Being gay or carrying a gun...why are they treated differently legally in businesses?

originally posted by: MarlinGrace
The 1964 civil rights act does not include sexual preference into it's description, (race, color, religion, or national origin) right now it is done at a state level, not all states have made this provision to protect gays. So in some instances they could be refused service. But it's pretty much on it's way out.

I say if you don't like it, leave go to another business, or start your own, that would be freedom. If someone is that bad as to refuse service to gays or anyone of color etc. they are their own worst enemy and will put themselves out of business sooner or later anyway.

I also don't think because a person doesn't like a particular race or sexual orientation that's his opinion and problem, fining them millions, taking away their business, chastising them in public for weeks isn't an example of freedom either. This is one of the things that makes this country great, just don't do business with them. When it hits their wallet they will change or sell, but it's something the public can change anytime they want. Just like better wages at wal-mart, apparently the public could care less about the wages, they have never slowed down. The power of the purse works everytime.

Correct, but that's why I phrased what I wrote as such - that you frequently don't get to discriminate. As mentioned, various states have already passed laws adding sexual orientation to the list of things you don't get to discriminate on, while other states have not.

There's a reason there is law regarding this. Let's say all gun shops (and other gun sellers) decided to not sell guns to women. Now, all men are able to easily go buy a gun, but it'd be much harder for women to obtain guns. This infringes on the right of women to bear arms... and greatly impacts their safety.

In a more indirect scenario, if banks were able to discriminate on whom they gave loans to, it would have immense effects on society. If banks all refused loans to a certain group of people, that group would really suffer. No cars, no homes, no businesses...

originally posted by: matafuchs
a reply to: Benevolent Heretic

All people have their right to beliefs, opinions and actions.

Wait - we do not have rights to SOME actions. Beliefs and opinions, yes, but actions? Not necessarily. You don't have the right to act any way you wish.

What I am stating that is that he has the right to refuse but if it is against a law or if there is community ban on using his services that is the consequence of his belief, opinion and action.

I agree. He gave up his business rather than conform to the law.

As someone else stated, the Westboro baptists are protected and they are royal holes. You do not have to like it but you cannot suppress it in my mind either. People like that will hang themselves in society...

Agreed. I fully support their right of expression.

originally posted by: Greven
Let's say all gun shops (and other gun sellers) decided to not sell guns to women. Now, all men are able to easily go buy a gun, but it'd be much harder for women to obtain guns. This infringes on the right of women to bear arms... and greatly impacts their safety.

I don't think this is true. There is no right to BUY guns.

a reply to: Benevolent Heretic

Ahhh...but you do have the right to act how you wish. You have the right to demonstrate which is an action and protected. If those actions physically harm someone or occur on private property that is another matter and you can be arrested but peaceful protest is protected.

Case in point - Westboro Baptists...

The Original constitution was created not to limit what a person could do but what the Federal government could do to that person. Over time it has eroded and been misconstrued to the point people think they are laws to follow as a citizen when they are really laws to restrict our government. Too bad it has come to that...

Guns don't kill people, crazy people with easy access to guns via lax gun laws do however.

Being attracted to a specific type of person is who a person is...biological most likely, the argument is moot though...it is akin to being a different skin tone. This has been pointed out repeatedly, get over it, its arguments like this that make the common citizen see responsible gun owners as little more than "gun nuts"...and gun enthusiasts need to be the ones leading the charge against such nonsense debates.

just my 2 cents (more like 1...damn economy)

a reply to: InverseLookingGlass
I think that there is more there than meets the eye. Social change is never easy and something that challenges the norm is always something that is going to be feared and reviled.

Carrying guns up until a few years ago, no one thought about, nor was it considered a social faux pas, now after all of the media hype, people are now looking at such with suspicion and terror, the idea that the person may decide to go postal or start something.

a reply to: crazyewok

That raises another point: you can legally have a gun. You can legally walk down the street with a gun. You can legally have a dog. You can legally walk down the street with a dog. A business premise may forbid you from entering with a dog...... What's the difference?

