Portland-area bakery sentenced to pay $135,000 Lesbian honeymoon

[rmstock]

A sign on the front door of Sweet Cakes by Melissa, a bakery in Gresham, indicates the business had run out of baked goods to sell one weekday evening. Melissa and Aaron Klein closed their shop in September 2013 and now operate the business out of their home.

Sweet Cakes owners pay damages while continuing appeal of $135,000 bias case
By George Rede | The Oregonian/OregonLive The Oregonian
Email the author | Follow on Twitter
on December 28, 2015 at 4:30 PM, updated December 29, 2015 at 3:25 PM
http://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2015/12/sweet_cakes_owners_pay_damages.html

  "The Oregon bakery owners who ignited a national controversy by refusing
   to make a wedding cake for a lesbian couple on Monday quietly paid a
   state-ordered $135,000 damages award and then some.
   
   Aaron Klein, co-owner of the shuttered Sweet Cakes by Melissa, walked
   into the Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries' Portland office and
   handed over a check for $136,927.07, an amount including accrued
   interest, agency spokesman Charlie Burr said.
   
   Earlier this month, the labor bureau recovered nearly $7,000 additional
   funds from the Kleins with the help of the state Department of Justice
   and a private collections agency, Burr said. The money came from a
   garnished bank account, he said.
   
   Aaron and Melissa Klein had refused to pay damages of $135,000 to
   Rachel and Laurel Bowman-Cryer, claiming financial hardship despite
   three online fundraising accounts set up by supporters that netted them
   at least $515,000 as of late September. Their reversal of course was
   first reported by Willamette Week.
   
   On July 2, Labor Commissioner Brad Avakian ordered the Kleins to pay
   damages for emotional and mental suffering, saying they had violated
   the women's civil rights by discriminating on the basis of their sexual
   orientation.
   
   Rachel Bowman-Cryer visited the Gresham bakery with her mother in
   January 2013 to order a cake for a civil commitment ceremony. Aaron
   Klein, working alone that day, turned her away, citing his Christian
   beliefs against same-sex marriage.
   
   The women filed complaints with the state, triggering a national debate
   over the Kleins' claims of religious freedom in the face of
   anti-discrimination laws that require Oregon businesses to serve the
   public equally.
   
   Tyler Smith, a Canby attorney representing the Kleins, said payment of
   the debt does not mean his clients have abandoned their appeal of
   Avakian's order. The Oregon Court of Appeals is likely to hear
   arguments next year but Smith said it made sense to pay now while the
   case is pending rather than incur additional interest charges.
   
   The bureau "was attempting to charge interest rates of 9 percent,
   equating to $35 a day, and seeking to garnish any assets of the Kleins
   so they couldn't earn interest on the money that had been donated to
   them," Smith said. "The prudent thing to do, given the generosity of
   people who have contributed funds, was to take care of it and continue
   the fight."
   
   Through their lawyers, the Kleins twice asked Avakian for a stay to
   delay enforcement of his order while the Court of Appeals considers
   their case. The commissioner rejected the requests on July 14 and again
   July 24, citing the amounts raised for the Kleins from crowdfunding
   sites. State officials subsequently went to court to establish their
   right to place a property lien or other assets belonging to the couple.
   
   "We certainly wish (the bureau) would have stayed collections efforts
   during the course of the appeal," Smith said.
   
   Altogether, the state has received roughly $144,000 from the Kleins –
   an amount that Burr acknowledged might be in excess of what was owed as
   of Monday, Dec. 28.
   
   "We have been in touch with their lawyers throughout the process," Burr
   said, providing them with exact amounts due to satisfy the debt. The
   figure has changed from day to day because of accruing interest.
   
   If the Kleins have overpaid, the agency will look at returning the
   difference, Burr said. The Kleins closed their Gresham bakery in 2013
   and now operate out of their home in Sandy.
   
   Paul Thompson, a Portland lawyer representing the Bowman-Cryers, said,
   "My clients are happy the Kleins paid the fine and are moving forward,
   and hope to see the ruling upheld on appeal."
   
