So, you know all this brouhaha, all these hysterics about how bakers, and photographers, and other service-providers who routinely work for gay clientele (but draw a line at serving gay weddings because they feel it imperils their souls) are horrible people?
And you know the whole “if you think that way, then you’re a bigot,” thing, because governments and pundits have taken it into their heads that it is their job to define “sin” to another person?
And you know that whole, “refusing to serve someone because they think differently than you is all Jim Crow-y and immoral?”
Yeah, well…so much for that.
A gay stylist in Santa Fe refused to cut New Mexico Governor Susana Martinez’s hair due to her stance on same-sex marriage. KOB-TV’s Stuart Dyson reports.
A Santa Fe hairdresser is waging his own boycott of sorts: He is denying service to the governor of New Mexico because she opposes gay marriage.
Antonio Darden, who has been with his partner for 15 years, said he made his views clear the last time Gov. Susana Martinez’s office called to make an appointment.
“The governor’s aides called not too long ago wanting another appointment to come in,” Darden told KOB.com. “Because of her stances and her views on this, I told her aides, ‘no.’ They called the next day asking if I’d changed my mind about taking the governor in, and I said ‘no’ again.”
Martinez has said marriage should be between a man and a woman. Darden, who said he has cut the governor’s hair three times, said he won’t serve her unless she changes her mind about gay marriage.
Darden apparently feels that it would go against his own personal moral code — his individual conscience — to cut the governor’s hair. He does not see this decision as an act of “intolerance.” In his mind, he believes that to cut her hair would be to co-operate with evil — a kind of sin, if not against God, then against his own reason and beliefs. He may fear that serving to the governor could be misconstrued as an affirmation of her views.
And no one in the press is arguing differently on the governor’s behalf. No one is suggesting that, by refusing to cut the hair of a person whose position is in alignment with the law, Mr. Darden is denying her a basic civil-right. Quite the opposite; many on social media are saying he is within his rights to refuse her.
I concur. If he is, though, then so are the Christians refusing to serve gay weddings. You can’t have it both ways.
But sadly, you can. That’s the beauty of adopting anti-foundationalism as your go-to philosophical stance: you are undaunted by accusations of inconsistency or hypocrisy; you reject the logical rigor reinforced by outmoded Enlightenment ideas that assume a kind of symmetry in thought; and you are allowed — as part of your philosophical and intellectual model — to just pick and choose your arguments based on the individual context.
Or, to put it another way, you grant yourself permission to change every intellectual rule on the fly, and advance sophistry as a kind of elevated, legitimate art form.
What we, as classical liberals, must do to combat such nonsense is not merely point out the hypocrisy, or the inconsistencies in logic, that make up the progressive’s self-serving form of “pragmatism.” Instead, we must simply refuse to comply — to engage in civil disobedience, and to bring our case to the American people when the government tries to run us out of business for insisting on our first amendment protections, even and especially if the courts, which have moved increasingly in the direction of activist superlegislatures granting themselves leave to act as philosopher kings and social engineers, rule against us.
Which brings us back to the states and the Article 5 conventions of the states process. The power of the government comes from our willingness to comply with its edicts. But once it rejects the rule of law in favor of selective enforcement and creating its own police state, in which the law is used as a weapon to beat back legitimate policy opposition, then what you have is tyranny, plain and simple.
I reject the lie of anti-foundationalism just as vehemently as I reject the institutionalization of a form of “interpretation” that is nothing of the sort, but rather is a will to power, a rule by consensus, a rejection of individual autonomy reinforced by an incoherent set of linguistic rules many on the right have been too blind to reject and too eager to internalize — creating the conditions for a steady movement leftward.
This movement is not accidental, nor is it incidental. It was planned and, under the current epistemological assumptions coming from the left we’ve allowed to take root, it is also inevitable, as I’ve been at pains to explain over the years here.
The time is coming when we will not have many choices left should we wish to preserve a representative republic. That’s not hyperbole; it’s fact. If we don’t reject the left’s institutional assumptions and refuse to abide them, we will have to find other ways to save ourselves.
Either that, or we sink into the morass of humankind’s persistent lot, to be ruled over by those who assert a dominance over us, Eloi to their Morlocks, sheep to their wolves, Hillary to their Bills.
And that ain’t my style.
