Stupid Theist Tricks:  Piety as a Cover for Bigotry

We've talked about this before (here and here).  But there is no end to the bigotry of some Christians (particularly against gays), and no end to the creative ways they try to rationalize their bigotry and make it sound as if they are the ones who have been wronged when the rest of the world pushes back against their hateful discriminatory practices.  Let's examine some of the seriously flawed logic they employ.

They vehemently disagree with public accommodation laws.  They liken them to an all-powerful evil state persecuting them and forcing them with threat of violence to perform wicked acts that violate their deeply held religious convictions.

This is the 21st Century equivalent to the Roman Empire demanding the early Christians offer incense to the statue of the supposedly divine emperor. The vast majority of the persecutors were mystified by what they saw as unreasonable Christian intransigence.
...
But what the God-haters don't understand is that we've been here before and survived. First the Temple Authorities tried to wipe out the Faith. Then the Romans. Then the Barbarians. Then the Muslims. Then the Norsemen. Then the Muslims again (under the Ottomans). Then the French revolutionaries. Then the Communists and the Nazis. Now the secularists and the gnus. What part of "the Gates of Hell shall not prevail" do they not understand? - Prokop

Notice the inevitable reference to Nazis.  As if the Nazis persecuted Christians.  A little history lesson is in order.  The Nazis were Christians, and they persecuted gays and other minorities in addition to Jews.  How this can be likened to public accommodation laws is a real mystery to me.  Public accommodation laws are meant to eliminate some of the kinds of discriminatory practices that bigots like the Nazis practiced.  If Christians really hate the Nazis so much, they shouldn't be trying to emulate them.  But the Nazis are generic "bad guys".  Toss them into the same bag with communists and various other historical bullies, and then throw modern secularists into the mix, and you have created one big bag of guilt by association.  Rational justification for this is not an option.

And what of those laws that supposedly force the poor, persecuted Christians to violate their religious beliefs?  The laws in the USA actually bend over backwards to accommodate the religious sensibilities and practices of Christians, even to the extent that religious beliefs tend to take precedence over fairness in many cases, but there must be limits to how far we can go to accommodate religious beliefs when they come into conflict with the rights and needs of the public.  If public accommodation laws are unpalatable for Christians, they must realize that nobody is forcing them to do anything that violates their beliefs.  If they don't want to comply with these laws, then they don't have to run a public accommodation.  It's that simple.

Here's another argument they make:

That homossexuals have "historically been the target of discriminatory behavior" does not justify trampling freedom of association and throwing to the Wind as a mere convenience the firmly held convictions of others, i.e. that it would be material cooperatiopn of evil to cater for an SS "wedding".

As I discussed before, the caterer is not being asked to participate or materially cooperate in a wedding, gay or any other kind of label you might wish to apply to it.  He doesn't even have to go to the wedding venue - just to the reception.  Even in cases where presence at the wedding itself might be required, such as a photographer would be asked to do, his taking pictures of the event is not the same as participating in it, and doesn't imply his approval or endorsement.  The caterer or photographer is merely being asked to perform the service that he offers to the public.  If he thinks that offering this service to certain people is wicked, then he shouldn't offer it to the public.

How about this for a leap of logic?

There is NO discrimination in not recognizing same sex "marriage" - none. No more than there is any in not recognizing marriage between siblings, or between parents and children, or between pet owners and their pets. As long as the rules are the same for everyone and everyone is being treated exactly the same, how on God's Green Earth can you possibly say there's any discrimination going on? Now if we treated one set of people in one manner, and another set in a different manner, then you might have a case to say "discrimination". But not here. Everyone, regardless of race, color, creed, sex, orientation, or what have you, is free to marry a person of the opposite sex, and prohibited from marrying a person of the same sex. One rule for all. How is that discriminatory?

This "one rule" that applies to everyone is itself discriminatory.  You might as well have a rule like this:  "We don't serve niggers.  Same rule applies to everyone, so you can't call us bigots".  Honestly, the person who uttered this little piece of logical escapism is exhibiting all the intellectual capacity of a third grader.

Well, this is fun.  Let's look at another example of the bigots' fallacies:

Yet another thought experiment for you. Assume that you are a male photographer, and your moral code forbids you from gazing on the naked bodies of women who are not your spouse. Now let's say a customer comes in and says they plan on holding their wedding ceremony in the nude, and want you to be their photographer. Are you saying this person has no right to say, "My religion forbids me from looking at naked women other than my wife. Find another photographer."?

Now we have conflated two very different things.  In this case, the photographer is being asked to actually do something, to perform an act (looking upon naked women), that violates his religious belief, as opposed to taking pictures of a gay wedding.  The act of taking pictures is not, in itself, wicked.  It is bigotry to refuse this service to certain people.  We understand that  by definition, bigotry is based on who is being denied service.  But it would not be bigotry to refuse photograph a nude wedding.  This would entail that the photographer do something that is against his religion, and no public accommodation law would require that.  So there's a difference, and what we have here is a straw man.

And then we have the claim that their bigotry is not aimed at certain people (ie. gays) at all.  It is the mockery of the institution of marriage that they object to.

So if Chuck and Larry two straight men wanted to marry then I would be OK with it?

In defense of this argument, they pull out this (obviously very unusual) case of two straight men getting married, andimply that they would refuse to provide service for this in the same manner that they would for a gay couple.  And therefore, this is not bigotry.  But this is more conflation, because now we're talking about an illicit or fraudulent marriage ceremony, which they are not obliged to accommodate, regardless of who is getting married.  So it is true that refusing to photograph this particular event may not be discrimination.  But that doesn't make their refusal to serve gay people any less bigoted.

One last example.  This is the assertion that "sexual pervert fascists" are simply out to destroy Christians.  In evidence is this case, where a Christian provides his service to a gay couple, and then gets bullied online anyway for his views about gay people, with the couple demanding their money back.  If it is true (and I have my doubts that the full story is being told here), then the gay couple was wrong to make an issue of it.  This has nothing to do with public accommodation laws.  This is the rare case where the Christian actually was victimized, and the anti-gay community is trying to make it look as if this is the usual situation, where the poor persecuted Christians get tossed to the lions.  The fact of the matter is that cases of religious bigots victimizing gay people are far more common than the reverse.

Public accommodation laws exist to protect the rights of people who would otherwise be subjected to unfair discrimination.  Nobody has to provide a public accommodation if they don't agree with those laws.  If you don't like the rules of the game, then don't play the game.