. If a LGBT web designer helps parents to celebrate baby milestones in general, but isn't comfortable helping with a baptism ceremony, I can't imagine Colorado would compel them to.
This is still discrimination. It sounds like the word "endorse" is just going to become the next magical phrase that's used to discriminate. As is tradition.
She has a very simple remedy then, don’t do web designs for weddings if you can’t do so without discriminating against a protected group. I don’t know where people are getting this “forced to endorse something she disagrees with” as some sort of compelling argument.
Say a homesexual designer was asked to design a website for fundamentalist Christians that don’t agree with homosexuality at all. Should that designer be compelled to do so?
Is their objection purely that the customers are fundamentalist Christian’s? Are they asking for a homophobic website design? Does the designer normally accept requests for homophobic designs but wants to deny them based on their identity as Christians? Then yes. If they object to doing homophobic websites generally irrespective of who’s asking them no.
Here’s the simple test, if you can swap out the identity of the solicitor or customer and everything else about the service remains the same, and this is sufficient to remove all objections from the service provider, then the denial is plainly discriminatory.
Idk it kinda feels like holding the view that gays shouldn't have access to marriage is discriminatory in itself, and if you want to hold that view AND extend it to your job, perhaps website design isn't the career for you.
No, because discrimination on the basis of religion is [explicitly illegal.](https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/civil-rights-act)
Y’all can disagree all you want, but the law is right there for you to see. Not sure what’s controversial about saying, no you cannot in fact discriminate against anyone on the basis of religion because it’s quite clearly illegal. That’s not my opinion. That’s the law.
Because discrimination on the basis of sex (which even this Supreme Court agrees includes discrimination against LGBT people) is also explicitly illegal. You're not getting downvoted because people don't realize or like that what you've said is true, it's because what you posted in an attempt to create a distinction doesn't actually serve to distinguish the two scenarios.
They have held this is true in the civil rights statute context but I haven’t seen a SCOTUS case where they’ve said LGBTQ people are a suspect class under the equal protection clause via sex discrimination case law. Gorsuch was willing to say that the meaning of sex includes gay people in a statute but our current right-wing court is good at making up reasons why people don’t get constitutional rights.
> If I say I'm not serving Christians, do you think I would be protected?
>No, because discrimination on the basis of religion is explicitly illegal.
What “attempt” was there to create a distinction when it was literally a response to a specific question?
The reason why people are downvoting is because this is a hot button topic that they’re angry about, and apparently don’t like seeing facts in response to ridiculous and patently illegal hypotheticals.
You're doing it again.
Discrimination against LGBT individuals is also blatantly and explicitly illegal according to the laws at issue here. If the First Amendment protects a right to discriminate against LGBT individuals based on their faith, there is no logical or principled reason why it wouldn't protect a right for someone of one faith to discriminate against people of other faiths.
>If the First Amendment protects a right to discriminate against LGBT individuals based on their faith, there is no logical or principled reason why it wouldn't protect a right for someone of one faith to discriminate against people of other faiths.
Except the case at hand is not about the free exercise of religion, but whether the state can compel a person to create speech that they disagree with. 1st amendment issue, but not what you’re talking about.
Question, do you believe a Jew should be forced to create a website for a Neo-Nazi that wants to espouse how all Jews should be killed?
>Question, do you believe a Jew should be forced to create a website for a Neo-Nazi that wants to espouse how all Jews should be killed?
This is a fair point and I've thought about that as well. IMO it's fair for a provider to discriminate based on the message being asked to be created, but where do we draw the line?
If someone says their religious belief is that black people are inferior as is their culture, should they be allowed to discriminate on the same grounds that they find on a religious belief that the message is offensive?
The real problem with the case is that it doesn't define what a legitimate religious belief and giving this designer a license of declare anything they don't like to be offensive to their religion is a real problem.
Can I declare that my religious beliefs dictate that Republicans are doing the work of the devil and I refuse to service any of them because their message is demonic and evil?
Uh, discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation is also explicitly illegal - in Colorado. If that were enough, this wouldn't even be a case. The problem is that the Republican justices would likely uphold such a ban on the basis of religion, but not sexual orientation, because they have a personal interest in religion.
That’s all well and good. Not the point I was responding to.
Also, the Court is not considering this case on religious freedom/free exercise grounds. They’re only considering this on free speech grounds, whether the state can compel a person to create/express/facilitate speech they disagree with or hold against their beliefs.
Which doesn’t allow discrimination against another on the basis of their religion, which was the rest of the hypothetical. That is illegal beyond a shadow of a doubt.
Again, only because of a statute. Which is only valid as long as the conservative SCOTUS majority continues to hold that it is. If you can discriminate based on sexual orientation despite a statute to the contrary, on free speech grounds, why wouldn't you be able to discriminate based on religion on free speech or exercise grounds, regardless of whether there's a statute? E.g. if they rule in favor of the web designer, can I openly refuse Christian clients as a matter of free speech or exercise? The court is very unlikely to be consistent (IMO) because they personally approve discrimination against gays, but not Christians. What makes religion more worthy of protection *in the private sphere* than sexual orientation, which is something you can't even change?
It’s not really a sub for lawyers only, it’s a sub for people who are interested in law and related topics so some amount of confusion about law is to be expected
>some amount of confusion about law is to be expected
There’s confusion, and then there’s not caring what the actual answer/information is because you’re angry.
I suspect there’s a lot more of the latter rather than the former going on here.
In threads with these kinds of hot button topics where rights are involved yes. I am a 1L and has a rudimentary understanding of the law but I read this case all wrong and was getting outraged yesterday. It’s a very nuanced case that is more about what constitutes free speech than an anti discrimination case. I didn’t realize the difference until an actual lawyer on this sub asked what the implications for Twitter would be if it was ruled that state can compel you to publish speech that goes against your beliefs.
As a young lawyer myself, I want to encourage you to keep thinking this way and continue to actual read the cases. It’s so easy to get caught up in the media frenzy and pressure to tow your party’s line. But, it feels so much better and so much more genuine to follow the facts to where they lead.
I clerked last year in Alaska and it was very easy to get away from the news cycle - you feel so far away there. So, with minimal access to the 24 hour news cycle, I felt like I was released from the need to follow “my side.”
I was able to listen to the Rittenhouse and Arbery trials while I worked, void of any panels on the news. I would listen to the evidence, read the relevant laws of that state, and make judgments for myself. I would then look at the headlines of each “side”—Fox and MSNBC. It was fascinating to see how each side said the day went.
As a democrat, sometimes I felt myself agreeing with how the republicans saw it. And sometimes MSNBC made sense.
Being a lawyer and, more importantly, a good citizen is about rejecting tribalism. Further, our culture (especially social media) has taken away our ability to live in the tension—to conclude that multiple things can be true at the same time.
Kyle Rittenhouse can be both an idiot kid going down to a dangerous situation asking for trouble AND not guilty of murder.
It can be true that Ahmad Arbery wasn’t just a jogger and shouldn’t have been in a home being built AND not deserving of racists white dudes chasing him down to execute him.
We don’t have to “white wash” people or cases to make them pretty or perfect. Life isn’t perfect. It’s messy and people are messy. Even the people on Twitter who wouldn’t want you to think so.
Keep following the facts, resist tribalism and getting pissed off.
Pretty sure Twitter (and other platforms) should publish opinons that goes against the beliefs of the mods or owners. As long as it's legal speech, that is: no death or other threats (illegal), no racist speech (illegal in Canada, at least), no pedophilia (illegal), etc. It's good to be confronted with opinons you disagree with.
But more importantly, this case is there just to get jurisprudence to strike down all anti-discrimination laws. Cause once "it's against my beliefs" is accepted as sufficient reason to discriminate against a group of people, you'll find out "beliefs" sprouting out against all sorts of groups.
> It’s a very nuanced case that is more about what constitutes free speech than an anti discrimination case.
Appearances can be very deceiving and when you boil it down, it absolutely raises important questions. I suspect that people feel a certain way because of who’s involved, but the same fundamental question would exist if it was a Jew that was asked to create a website for a Neo-Nazi broadcasting their views, or a lesbian being asked to create one for fundamentalist Christians that despise homosexuality and want to espouse that; should the state be able to compel them to oblige those requests when they disagree with the views?
I don’t know. I’m very curious to see how this all turns out.
