Should bakers be forced to make gender transition celebration cakes?

[TomC]

He's not blocking anything.
Tom

Yes he is.

What, exactly?

Exactly.
Tom

 

[ZiprHead]

Nobody put any massage on the cake. Why do you keep saying that?

It's the message Scardina conveyed to Phillips that he objected to, nothing else.

Why do keep saying differently?
Tom

And that's illegal discrimination.

 

[TomC]

Nobody put any massage on the cake. Why do you keep saying that?

It's the message Scardina conveyed to Phillips that he objected to, nothing else.

Why do keep saying differently?
Tom

And that's illegal discrimination.

So? You aren't always opposed to discrimination. Walmarts used to discriminate against unmasked customers. You were OK with discrimination then, IIRC.

But here's where you and I really differ. We agree that Phillips is an asshat. Making the cake is no big deal. He should have just done it.

What I don't want is giving the government that much power to micromanage people's lives. I don't trust government that much. From Jim Crow to Iraq invasion to installing Trump, I just don't consider the USA government anything like a moral compass.
Tom

ETA ~You added "illegal" to your post after I started responding. It kinda made my point. Thanx~

 

[Metaphor]

The cake conveys no message. When told what the cake was for, the baker refused. He's discriminating against the trans person.

Nope. That's just flat out wrong.

Phillips would have made a pink and blue cake for anybody.

He'd have made any cake for a trans person.

He objected to making a cake, any design and any customer, with that particular message.

It's not the person or the cake. Scardina knew that. Which is why xhe had to affix a message to it in order to get what xhe really wanted. The opportunity to legally bully someone xhe dislikes.
Tom

He doesn't believe in the message. He's blocking someone else's message because the mere idea that trans identity can be celebrated triggers his bigoted bones.

He's blocking nobody. Phillips could not and did not block Scardina from obtaining or making a trans celebration cake. He isn't God or the State.

He just refused to have his labour compelled to create a cake with a message he disagreed with.

 

[untermensche]

The message cannot be separated from the only people that would want that message.

Opposing the likely and reasonable message of a group is to block that group.

Opposing swastikas is opposing Nazi's.

 

[Metaphor]

He's not blocking anything.
Tom

Yes he is.

Definition of to block:

2
to use your power to stop something from being done or from succeeding
She accused him of blocking her promotion.
The plan to build a new nursery school was blocked by local residents.

Phillips, apparently, has the power to re-order commerce, forbid the creation of other bakery businesses, and stop grocery stores from selling flour, sugar, butter, and eggs, and magickally remove the knowledge of cake-making from all books and all minds.

One wonders, if Phillips has such extraordinary, supernatural powers, he didn't just transmogrify Scardina and her lawsuit into a flea.

 

[TomC]

The message cannot be separated from the only people that would want that message.

Yes it can.
That's why Scardina had to explain the message in order to get xer lawsuit. Otherwise, Phillips might have ruined xer plans and made the cake as ordered.

A scumbag lawyer like Scardina wasn't going to let that happen.
Tom

 

[ZiprHead]

He doesn't believe in the message. He's blocking someone else's message because the mere idea that trans identity can be celebrated triggers his bigoted bones.

He's blocking nobody. Phillips could not and did not block Scardina from obtaining or making a trans celebration cake. He isn't God or the State.

He just refused to have his labour compelled to create a cake with a message he disagreed with.

The cake doesn't have a message.

 

[ZiprHead]

And that's illegal discrimination.

So? You aren't always opposed to discrimination. Walmarts used to discriminate against unmasked customers. You were OK with discrimination then, IIRC.

But here's where you and I really differ. We agree that Phillips is an asshat. Making the cake is no big deal. He should have just done it.

What I don't want is giving the government that much power to micromanage people's lives. I don't trust government that much. From Jim Crow to Iraq invasion to installing Trump, I just don't consider the USA government anything like a moral compass.
Tom

ETA ~You added "illegal" to your post after I started responding. It kinda made my point. Thanx~

Is your point that illegal discrimination is fine if you are against the person being discriminated against? Because that point is coming across loud and clear.