   -- George Rede
   
   grede@oregonian.com
   503-294-4004
   @georgerede
   "

[rmstock]

How To Stamp Out Cultural Marxism In A Single Generation
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 10/23/2015 20:50 -0500
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-10-23/how-stamp-out-cultural-marxism-single-generation

  "Submitted by Brandon Smith via Alt-Market.com,
   
   There are very few legitimate cultural divisions in the world. Most of
   them are arbitrarily created, not only by political and financial
   elites, but also by the useful idiots and mindless acolytes infesting
   the sullied halls of academia.
   
   It is perhaps no mistake that cultural Marxists in the form of "social
   justice warriors", PC busybodies and feminists tend to create
   artificial divisions between people and "classes" while attacking and
   homogenizing very real and natural divisions between individuals based
   on biological reality and inherent genetic and psychological ability.
   This is what cultural Marxists do: divide and conquer or homogenize and
   conquer, whatever the situation happens to call for.
   
   They do this most commonly by designated arbitrary "victim status" to
   various classes, thus dividing them from each other based on how
   "oppressed" they supposedly are.  The less statistically prominent a
   particular group is (less represented in a job field, media, education,
   population, etc.) in any western society based on their color,
   ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender, etc., generally the more victim
   group status is afforded to them by social justice gatekeepers.  Whites
   and males (straight males) are of course far at the bottom of their
   list of people who have reason to complain and we are repeatedly
   targeted by SJW organizations and web mobs as purveyors of some absurd
   theory called "the patriarchy".
   
   Although cultural marxism does indeed target every individual and harm
   every individual in the long run, my list of personal solutions
   outlined in this article will be directed in large part at the
   categories of people most attacked by the social justice cult today.
   
   I do not write often about PC cultism and social justice because the
   movement is only a symptom of a greater problem, namely the problem of
   collectivism. The only true and concrete social (group) division is the
   division between collectivists and individualists: between those who
   believe the individual should be subservient to the group mind and
   those who believe the group is meaningless without the individual mind.
   
   I have already spoken on the root dangers and logical inconsistencies
   of the social justice cult in articles such as 'The Twisted Motives
   Behind Political Correctness' and 'The Future Costs Of Politically
   Correct Cultism.'
   
   There are many intelligent commentators on the Web who have
   consistently demolished the PC mob with reason and logic, and I leave
   that battle to them. In this article I would like to continue my
   examination but with the goal of presenting some real and tangible
   solutions. And like most solutions to most problems, it is the
   individual who is required to draw the line in the sand and change the
   way he approaches the realm of cultural Marxism. It is not up to
   groups, organizations or governments.
   
   First, let's be clear, cultural Marxism has already done most of the
   damage it can possibly do to our way of life. And by damage, I mean the
   end of long-standing foundational pillars of society that provide
   stability and prosperity, including traditional marriage (not
   government-licensed marriage), family, gender "roles," etc. (which
   cultural Marxists openly boast about tearing down).
   
   In Western nations male suicide rates are way up. Women's proclaimed
   levels of happiness and contentment are way down, despite the fact that
   they have had wage equality for decades (yes, the wage gap is a
   perpetually pontificated Lochness monster-sized myth that was debunked
   years ago by economists like Thomas Sowell), despite the fact that they
   have surpassed men in educational participation and despite the fact
   that they have total control over family planning.
   
   

   
   Marriage rates are at historic lows since the 1970s and the rise of
   social justice activism. Of course, the argument is often presented
   that economic decline has more to do with this than cultural Marxism.
   However, setting aside the rising tide of men who fear being bled dry
   through divorce settlements based on double standards, the West's
   economic decline (and thus marriage decline) can be correlated to the
   increase in overt debt spending. And debt spending is driven directly
   by socialist legislation, entitlement programs and social welfare
   addiction, more so even than it can be correlated to military spending.
   