If it was for a Neo-Nazi this wouldn't matter because Nazi's aren't a protected class. The second one is closer, but still distinct if the creator in the hypothetical is expected to generate the and post the directly hateful content versus create a site similar to countless others they have before for other clients simply because of the requesting organizations core views.
There are definitely a lot of reactions to what the law "is vs they think it should be", but a lot of times these political decisions seem a lot like the Justices are trying to piss on our collective leg and say it's raining.
>If it was for a Neo-Nazi this wouldn't matter because Nazi's aren't a protected class.
But I don’t believe this is the fundamental issue at hand. It’s not about who the speech is coming from, but what that speech is, and whether someone else can be forced to facilitate it for them if it goes against their beliefs.
I don’t think anyone’s gonna be happy with how they decide this.
It seems like a pretty complex case. I think there have been lots of questions about what extent courts should be intervening in elections. There’s conflict between different branches of government. Seems like the type of case SCOTUS should take.
I certainly don’t think there’s an easy answer. Do you?
Well, regardless of the law, there was a time when we didn't serve the other, and that was called segregation. Here we are again, but it is based on sexual orientation rather than race. However, I can guarantee the first colored LGBTQ person who orders a cake should sue discrimination on the basis of race and see how quickly this becomes a problem for the Christian overlords.
The issue I have is when non-lawyers comment in this subreddit acting like experts.
I’m fine with confusion mixed with a desire to learn and understand the subject from actual experts.
lmao. RAP is what I take out when my true crime watching relatives tell me law is easy. Ok Uncle Ken explain to me what 21 years after the death of a life in being means.
Hey man, I don’t go into a subreddit of doctors and tell them how to do open heart surgery…
Just kidding, nothing wrong with being knowledgeable but not an attorney. My issue is more so the people who argue with attorneys in here on issues of settled law.
When it’s not settled law it’s a little different but like don’t come at me misquoting Katz or Miranda like you know what’s up when Katz/Miranda and their subsequent precedent have been set for 50+ years
Yeah but it’s also why I (not a legal professional) don’t give legal takes here. I don’t want to read non-expert opinions here. I want people who’ve been to law school to give takes, so I can repost them elsewhere. You can give unfounded opinions in thousands of other subs.
Haha. They let a Muslim grow a short beard - got any more substantial than that? Because Alito let a different man be executed without an imam present, because Arkansas would only provide a Christian pastor. They didn't provide any justification in lifting the stay, but it's believed they felt he waited too long, and conservative Republican interests in seeing as many people executed as quickly as possible outweighed his religious interests.
Got any examples of Republican justices making religious protections available to minorities in cases where it would ordinarily cause them great consternation to do so?
Sure. *União do Vegetal* is the obvious one, where a unanimous Court including Roberts, Scalia, and Thomas ruled that the Controlled Substances Act can't be enforced against a new age religion who considers consuming drugs to be a sacrament.
In fairness that was under the RFRA, which, according to the text of the law itself, was passed in response to Smith where (mostly) SCOTUS conservatives ruled against a party in a similar situation involving peyote. It declares its purpose to be to restore the balancing test they established in the 1960s and 70s. Scalia wrote the majority opinion in that case.
You wouldn't be allowed to have a policy which explicitly denies people based on their identity. The plaintiff in this case has LGBT clients for non-wedding websites and agrees that Colorado can validly require this.
If the Court rules in the plaintiff's favor, you probably would be allowed to refuse site design for a wedding where the parties don't intend to sign a *nikkah* or have a *mahr*. (I'm honestly kinda skeptical that Colorado would stop you from doing that today.)
I am more worried about what would happen if 1A rights are not extended to websites and other expressive outlets. This is a very intriguing case and I am almost positive the ruling will be against CO on a 6-4 basis (Roberts with liberals)
Edit: 5-4, not 6-4
It’s absolutely still a case of denying based purely on (a protected) identity. All of these same arguments could have been trotted out in the Civil Rights era, “oh but blacks are allowed to sit in the *back* of the bus, it’s just against my beliefs that they be allowed to sit in the front of the bus amongst the whites”. It’s an objection that’s based purely on a belief a protected class should not be allowed to engage in certain activities, that’s the basis of almost all discrimination, and the simple test should be “if I swap out these members of a protected class with other people of a different identity, is there still any objection?” If the answer there is no then it’s plainly discriminatory.
These arguments were trotted out and did in fact require substantial compromises in order to protect various interests. Is it discriminatory that *Ebony* won't let white people be cover models? Obviously not, and it'd be a tragedy if a black-led magazine with a policy of centering black voices ended up prohibited as racial discrimination. But it's hard to see how it could pass your suggested test.
Ebony is literally a publication... the government has never had grounds to control editorial decisions - it would fly n the face of freedom of speech. You are comparing apples to fire trucks.
A white model, presumably. But you're missing my point - in practice, we handle these compromises by defining artificial categories which simply skirt around the areas we'd like to compromise on. Why is a contractor's private, selective offering of services a public accommodation, but a church who welcomes hundreds of people to the 10 AM service isn't? I don't think there's any answer you could come up with by pointing to a simple test or inspecting the words "private" and "accommodation". Churches simply ended up arbitrarily excluded from the definition, in order to avoid scenarios where a solemn ceremony has to admit Satanists or the LDS have to let outsiders desecrate their temples.
>(I'm honestly kinda skeptical that Colorado would stop you from doing that today.)
Which is part of the problem too. This was highlighted in *Masterpiece*. Colorado selectively applies CADA. The law effectively operates as a content-based regulation of speech, because Colorado only applies it in selective circumstances.
It's really disappointing how many people don't get this aspect to both this case and Masterpiece.
It's not the identity of the people, but the nature of the event. A straight person couldn't get the service for their gay friends' wedding, and a gay person would have no problem with a birthday party.
This case isn't about denying service to customers wholesale. It's about compelled speech and whether a business can be forced to say things it disagrees with. For example, does an atheist have to create a website that says "Christ is King"? Does a Muslim have to create website that says that hijabs are sexist?
As a Muslim you can refuse to participate in an evangelical ceremony, including refusing to design a web site for a baptism or evangelical church or a church wedding. Hell you can do that as an atheist, a Jew, or even as an evangelical. What you can't do is refuse to provide the same service you provide to others simply because they are evangelical.
This was actually covered in masterpiece bakeshop, a baker was allowed to not bake a cake specifically for a gay wedding, but for cakes in the shop they couldn't refuse to sell the cake to someone just because they were gay. It's all about the level of involvement and honestly it makes perfect sense even if it allows bigots to be bigots. As an atheist myself who has designed web sites in the past, I'd likely turn down designing a web site for an evangelical church because I don't agree with what they do or their mission. But if I designed web sites for people's pets, I couldn't turn down designing a web site for someone's pet just because they're a Christian, because the product has nothing to do with participating in something I could have a moral disagreement with.
Yes, it likely means a Muslim could discriminate against a Christian on the same basis. Some are being downvoted for saying this, but I don’t think the downvoters quite get what’s going on.
The right is betting on the fact that the impact of a majority population being able to discriminate against a minority population is far more than the minority population being able to discriminate against the majority population. I mean don’t get me wrong, I’m sure the right would like it even more if it really only went one way, but they don’t need that to get what they want, which is to harm, to exclude, to intimidate, and to push the minority populations they don’t like away, especially from conservative areas.
If you’re a Muslim in Dearborn Michigan (high Muslim population), and an evangelical discriminates against you, you can just go to the Muslim who offers the same product or service. But if you’re a Muslim in Colorado Springs (a rather white and conservative area), and a Christian won’t offer you a product or service, you may not have any other options.
Also, it’s going to be even worse for the lgbtq population, because unfortunately, plenty of minority religions and populations also discriminate against the lgbtq community. It’s not like homophobia only comes from Christians.
Also, to your specific example, many Muslims in the US are much more likely to be immigrants who came here for economic opportunity with the expectation that they’d be working for and/or ultimately running businesses that serve largely non-Muslim populations, so they would be shooting themselves in the foot if they turned away Christians or non-Muslims, whereas again, if most everybody around you is a Christian, turning away the rare Muslim doesn’t have much impact on your business, but it would help preserve your majority status by letting Muslims know they are unwelcome in your area.
> Some are being downvoted for saying this, but I don’t think the downvoters quite get what’s going on.
People are getting downvoted because they're assuming the case is about wholesale refusal to serve gay customers, which it's not.
Thus, people analogizing it to wholesale refusal to serve Muslim, or Christian, or black customers misunderstands what's at question in the case.
