Why I used to support gay marriage, but no longer do.

[JollyRoger]

Even if I believe they are guilty doesn't mean I agree with the maximum punishment.

 

[civman110]

Even if I believe they are guilty doesn't mean I agree with the maximum punishment.

That's true, but that's quite different from what we were talking about originally.

 

[bernie14]

I usually offer a free consultation to evaluate the case before quoting a fee. Part of my decision making processes involves how I perceive the stressfulness in working with the client. I may determine the potential work is not worth the stress or I may determine that x amount of money would make it worth it. It is only a part of the decision making and fee setting process and of course I don't disclose my evaluation of the prospect's personality.

Ok...good answer. Another question..., if the clients BS, religious nonsense,etc., are of significant stress that you decide to refuse the case,do you tell them so? Could you legally tell them so??

 

[JollyRoger]

I wouldn't tell them. They might be able to spin it into a claim of religious discrimination, but I think I could probably win on the claim.

 

[bernie14]

I wouldn't tell them. They might be able to spin it into a claim of religious discrimination, but I think I could probably win on the claim.

I hope you would win the claim....i feel l have the right to refuse certain patients. ....thing is this, if you or i were a cake or poster/shirt maker and we had a client that WE, because of our beliefs, thought was crazy, making demands that were significantly stressful ....should we have the right to refuse service and what argument do we use to do so?? We find the colors wrong or tbe logo in bad taste? ??

 

[choxorn]

Even if I believe they are guilty doesn't mean I agree with the maximum punishment.

And, guilty or not, they still deserve a fair trial and the state still has to not violate their rights to get that verdict.

Fact of the matter is, pretty much everyone charged with a crime is guilty of it, District Attorneys won't generally prosecute a case they don't think they can win, and a lot of the time the defendant is pretty obviously guilty. Does that mean that criminal defense lawyers shouldn't bother representing them, and making sure that the prosecution is doing its job right?

 

[Flying Pig]

You don't need an argument - to my mind it's much more professional to say 'I'm sorry, I'm no longer able to represent you - the relevant paperwork is in the post.'

 

[aelf]

Meta? I can try.

"Check your privilege" is overdone. But it's still probably the right response when a predominately white-college-educated-American discussion board takes up fat-shaming predominately lower income demographics. The same internet discussion board where accumulating over 20 years of gross median wages is commonly referred to(by Americans) as "not that much money." If one is suspicious of common Ameri/western-liberal standards being in the best interests of everybody instead of frequently being self-serving and convenient, like I think you might be, I would think you'd probably be on board with questioning the justice of mocking the stupid backwardness of the underclasses.

That all sounds very reasonable. But then you also act like nobody can say anything bad about people who belong to "lower income demographics" (some actually don't, but they share certain similar traits). You automatically assume that people doing that think that their standards are perfect. I can think my standards are not perfect but still point out that some people just suck when it comes to certain things.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

I hope you would win the claim....i feel l have the right to refuse certain patients. ....thing is this, if you or i were a cake or poster/shirt maker and we had a client that WE, because of our beliefs, thought was crazy, making demands that were significantly stressful ....should we have the right to refuse service and what argument do we use to do so?? We find the colors wrong or tbe logo in bad taste? ??

This is where JR has left the reality out in the bright light of day for all to see.

Any business that works on bids has the same opportunity that he has, because a bid is based on numerous factors and there is no requirement to disclose how the company weighted those factors.

I go look at a pool and the pool owner is someone I think will cause me problems, I bid the service high. My bid is high enough to make whatever problems worth my while. I don't have to tell them "you remind me of my ex wife" or " I don't want to fend off your religion every week" or anything else. But yes, if I tell them that I factored their religion into the bidding process I may need a lawyer to convince a court that it was the effects of their religion, ie added time fending off proselytizing every time I service their pool, not religious discrimination that added to the bid.

This shirt maker, or any other printer, could easily do the same. They are not required to make a religio-political stand out of their bidding process. What they did is more akin to something else I have done.

I go to bid a pool. A very pleasant housewife leads me out to the back yard. We chat while I assess the trees and do a quick chemical test on her pool. I'm thinking my usual fee, as there is no reason to change it. But I do always get a feel for the income and stability of my potential client, so I am steering the conversation that direction. She says her husband is a cop. I immediately say "I won't give you a bid." When she asks why I tell her "I do not work for or with cops."

Because choice of employment is not protected I can not only factor it into the bid, but I can openly refuse service and make as much of a political statement out of it as I desire. But the shirtmaker openly took their stand based on an element that is protected. That's their choice, and the subsequent lawsuit is the consequence of that choice.

 

[Borachio]

Now, I'm just plain curious. Are there no "good" cops then, Mr Nothin?

Aren't police officers just like anyone else? That is: they're no better and no worse than anyone?

And isn't being a law enforcement worker just as important a job as a fireman or ambulance driver?

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Now, I'm just plain curious. Are there no "good" cops then, Mr Nothin?

Aren't police officers just like anyone else? That is: they're no better and no worse than anyone?

And isn't being a law enforcement worker just as important a job as a fireman or ambulance driver?

Maybe there are, but it isn't worth the business to take the chance, in my opinion.

