by
Les May
A
panel of five judges sitting as the Supreme Court
yesterday gave a ruling which reinforces our right to free speech and
ensures that we cannot be forced to express views that we disagree
with.
The
case revolved around a case where a Gareth Lee had placed an order
for a cake decorated with the words ‘Support Gay Marriage’.
The owners of the bakery, Daniel and Amy McArthur declined the order
because as Christians they were being expected to express a view that
they disagreed with.
Lee
argued that they were discriminating against him because he is a
homosexual. Two lower courts accepted this argument but the Supreme
Court did not.
The
president of the Court Lady Hale said:
‘It
is deeply humiliating to deny someone a service because of that
person’s race, gender, disability, sexual orientation, religion or
belief’.
‘But
that is not what happened in this case. As to Mr Lee’s claim based
on sexual discrimination, the bakers did not refuse to fulfil his
order because of his sexual orientation’.
The
court accepted the argument of the McArthur’s lawyer that forcing
them to bake the cake would be forcing them to go against their
religious beliefs.
Commenting
on this ruling the chairman of the Equality and Human Rights
Commission said:
‘Freedom
of expression – including the right not to express a view – and
freedom of belief are rightfully protected in a democratic society
and this case demonstrates the need for a more nuanced debate about
how we balance competing rights’.
Lee was trying to use the Courts
to force the McArthur’s to accept his view of the world. It was
the action of a bully. His mistake was to argue that the couple were
being ‘homophobic’ when they simply had a different view about
the world. A view to which he took exception.
But as I have argued in another
publication Lee’s approach is far from uncommon.
Increasingly we see people who
express a view which the listener or reader does not like being
labelled as antisemitic, homophobic, islamophobic, mysoginistic or
some similar pejorative epithet.
The courts ruling means that
provided we do not discriminate against someone because of what they
ARE, we will not find ourselves in court for expressing our dissent
from the views they hold. Mr Lee should be happy about this. He can
criticise the views about homosexuality held by some Christians to
his heart’s content safe in the knowledge that he will not find
himself in court for being Christianophobic.
I should say that I have always
been a bit puzzled how some Christians know what God
thinks about homosexuals as to the best of my knowledge he has never
written an autobiography. Perhaps they have just read the wrong sort
of biographies..
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