Bake the Damn Cake, Already

I'm not sure how much more split it is possible to be on the issue before the Supreme Court on the baker who refused to bake a special cake for a gay wedding. On instinctive principle, I say good for him. In a free society, a citizen should be coerced as infrequently as possible -- and then only as a last resort. If the government tries to force him to do something, he should damn well fight back.

On the other hand, what a stupid point of principle to stand on. If you fear that baking a cake for some gay folk is going to send you to hell, violate your conscience, or otherwise cause you moral conflict, you are clearly taking the whole cake thing too seriously. Would this fellow bake a cake for a hetero couple interested in swinging? Anal sex? Shellfish for dinner? Those things are pretty strongly frowned upon by some religious folk, too. Let me guess: when it's a straight couple, the baker's attitude is, don't ask, don't tell.

All that said, there are a couple of points of principle that are clearly at stake. First, I want to distinguish this from the segregated lunch counters the left has taken to analogizing. The reason we needed the civil rights movement, the civil rights act, protected classes, and all that jazz was not because some peckerwood restaurateurs down south wouldn't let blacks eat at the counter. It was because those states and municipalities had enshrined segregation into law. A blunt tool was needed because there was no legal remedy available locally.

Look at it this way: If a gay couple can get a cake at pretty much any other baker, then society has already provided the remedy to for the problem -- and, I'd argue, will probably mete out a penalty to  those who would refuse to serve all. Thus, the suit against this particular baker is egregious and probably vindictive.

However, if the law in Colorado stated quite clearly that gay people could not be served by any baker, and that a violator of this ban would be subject to sanction or fine, a court case would be only the start. (Tar and feathers for the Coloradans, to say the least.)

But that is not the case here. What did the gay couple suffer? They had to take their business elsewhere. But really, why not sue?  Make the bigot take your money!

Also at stake here is the idea of protected class, as I mentioned. Can you make the baker serve you despite sexuality, gender, race? It appears so. But the baker would be within his rights to deny you if you wanted, let's just say, a MAGA cake, yes? Again, it appears so. So some animals are more equal than others. When North Carolina voted down transgender bathroom rights, Springsteen canceled his concerts there. Now, this isn't like baking a cake. North Carolinians can't go to that other Springsteen down the street. But being a citizen of a state with retrograde views isn't a protected class.

Look, I'm with The Boss on this one. Fuck 'em. But other people making a living by the sweat of their brow or the art of their fingers should be able to say fuck 'em as well -- as long as society is providing a remedy, ideally through good old competition, to that denial of service. (I'd even be inclined to suggest that North Carolina's problem could be remedied by the competition of an electric guitar hurled down a long stairway to the accompaniment of a baying, laryngitic hound dog.)

What I'm fearful of is that we will drift away from a governing principle. Like I said, I could go either way (pun intended) on this case. But whatever way we go, I want an articulated principle on which we may proceed once this is over. It can't simply be that we may deny service to people who hold views we find distasteful -- as long as those are pre-approved distasteful views.

The left would like to hold that, of course you could deny service to Nazis, say, because they are bad and wrong. End of story. But keep in mind that the left will not always be in charge of what views rise to that level of wrongitude.

One final note: Gays across the country were willing to wait patiently as Obama evolved on the issue of gay marriage. Remember that he was as retrograde as our Denver baker for the majority of his  time in office. (And he was the only president we had, after all. We could choose another one down at the dollar store in mid-2014.) Is it crazy to suggest that we can spare a few more moments of evolution for bakers, florists, eyebrow threaders?