   Therefore, cultural Marxism and its vicious attempts to forcefully
   "harmonize" wealth through taxation and welfare have indeed caused the
   very economic conditions by which marriage is made untenable and
   families are made unstable.
   
   While women become more and more unhappy, men and masculinity are
   essentially demonized by cultural Marxists (mainly feminists) as
   "toxic." This propaganda campaign has been so successful that men in
   many first world nations are beginning to pursue, for all intents and
   purposes, an asexual lifestyle safer from collectivist intrusions and
   judgments.
   
   As if the psychological browbeating were not enough, the chemistry of
   the male body is also being warped by estrogen-imitating chemicals
   present in industrial products, plastics and soy-based foods. A decline
   in normal levels of male testosterone and an ever increasing hormonal
   feminization of younger generations of men and boys is becoming
   prevalent.
   
   Indirect chemical influences aren't the only threat. Direct drugging of
   boys (with far greater frequency than girls) with psychotropics in
   order to subdue their natural tendencies towards physicality and
   frenetic activity is epidemic in public schools, all with the goal of
   making boys behave more like girls.
   
   Finally, the erasure of free speech and thought is always the holy
   grail of cultural Marxists; but this is not always done through
   government power — at least not right away. Social justice cultists
   rely more on collective pressure and public shaming tactics to engineer
   an environment in which people feel compelled to self-censor rather
   than deal with the hailstorm of witch hunters and wagging fingers.
   
   Cultural Marxists do use government force to police what they consider
   thought crimes, but usually in an incremental manner. One day, it's the
   use of government to demand associations, as with a Christian-owned
   cake business being forced to work for another party that feels
   entitled to a gay wedding cake. Another day, it might be a public
   school being forced to allow boys dressed as girls in the girls'
   bathroom or locker room. Another day, it might be the implementation of
   lowered standards and quotas to force businesses to hire people with
   victim-group status, even if they are unqualified for the job.
   
   All of these actions impede upon the individual freedoms and privacy
   rights of others, all under the guise of "equality." And because
   cultural Marxists need to constantly observe ever greater modes of
   oppression and inequality in order to justify their existence, the
   impositions on individual liberty will never end. Today, people may
   argue that such violations are "minor" and not to be concerned over. It
   is happening to strangers or distant neighbors, not to them; so why
   should they care? Liberty movement champions know full well why this
   thinking is idiotic; the trampling of one person's individual liberties
   is the trampling of ALL people's individual liberties. Totalitarianism
   is a virus that feeds on one person to the next until everyone is on
   the menu.
   
   It is not enough anymore to simply continue pointing out the insanity
   of political correctness; we must also take useful steps toward
   reversing the destruction already wrought.
   
   And so, here are my solutions, which must be enacted by individuals in
   their daily lives regardless of the potential backlash. Do you have
   leftist leaning friends or family members? It doesn't matter. Are you
   employed in a workplace crawling with social justice ideologues? Stop
   seeing them as part of the equation because they do not matter. Worried
   about losing a relationship if you make a stand? Say good riddance.
   This is what must be done by free thinkers if they are to counter and
   reverse the collectivist nightmare of cultural Marxism.
     
          Feel no shame: Social justice relies on shaming tactics, usually by
      slandering an opponent with a label that does not really apply to him,
      in order to control his arguments and behavior. If you don't care about
      being called a bigot, a racist, a sexist, a misogynist, a homophobe,
      etc., then there is not really much that they can do to you.
     
          Do not self-censor: This does not mean you should go out of your
      way to be antagonistic or act like an ass, but the thought police have
      power only if you give power to them. Say what you want to say when you
      want to say it, and do it with a smile. Let the PC police froth and
      scream until they have an aneurism. Cultural Marxists are generally
      weaklings. They avoid physical confrontation like they avoid logic, so
      why fear them?
     
          Realize there is no such thing as white privilege or male
      privilege: In reality, there is only institutionalized "privilege" for
      victim-status groups. There is no privilege for whites, males, white
      males or straight white males. When confronted with such claims, demand
      to see proof of such privilege. Invariably, you will get a long list of
      first world problems and complaints backed by nothing but easily
      debunked talking points and misrepresented statistics. People should
      not feel guilty for being born the way they are, and this includes us
      "white male devils."
     
