HylianSwordsman said:
I see where you guys are coming from with this, and it might work in today's day and age, I'm just wondering, how would you deal with it if people started discriminating for other religious reasons? Say for example, that an atheist decides not to serve Christians because he believes that religion is evil. I imagine you'd advocate for the same "vote with your wallet" approach or "leave a bad review" approach. Free market approaches, I get it. But with Christianity on the decline, and non-religious people making up 30% of the nation and growing, one day Christians could be a minority. Lets say this atheist exists in a future America where Christians are as common as Jews and Muslims are now. Non-religious people are the vast majority, and it's as common to look down upon it as it is to look down on gays now. If the atheist shop owner defines his religious stance as promoting non-religion, he could claim under this court decision that he should be able to discriminate against Christians for religious freedom reasons. Is that fair for the Christian? Shouldn't he be able to participate equally in society regardless of his religious views? You might say yes, but in this future, there probably wouldn't be much of an outcry, and the atheist would still get plenty of business because most people in this future aren't Christian, don't care, and many even look down on Christians. A free market solution will never come. And don't try to answer this with "oh that'll never happen" because a) you don't know that and b) it's just a hypothetical to illustrate my point that the free market isn't always going to care enough to solve the problem. A fair democracy doesn't rely on the free market to enforce fairness, it lets everyone participate in society equally (unless someone violates someone else's rights, like a murderer, who then doesn't get to participate and is instead jailed). |
I'm not gonna take the easy way out and say it won't happen. Heck, what you mentioned does have a chance of happening. Crazier and more ludicrous things have happened in America. Yes, Christians are diminishing in numbers at this point, but it won't stop religious-based discrimination from happening in both sides. For example, in your same hypothetical future, an atheist baker based on a small conservative town decides he wants to turn down several cakes for Christian weddings. Instead of the customers forcing him to bake it through law, they could happily go to other bakeries in town. They all know about the atheist shop owner who defined his religious stance by promoting non-religion and they'll look for someone else who can give them a better service. Either he makes a compromise or moves out to another place where only atheists will be buying his cakes. It's a free market so he can do whatever he wants, even if it's harmful for his finances.
And like Cobretti here, the more the extremists on both sides let themselves be known, the more they'll get mocked at by both religious and secular citizens.
Again, I'm not saying it won't happen. But it's just a hypothesis, a "what if", a chance.
Also, I find the bolded premise quite curious because I thought atheists, by definition, are against organized religion and won't consider themselves to be part of one.
