Oh my! Such a can of worms has been opened in Arizona that even the Republican senators who originally backed the bill are trying to tell the cool kids that, hey! they're cool, too, and they didn't really mean to be uncool at all. I'm talking, of course, about the bill in Arizona's legislature that will allow private businesses to discriminate against any customer based on religious belief.
The horror! Oh, the humanity!
Twitter has overheated! Facebook rage runs rampant! Obviously, by passing such a law, Arizona is trying to stomp all over the LGBT community and promote hatred and hate-speech and hate-crimes and just a general overflowing of hatred all over the place. It must be the work of those nefarious and overreaching religious nut-jobs who hate blacks and gays and anyone who is different! People who proudly proclaim that they never go to church or practice any organized religion are declaring that they must know the Bible better than most schmucks who go to church, who are (to reiterate) the very clods who have brought such an awful bill to pass.
It's all very dramatic and very stupid.
So let's look beyond the merely superficial, hair-raising headlines, shall we? Let's get a bit of perspective into what is and is not freedom. Then let's talk about how so many tolerant and compassionate people are completely missing the mark.
First of all, a bill allowing private businesses to discriminate against any customer based on religious belief is not the end the of the world. Remember those "No Shirt, No Shoes, No Service" signs in the convenience store by the beach (or anywhere else)? Yeah, that's discrimination. Remember those "We reserve the right to refuse service to any customer for any reason" signs in restaurants and bars (not that I frequent bars, but I've been in enough to know they're there)? Yeah, that's also discrimination.
The problem is that people think "discrimination" is a bad word. If you're discriminating, you're obviously an intolerant, incompassionate, and wholly unfeeling lout. If you discriminate, it must mean you're some sort of bigot or homophobe (which is a world I detest, as it's so completely misused) and you should probably be shot at dawn in the main square after being forced to stand in the stocks overnight and be pelted with rotten vegetables and cow dung. And yet the same people who believe discrimination is evil also make choices about what brands to buy, which people to be friends with, what clothes to wear, what car to drive, and where they work. In short, everyone discriminates. To discriminate means to make a value judgement based on your beliefs, experience, perception, tastes, and understanding.
Of course, in this case, people are up in arms about the possibility that private business owners will be able to choose which customers to serve and which not to, and because the stories have made national headlines about gay couples suing private florists or bakers for not providing their services for a wedding to which the owners objected on religious grounds, discrimination for business owners must mean that business owners will now throw out the gays en masse.
Being of a libertarian mindset, I support the right of absolutely any private business to discriminate about whom they will and will not serve. Why? Not because I'm a heartless, bigoted homophobe. No, it's because I think we are all benefited by as much liberty in business as possible. I think it is absolutely immoral of the State to legislate that any private business owner must serve absolutely everyone who walks through their doors.
GASP! I can hear someone claiming that I would have supported segregation in the Old South! Maybe even slavery!
Let's be logical here. If a private business is free to discriminate, the market is much more free. Free, unfettered markets produce products and services that are based on what the public is willing to pay for. Jobs are created, creativity and ingenuity are rewarded, and people find new products they didn't know they needed before. Wealth is created this way, and anyone can get a share of that wealth by coming up with a popular product or service. Any attempt at forcing private businesses to serve one set of people or not serve another set of people gets in the way of this process. That, to me, creates more evil in the long run than allowing discrimination. Yes, evil. I said evil.
Once the State can tell you whom you must serve, they can also tell you whom you must not serve. Remember Hitler's Germany, where private businesses were penalized for serving Jews? What if much-maligned Christians in the U.S. became the new boogeyman, not to be treated as full citizens--or even as full humans? What if it were people with dark skin? Oh, wait, that's already happened. So don't tell me it can't happen here. And if you allow the modern State to tell private businesses whom they must serve, it's happened again.
But what about the gay people who want cakes or flowers for their weddings? How fair is it that they can't get them from people who are religiously opposed to gay marriage?
I tell my children that I'm going to make them t-shirts with the words "It's not fair!" printed on the front. I hear that phrase so much, and it's something you expect from immature children, not from adults.
Okay, so what about dirty, stinking homeless people who regularly get thrown out of stores for being dirty, stinky, drunk, foul-mouthed, or annoying? What about people who don't get served because they aren't wearing shoes or a shirt? What about someone who walks into a store and begins to antagonize everyone in it with threats? Should you be forced to serve all of those people? Even if they hurt your business or threaten your other customers or you whole-heartedly disagree with their lifestyle?
Yes, it is the same thing.
So if this bill passes, what happens? It means that any private business owner remains in control of his or her business. It means he or she can discriminate about which customers to serve or not serve. And if a gay couple walks in and is rejected on religious grounds, the gay couple has the opportunity to find an establishment that would be more than happy to take their money for services they are willing to render.
The point is this: it doesn't matter if it's on religious grounds or political grounds or whatever grounds. Private business is PRIVATE and has the right to discriminate. This is the way the free market works. If you don't like a store for their discrimination policies, choose another store. Spend your money in establishments that want your money. Vote with your wallet. Tell your friends. This is how all of us participate in the free market. Those private businesses who make choices that are unpopular will feel the consequences in their bottom line. Maybe they change their policies, maybe they go bankrupt. But it's their choice because they are PRIVATE.
Emotions and hurt feelings do not enter into this conversation, which is often the currency of leftist policies. Free markets work best for everyone, regardless of race, color, religion, gender, or sexual orientation. When the State dictates to private business owners that they no longer have the right to discriminate for any reason that blows in on the political wind, there is no free market. Then we all suffer for someone's hurt feelings and downtrodden emotions. We all lose more liberty and freedom. We all take another step toward evil.
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