Do Businesses Have the Right to Refuse Service Based on Moral/Religious Objections?

[suebee]

Wow! I deliberately didn't look at the poll results or the other posts before my initial response. I would never have expected this kind of response as a community. Surprising.

Originally Posted by Linus

And if I can also add, in Canada, religious organizations can choose to not marry a same-sex couple (religious freedom) and for that reason, if that can be allowed, the businesses should have that right as well.

If I was a business owner in Canada I would also have the right to refuse business to straight married if I wanted to.

And if K and I get married in Canada, we'd make sure that all those we chose to business with us were supportive. I certainly wouldn't choose someone who isn't supportive.

I don't care for discrimination on religious grounds, but there has to be some allowance for religious freedom. It should be added that it's only religious institutions who have the right to refuse on religious grounds. A case was played out not too long ago (in Alberta I believe) where a marriage commissioner refused to perform his duties based on his religious beliefs (refused to marry a gay couple). His case went to court and was not found to have merit. My take: if you can't do your job based on your religious beliefs, especially your PUBLIC SERVICE job, where you supposedly work FOR the people - get another job.

Originally Posted by Medusa

I'd probably err on the side of the business owner, even if in this case I don't care for their reasoning.

I think about how I would feel as the owner of this site if the Federal government came and told me that I had to allow x, y, or z people.

There was an article several years ago about a restaurant owner who had a very upscale establishment that disallowed children. A couple who demanded to bring their children inside sued the crap out of them - I'm going to have to look it up because I can't remember if they won or not but I did remember thinking that the restaurant owner should have the right to create whatever ambience in their establishment that they saw fit without the courts telling them otherwise.

Would it piss me off if a business refused to serve me or significantly altered the services provided to me because of their religion or me being Gay? Probably. But I think a good example of this is that there is a bookstore here in town called "Hastings" that does not have a Gay and Lesbian section of books- so I get to make the choice to withdraw my Gay dollars and spend them elsewhere.

Okay, is this perhaps a major difference between the U.S. viewpoint and Canadian viewpoint? Because for me my government is MINE. It is there to protect the rights of EVERYBODY. If they're doing it right somebody is always going to be pissed off I guess. But as far as discrimination goes, I don't know that anybody has the RIGHT to do that. Different people might very well have differing opinions as to what is discrimination, but the rights of the minority should always be protected. I'd love to hear what others have to say about government interference v.s. societal protections of minorities.