(h/t DarthLevin)
Here’s where I think Alinksy’s Rules should apply: Martinez should sue the hairdresser into oblivion. And I say this as someone who thinks that any business, period, should be able to choose whom to serve or not, and let the market sort out the consequences. Right now, I’m not feeling too charitable. Instead, I’ve decided to release my inner dick and put the screws back to these people. Do I think that either the public or the courts will support such an action? Of course not. However, I want it to be perfectly clear that we are now an Animal Farm nation, where some pigs are more equal than others.
That would be the very model of a modern major pyhrric victory, I think.
The smart play is for the governor to go to the podium, declare she respect’s and supports Mr. Darden’s decision to run his business in accordance to the dictates of his conscience, and to then announce that she’s going to work to see that Christians are afforded the same rights of conscience in law.
Exactly right, Ernst. I fear this would never happen though, since some are more equal than others.
Ah, the old “Intellectual Fly Rule”, whereby you can either be consistent in your thinking or not – don’t matter no how.
The consistency is found in the conceptual framework of victimhood. Darden is victimized when the governor pays him to cut her hair.
Just like gay couples are victimized when christian bakers and photographers refuse to take money in exhcange for a service.
Wife Says Democrat Alan Grayson Wages One-Man War on Women
– That asks the essential question: “When is a missle test a metaphore for a middle finger?
– Obama continues to display his faith in the support of the voters in ObamaCare. “Theres no doubt that the way I put that forth, nnnhhh, so unequivically was not, uhhhh, accurate”. Bumblefuck is now putting off the day of reckoning past the elections. Its not about patients, its about politics and power.
– Because, really, you just can’t own enough pink for your wardrobe.
It’s nice that someone has gone ahead and provided a real-life example of goose & gander sauce, but it’s still fraught with the SSM self-righteousness.
Sow this seed everywhere you can: So no printer gets to tell the West. Bap. “Church” to GET LOST when they ask for a fresh batch of “God Hates Fags” signs?
123 characters
Because everyone hates Fred Phelps’s Clan Of Horror. It’s the one thing we as a country can unite behind.
schadenfreude news
Wasserman Schultz Says Gay Men Grab Party Leadership Roles Away From Lesbians
Ernst nails the governor’s best move. Will she take that route? Unlikely, because New Mexico, Albuquerque and Santa Fe especially, are, sadly, Blue.
I’m guessing there’s another hairdresser in New Mexico she can use. Try in Deming or White Sands. Or Road Trip to Texas.
>because New Mexico, Albuquerque and Santa Fe especially, are, sadly, Blue. <
alot of hair stylist bigots in new mexico
It may also be possible she can find a gay Christian hairdresser who personally repudiates samesexmarriage, even if only because of a belief that marriage itself stinks on ice.
he should cut the hoochie’s hair I think
that would be the professional thing to do
>he should cut the hoochie’s hair I think<
nah he can cut what he wants. just extend that right to his fellow americans.
Color me shocked: Transgender Student Recants Sexual Assault Report
Caroline Glick is going to be on Levin’s show in the next few minutes, talking about her book which released today. check it.
i like your idea ms. glick. something feasible for a change.
it puts the squeeze on the pali islamists.
“missle”
Ack
The response Ernst suggests is, I think, filled with the spirit of what Jeff is urging.
As for the Christian bakers, etc.: become Outlaws and find ways around The Rule Of Whim that pervades the Law. Check with a good lawyer and find out if you list the cost of each cake at, say, $50,000, but offer a discount of $49,900 to, say, NRA, members, as one example.
can you price a gay “marriage” cake @ $5000 and real marriage @ $1000? are using pricing signals a 1st amendment right?
indeed is not most of proggtardia trying to eliminate pricing signals from society for “social justice”?
di
I got into quite a discussion with some proggie about what constitutes a “public accommodation” … He was sneering at my “lack of understanding” about the backwards AZ bill that enabled “illegal discrimination”
I used that exact scenario … could a custom t-shirt shop turn down a “God hates Fags” order?
He refused to answer. Ever.
That’s because only bad discrimination should be illegal, but discriminating against bad discriminators should be mandatory, you sneerworthy hobbitess.
>He refused to answer. Ever.<
they are societal wrecktifiers or rectifiers
The Anchoress (Ms. Scalia) is only one day behind me.
