TMCTLT wrote:That's correct and yes it's " equal opportunity offender " rules.....as with the Smoking Ban everywhere, if left alone the problem would have solved itself. If a business owner chooses to allow smoking great, those who don't like it find another bar/ restaurant to go to where smoking is prohibited. Much the same if a particular business decides they will not serve the gay community, find another that will...if there's none out there then Start one. If a given community does or doesn't approve of how a business conducts itself.....I expect it will show up in his / her bottom line and they
( the business owner ) will have to decide if " lost revenue " is worth it!! Let the People speak with their pocketbooks not through constant legislation
So, there's a very clear reason why this isn't a "clean cut decision". On paper, this sounds great. If a business doesn't want to serve blacks, and blacks are 30% of the community's population, well the business will suffer. People can vote with their wallets.
But this legislation was initially put in place to align with the primary theme of our Bill of Rights, to protect from the tyranny of the majority. When you have a group with very little money, or which is a very small percentage of the community, they will be run roughshod over. Remember, as an old, white, christian male (I'll even assume straight), you have more options available to you. If someone decides not to serve any part of the group you're in, there's so many of you that it WILL have an impact on their bottom line, hell, there's so many of you one of you will open a new business.
but what if there were two of you in the entire community?
If the grocery store didn't want to serve you, where do you get your food? Another store isn't going to open to get the margin on those two more customers, especially if the community were bigoted enough to not want to be at the grocery store you were in.
Bottom line, I like the idea on paper that a business owner can refuse to serve christians, veterans, black people whatever they want and be punished by the community later. But the reality is that there are true minority populations who don't have the ability to "punish" merchants by withholding significant amounts of business.
Are you personally willing to throw your white, christian, straight, male buying power in the fight as well? If we allowed businesses to choose who to serve/not serve, would you personally refuse to patronize a business which refused to serve gays? Or a business which refused to serve blacks? Or would you take a "it doesn't apply to me, so I'll keep going there" stance? (which ultimately reinforces the tyranny of the majority).