I don't hear dog lovers up in arms (pun intended) about this?

a reply to: matafuchs

If I'm reading your OP correctly, I'd say this... Open display of gay affection is objectionable to some. It's repulsive to others. Male, Female..doesn't matter and it's not a cute play to sexual concepts for the people who honestly are offended by it. God knows I'm around enough in the Bible belt out on the far side of opinions to get a good look at how sincere it really is. It's to the core repulsive for some.

Personally, ALL public display of affection, gay or straight, beyond lips on the cheek or holding hands...or hands around the waist while walking or something at most, are too much IMO. I'm prudish and I was raised in a very specific way for values. I'll admit that, but I'm also part of the American population and among a measurable group of it, at that. So..should be considered as much as anyone for that.

Having said that...

The same SHOULD apply to open carry for business owners to say NO!. It is NOT a Constitutional Right to carry a gun on your hip anywhere your whims may fancy it. Even for us with a permit to carry, every state is off limits with places like Court Houses or Jail lobbies, among other things. States that don't have supremacy written in for it also see very different laws (challenged and lost) which bar open carry in some cities but not others.

Even the "Wild West", if one recalls, sometimes had laws of checking your firearm in or absolutely not carrying openly among the town folk. It's seen in movies, but actually existed that way too. I don't recall reading anything screaming Constitutional Violation back then, to have to check a firearm under some conditions....back when disputes weren't always settled in a civil courtroom.

A business owner should have the right to determine who they do business with. Within the laws of our civil rights, and those are specifically defined..not adjusted as we'd like...they should have whatever discretion they want.....and the public ALSO has the right to see them run out of business by simply not DOING business with them.

Free nation all around.

originally posted by: Greven

originally posted by: MarlinGrace
The 1964 civil rights act does not include sexual preference into it's description, (race, color, religion, or national origin) right now it is done at a state level, not all states have made this provision to protect gays. So in some instances they could be refused service. But it's pretty much on it's way out.

I say if you don't like it, leave go to another business, or start your own, that would be freedom. If someone is that bad as to refuse service to gays or anyone of color etc. they are their own worst enemy and will put themselves out of business sooner or later anyway.

I also don't think because a person doesn't like a particular race or sexual orientation that's his opinion and problem, fining them millions, taking away their business, chastising them in public for weeks isn't an example of freedom either. This is one of the things that makes this country great, just don't do business with them. When it hits their wallet they will change or sell, but it's something the public can change anytime they want. Just like better wages at wal-mart, apparently the public could care less about the wages, they have never slowed down. The power of the purse works everytime.

Correct, but that's why I phrased what I wrote as such - that you frequently don't get to discriminate. As mentioned, various states have already passed laws adding sexual orientation to the list of things you don't get to discriminate on, while other states have not.

There's a reason there is law regarding this. Let's say all gun shops (and other gun sellers) decided to not sell guns to women. Now, all men are able to easily go buy a gun, but it'd be much harder for women to obtain guns. This infringes on the right of women to bear arms... and greatly impacts their safety.

In a more indirect scenario, if banks were able to discriminate on whom they gave loans to, it would have immense effects on society. If banks all refused loans to a certain group of people, that group would really suffer. No cars, no homes, no businesses...

Agreed, we work as a country towards fairness everyday but I don't know if you can ever legislate moral fairness in people. As a species we could a do a whole lot better. I guess this is why the lawyers do so well.

originally posted by: Benevolent Heretic

originally posted by: Greven
Let's say all gun shops (and other gun sellers) decided to not sell guns to women. Now, all men are able to easily go buy a gun, but it'd be much harder for women to obtain guns. This infringes on the right of women to bear arms... and greatly impacts their safety.

I don't think this is true. There is no right to BUY guns.

I don't know about you but I don't want my woman having a gun, there would be bodies strone down the freeways of bad drivers. I won't even teach her how to shoot. Flying ashtrays seem much safer....

a reply to: Wrabbit2000

The same SHOULD apply to open carry for business owners to say NO!. It is NOT a Constitutional Right to carry a gun on your hip anywhere your whims may fancy it. Even for us with a permit to carry, every state is off limits with places like Court Houses or Jail lobbies, among other things. States that don't have supremacy written in for it also see very different laws (challenged and lost) which bar open carry in some cities but not others.

