Consider the following news item:
'Now some people are more equal than others': Despair of Christian hotel owners penalised for turning away interracial couple
Two Christian hotel owners punished for refusing a bed to an interracial couple claimed yesterday that their religion is being suppressed.
Arthur and Martha Bloggs said Christianity had been pushed to the margins of society, and added: ‘Some people are more equal than others.’
They spoke out after a landmark court decision awarded £1,800 each to James Smith (black) and Anne Jones (white), who were denied a double room under the Bloggs’ biblically-inspired policy of allowing only couples of the same race to share a bed in the hotel that is also their home.
This story is imaginary. But I have constructed it using almost exactly the same words and details as those which appeared in the Daily's Mail's reporting of the case of Peter and Hazelmary Bull, who, a judge ruled yesterday, acted unlawfully in refusing to allow gay couple Martyn Hall and Steven Preddy to share a bed on their premises.
The Bulls' right to refuse, on grounds of conscience, to accommodate gay couples' requests to share double beds has been defended in the usual rightwing quarters - not only the Mail but, for instance, by Christian conservative blogger Archbishop Cranmer, and a contributor on ConservativeHome.
However, those who sympathise with the Bulls owe it to us to explain where their loyalties would lie in my imagined scenario, and - if it would not again lie with the B & B owners - what accounts for the difference, in their eyes, between religiously-motivated discrimination towards same-sex and interracial couples respectively.
Now, it will not do for them to try to evade the question by refusing to acknowledge the possibility that my case could ever arise. We know that Christians have in the past been just as opposed to interracial relationships as same-sex relationships, and in particular that various biblical passages were invoked in support of anti-miscegenation laws in the US. Who could confidently deny that there are at least some who still, quietly, agree with the words of the trial judge in Loving v. Virginia to the effect that:
Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, malay and red, and he placed them on separate continents. And but for the interference with his arrangement there would be no cause for such marriages. The fact that he separated the races show that he did not intend for the races to mix.
Nor will it do to suggest that discrimination against gay couples is alone acceptable because, whilst Christian opposition to homosexuality is amply founded in the 'valid' interpretation of biblical passages, opposition to interracial marriage is based on biblical 'misreadings'. The state does not - cannot - get into the business of ruling on what counts as valid interpretation of holy texts, nor create law on that basis.
Nor again can defenders of religious discrimination against gay people claim that, whilst Christian opposition to homosexuality is common and mainstream, only at most a few lone kooks would now take the same view of miscegenation. In a liberal democracy, religious freedom cannot be made contingent on the popularity of the belief in question.
Nor, finally, can they distinguish between the Bulls and the B & B owners in my example by claiming that, whilst the latter are guilty of racism - that is, prejudice directed against an unchosen characteristic of a person - the former have merely refused to play host to a certain kind of behaviour with which they disagree - namely, homosexual activity. For my case can equally be described as involving a refusal to tolerate a certain kind of behaviour - namely, sexual activity between people of different races.
Conservatives who bite the bullet, and endorse the idea that religious B & B owners ought to have the right to turn away interracial as well as same-sex couples unquestionably put themselves beyond the pale of mainstream British public opinion. I doubt that many supporters of the Bulls would be prepared to do so. However, if they don't, they can be indicted for being prepared to deny some groups but not others the full protection of the law, based on nothing more than their own, ad hoc personal preferences. For such conservatives, it is certainly true that, in the Bulls' words, 'some people are more equal than others'. But, equally certainly, it is not gay people who are at the top of the heap.
Excellent post, but I thought the technical reason the couple were denied a room was because they weren't married, and the B&B owners had the same policy for straight couples who weren't married?
ReplyDeleteDidn't one of the ruling judges say in his summary that he wasn't passing comment on what the situation would have been if the couple didn't have a civil partnership...or did...something like that?
I thought the judge made the specific comment that he made the award on the basis that Mr Preddy and Mr Hall were in a civil partnership, and therefore entitled to the same consideration and treatment as a married couple would be. This was direct discrimination because two men are not currently permitted to marry.
ReplyDeleteIf, as is claimed, an unmarried and un-civilly-partnered couple of whatever gender balance were turned away because the Bulls do not approve of two people sharing a bedroom if they are not married to each other, that would not be discriminatory.
There is the small matter of someone who has claimed that he and his female partner (not his wife) were permitted to share a room at the Bulls' hotel. But that's not a debate for now.