You’ve heard of “Driving while black”?
We now have “Clerking while Christian.”
Rowan County, Kentucky Clerk, Kim Davis is waking up in jail this morning. It’s her third such morning. And why? Because she didn’t get a permission slip from The State. Kim Davis is in jail because ever since the Obergefell decision at the U.S. Supreme Court just 10 or so weeks ago, she has found herself in the absurd position of having to beg like a serf, plead, “try in vain” to get the Kentucky legislature to pass a one page law allowing her to opt-out of facilitating what she regards as a sin. She wasn’t “trying in vain” to get to “no” to gay marriage at all, ever, out of Rowan County; quite the opposite. She was trying desperately to get to “yes.” The goal of her pleadings wasn’t to impose her value system on others; quite the opposite. Same-sex marriage licenses could flow out of Rowan County Kentucky by the ream. She just wanted someone else to sign-off on them, like her Deputy Clerk who already has the authority to issue when, for instance, she’s on vacation or sick. The only difference now is she would like the Deputy Clerk to be able to sign autonomously; under his or her own name and authority, not hers.
This could quite literally be fixed with a one page law and a Kinkos run.
But don’t let the simplicity of the solution trick you into thinking the issue underlying its necessity is a little thing. It’s not. It’s deeply, profoundly, existentially WRONG.
This is the first time in the history of our Constitutional Republic a Christian (a person of any faith) has had to plea for a permission slip from The State to have a job while Christian.
Let that sink in.
Clerking while Christian is now illegal in America.
How do we know this?
Kim Davis is in jail, remember?
“Well, she can quit, right?”
Yup. She could.
But what about the next clerk? Or the next _____ in a marriage-related job? And the next? Right now Kim Davis is a population of one. What about when there are 10? 1,000? 10,000 in jail? Is that really who we are?
Lots of haters-who-are-gonna-hate point out that Kim Davis is a fallen woman. Married several times, etc.
Yup. All true.
But the quality of your rights is not contingent upon the quality of the human claiming them. If they were, we’re all screwed. Seriously.
Are we really okay with living in a country where entire sectors of the economy are closed-off to you because you’re not on-board with same-sex marriage?
I’ve spent quite a bit of time the last few days on Twitter engaging with same-sex-marriage supporters just delighted ‘the bitch is in jail.’ Probably the top red-herring they offer up is “These are the same arguments you bible-thumpers used against interracial marriage.” This isn’t even remotely like interracial marriage. Marriage is a choice. Being black isn’t. You can’t help being black. Kim Davis isn’t denying fishing licenses on the basis that someone “looks” a particular way to her. I’m not aware of any religion or time in 5,000 years of human history that human beings fishing was regarded as a sin, gay or straight, black or white. That would be discrimination and I would fully support punishment if she did something so patently egregious.
The other red-herring the haters-who-are-gonna-hate throw out there is this ridiculous case of a Muslim woman who took a job as a stewardess then refused to serve alcohol. Unless the airline was “Alcoholics Anonymous Airlines” which never-ever served booze, then AFTER she was already working the airline got bought out by Delta so the terms of her employment changed, tough-noogie. You knew you had to serve booze when you took the job. You chose it, freely. Nobody forced you to take it. If, however, this Muslim woman did find herself working for Delta instead of the dry airline she took the job with, well, then hell yes! I’d support her being offered an accommodation. Why not? You do what you can to keep her on the payroll. Doesn’t mean she has to like it. Maybe it’s a ground job, I don’t know. But you do what you can to help her. But if you accept the job knowing you can’t do it, that’s on you, not me.
There’s also the red-herring of “Well, what if a pacifist refused to issue you a gun-permit?”
Was the 2nd Amendment operational when the pacifist took the job?
Yes?
Then, just like the Muslim stewardess, that’s on you, not me. You shouldn’t have taken the job.
There were even several haters-who-are-gonna-hate who were in high-dudgeon that “Well, the taxpayers pay her. She works for the government. She has to do it,” so I asked them:
“If the county garbage-men are told ‘New rules: You have to collect corpses now,'” or even this one “As a condition of the state giving you your medical license, you now have to perform late-term abortions. It is, after all, a *legal* procedure.”
Without exception, these people were good with collecting corpses and late-term abortions being forced conditions of employment, no accommodation. None. At all. I tried. I tried to offer up all kinds of concessions, like lower pay, etc. if they could just keep their jobs. Nope.
THEY. MUST. COMPLY.
How do we manufacture people like this?
“You can’t pick and choose,” they say.
“Pick and choose?” How about asserting your constitutional rights based on Kennedy’s majority decision inventing a new “Right to Dignity” on the basis of (perverting) the 14th amendment but denying Kim Davis her 1st amendment rights?
The constitution applies the 14th to you but not the 1st to her? WHAT?
And if bureaucrats surrender their 1st amendment rights, what other rights are subject to the mob? The 4th? The 5th?
Talk about “pick and choose”!
How did we get here? That even one American has to literally beg, like a serf, for an act of congress to allow her to work while Christian?
BONUS QUESTION: Remember the rallying cry when this all started? “How does my marrying someone of the same-sex affect your marriage? Your life? What do you care?”
The all too predictable answer: Kim Davis.