In Reply: Legally Unnecessary Regulations and Restrictions as a Way to Legislate Morality

In reply to Truth Wins Out -

Note: This link used to lead to a post by Evan Hurst--"As good as it feels to have politicians telling Chick-Fil-A to get lost, it's actually not okay http://bit.ly/MMeAUo #p2 #lgbt"-- but the post, as well as some powerful back and forth by the readers in the comment section, was disappeared by some person or persons at Truth Wins Out, which yes, is pretty ironic. (Those persons do not include the author, who said the decision was out of his hands--but offered to send me a copy, which yes, I intend to repost here, under the "sometimes it's better to ask forgiveness than permission" theory. I did not ask Evan whether it would be ok, and thus did not put him in the position of letting me down or going against the wishes of the site he writes for, either. If/when I get a copy, it will appear below--unless the author includes a request that I not share it when he sends the post, of course, in which case I will report that.

Either way, my reply to the disappeared Truth Wins Out post and reader commentary appears below:
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I see the chick-fil-a issue regarding these government officials as being akin to the government officials passing immpossible/extremely costly-to-comply-with regulations on medical providers in the business of providing a service to which these government officials are opposed--abortions--and thus closing them down, or keeping them from opening. (And unlike the Chick-fil-a threats, these regulations against abortion providers are already in place in several cities and states...)

I'm all for protesting, and for the free speech and right of religious and moral conscience of all involved... ...but I cannot support targeting businesses with legally unnecessary regulations and restrictions because you oppose the business on moral grounds, whether it's anti-abortion legislators targeting clinics or pro-marriage equality legislators targeting fast food chicken.
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Posted July 26, 2012 10:27:14 PM EDT