All customers at some point either ask for or demand special treatment. With cops ask for is out of the question, and demands backed by a badge and a gun can't be treated like other requests. Better to do without their business altogether.

As to being "no better and no worse" than anyone else, I would say no. Employment is a choice, but part of that choice is being willing to accept the fact that your job will influence your character. I live with the consequences of having trained my conscience to rationalize the possible 'necessity' of incinerating a hundred million people. I can't imagine what I would have to do to my conscience to be a cop, but I know it ain't pretty.

 

[Flying Pig]

If anything, much less, surely? If there's anything that military life teaches you, it's that discipline and authority bring out the best and the worst in people - if you're nasty in uniform, you're still going to be a nasty piece of work out of it, and the reverse is true.

 

[Farm Boy]

That all sounds very reasonable. But then you also act like nobody can say anything bad about people who belong to "lower income demographics" (some actually don't, but they share certain similar traits). You automatically assume that people doing that think that their standards are perfect. I can think my standards are not perfect but still point out that some people just suck when it comes to certain things.

Well, it's probably a personal characteristic, but when people start advocating that the undesirables needs to be controlled since they tend to engage in "socially undesirable lifestyle choices" and those controls generally result in economic sticks and sanction which advantage the upper middle class they start blending into the other white noise of the "thug thug thug" chants in the background. Everyone seems to like to punch down one rung on the ladder and for exactly the same reason. Keeps their own perch clearer.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

If anything, much less, surely?

Not really. The whole military environment made the rationalizing easier to start with, and the fact that incinerating whole continents of people is about as impersonal as killing can get helped as well.

On the other hand, I have lived a life out of the military where meeting violence with violence has not been uncommon and it has been at personal level...and has sometimes strayed into professional. While I have no problem with it when it is meeting violence with violence, when it has been just for money it has weighed on me immediately and unbearably. So, no, I can't see how I could even start down the path of being a cop, myself.

I understand that you have done it, and I also have developed a high regard for you as presented here, which is contradictory. I rationalize most of that with police in the UK being a much different entity than police in the US. Though I do not repeatedly stress "US police" I request that you keep in mind that that is what I always mean and take no offense, as none is meant.

 

[El_Machinae]

“In short, HOO’s declination to print the shirts was based upon the message of GLSO and the Pride Festival and not on the sexual orientation of its representatives or members,” the court wrote in its decision. “In point of fact, there is nothing in the record before the Commission that the sexual orientation of any individual that had contact with HOO was ever divulged or played any part in this case.”

I find that to be a rather fair ruling.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

I find that to be a rather fair ruling.

I do to. My only issue with the entire situation is that the shirt company opted to make a political issue out of turning down business, knowing that when they inevitably got sued for it some bunch of headline seeking Christian crusader attorneys would jump into the case...as was no doubt prearranged.

Had they just said "We have all the business we can handle in that time frame, here's a couple good options that do good work. Thank you for considering us," the end result would have been the same...only easier.

 

[JollyRoger]

I think there is a GoFundMe game afoot with some of these businesses. Play the victim to the evil gays and watch the money roll in.

 

[classical_hero]

Marriage, a sacred institution:

That is pure laziness on your part. It just shows a perons lack of understanding of the Bible by just simply using this graphic. It is not the first time i have seen it and it won't be the last, but is just foolish to rely on this without doig astudy of the ancient cultures around the region, which most people who use this won't ever do.
http://creation.com/monogamy-bible-one-man-woman

It is very important to remember that not everything recorded in the Bible is approved in the Bible.

Polygamy is just like divorce in the eyes of God, something he permitted because of the hardness of man's heart, not because he designed it that way. But through out the Bible we see the consequences of people' actions when they go against God's design.

The Levirate marriage is for the purpose of producing a male heir for the family line and once the heir has been born the brother no longer has a duty for that and is free to go. Without it the family line will die off and the fortune will then go to the nearest male heir, which would be the brother, which is why God killed Onan because of his greed by denying his brother a chance for his family line to continue and thus get the fortune with it.

The "rape" one is even about rape at all, it is about pre-marital sex. In a previous verse th punishment for a rapist is death, whereas in this verse death isn't the punishment, because it is a different situation. Rape was always punished by death.

 

[Flying Pig]

The Levirate marriage is for the purpose of producing a male heir for the family line and once the heir has been born the brother no longer has a duty for that and is free to go. Without it the family line will die off and the fortune will then go to the nearest male heir, which would be the brother, which is why God killed Onan because of his greed by denying his brother a chance for his family line to continue and thus get the fortune with it.

I find it interesting that you can write an entire paragraph like that without acknowledging that the woman in question has any part in this - as if she's entirely an inanimate object to be passed around so that other people can 'fulfil their duties'.

 

[Borachio]

The "rape" one is even about rape at all, it is about pre-marital sex. In a previous verse th punishment for a rapist is death, whereas in this verse death isn't the punishment, because it is a different situation. Rape was always punished by death.

Very strange! But true.

If a man find a damsel that is a virgin, which is not betrothed, and lay hold on her, and lie with her, and they be found;

29 Then the man that lay with her shall give unto the damsel's father fifty shekels of silver, and she shall be his wife; because he hath humbled her, he may not put her away all his days.