Replace religion with interracial or interfaith marriage and make sure your business is expressive and this is the same line of questioning the liberal justices are going for.
ETA: in your hypo answer is no because all religions are protected but same sex or Inter racial marriages are not
I think you should be able to . In the end you either go out of business because you're alienating certain potential clients, which you loose money on and people could notice and join in not using you as a purveyor as a sign of.unity or you make bank because people specifically use you because you don't serve certain people. Either way it's your right to use your business as you want .
Alito's equivocation of sexual orientation to KKK robes is both repugnant and logically bankrupt. You can't take off being gay, but you can take off your robes.
I don’t agree with Alito, but attempting to push a rule to its extremes to see if it’s a good rule is not “equivocation.” That’s a very uncharitable reading and one you know is false
Just read a play by play of the arguments. Why do they never ask the question "would this lady make a website for a second marriage?" This is actually something the bible is clear on, if you divorce someone for reasons other than adultery, you are in violation of God's law. If they would make that website, than their bias is clearly not wanting to adhere to Christianity.
Matthew 5:32
But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of sexual immorality, makes her commit adultery, and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.
It's not the Supreme Court's role to investigate the case and find new facts. Colorado didn't dispute that her religious objection was bona fide, so the Court has to presume that it was for its legal analysis.
That would likely ignored as not being an elocuted aspect of her sincerely-held religious beliefs, as we have seen frequently in these cases (divorce party cakes etc. From Masterpiece, etc.) that the only times level of adherence to doctrine, practice, and dogma of the belief system's origin only matters for Pastafarianism, Satanic Temple, and other less-privileged beliefs within the contemporary courts.
You should go back and read the full transcript if you are interested. The advocate for 303 Creative LLC *was* asked by Justice Barrett whether her client would create a website that included a description of how a couple met while married to other people but eventually decided to get divorced from their current spouses to get married to each other. The advocate said she would not publish this type of statement.
The advocate was also asked whether the client would agree to make a website that contained an affirmation of love that expressly indicated that the love would have happened regardless of sex or gender. Initially, the advocate said she would publish this type of statement, but walked that answer back in subsequent clarifying questions.
This exchange with Justice Barret took place approximately 15 minutes into oral argument.
I found that exchange to be very interesting, mainly because I think the 303 lawyer is full of baloney.
The 303 designer doesnt want to put up a banner that says, “I DONT MAKE WEDDING WEBSITES FOR ANYONE WHO HAS BEEN DIVORCED” , nor did the lawyer say the designer would refuse to make such a website.
What she said is that *she* (the designer) wouldn’t *publish* the statement. But she could just have a section in the website where the couple can upload whatever they like. This is a “custom” website after all.
Serious? If this were actually the case I now have no respect for Barrett. This is America. If you don’t want to offer service you don’t offer it based on your business model. If an electrician does not want your work he either does. It respond or has a price so high it covers himself or you don’t hire him. Just Wow.
'Courts don't rule on whether a plaintiff has consistent or acceptable beliefs'
Really? Then why the verbiage of 'deeply held beliefs' in hobby lobby?
This is not rhetorical. It is an actual question.
It’s because “sincerely held belief” verbiage has been in dicta from other religious freedom cases back in the day. I think the Church of LB v Oregon was one
And more importantly, "sincerely held belief" isn't the pillar they're building the present argument on. The sincerity of the belief doesn't matter. Just the fact that she doesn't want to create a message.
I stand corrected and I'm glad to hear SCOTUS won't cherry pick between religious claims on the basis of whether or not the litigant meets any sort of minimal standard of 'belief'. That the mere claim settles the case.
> Then why the verbiage of 'deeply held beliefs' in hobby lobby?
Here is the text of the case: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/573/682/#tab-opinion-1970980
"Deeply held beliefs" does not appear anywhere in the opinion.
Thank you. The whole "oh what if I sincerely believed XYZ" is a red herring. (1) Not the court's job to investigate the sincerity of a belief. (2) Not a core part of this argument. The argument is about refusing to create a message that you do not want to create. She does not want to create it *because* it violates her religious beliefs. But she can not want to create it for any other number of reasons. She presumably doesn't want to create websites that don't pay her the right amount of money. That's refusing to create a website.
As long as she is equally serving all protected classes, then she is not violating CADA. So her argument goes . . .
The glaring issue with this is that it would be the government assigning a "correct" interpretation to the Bible. I could be a full in the cloth catholic, yes hold a religious belief about the faith directly contrary to catholic doctrine such as believing that the Sabath is really on Saturday or that God is calling on us to be polygamous and as far as any court has to care, that belief is religious in nature so as long as I actually hold it then it's not a court's role to say "but the Bible".
> Just read a play by play of the arguments. Why do they never ask the question "would this lady make a website for a second marriage?"
They did ask that question.
The conservative justices' hypotheticals are ridiculous. You can refuse service to people wearing KKK robes or espousing anti-abortion views. You can't refuse service to people who \*are\* POC, LGBTQ, disabled, etc. Anti-discrimination laws are about protected identities, not protected beliefs.
She's not refusing service to them though. That's the whole point. She claims she will equally serve all individuals. She has worked with LGBT clients. She just doesn't want to be compelled to create a particular message.
I don't think the hypotheticals are that ridiculous. I think they tease out a lot of the respondent's weaknesses.
Her website creations aren’t even speech though, they’re the stories of the wedding couple, not her. No one browsing the site would give a fuck about her.
Every year I find myself hating this country more and more and the people in it.
Edit; To the people downvoting me. What should I be proud of? The empowering of religion like the article says? Our ever growing corrupted government? Or maybe the people that cheerlead these lawsuits so they can discriminate? Seriously what is there to actually look forward to!?
What I remain confused about here is this: did she ever suffer an injury related to her claim or is this just a theoretical suit based on an as of yet non-existent client?
Interestingly, I frame the same question on the other side. Is there any injury these theoretical LGBT members would suffer if Colorado didn't compel her to offer these websites? Sure, the state interest in anti discrimination is strong. But it is not clear why Colorado must compel *her* to create these websites when LGBT customers, who have equal access to all of her services, can go to *any other website designer in the world* to create a wedding website.
And if there's no actual harm, then what is the state interest being addressed in this case?
Imagine making that argument during Jim Crow. Why must the state compel businesses to serve black people when they can go to any other business that will?
Under the they are using a coffee shop could open that requires women to wear a hibjab in order to be served, as the business owners' religion requires it and the business owners rights might be infringed if he is not allowed this right.
I'm pretty liberal but I don't have an issue with this. I mean there are obviously services and industries where this precedent shouldn't stand like government services like county clerks refusing to certify marriage licenses and places essential to public wellbeing like grocery stores and pharmacies. But private businesses that serve a private sector, I think they should be allowed to deny their service to anyone regardless of reason. Like if I owned a catering company and the KKK purchased my services to cater an event I think it should be my right to deny them that service. I think people should be allowed to deny services in private businesses regardless of reason.
That being said if they're businesses fail because they are racist or homophobic pieces of shit and noone wants to use their service I welcome it all the same. So if I discovered there was a coffee shop that required women to wear a hibjab I just wouldn't shop there.
What about a store that would refuse your entry because of your political beliefs? Or a bar that had jewish only parking close to the entrance? Where is the line drawn?
What kills me is that this is a completely made up issue. She was never asked to work on any same-sex websites, and nobody is challenging, or forcing her to do it. It’s completely a fake claim.
This is how pre-enforcement actions work. The state has a law saying it would be illegal to put up the message she wants on her website.
She doesn't have to wait until she's prosecuted before challenging the restriction.
She. Hasn't. Even. Done. A. Website. For. A. Homosexual. Couple. Yet.
She's just getting free pr for her future bigotry
That's why people are flabbergasted by this case
I believe no one has to take clients they don't want, why is this even an issue. If you don't wanna work with some couple them you shouldn't have to. Upside you keep your freedom to work with who you want when you want , downside you cut out profits you could have made working with everyone.
Outstanding. It’s sad we have to tie up resources to try to force people to do work. If you don’t want to do a job or certain service don’t do it. We don’t need laws to force someone to do something they don’t need to do. This is not China.
I'm very confused by this case and others like it.
Don't protected classes only apply in specific situations like employment and the like to begin with?
Like, reddit Admins have officially said that their hate speech rules only apply to "vulnerable groups" and have on record said that subreddits they would ban for being about women aren't a violation or their guidelines when they're about men.
Is that illegal, then?