 

[TomC]

He doesn't believe in the message. He's blocking someone else's message because the mere idea that trans identity can be celebrated triggers his bigoted bones.

He's blocking nobody. Phillips could not and did not block Scardina from obtaining or making a trans celebration cake. He isn't God or the State.

He just refused to have his labour compelled to create a cake with a message he disagreed with.

The cake doesn't have a message.

It didn't until Scardina gave it one.

And let's be realistic. The message was "FUCK you! I'm taking you to court, because I'm a lawyer and you're just a baker. I'll own you!"

That was the real message of it's cake.
Tom

ETA ~Notice that I didn't use the gender neutral pronoun that @Jarhyn objected to.~

 

[James Madison]

That can’t be right. The cake is the symbol. As you stated “symbology of the purchaser” and the cake is the symbol, the symbol is expressive and the baker is creating that expressive symbol and when the baker does, the baker is speaking.

The baker doesn't want the customer to use the cake in a celebration for trans-ness. The baker is blocking the customer's expression by simply not making a cake he would ordinarily make for someone else.

This is like, say, a teddy bear manufacturer who makes 1 teddy bear at a time. He makes them very slightly custom with known "recipes" like say in Build a Bear. One little girl, her last name is McFadden from the dreaded McFadden family that the manufacturer hates, well, she wants a teddy bear with a green hat. Because in her head, it reminds her of Robin Hood whom she thinks is cool and she wants to call her Teddy Bear Robin. So she asks for the Teddy Bear to use the common recipe of adding a green hat. The manufacturer (store employee) says fuck off because of the customer's family, so that he doesn't want the girl to be happy. He in no way believes that a Robin Hood spirit will inhabit the Teddy Bear or believes in the symbology of the green hat. It's a recipe he would use for any other customer but he wants to block the specific happiness of this particular little girl.

It's not that different in the baker situation except that he wants to block the trans celebration. The baker isn't speaking, he's acting...politically in order to stop someone else.

ahem* bullshit.

Symbolism exists in the customer's head. The baker is aware that is where the symbolism exists.

Of course, what you’ve said is but a truism. The human brain associates meaning with symbols. Phillips is also attaching a meaning to this symbol.

The baker is blocking the customer's expression by simply not making a cake he would ordinarily make for someone else.

First, he would not make the same]/I]cake for anyone else. He isn’t making this cake for anyone.

Next, he is refusing to create the symbol and expressive object requested.

The baker isn't speaking, he's acting...politically in order to stop someone else

To the contrary, he is speaking when making the specific symbol and expressive object. Expressive and symbolic speech communicates a message just as a message placed into writing, and the latter being speech, the former is also.. A baker writing a message requested by a customer onto their cake is speaking. After all, the baker has to write out the message, and the baker is speaking when doing so.

The message, the speech, could be, “Death to America.” The symbolic, expressive version can be the Reaper burying the U.S. with his sickle. The baker is speaking in the latter example just as he is speaking when writing the former example onto a cake. The speech originated in the mind of the customer, it’s their message, but the baker has to be speaking himself to create it on a cake or create a cake with the symbolic/expressive message.

 

[ZiprHead]

The cake doesn't have a message.

It didn't until Scardina gave it one.

And let's be realistic. The message was "FUCK you! I'm taking you to court, because I'm a lawyer and you're just a baker. I'll own you!"

That was the real message of it's cake.
Tom

And the baker could have avoided that by baking the cake like any other reasonable person would.

 

[Metaphor]

He doesn't believe in the message. He's blocking someone else's message because the mere idea that trans identity can be celebrated triggers his bigoted bones.

He's blocking nobody. Phillips could not and did not block Scardina from obtaining or making a trans celebration cake. He isn't God or the State.

He just refused to have his labour compelled to create a cake with a message he disagreed with.

The cake doesn't have a message.

If the cake doesn't have a message (I don't agree with your characterisation), then all the more can it be said that he cannot be "blocking" anybody's message.

