Riff-ruhs, or Religious Freedom Restoration Acts, are all
the rage in state legislatures across America these days. According to the Associated Press (April 2, 2015), 20 states have
passed some sort of RFRA, and another dozen are considering them.
So what is the cause of this? When the Supreme Court ruled
in favor of same-sex marriages, some conservative business owners were
incensed. They felt the law now demands they serve, in the normal course of
business, same-sex couples that want to, say, buy a wedding cake or flowers for
their wedding, have a photographer take pictures of their wedding, buy dinner
in a local restaurant, or perhaps buy a house. Most of the opposition is based
on the owner’s “strongly held religious beliefs” that same sex marriage is
against their religion, and therefore they do not want to offer their goods or
services to those engaged in the legal act of same sex marriage. Consequently,
the lobbied their state legislators to pass laws that would allow them to
legally deny goods or services to “those people,” based on their religious
beliefs.
Why? Do they not realize the consequences of these actions?
Is discrimination against same sex couples so important to them, that they
would rather go out of business, than sell to the whole public?
When a couple is preparing to marry, they consult with
friends and family members, as well as social media, when choosing
photographers, florists, and bakers. After making a decision, based on the
above recommendations, they go to that particular shop, perhaps only to find
out they are being denied service, because they are a same sex couple. If this
happened to you, what would you do? Perhaps in a large city, you would go
elsewhere to purchase the goods or services; but in small rural communities,
that may not be feasible. Then what?
Henry Ford once remarked, if a person is satisfied, they
will tell 3 people; if they are dissatisfied, they will tell 7. In this day of
social media, I suspect the numbers, in case of dissatisfaction, are
considerably higher. So, what does that matter, you might be thinking.
Do you remember when South
Africa was still enforcing apartheid? Groups
of people rallied against investment firms and companies that were doing
business in South Africa ,
and slowly but surely the economic factors began to have a telling affect.
Investment firms, retirement funds, and businesses changed models and the money
to support apartheid dried up. The change happened. (And no, I am not
minimizing the effect of Nelson Mandela and others within South
Africa who worked so hard for change.) So it
will be for businesses that discriminate, albeit supposedly legal to do
so.
As for me, I am in a heterosexual marriage, so on one hand,
this doesn’t affect me. But, being who I am, and my strongly held beliefs, I
will not knowingly patronize a business that discriminates against anyone,
regardless of the reason.
Just some food for thought.
Your comments are welcome, as always.
R.M. “Bob” Hartman