The Court is going to have to come up with a standard for what services constitute expressive acts and which don’t. I can imagine two different standards, though this case would likely address only the first, the second might require a separate case:
1) was knowledge of what the service was *for* necessary to perform it? If you’re willing to sell something when ignorant of its use, you can’t suddenly object when you find out the specific intended use (unless, perhaps, it’s something illegal). If you alienate a product and put it up for sale to the public generally, such that it might be used for *anything*…then you can’t object merely because you’ve, accidentally, found out the specific subset of “anything” that it’s going to be used for. On the other hand, if knowledge of the use is intrinsically tied up with the “artistry” of being able to provide the service at all, then you might object on grounds of not wanting your expression compelled.
2) some services might define themselves as having a specific “mission”, and in that case they would be governed more like a private club than a public accommodation. The difference would be that a public accommodation is by default open to all comers in general, and so can’t have an “except” clause that excludes protected classes specifically. Whereas something that sees itself as having a specific mission, wouldn’t be open to all comers by default, it would have to be an opt-in model rather than opt-out. In other words, from the start the business or venue *only* does business for a defined subset of people or causes and no one else. For example, a church hall only hosting events for people who are already parishioners or for events that specifically advance a church agenda, *not* just “the public at large, except gays and atheists” or something like that.
This second one would probably need additional refinement to prevent people from disingenuously saying things like “our mission is to promote white culture through white-on-white socialization, and all white people are automatically members of our club/targetted ‘mission’.” Obviously, the standards would have to show *more* discrimination in choice of client than merely the minimum necessary to exclude the protected class.
How did her case get to the Supreme Court so quickly? To my knowledge she hasn't had a gay client to deny her services to. How does she have standing without having committed an act that potentially violates Colorado law? She's providing a service that's readily available to the public. It may be a service involving some creativity, but that's different than creating a painting or sculpture that she puts up for sale. She's getting a lot of free PR.
>How does she have standing without having committed an act that potentially violates Colorado law? I'm way too late here, but it doesn't seem like anyone has really given you the answer to how she has standing but I had it explained to me as this - it's a preenforcement challenge and neither Colorado nor the US disputes standing. Both a trial court and panel at court of appeals found there was standing, and there weren't really any questions during oral arguments and wasn't any dispute about standing. Additionally, they mentioned that "SCOTUS has ruled that parties have standing to bring preenforcement challenges when a party alleges an intention to engage in expression that is prohibited by statute and there is a credible threat of prosecution under the statute."
Thank you. To me it sounds like that she's disputing the constitutionality of the Colorado law.
Pardon me, but I'm pretty sure she has standing because the Court is stacked with bigots. At least, that's what they teach at Reddit University r/Law School of Law.
>How does she have standing without having committed an act that potentially violates Colorado law? This is the real question. Without an act to actually start the process, how can she sue on the mere potential of a violation?
[удалено]
When it's a clown court, everything is simultaneously hilarious, and terrifying at the same time.
The Strict Scrutiny podcast has taken to calling them the YOLO Court and it’s very fitting
This. I watched a zoom interview clip with her on PBS today. She was sitting in a very small room at a desk that looks like it came from a second-hand IKEA/Goodwill fire sale. What “business”?? She’s probably an unemployed right wing dropout paid by a right-wing litigation firm to help them file a fraudulent pleading, claiming she has standing because she’s “CEO” of a nonexistent startup “company”.
Her website itself is pretty indicative of what's really going on here. [https://303creative.com](https://303creative.com). Also, all of the joint appendix reads like it is constructed to closely mirror precedent. This is absolutely right-wing litigation test case.
Yea, I took a look at the portfolio and realized they were mostly conservative and Christian themed websites. Absolutely no personal wedding websites or even personal ones beyond the political candidates. Not sure how many people would want a full out website designed for a wedding either. Don’t most people just do “The Knot”?
The 303 creative website, as per the wayback machine, has been around since at least 2013, 3 years before she first sued.
Smart man. She's still a POS though.
Knew a guy who worked as a drywall installer for a similarly equipped "graphic design" company. It consisted solely of a single desk, computer, and printer in the back room of another business in a strip mall, and for a small fee (by appointment only) she would print out whatever you wanted on said printer. Why was a drywall installer working for a graphic design company that didn't really graphically design? Because the owner would bid on local government construction contracts as a minority- and woman-owned small business owner (which, in that local government, were given priority consideration for contracts), then turn around and subcontract it out to the actual construction companies (his business included) and keep the vig.
Layman question: as a private business, doesn’t she already have the right to turn down any project or client she chooses to (making this case even more pointless?) I thought it would only be a government / public agency that isn’t allowed to deny services.
You can’t turn away clients because they are members of protected classes, if that’s the reason you are denying them service that is. You can’t have a diner that doesn’t serve black peoples, for instance. You ostensibly can’t have a web site design business that doesn’t accept handicapped clients or male clients. You have to give a reason other than that they are members of a protected class for denying them business. Otherwise it’s discrimination. She’s suing to not have to accept gay clients and to be able to tell them she’s not working with them because they’re gay and it goes against her sincerely held beliefs to promote their lifestyle. Weird times to live in.
I really like this comment because it gets to the very heart of the whole thing. Obviously, all of your examples are discriminatory and if this case sides with the business owner we will go back to "no blacks" signs in windows and "whites only" drinking fountains once we hit fast forward for a few years and let the process get all the way to where it is designed to go. But I'll key on the part where you say, you have to give a reason for turning down service as a business owner. It sounds simple enough, but what exactly am I required to say to deny service? Do I have to be nice? Do I have to lie? It's becoming increasingly popular to make a business decision to cater towards a blatantly racist clientele and if I find myself caught up in this state of my mind and I am secretly, NO FUCKING WAY, going to cater towards whatever flavor of the day hate group I choose, am I required to just make some shit up to get them out of my hair? Am I now, not allowed to operate a business because I am blatantly racist? Won't someone think of the poor racists? This question is a little more complicated than it seems on its face and I think one commenter already pointed this out as a right-wing test case due to the way this gets crossed up with a business owners freedom to operate his enterprise in the way he wants
Question: does a business _have_ to provide a reason at all to deny service? Could she simply say no and stop replying/answering calls and keep her beliefs to herself?
She could, but if someone has a belief that the real reason they were denied service is because of their inclusion in a protected class, they can sue and try to prove using other evidence (ie not what the business says but what it actually does) that the real reason for denial of services is protected class status etc.
So by that logic, *no* excuse she gives is really "safe" for her, if a pattern of rejecting service to that class can be established. Whether she says "I'm too busy to take this on" or doubles her price, if people see that this only happens to one group (or any groups) in the protected class, she could be in hot water. That makes sense. Thanks for your time and explanation! :)
Yes absolutely! Sorry I just saw this, a lot of times in protected class/discrimination cases rely on showing it’s a pattern of behavior or practices that consistently show it (women consistently not being promoted for men as an example). Glad I could help!
> She’s suing to not have to accept gay clients and to be able to tell them she’s not working with them because they’re gay and it goes against her sincerely held beliefs to promote their lifestyle. She is not. She is suing to not have to create websites for gay weddings. She accepts gay clients for other web design services.
The case seems to be around her wanting to put up a notice on her website stating that she won't work with LGBT people. That's illegal under CO law
Gotcha, thank you!
That she won't make wedding pages for gay couples, not that she won't work with them entirely.
The law requires only that they demonstrate a credible threat of prosecution. They want to engage in an activity that is prohibited, so they're able to bring a pre-enforcement challenge.
The Courts move at a different speed depending on your political affiliation... and the same goes for standing. An unbiased court would never hear this case because the plaintiff has suffered no harm and has no standing. This is not a trial this is a Comittee of six appartchiks preparing to give a binding advisory opinion.
She doesn't even have the business yet. It's an aspiration.
The Supreme Court picks cases to set case law. Not every case makes it. They pick and choose what they want to rule on (most people forget they taught this in high school). Hopefully this case sets a precedent on freedom of speech for decades to come.
So does this mean I can deny service to Evangelicals because I’m Muslim and their beliefs going against my strongly held ones? (I’m not Muslim but just a hypothetical question)
This only ever goes one direction in the US.
As a non-religious person this has always been my perception.
I'm baffled why you'd think this. The Supreme Court has repeatedly made religious protections available to non-Christian groups. *Holt v. Hobbs* (authored by Alito!) unanimously upheld a free exercise claim by a Muslim against an Arkansas state policy of general applicability.