I can add Don2 along with Toni to the list of people who don't know what the word 'block' means.

 

[ZiprHead]

To the contrary, he is speaking when making the specific symbol and expressive object. Expressive and symbolic speech communicates a message just as a message placed into writing, and the latter being speech, the former is also.. A baker writing a message requested by a customer onto their cake is speaking. After all, the baker has to write out the message, and the baker is speaking when doing so.

The message, the speech, could be, “Death to America.” The symbolic, expressive version can be the Reaper burying the U.S. with his sickle. The baker is speaking in the latter example just as he is speaking when writing the former example onto a cake. The speech originated in the mind of the customer, it’s their message, but the baker has to be speaking himself to create it on a cake or create a cake with the symbolic/expressive message.

The cake doesn't have a message.

 

[James Madison]

That can’t be right. The cake is the symbol. As you stated “symbology of the purchaser” and the cake is the symbol, the symbol is expressive and the baker is creating that expressive symbol and when the baker does, the baker is speaking.

The cake is not expressing anything. The only expression is by the cake buyer.

You cannot separate the expression of the customer from the cake because the customer’s expression is the cake.

 

[TomC]

And that's illegal discrimination.

So? You aren't always opposed to discrimination. Walmarts used to discriminate against unmasked customers. You were OK with discrimination then, IIRC.

But here's where you and I really differ. We agree that Phillips is an asshat. Making the cake is no big deal. He should have just done it.

What I don't want is giving the government that much power to micromanage people's lives. I don't trust government that much. From Jim Crow to Iraq invasion to installing Trump, I just don't consider the USA government anything like a moral compass.
Tom

ETA ~You added "illegal" to your post after I started responding. It kinda made my point. Thanx~

Is your point that illegal discrimination is fine if you are against the person being discriminated against? Because that point is coming across loud and clear.

What?
Who do you think I'm against?

What I'm against is the government sticking their noses up everybody's butts.
Tom

 

[TomC]

The cake doesn't have a message.

It didn't until Scardina gave it one.

And let's be realistic. The message was "FUCK you! I'm taking you to court, because I'm a lawyer and you're just a baker. I'll own you!"

That was the real message of it's cake.
Tom

And the baker could have avoided that by baking the cake like any other reasonable person would.

I agree.
But he didn't block anything. At best, he could have blocked Scardina's bullying.
Tom

 

[Jarhyn]

Is your point that illegal discrimination is fine if you are against the person being discriminated against? Because that point is coming across loud and clear.

What?
Who do you think I'm against?

What I'm against is the government sticking their noses up everybody's butts.
Tom

I don't know. From all the conversation you have had here, which in my experience never fails to touch on trans threads, you have every intention of upholding the status quo where the government sticks their nose up everyone's butt and posts the manifest of what they find there on legally accessible and requestable documents, and assumes a 1:1 relationship between that thing and gender, and whether people keep it

 

[TomC]

To the contrary, he is speaking when making the specific symbol and expressive object. Expressive and symbolic speech communicates a message just as a message placed into writing, and the latter being speech, the former is also.. A baker writing a message requested by a customer onto their cake is speaking. After all, the baker has to write out the message, and the baker is speaking when doing so.

The message, the speech, could be, “Death to America.” The symbolic, expressive version can be the Reaper burying the U.S. with his sickle. The baker is speaking in the latter example just as he is speaking when writing the former example onto a cake. The speech originated in the mind of the customer, it’s their message, but the baker has to be speaking himself to create it on a cake or create a cake with the symbolic/expressive message.

The cake doesn't have a message.

In post #1212, you agreed that the cake had a message and what the message was.
Tom

 

[ZiprHead]

That can’t be right. The cake is the symbol. As you stated “symbology of the purchaser” and the cake is the symbol, the symbol is expressive and the baker is creating that expressive symbol and when the baker does, the baker is speaking.

The cake is not expressing anything. The only expression is by the cake buyer.

You cannot separate the expression of the customer from the cake because the customer’s expression is the cake.

So you admit it's the customer's expression, not the baker's.