          Demand facts to back claims: Cultural Marxists tend to argue on the
      basis of opinion rather than fact. Present facts to counter their
      claims, and demand facts and evidence in return. Opinions are
      irrelevant if the person is not willing to present supporting facts
      when asked.
     
          Do not play the game of "unconscious bias": If social justice
      cultists can't counter your position with facts or logic, they will
      invariably turn to the old standby that you are limited in your insight
      because you have not lived in the shoes of a - (insert victim group
      here).  I agree.  In fact, I would point out that this reality of
      limited perception also applies to THEM as well.  They have not lived
      in my shoes, therefore they are in no position to claim I enjoy
      "privilege" while they do not.  This is why facts and evidence are so
      important, and why anecdotal evidence and personal feelings are
      irrelevant where cultural Marxism is concerned.
     
          Let cultural Marxists know their fears and feelings do not matter:
      No one is entitled to have teir feelings addressed by others. And, a
      person's fears are ultimately unimportant. Whether the issue is the
      nonexistent "rape culture" or the contempt cultural Marxists feel over
      private gun ownership, their irrational fears are not our concern. Why
      should any individual relinquish his liberties in the name of placating
      frightened nobodies?
     
          Demand that society respect your inherent individual rights:
      Collectivism's ultimate propaganda message is that there is no such
      thing as inherent rights or liberties and that all rights are arbitrary
      and subject to the whims of the group or the state. This is false. I
      have written extensively in the past on inherent rights, inborn
      psychological contents and natural law, referencing diverse luminaries,
      scientists and thinkers, including Thomas Aquinas, Carl Gustave Jung,
      Steven Pinker, etc., and I welcome readers to study my many articles on
      individualism.  Freedom is an inborn conception with universally
      understood aspects. Period. No group or collective is more important
      than individual liberty. No artificial society has preeminence over the
      individuals within that society. As long as a person is not directly
      impeding the life, liberty, prosperity and privacy of another person,
      he should be left alone.
     
          Maintain your rights; they do not hurt other people: PC cultists
      will invariably argue that every person, whether he knows it or not, is
      indirectly harming others with his attitude, his beliefs, his refusal
      to associate, even his very breathing.  "We live in a society", they
      say, "and everything we do affects everyone else...".  Don't take such
      accusations seriously; these people do not understand how freedom works.
     
          Say, for instance, hypothetically, that I refuse to bake a gay
      wedding cake for a couple and I am accused of violating their rights in
      the name of preserving my own. I would immediately point out that no
      one is entitled to a gay wedding cake, baked by me or anyone else and I
      have every right to choose my associations based on whatever criteria I
      see fit. Now, a corrupt government entity may claim I do not have that
      right. But the fact is I do, and no one — not even government — can
      force me to bake a cake if I don't want to. Also, I would point out
      that the gay couple in question has every right in a free society to
      bake their OWN damn cake or open their own cake shop to compete with
      mine. This is how freedom works. It is not based on collective
      entitlement; it is based on personal responsibility.
     
          Refuse to deny the scientific fact of biological gender: Gender is
      first and foremost a genetic imperative. Society does not determine
      gender roles; nature does. A man who chops up his body and takes
      hormone pills to look like a woman is not and will never be a woman. A
      woman who tapes down her breasts and gets a short haircut will never be
      a man. There is no such thing as "transgendered" people. No amount of
      social justice or wishful thinking will ever allow them to reverse
      their genetic proclivities. Their psychological and sexual leanings do
      not change their inborn biological reality.
     
          By extension, we should refuse to play along with this nonsense. I
      will never refer to a man in a wig and dress as a "woman." I will never
      refer to a woman with identity issues as "transgendered." They are what
      nature made them, and we should not police our pronouns just to falsely
      reassure them that they can deny nature.
     