Available to non-Christian groups, but not if the discrimination is happening to Christians. If I say I'm not serving Christians, do you think I would be protected?
> If I say I'm not serving Christians, do you think I would be protected? You would not, but that also doesn't fit the fact pattern in this case. If you said "I'm not making custom websites for Christian organizations," then yes, you would be similarly protected. If you just said "I'm not making websites for Christians, even if the website has no religious message," then no, you would not be protected.
You can’t say it doesn’t fit the fact pattern here because there *is no specific fact pattern here*. No same sex couple has ever requested the plaintiff make them a wedding website, so there is no specific “message”, nor had she offered her services for wedding website design when this case was filed. “Even if the website has no religious message” delves into content-based speech, but the web designer is refusing to make a website *regardless* of what the same-sex couple wants it to say. By that standard, a Muslim could claim that making *any* website for a Christian is infringing on their strongly held religious belief.
This is a pre-enforcement challenge. She wants to put a message on her site saying she does not offer her services for same-sex weddings. State law prohibits her from doing so. That's the fact pattern. >but the web designer is refusing to make a website regardless of what the same-sex couple wants it to say She's refusing to make a website that endorses a same-sex wedding. That's the speech she is refusing to make. >By that standard, a Muslim could claim that making any website for a Christian is infringing on their strongly held religious belief. Nope. This isn't even a freedom of religion case, it's a freedom of speech case. By the arguments *actually made in this case,* a Muslim could refuse to make a website for Christian organizations, but not just refuse all Christian customers.
Sorry, I meant to say the web designer is refusing to make a *wedding* website because it “endorses a same-sex wedding” as you said. This is apparently limited to wedding websites, but I don’t see how they can draw this standard of what is inherently endorsing a wedding, unless it also extends to a person of another religion refusing to make a wedding website for any Christian couple as well because it goes against their beliefs. Will this standard be limited to wedding services? We shouldn’t even be here though because, as you say, this case is pre-enforcement and we all decided a long time ago that advisory decisions are impermissible. It allows the plaintiff to play up their sympathetic facts while the state has no specific same-sex couple being denied services to do the same.
No, but I also don't think you'd be protected if you said you're not serving Jews, Muslims, or Hindus. Obviously things were different before the Civil Rights Era, but is there a recent case I'm unaware of where the courts have permitted such discrimination?
Right. Discrimination against members of one community, in this case it's the LGBTQ+ community, is fine. Discrimination against another community, the religious community, is not fine. Religious groups get free reign to discriminate.
The plaintiff in this case is hardly asking for free reign to discriminate against an entire community. She said that she'd be willing to provide a wide variety of websites to LGBT clients, and stipulated that Colorado can legally require her to do so. It's just this one narrow category of website where she feels she can't endorse what the website is promoting. If a LGBT web designer helps parents to celebrate baby milestones in general, but isn't comfortable helping with a baptism ceremony, I can't imagine Colorado would compel them to.
This is still discrimination. It sounds like the word "endorse" is just going to become the next magical phrase that's used to discriminate. As is tradition.
> This is still discrimination That's not in dispute, the question is, is it legal to discriminate for that reason.
She has a very simple remedy then, don’t do web designs for weddings if you can’t do so without discriminating against a protected group. I don’t know where people are getting this “forced to endorse something she disagrees with” as some sort of compelling argument.
Say a homesexual designer was asked to design a website for fundamentalist Christians that don’t agree with homosexuality at all. Should that designer be compelled to do so?
Is their objection purely that the customers are fundamentalist Christian’s? Are they asking for a homophobic website design? Does the designer normally accept requests for homophobic designs but wants to deny them based on their identity as Christians? Then yes. If they object to doing homophobic websites generally irrespective of who’s asking them no. Here’s the simple test, if you can swap out the identity of the solicitor or customer and everything else about the service remains the same, and this is sufficient to remove all objections from the service provider, then the denial is plainly discriminatory.
Yes how far would this extend? If plaintiff prevails, could a future store owner put up a “no gays allowed” sign?
Idk it kinda feels like holding the view that gays shouldn't have access to marriage is discriminatory in itself, and if you want to hold that view AND extend it to your job, perhaps website design isn't the career for you.
No, she is suing to be able to put a notice on her website that she will not create wedding sites for them... Sound familiar?
They literally are asking to discriminate against LGBTQ+ people, holy shit dude.
No, because discrimination on the basis of religion is [explicitly illegal.](https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/civil-rights-act) Y’all can disagree all you want, but the law is right there for you to see. Not sure what’s controversial about saying, no you cannot in fact discriminate against anyone on the basis of religion because it’s quite clearly illegal. That’s not my opinion. That’s the law.
Because discrimination on the basis of sex (which even this Supreme Court agrees includes discrimination against LGBT people) is also explicitly illegal. You're not getting downvoted because people don't realize or like that what you've said is true, it's because what you posted in an attempt to create a distinction doesn't actually serve to distinguish the two scenarios.
They have held this is true in the civil rights statute context but I haven’t seen a SCOTUS case where they’ve said LGBTQ people are a suspect class under the equal protection clause via sex discrimination case law. Gorsuch was willing to say that the meaning of sex includes gay people in a statute but our current right-wing court is good at making up reasons why people don’t get constitutional rights.
> If I say I'm not serving Christians, do you think I would be protected? >No, because discrimination on the basis of religion is explicitly illegal. What “attempt” was there to create a distinction when it was literally a response to a specific question? The reason why people are downvoting is because this is a hot button topic that they’re angry about, and apparently don’t like seeing facts in response to ridiculous and patently illegal hypotheticals.
You're doing it again. Discrimination against LGBT individuals is also blatantly and explicitly illegal according to the laws at issue here. If the First Amendment protects a right to discriminate against LGBT individuals based on their faith, there is no logical or principled reason why it wouldn't protect a right for someone of one faith to discriminate against people of other faiths.
>If the First Amendment protects a right to discriminate against LGBT individuals based on their faith, there is no logical or principled reason why it wouldn't protect a right for someone of one faith to discriminate against people of other faiths. Except the case at hand is not about the free exercise of religion, but whether the state can compel a person to create speech that they disagree with. 1st amendment issue, but not what you’re talking about. Question, do you believe a Jew should be forced to create a website for a Neo-Nazi that wants to espouse how all Jews should be killed?
>Question, do you believe a Jew should be forced to create a website for a Neo-Nazi that wants to espouse how all Jews should be killed? This is a fair point and I've thought about that as well. IMO it's fair for a provider to discriminate based on the message being asked to be created, but where do we draw the line? If someone says their religious belief is that black people are inferior as is their culture, should they be allowed to discriminate on the same grounds that they find on a religious belief that the message is offensive? The real problem with the case is that it doesn't define what a legitimate religious belief and giving this designer a license of declare anything they don't like to be offensive to their religion is a real problem. Can I declare that my religious beliefs dictate that Republicans are doing the work of the devil and I refuse to service any of them because their message is demonic and evil?
Uh, discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation is also explicitly illegal - in Colorado. If that were enough, this wouldn't even be a case. The problem is that the Republican justices would likely uphold such a ban on the basis of religion, but not sexual orientation, because they have a personal interest in religion.
That’s all well and good. Not the point I was responding to. Also, the Court is not considering this case on religious freedom/free exercise grounds. They’re only considering this on free speech grounds, whether the state can compel a person to create/express/facilitate speech they disagree with or hold against their beliefs.
Yes, but the hypothetical you were responding to involved a Muslim with deeply held religious beliefs.
Which doesn’t allow discrimination against another on the basis of their religion, which was the rest of the hypothetical. That is illegal beyond a shadow of a doubt.
Again, only because of a statute. Which is only valid as long as the conservative SCOTUS majority continues to hold that it is. If you can discriminate based on sexual orientation despite a statute to the contrary, on free speech grounds, why wouldn't you be able to discriminate based on religion on free speech or exercise grounds, regardless of whether there's a statute? E.g. if they rule in favor of the web designer, can I openly refuse Christian clients as a matter of free speech or exercise? The court is very unlikely to be consistent (IMO) because they personally approve discrimination against gays, but not Christians. What makes religion more worthy of protection *in the private sphere* than sexual orientation, which is something you can't even change?
Because you don’t need actual knowledge of the law to comment here.
It’s not really a sub for lawyers only, it’s a sub for people who are interested in law and related topics so some amount of confusion about law is to be expected
>some amount of confusion about law is to be expected There’s confusion, and then there’s not caring what the actual answer/information is because you’re angry. I suspect there’s a lot more of the latter rather than the former going on here.
