George Will writes in the Washington Post that a wedding photographer is being victimized by a lawsuit over her refusal to photograph a gay commitment ceremony because of her religious beliefs. Will writes, "Elaine Huguenin, who with her husband operates Elane Photography in New Mexico, asks only to be let alone." But, of course, she doesn't ask only to be let alone. She asks to operate a public business, but to serve only customers who meet with her approval based on her religious beliefs. By Will's logic, she might just as easily be entitled to reject Catholics or Mormons based on their religion.
But what really leaves a bad taste in Will's mouth is that the victims of Huguenin's discrimination decided to sue. 'Willock could then have said regarding Elane Photography what many same-sex couples have long hoped a tolerant society would say regarding them — “live and let live."' Just as, after all, Martin Luther King, Jr. could have gone to eat at a different lunch counter and Rosa Parks could have quietly sat at the back of the bus.
King had words to the well-meaning white people George Will (perhaps unconsciously) echoes:
Frankly, I have yet to engage in a direct action campaign that was "well timed" in the view of those who have not suffered unduly from the disease of segregation. For years now I have heard the word "Wait!" It rings in the ear of every Negro with piercing familiarity. This "Wait" has almost always meant "Never." We must come to see, with one of our distinguished jurists, that "justice too long delayed is justice denied."
Ms. Huguenin is free to practice whatever poisonous bigotry she wishes in her home and in her "church." However, she is and ought not to be not entitled to freedom to deny others retail services based on either her religious ideosyncracies or their sexual orientation.