          Deny the illusion of Utopian equality: There is no such thing as
      pure equality.  Society is not a homogeneous entity, it is an
      abstraction built around a group of unique individuals.  Individuals
      can be naturally gifted, or naturally challenged.  But there will
      always be some people who are more apt towards success than others.
     
          I have no problem whatsoever with the idea of equality of
      opportunity, which is exactly what we have in this country (except in
      the world of elitist finance which is purely driven by nepotism).  I do
      have a problem with the lie of universal equality through engineered
      means.
     
          Standards of success should not be lowered in order to accommodate
      the least skilled people to facilitate artificial parity.  For example,
      I constantly hear the argument that more people with victim group
      status should be given greater representation in positions of influence
      and regard within our culture, from science and engineering, to media,
      to business CEO's, to politics, etc.  The key word here is "given",
      rather than "earned".  There is nothing wrong with one group of people
      excelling in a field more than another group, and there is nothing
      wrong with inequality when it comes to individual achievement.  We must
      begin refusing to reward people for mediocrity and punishing success
      simply because the winners are not part of a designated victim group.
     
          If you are a man, embrace your role: I am a man and cannot claim to
      know what specific solutions women should take to counter cultural
      Marxism. I would love to read an article written on the subject by a
      woman in the Liberty Movement.  I will say that men in particular have
      a considerable task ahead in terms of their personal endeavors if they
      hope to repair the destruction of social justice.
     
          For thousands of years, men have been the primary industrial force
      behind human progress. Today, they are relegated to cubicles and
      customer service, to video games and Web fantasies, to drug addictions
      and a lack of responsibility. If we have any chance of undoing the
      damage of cultural Marxism, modern men must take on their original
      roles as producers, inventors, entrepreneurs, protectors, builders and
      warriors once again. They should do this for their own benefit, and not
      for the validation of others.
     
          You don't have to prove to anyone you do "manly things", just go
      out and do them. Most importantly, become dangerous. Men are meant to
      be dangerous beings. That does not mean we are meant to be
      indiscriminately violent (just as women aren't meant to be
      indiscriminately violent), but we are supposed to be threatening to
      those who would threaten us. Modern society has NOT removed the need
      for masculinity and I believe people will begin realizing this the more
      our culture sinks into economic despair. Train in martial arts, learn
      tactical firearms handling, go hunting and don't take lip from people.
      In my opinion, every man should know how to kill things, even if he
      never plans on using those abilities.
     
          Home-school your children: It's simple, if you don't want your kids
      propagandized, if you truly want them to be free from collectivist
      conditioning, then you will make the sacrifice and extract them from
      public schooling. With the introduction of Common Core into U.S.
      schools in particular, there is no other recourse but home schooling to
      prevent the brainwashing of cultural Marxism. If you do not do this,
      you are relying on the hope that your children will escape with their
      critical thinking abilities intact. Some do, and some don't. Others
      turn into mindless social justice zombies. You can give them an
      advantage by removing them from a poisonous environment, and that is
      what matters.
   
   The insane lie that cultural Marxists seem to have conned themselves
   and others into believing is that their "activism" is somehow
   anti-establishment. In fact, social justice is constantly coddled and
   supported by the establishment. From politicians to judges to media
   pundits to the blogosphere, the overwhelming majority of people in
   positions of traditional power (even in supposedly conservative
   circles) have been more than happy to become the enforcers of the
   social justice warrior agenda, an agenda representing a minuscule
   portion of the public. There is no establishment for the PC army to
   fight; the establishment bias works vastly more in favor of their
   ideology than any other. Cultural Marxists ARE the establishment."

[Christopher Marlowe]

Why not just bake a crappy cake?

[rmstock]

Why not just bake a crappy cake?

That's a fair question, but i sense that  somehow, someone wanted to
set an example and generate a court-case paper-trail ... The piece above
by Brandon Smith and republished by Zerohedge make several referrals
to a gay wedding cake and the Portland-based bakery case could
very well be the reason Brandon Smith wrote the article in the first
place.