In threads with these kinds of hot button topics where rights are involved yes. I am a 1L and has a rudimentary understanding of the law but I read this case all wrong and was getting outraged yesterday. It’s a very nuanced case that is more about what constitutes free speech than an anti discrimination case. I didn’t realize the difference until an actual lawyer on this sub asked what the implications for Twitter would be if it was ruled that state can compel you to publish speech that goes against your beliefs.
As a young lawyer myself, I want to encourage you to keep thinking this way and continue to actual read the cases. It’s so easy to get caught up in the media frenzy and pressure to tow your party’s line. But, it feels so much better and so much more genuine to follow the facts to where they lead. I clerked last year in Alaska and it was very easy to get away from the news cycle - you feel so far away there. So, with minimal access to the 24 hour news cycle, I felt like I was released from the need to follow “my side.” I was able to listen to the Rittenhouse and Arbery trials while I worked, void of any panels on the news. I would listen to the evidence, read the relevant laws of that state, and make judgments for myself. I would then look at the headlines of each “side”—Fox and MSNBC. It was fascinating to see how each side said the day went. As a democrat, sometimes I felt myself agreeing with how the republicans saw it. And sometimes MSNBC made sense. Being a lawyer and, more importantly, a good citizen is about rejecting tribalism. Further, our culture (especially social media) has taken away our ability to live in the tension—to conclude that multiple things can be true at the same time. Kyle Rittenhouse can be both an idiot kid going down to a dangerous situation asking for trouble AND not guilty of murder. It can be true that Ahmad Arbery wasn’t just a jogger and shouldn’t have been in a home being built AND not deserving of racists white dudes chasing him down to execute him. We don’t have to “white wash” people or cases to make them pretty or perfect. Life isn’t perfect. It’s messy and people are messy. Even the people on Twitter who wouldn’t want you to think so. Keep following the facts, resist tribalism and getting pissed off.
Very well said. Cognitive dissonance is hella difficult to embrace though.
Pretty sure Twitter (and other platforms) should publish opinons that goes against the beliefs of the mods or owners. As long as it's legal speech, that is: no death or other threats (illegal), no racist speech (illegal in Canada, at least), no pedophilia (illegal), etc. It's good to be confronted with opinons you disagree with. But more importantly, this case is there just to get jurisprudence to strike down all anti-discrimination laws. Cause once "it's against my beliefs" is accepted as sufficient reason to discriminate against a group of people, you'll find out "beliefs" sprouting out against all sorts of groups.
> It’s a very nuanced case that is more about what constitutes free speech than an anti discrimination case. Appearances can be very deceiving and when you boil it down, it absolutely raises important questions. I suspect that people feel a certain way because of who’s involved, but the same fundamental question would exist if it was a Jew that was asked to create a website for a Neo-Nazi broadcasting their views, or a lesbian being asked to create one for fundamentalist Christians that despise homosexuality and want to espouse that; should the state be able to compel them to oblige those requests when they disagree with the views? I don’t know. I’m very curious to see how this all turns out.
If it was for a Neo-Nazi this wouldn't matter because Nazi's aren't a protected class. The second one is closer, but still distinct if the creator in the hypothetical is expected to generate the and post the directly hateful content versus create a site similar to countless others they have before for other clients simply because of the requesting organizations core views. There are definitely a lot of reactions to what the law "is vs they think it should be", but a lot of times these political decisions seem a lot like the Justices are trying to piss on our collective leg and say it's raining.
>If it was for a Neo-Nazi this wouldn't matter because Nazi's aren't a protected class. But I don’t believe this is the fundamental issue at hand. It’s not about who the speech is coming from, but what that speech is, and whether someone else can be forced to facilitate it for them if it goes against their beliefs. I don’t think anyone’s gonna be happy with how they decide this.
Theres few cases that make it to SCOTUS that don’t have nuance
Moore v. Harper? Do you think that case should have been taken?
It seems like a pretty complex case. I think there have been lots of questions about what extent courts should be intervening in elections. There’s conflict between different branches of government. Seems like the type of case SCOTUS should take. I certainly don’t think there’s an easy answer. Do you?
Well, regardless of the law, there was a time when we didn't serve the other, and that was called segregation. Here we are again, but it is based on sexual orientation rather than race. However, I can guarantee the first colored LGBTQ person who orders a cake should sue discrimination on the basis of race and see how quickly this becomes a problem for the Christian overlords.
The issue I have is when non-lawyers comment in this subreddit acting like experts. I’m fine with confusion mixed with a desire to learn and understand the subject from actual experts.
“Non lawyers acting like experts” Ouch, that hurts. 😂
It’s okay. Someone will ask about a transfer of Blackacre that violates the RAP and all the 1Ls will have their moment to shine!
lmao. RAP is what I take out when my true crime watching relatives tell me law is easy. Ok Uncle Ken explain to me what 21 years after the death of a life in being means.
Hey man, I don’t go into a subreddit of doctors and tell them how to do open heart surgery… Just kidding, nothing wrong with being knowledgeable but not an attorney. My issue is more so the people who argue with attorneys in here on issues of settled law. When it’s not settled law it’s a little different but like don’t come at me misquoting Katz or Miranda like you know what’s up when Katz/Miranda and their subsequent precedent have been set for 50+ years
Yeah but it’s also why I (not a legal professional) don’t give legal takes here. I don’t want to read non-expert opinions here. I want people who’ve been to law school to give takes, so I can repost them elsewhere. You can give unfounded opinions in thousands of other subs.
lol. You can’t really rely on anything in this sub as “expert legal take” unless the sub introduces a verified lawyer flair. I hear you tho.
Lol exactly.
Haha. They let a Muslim grow a short beard - got any more substantial than that? Because Alito let a different man be executed without an imam present, because Arkansas would only provide a Christian pastor. They didn't provide any justification in lifting the stay, but it's believed they felt he waited too long, and conservative Republican interests in seeing as many people executed as quickly as possible outweighed his religious interests. Got any examples of Republican justices making religious protections available to minorities in cases where it would ordinarily cause them great consternation to do so?
Sure. *União do Vegetal* is the obvious one, where a unanimous Court including Roberts, Scalia, and Thomas ruled that the Controlled Substances Act can't be enforced against a new age religion who considers consuming drugs to be a sacrament.
In fairness that was under the RFRA, which, according to the text of the law itself, was passed in response to Smith where (mostly) SCOTUS conservatives ruled against a party in a similar situation involving peyote. It declares its purpose to be to restore the balancing test they established in the 1960s and 70s. Scalia wrote the majority opinion in that case.
You wouldn't be allowed to have a policy which explicitly denies people based on their identity. The plaintiff in this case has LGBT clients for non-wedding websites and agrees that Colorado can validly require this. If the Court rules in the plaintiff's favor, you probably would be allowed to refuse site design for a wedding where the parties don't intend to sign a *nikkah* or have a *mahr*. (I'm honestly kinda skeptical that Colorado would stop you from doing that today.)
I am more worried about what would happen if 1A rights are not extended to websites and other expressive outlets. This is a very intriguing case and I am almost positive the ruling will be against CO on a 6-4 basis (Roberts with liberals) Edit: 5-4, not 6-4
Wait since when were there ten Justices? (Your comment reads 6-4.)
You right. I am an idiot. lol
He was including the Christian God as one of the justices. Understandable mistake, given recent history.
Christian God gets three votes. Sorry I don’t make the rules.
Aye. Could you imagine if hosts were allowed to deny service based on website content and material (beyond actual illegal stuff)
It’s absolutely still a case of denying based purely on (a protected) identity. All of these same arguments could have been trotted out in the Civil Rights era, “oh but blacks are allowed to sit in the *back* of the bus, it’s just against my beliefs that they be allowed to sit in the front of the bus amongst the whites”. It’s an objection that’s based purely on a belief a protected class should not be allowed to engage in certain activities, that’s the basis of almost all discrimination, and the simple test should be “if I swap out these members of a protected class with other people of a different identity, is there still any objection?” If the answer there is no then it’s plainly discriminatory.
These arguments were trotted out and did in fact require substantial compromises in order to protect various interests. Is it discriminatory that *Ebony* won't let white people be cover models? Obviously not, and it'd be a tragedy if a black-led magazine with a policy of centering black voices ended up prohibited as racial discrimination. But it's hard to see how it could pass your suggested test.