I feel the whole of this is strange. I was raised in a small town in the desert and lived from age 10 in CA. In all my 58 years I have never seen people walk around with guns. They didn't take guns into stores or restaurants...I never ever saw this even though i grew up with cowboys, the real kind that break wild horses.

Something I wonder about is if a guy sits down at a table in a restaurant to eat with a side arm, how do we know someone will not grab his gun and use it? It makes the weapon open to everyone around him in a sense. If he carries the gun and it is not loaded it is not going to serve any function in an emergency like being attacked.

If it is not locked down in the holster and is loaded every person who cannot buy a gun could get ahold of his.

Wow, the US sounds like a complicated place.

The whole analogy between serving gay people and displaying firearms just makes my head hurt a little.

What about gay people with firearms?
Sounds like that's what it takes to get some service in some places!

Well, in SA our Constitution forbids discrimination on the basis of gender, race or sexual orientation.
Religions can discriminate in their churches, but not public businesses.
Firearms must be licensed and concealed in public, because they are stolen, and some people have been robbed because of their firearms.
Then there's also badly kept, aged and faulty firearms, and some silly people who might blow their own family jewels off.
They always say don't even apply or get one unless you are ready to kill somebody, and I'm not, but I don't mind if other people carry them.
Conceal your loaded weapon and nobody should have a problem here.

I suppose when in Rome ... if I went to Mogadishu I suppose people wearing rocket launchers wouldn't bother me, or just as little as security guards with machine guns at the auto-bank.
However, having coffee with people wearing suicide-bomber vests would bother me, even if it is a cultural double standard.

a reply to: Char-Lee

Something I wonder about is if a guy sits down at a table in a restaurant to eat with a side arm, how do we know someone will not grab his gun and use it? It makes the weapon open to everyone around him in a sense.

I have to chuckle a bit at seeing you key on this, and it's why it's never set well with me to see people, outside of cops and the literal State authority behind them by a phone call, carrying openly. The cop deters the action (most of the time, anyway) simply by being a cop. Normal people with a gun openly on the hip tho?

Well, I've always looked at people carrying a gun I can see for two things...are they carrying their gun arm differently (I.E. is this a way of life to them, or an 'exercise in statements') and how easily could it be taken from them (do they have situational awareness or head up butt syndrome?). it's not comforting on how often it's not the good side I think I've seen...and sometimes it is cops too I suppose on the HUB syndrome.

Concealed is something I fully support but concealed means concealed. As in..it's there as a tool if needed, not as a statement to be flaunted. Flaunting can make a whole room uncomfortable, as the thread is referring to, I believe.

Open Carry and Concealed Carry to me are two separate things and will be addressed I am sure in another thread. In this case, I was really referring to people who may have a CWP and are not allowed in a Starbucks, Chipolte, etc. I mentioned earlier that I would leave a restaurant if I was there with my kids and there was an open carry.

I appreciate the comments in the thread.

I just wanted to see what the consensus thought about whether a business owner should have the right to restrict something that is legal to do within the guidelines of the state you live in.

Even the NRA thinks it is 'weird' what the Open Carry folks are doing

www.mysanantonio.com...

originally posted by: matafuchs
Open Carry and Concealed Carry to me are two separate things and will be addressed I am sure in another thread. In this case, I was really referring to people who may have a CWP and are not allowed in a Starbucks, Chipolte, etc. I mentioned earlier that I would leave a restaurant if I was there with my kids and there was an open carry.

I appreciate the comments in the thread.

I just wanted to see what the consensus thought about whether a business owner should have the right to restrict something that is legal to do within the guidelines of the state you live in.

I think he should--it's his private business--but then I think it should apply in all cases: race, religion, gay, straight, whatever. There should be no specially protected classes.

Now, I'm not agreeing with discrimination. In business, all I care is if their money is good. That's the entire reason I'm in business in the first place. I just am uncomfortable with the state legislating who people may or may not associate with. It reeks of thought police to me.