The Hobby Lobby Lawsuit Is A Trojan Horse

[unhappycamper]

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/11/26/the-hobby-lobby-lawsuit-is-a-trojan-horse/



The Hobby Lobby Lawsuit Is A Trojan Horse
By Amanda Marcotte
Tuesday, November 26, 2013 13:58 EST

You have to hand to right wing pundits. They kick ass at the bait-and-switch, particularly with their own people. They knew that throwing a major fit over the contraception mandate, no matter how much it’s dressed up in “religious freedom” as an excuse, would be understood by their followers as an attack on stupid sluts looking for a handout who just need to keep their legs closed. And that their people would not think one whit further about the implications of allowing your employer to tailor your compensation for your labor to his religious beliefs. But the Hobby Lobby case that’s going in front of the Supreme Court will not be argued on the grounds of whether or not stupid sluts need to keep their legs closed. It’s going to be argued on the grounds that a business can have a “religion”—which can contain any beliefs they want—and that they have wide berth to use that “religion” to discriminate against their employees. Maybe it will be limited to compensation, or maybe it will be bigger than that. After all, if they’re allowed to withhold benefits because they disapprove of your private life, then what else will they be able to do? Refuse to hire women at all?

Even if the court makes a narrow decision, limiting your boss’s power to saying “religion!” and being able to withhold benefits you’ve earned because of it, that’s a catastrophe. Jill Filipovic kicked it off on Twitter and I added a few.

~snip~

They used sex paranoia and misogyny to create a chance for the Supreme Court to give your boss an unbelievable amount of power over your private life and health care choices. Make no mistake about that.

[tclambert]

1. If corporations are people, my friend, then why can't they have a religion?

Praise be to Ayn Rand. Hallelujah, amen, fahrvergnügen.

[tridim]

9. Satanist corporations could be quite interesting. nt

[Android3.14]

2. I can believe that

First corporations must be people, then they can have religion, and soon they will have a vote.

[RoccoR5955]

7. They already vote

With their money, and their threats to employees who do not vote their way!

[Enthusiast]

3. Corporations are not people

and money does not equal free speech. Those are right wing lies and tools of control.

Suspiciously, there are very few elected Democrats saying that in public, that corporations are not people. We need more speaking out or we will live in a world of "their" design. You are seeing the beginnings of such a world right now. How do you like it?

[annabanana]

4. Health Insurance is part of your pay package.

One you are paid, your employer is not allowed to tell you how to use it.

Could an Orthodox Jewish employer say, "I'll pay you, but you're not allowed to buy pork chops with that money"?

[greymattermom]

5. so if corporations can have a religion?

what's next? Can they require their members/employees to practice certain rituals, or have certain beliefs? If so, why would anyone of a different religion do business with them? If Hobby Lobby is Baptist, won't other religions will need their own stores? Where's the agnostic art supply store in my neighborhood???? Next door to the Methodist one???

[RoccoR5955]

8. I can see it now

My job would want me to sacrifice a goat or something on some weird "holy day."
Perhaps some Incan based outfit would require human sacrifices too.

[cascadiance]

6. So... Will the SCOTUS then be said to be PRO Shariah Law in corporations?...

If this goes through and corporate "persons" have the right to practice their own "religion" (however that should be decided within that "person&quot , then what's stopping many corporations with controlling interest in to making that person institute shariah law over its employees in a country where many red wing states are trying to pass laws against it even though our government isn't even close to practicing it.

Seems like the anti-shariah law people should be made aware of this case so that they can be enlisted in standing in front of the courthouse too! That oughta give Faux News something to think about and maybe talk about too...

[Heather MC]

10. Virgins, Blacks, Gays better watch out!!

Virgins, if your Christian boss rapes you, instead of going to jail, you would have to marry him. because According to his Religion that is acceptable.

Black folks, we could lose our Jobs, because according to the bible Dark skin people are a curse. Just ask Mitt Romney, he can feel in the Details

And to my openly gay brothers and sister, well you know where you are on a religious scale of 1 to 10000 -0 but slightly above women Yea you.

I really hope this is one of those cases where they consider all the angles, and they vote based on the laws and not party lines

28 States had this law before the ACA and no one complained.

[Jerry442]

11. OK, let's do a little thought experiment.

1. If Hobby Lobby is allowed to provide coverage to women that doesn't cover contraception, they can purchase contraceptives out of their pay, right?

2. If HL is allowed to provide coverage to women that doesn't cover contraception, HL wouldn't have any objections if women were allowed to purchase a rider out of their pay at some exorbitant price of, say, $10,000 a year, right?

3. HL surely wouldn't have any grounds to object if the price of the rider wasn't exorbitant, say $300 a year, right? (If that number doesn't seem right to you, feel free to plug in one that does.)

4. So, HL wouldn't really have any moral grounds to object if the price of the rider was $.01 per year, right?

Thing is, the insurance company that supplies the coverage would jump at the chance to do #4, because reducing the number of pregnancies covered in the general policy by even a little bit saves them a bunch of dough. This is not news. Everybody's heard it.

So, where's the legal argument for HL, anyway?

[ancianita]

12. How can a legal fictional personhood lay claim to a religion. Where is the evidence of tithes, of

the actual religion's dogma, in print, against contraception or anything having to do with sexual identity or behavior. Where's the PROOF of membership in any church.