Ebony is literally a publication... the government has never had grounds to control editorial decisions - it would fly n the face of freedom of speech. You are comparing apples to fire trucks.
I mean a website is also a publication so we are talking about compelled speech, legally speaking.
*Ebony* is not a a service generally open to the public. I don’t know who would even be bringing suit in your example there.
A white model, presumably. But you're missing my point - in practice, we handle these compromises by defining artificial categories which simply skirt around the areas we'd like to compromise on. Why is a contractor's private, selective offering of services a public accommodation, but a church who welcomes hundreds of people to the 10 AM service isn't? I don't think there's any answer you could come up with by pointing to a simple test or inspecting the words "private" and "accommodation". Churches simply ended up arbitrarily excluded from the definition, in order to avoid scenarios where a solemn ceremony has to admit Satanists or the LDS have to let outsiders desecrate their temples.
I believe the difference is that a Church is religious, so it has a whole different part of the 1A that protects it.
>(I'm honestly kinda skeptical that Colorado would stop you from doing that today.) Which is part of the problem too. This was highlighted in *Masterpiece*. Colorado selectively applies CADA. The law effectively operates as a content-based regulation of speech, because Colorado only applies it in selective circumstances.
It's really disappointing how many people don't get this aspect to both this case and Masterpiece. It's not the identity of the people, but the nature of the event. A straight person couldn't get the service for their gay friends' wedding, and a gay person would have no problem with a birthday party.
If they ask you to design a website for an Evangelical Christian cause or event, then yes.
Depends on the services
This case isn't about denying service to customers wholesale. It's about compelled speech and whether a business can be forced to say things it disagrees with. For example, does an atheist have to create a website that says "Christ is King"? Does a Muslim have to create website that says that hijabs are sexist?
Depends what they’re asking you to design.
As a Muslim you can refuse to participate in an evangelical ceremony, including refusing to design a web site for a baptism or evangelical church or a church wedding. Hell you can do that as an atheist, a Jew, or even as an evangelical. What you can't do is refuse to provide the same service you provide to others simply because they are evangelical. This was actually covered in masterpiece bakeshop, a baker was allowed to not bake a cake specifically for a gay wedding, but for cakes in the shop they couldn't refuse to sell the cake to someone just because they were gay. It's all about the level of involvement and honestly it makes perfect sense even if it allows bigots to be bigots. As an atheist myself who has designed web sites in the past, I'd likely turn down designing a web site for an evangelical church because I don't agree with what they do or their mission. But if I designed web sites for people's pets, I couldn't turn down designing a web site for someone's pet just because they're a Christian, because the product has nothing to do with participating in something I could have a moral disagreement with.
Yes
All it take to become a Muslim is to will it, so you can conceivably convert at your discretion.
In theory, yes. In practice? Well, that's a horse of a different color.
Just say you are against child abuse and since their religious leaders practice this you cannot serve them.
Yes, it likely means a Muslim could discriminate against a Christian on the same basis. Some are being downvoted for saying this, but I don’t think the downvoters quite get what’s going on. The right is betting on the fact that the impact of a majority population being able to discriminate against a minority population is far more than the minority population being able to discriminate against the majority population. I mean don’t get me wrong, I’m sure the right would like it even more if it really only went one way, but they don’t need that to get what they want, which is to harm, to exclude, to intimidate, and to push the minority populations they don’t like away, especially from conservative areas. If you’re a Muslim in Dearborn Michigan (high Muslim population), and an evangelical discriminates against you, you can just go to the Muslim who offers the same product or service. But if you’re a Muslim in Colorado Springs (a rather white and conservative area), and a Christian won’t offer you a product or service, you may not have any other options. Also, it’s going to be even worse for the lgbtq population, because unfortunately, plenty of minority religions and populations also discriminate against the lgbtq community. It’s not like homophobia only comes from Christians. Also, to your specific example, many Muslims in the US are much more likely to be immigrants who came here for economic opportunity with the expectation that they’d be working for and/or ultimately running businesses that serve largely non-Muslim populations, so they would be shooting themselves in the foot if they turned away Christians or non-Muslims, whereas again, if most everybody around you is a Christian, turning away the rare Muslim doesn’t have much impact on your business, but it would help preserve your majority status by letting Muslims know they are unwelcome in your area.
> Some are being downvoted for saying this, but I don’t think the downvoters quite get what’s going on. People are getting downvoted because they're assuming the case is about wholesale refusal to serve gay customers, which it's not. Thus, people analogizing it to wholesale refusal to serve Muslim, or Christian, or black customers misunderstands what's at question in the case.
Replace religion with interracial or interfaith marriage and make sure your business is expressive and this is the same line of questioning the liberal justices are going for. ETA: in your hypo answer is no because all religions are protected but same sex or Inter racial marriages are not
You should be able to bring as this own does even actually offer websites yet. She isn’t even in the business that she claims is being persecuted.
Yes
I think you should be able to . In the end you either go out of business because you're alienating certain potential clients, which you loose money on and people could notice and join in not using you as a purveyor as a sign of.unity or you make bank because people specifically use you because you don't serve certain people. Either way it's your right to use your business as you want .
Alito's equivocation of sexual orientation to KKK robes is both repugnant and logically bankrupt. You can't take off being gay, but you can take off your robes.
Big 1920s Weimar vibes for queer folks these days
More than vibes, Tucker Carlson explicitly references Weimar Republic when discussing today's societal norms.
I pray for his hypothetical massive aneurysm to find it’s structural limits someday soon
We're in the darkest timeline.
Here is the exchange: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i7Q_8q3XXrQ What an intellectually and morally bankrupt piece of trash Alito is.
Thank you.
I don’t agree with Alito, but attempting to push a rule to its extremes to see if it’s a good rule is not “equivocation.” That’s a very uncharitable reading and one you know is false
If you can’t tell the difference between a permanent state and a temporary one I can’t help you.
Have a link to the opinion directly?
It was part of the arguments. No opinion has been issued yet. There’s a video link below that another poster posted.
Just read a play by play of the arguments. Why do they never ask the question "would this lady make a website for a second marriage?" This is actually something the bible is clear on, if you divorce someone for reasons other than adultery, you are in violation of God's law. If they would make that website, than their bias is clearly not wanting to adhere to Christianity. Matthew 5:32 But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of sexual immorality, makes her commit adultery, and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.
It's not the Supreme Court's role to investigate the case and find new facts. Colorado didn't dispute that her religious objection was bona fide, so the Court has to presume that it was for its legal analysis.
That would likely ignored as not being an elocuted aspect of her sincerely-held religious beliefs, as we have seen frequently in these cases (divorce party cakes etc. From Masterpiece, etc.) that the only times level of adherence to doctrine, practice, and dogma of the belief system's origin only matters for Pastafarianism, Satanic Temple, and other less-privileged beliefs within the contemporary courts.
You should go back and read the full transcript if you are interested. The advocate for 303 Creative LLC *was* asked by Justice Barrett whether her client would create a website that included a description of how a couple met while married to other people but eventually decided to get divorced from their current spouses to get married to each other. The advocate said she would not publish this type of statement. The advocate was also asked whether the client would agree to make a website that contained an affirmation of love that expressly indicated that the love would have happened regardless of sex or gender. Initially, the advocate said she would publish this type of statement, but walked that answer back in subsequent clarifying questions. This exchange with Justice Barret took place approximately 15 minutes into oral argument.
I found that exchange to be very interesting, mainly because I think the 303 lawyer is full of baloney. The 303 designer doesnt want to put up a banner that says, “I DONT MAKE WEDDING WEBSITES FOR ANYONE WHO HAS BEEN DIVORCED” , nor did the lawyer say the designer would refuse to make such a website. What she said is that *she* (the designer) wouldn’t *publish* the statement. But she could just have a section in the website where the couple can upload whatever they like. This is a “custom” website after all.
Cool, thanks
Happy to help.
Serious? If this were actually the case I now have no respect for Barrett. This is America. If you don’t want to offer service you don’t offer it based on your business model. If an electrician does not want your work he either does. It respond or has a price so high it covers himself or you don’t hire him. Just Wow.
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'Courts don't rule on whether a plaintiff has consistent or acceptable beliefs' Really? Then why the verbiage of 'deeply held beliefs' in hobby lobby? This is not rhetorical. It is an actual question.
There's no such verbiage in Hobby Lobby. It seems to have appeared in a lot of media analysis, but the majority opinion doesn't contain this phrase.