He refused to answer. Ever.
That’s why it’s such an excellent example, even if I do say so myself.
Everyone knows that the proprietor of a store can refuse to take any gig, any time, for any reason. Which is why stores often post signs saying that they reserve the right to refuse service at their discretion.
Sounds like bakers, photogs, and caterers might have to be “booked solid” every time they’re offered a gig they don’t want.
Just like they have always done.
If I was a baker, I’d put a sign in the door, on the counter, behind the cash register, etc.
“Wedding cakes made by special request only.”
Just to see what that does to the “but it’s on the menu!” argument.
I think it’s time poor little Adolph Hitler Campbell was reunited with his family. He was the child who was removed from his parents’ custody when his mother ordered him a birthday cake at Walmart a few years ago. The parents it seems are Nazis and have several children with names like Eva Braun Campbell, et alia.
I guess being a neo-Nazi is cause to have one’s children seized by the state. Being gay is cause to sue the living daylights out of bakers and photographers.
Maybe cake should be outlawed. It seems to be a common element in both stories.
Not outlawed but heavily regulated as a controlled substance. After all Harvey Milk got shot by an out of control cake eater.
That was a snack cake and those are now heavily regulated.
Lord knows what could happen if a snack cake fell into the hands of a pot smoker who was jonesing.
Boston cream pie is a deceptively titled cake.
IMPORTANT! : If someone offers you come “yellow cake”, ask for more information before you agree to receive it.
This particular kind of cake is rather popular but not my cup of tea.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZItvCgsMMgI
Here is a woman reasoning — shockingly! — publicly, in the stark light of day we might say. But do not listen to this, for god’s sake. Reasoning in the light of day is infectious, it can ruin your brain by altering your thinking. Reasoning in the light of day is dangerous, deadly, even. So just don’t. Don’t do it. Be warned away. Let the sleeping dogs lay sleeping.
Well now.
And what nations or terror organizations does the ClownDisaster reward at his own nation’s expense? Iran? Syria? Hamas? The Muslim Brotherhood?
Hnhnn, that’s a stumper.
And what ally nation does the ClownDisaster punish merely by opening his mouth?
Hnhnn, another stumper.
And in Syria, the tattering of the “red” line.
I’ll be damned. 51 Nay votes on the Adegbile nomination. Adios, dirtbag.
The Hill: Boehner: Hold Lerner in Contempt
Yeah, but no, John. It’s you we hold in contempt, you spineless piece of shit.
Wow, the Dems must really be sweating bullets about hanging on to the Senate, huh?
Are we quite sure the Democrat votes against weren’t simply on account that they resented not being able to pronounce his name?
They like their jobs more than they like cop killers and race wars.
On the question that they like their jobs, I notice I haven’t correlated the nay Democrat votes with the Democrat Senators who happen to be standing for reelection this fall. Has anyone got a rundown on that?
*** “a total of seven Democrats peeled off”
Harry Reid, for procedural reasons.
Bob Casey, Pennsylvania. (Because Pennsylvanians’ memories will run longer than the next election, surely)
Sens. Chris Coons, of Delaware; Heidi Heitkamp, of North Dakota; Joe Manchin, of West Virginia; Mark Pryor, of Arkansas; and John Walsh, of Montana. ***
Pryor, I know is running. Coons, also. John Walsh, for Baucus’ seat, since he was appointed to fill it after Baucus’ retirement. That’s it, I think.
Oh, surprise! Whoever would have seen that coming?
Well of course it does. What else would it do with inbound missiles to Gaza from Syria through Iran? Gotta do what’s necessry to improve the chances that once used those Gazan missiles would have a better kill-ratio.
Pryor may have just sunk his Arkansan ship.
Ace arguing for
Republicansconservatives to learn how to lie successfully —just like Democrats is just the cherry on top.And Pryor only hurt himself with undecided voters in Arkansas who watch MSNBC.
Unless Republicans make a big deal out of it.
Going to be hard to use that footage without MSNBC going apeshit over copyright.
And they know they’ll lose on fair use grounds in court –after the election.
(And even that assumes the GOP and/or Cotton campaign and/or ind. 3rd party challenges the cease-and-desist from using our copyrighted material letters)
>Sens. Chris Coons, of Delaware;<
wilmington is a philly news market