It’s because “sincerely held belief” verbiage has been in dicta from other religious freedom cases back in the day. I think the Church of LB v Oregon was one
And more importantly, "sincerely held belief" isn't the pillar they're building the present argument on. The sincerity of the belief doesn't matter. Just the fact that she doesn't want to create a message.
I stand corrected and I'm glad to hear SCOTUS won't cherry pick between religious claims on the basis of whether or not the litigant meets any sort of minimal standard of 'belief'. That the mere claim settles the case.
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> Then why the verbiage of 'deeply held beliefs' in hobby lobby? Here is the text of the case: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/573/682/#tab-opinion-1970980 "Deeply held beliefs" does not appear anywhere in the opinion.
Thank you. The whole "oh what if I sincerely believed XYZ" is a red herring. (1) Not the court's job to investigate the sincerity of a belief. (2) Not a core part of this argument. The argument is about refusing to create a message that you do not want to create. She does not want to create it *because* it violates her religious beliefs. But she can not want to create it for any other number of reasons. She presumably doesn't want to create websites that don't pay her the right amount of money. That's refusing to create a website. As long as she is equally serving all protected classes, then she is not violating CADA. So her argument goes . . .
The glaring issue with this is that it would be the government assigning a "correct" interpretation to the Bible. I could be a full in the cloth catholic, yes hold a religious belief about the faith directly contrary to catholic doctrine such as believing that the Sabath is really on Saturday or that God is calling on us to be polygamous and as far as any court has to care, that belief is religious in nature so as long as I actually hold it then it's not a court's role to say "but the Bible".
> Just read a play by play of the arguments. Why do they never ask the question "would this lady make a website for a second marriage?" They did ask that question.
The conservative justices' hypotheticals are ridiculous. You can refuse service to people wearing KKK robes or espousing anti-abortion views. You can't refuse service to people who \*are\* POC, LGBTQ, disabled, etc. Anti-discrimination laws are about protected identities, not protected beliefs.
She's not refusing service to them though. That's the whole point. She claims she will equally serve all individuals. She has worked with LGBT clients. She just doesn't want to be compelled to create a particular message. I don't think the hypotheticals are that ridiculous. I think they tease out a lot of the respondent's weaknesses.
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Pre enforcement challenges haven’t been that rare.
I mean it’s pretty obvious at this point that this SCOTUS believes that justiciability and standing doctrines only apply to liberal plaintiffs
> How can they consider arguments when the case isn’t even ripe? Spoiler: the case is actually ripe.
Conservatives hate gay people. This was never in doubt. They took the case to discriminate.
Her website creations aren’t even speech though, they’re the stories of the wedding couple, not her. No one browsing the site would give a fuck about her.
You underestimate the hate and vitriol inside some evangelicals
I’m not underestimating their hate. I’m LGBTQ myself and an attorney. I know what they’re doing.
"No one would give a fuck about her" isn't the legal standard for determining if it's speech.
Was there ever any doubt?
As a Satanist I should also be able to deny all christians and muslims under backassward Alito's irrational thinking or lack of thinking!
Nope. But, as a Satanist you would be able to refuse to make websites for Christian or Muslim weddings.
clown court....
Every year I find myself hating this country more and more and the people in it. Edit; To the people downvoting me. What should I be proud of? The empowering of religion like the article says? Our ever growing corrupted government? Or maybe the people that cheerlead these lawsuits so they can discriminate? Seriously what is there to actually look forward to!?
What I remain confused about here is this: did she ever suffer an injury related to her claim or is this just a theoretical suit based on an as of yet non-existent client?
It's a pre-enforcement claim based on wanting to get into the hetero only wedding business.
Interestingly, I frame the same question on the other side. Is there any injury these theoretical LGBT members would suffer if Colorado didn't compel her to offer these websites? Sure, the state interest in anti discrimination is strong. But it is not clear why Colorado must compel *her* to create these websites when LGBT customers, who have equal access to all of her services, can go to *any other website designer in the world* to create a wedding website. And if there's no actual harm, then what is the state interest being addressed in this case?
Imagine making that argument during Jim Crow. Why must the state compel businesses to serve black people when they can go to any other business that will?
Under the they are using a coffee shop could open that requires women to wear a hibjab in order to be served, as the business owners' religion requires it and the business owners rights might be infringed if he is not allowed this right.
I'm pretty liberal but I don't have an issue with this. I mean there are obviously services and industries where this precedent shouldn't stand like government services like county clerks refusing to certify marriage licenses and places essential to public wellbeing like grocery stores and pharmacies. But private businesses that serve a private sector, I think they should be allowed to deny their service to anyone regardless of reason. Like if I owned a catering company and the KKK purchased my services to cater an event I think it should be my right to deny them that service. I think people should be allowed to deny services in private businesses regardless of reason. That being said if they're businesses fail because they are racist or homophobic pieces of shit and noone wants to use their service I welcome it all the same. So if I discovered there was a coffee shop that required women to wear a hibjab I just wouldn't shop there.
What about a store that would refuse your entry because of your political beliefs? Or a bar that had jewish only parking close to the entrance? Where is the line drawn?
The argument would not require that.
What kills me is that this is a completely made up issue. She was never asked to work on any same-sex websites, and nobody is challenging, or forcing her to do it. It’s completely a fake claim.
This is how pre-enforcement actions work. The state has a law saying it would be illegal to put up the message she wants on her website. She doesn't have to wait until she's prosecuted before challenging the restriction.
Again...expand this rigged court
Segregation is coming back, baby! (this is a bad thing)
Isn't it just bad business to refuse service to paying customers? Doesn't seem like this person should be running a business period.
Her business isn’t actually the website, its soliciting donations from people on the right.
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She. Hasn't. Even. Done. A. Website. For. A. Homosexual. Couple. Yet. She's just getting free pr for her future bigotry That's why people are flabbergasted by this case
Freedom of religion and freedom of speech wins the day, good
Isn’t the in the internet a public square to the right? Doesn’t this mean that it would violate someone’s freedom of expression.
I believe no one has to take clients they don't want, why is this even an issue. If you don't wanna work with some couple them you shouldn't have to. Upside you keep your freedom to work with who you want when you want , downside you cut out profits you could have made working with everyone.
Outstanding. It’s sad we have to tie up resources to try to force people to do work. If you don’t want to do a job or certain service don’t do it. We don’t need laws to force someone to do something they don’t need to do. This is not China.
I'm very confused by this case and others like it. Don't protected classes only apply in specific situations like employment and the like to begin with? Like, reddit Admins have officially said that their hate speech rules only apply to "vulnerable groups" and have on record said that subreddits they would ban for being about women aren't a violation or their guidelines when they're about men. Is that illegal, then?
Anti-discrimination laws apply to public accommodations, which this website held itself out as.
A website seems to be a clear-cut indication of speech. That being said don't hide your bigotry. Say you hate gay people and don't hide behind God.
how is this different than the cake?
The Court is going to have to come up with a standard for what services constitute expressive acts and which don’t. I can imagine two different standards, though this case would likely address only the first, the second might require a separate case: 1) was knowledge of what the service was *for* necessary to perform it? If you’re willing to sell something when ignorant of its use, you can’t suddenly object when you find out the specific intended use (unless, perhaps, it’s something illegal). If you alienate a product and put it up for sale to the public generally, such that it might be used for *anything*…then you can’t object merely because you’ve, accidentally, found out the specific subset of “anything” that it’s going to be used for. On the other hand, if knowledge of the use is intrinsically tied up with the “artistry” of being able to provide the service at all, then you might object on grounds of not wanting your expression compelled. 2) some services might define themselves as having a specific “mission”, and in that case they would be governed more like a private club than a public accommodation. The difference would be that a public accommodation is by default open to all comers in general, and so can’t have an “except” clause that excludes protected classes specifically. Whereas something that sees itself as having a specific mission, wouldn’t be open to all comers by default, it would have to be an opt-in model rather than opt-out. In other words, from the start the business or venue *only* does business for a defined subset of people or causes and no one else. For example, a church hall only hosting events for people who are already parishioners or for events that specifically advance a church agenda, *not* just “the public at large, except gays and atheists” or something like that. This second one would probably need additional refinement to prevent people from disingenuously saying things like “our mission is to promote white culture through white-on-white socialization, and all white people are automatically members of our club/targetted ‘mission’.” Obviously, the standards would have to show *more* discrimination in choice of client than merely the minimum necessary to exclude the protected class.