Atheists Sue Rhode Island Florist For Refusing Service

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Teen atheist Jessica Ahlquist gained widespread media attention throughout 2012 after successfully suing to have a prayer mural removed from her high school in Cranston, R.I. After a judge sided with Alhquist, she received threats from those who opposed her actions and scholarships and praise from the nation’s atheist activist movement. But among the odder developments following the case was a subsequent spat that developed between Rhode Island-based florists and the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF), an atheistic non-profit.

You're in America, for crying out loud, of course you're going to get ostracized for this. That doesn't mean it's right, it just means it's to be expected. But on the other hand, it bugs me when atheists start lashing out like this and I'm not even Christian. For example, there's a cross up in the hills overlooking my town on the edge of the lookout spot. It lights up at night and can be easily seen from certain parts of the central business district. I don't know who pays for it to be maintained and powered, but it's (technically) on tribal land. Not even the tribal elders or the staunchest atheists in my town have even bothered trying to have it removed, in fact despite it's visibility most people forget it's even there. No, having a prayer mural in a school probably wasn't a good thing if it was exclusively Christian, but atheists who want to get rid of all religion everywhere - despite the existence of religions that don't hurt anyone - are doing more harm than good as far as I'm concerned.

I'm not saying it was right for the florists to have refused service, either - in fact that strikes me as rather spiteful and un-Christian - but I feel that suing someone over it is not the best way to go. If it was me, I would have just taken my business elsewhere (after giving them a long lecture) and then let the discriminating florist have it on social media later (or possibly even /b/). I saw something like this back in 2003 with the now-long-defunct Universist movement: they were organizing manufacture of membership bracelets or somesuch and the supplier refunded their money, saying they didn't want their business. People are going to refuse you service some time in your life, get over it. Virgin Mobile didn't want my business because I was disabled and Telstra wouldn't give me a phone plan because I don't have a driver's license. In the end, I got phone and internet with Dodo and have been happy with it ever since. I would only consider a lawsuit if there was the potential for a lot of other people to be seriously inconvenienced in the same way and the business was actually breaking the law in a concrete manner. (In hindsight, I probably should have sued Virgin Mobile.)

None of this, however, excuses the horrible, awful, hateful, bigoted rubbish spewing out of so-called "Christians" in the comments section. Some of those people need to be slapped around with a softcover Bible until their eyes derp.

You ever read a story where everyone involved is a douche

yeah

this is one of them

Can we please ban Xero Clue from starting topics? It's no good having him on ignore if I have to click "display" just to see what he's bawwing about this time.

Get fucked, Eileen. Take me off ignore if it bothers you that much.

Eileen you are so fucking stupid it's unbelieveable.

ps Clopper your writeup is shitty and lacking pertinent information

You're right. I shouldn't have clicked.

Clopper, stop being such a tryhard and maybe you'll stop being such a shit poster

I would like to take this time to remind people that if you call me Clopper, I will not respond to your post.

Clopper wrote:

I would like to take this time to remind people that if you call me Clopper, I will not respond to your post.

And yet you keep doing it.

And don't think I didn't notice you changing my quote tags back to "Xerrofoot" from "Clopper" in the Starving Idiots thread.

I'd like to take this time to remind you if it so obviously annoys you people are going to keep doing it.

But if you'd prefer, I can call you Cloptrop. Because every time you post it reads like some twisted combination of this, this, and this.

xerrofoot wrote:

I would like to take this time to remind people that if you call me Clopper, I will not respond to your post.

OH CLOPPER YOU THINK THAT'S A THREAT

THAT IS SO CUTE

I like the part where he thinks he's important!

xerrofoot wrote:

I would like to take this time to remind people that if you call me Clopper, I will not respond to your post.

And yet you responded to everyone.

I keep forgetting. I'll be doubly sure to keep ignoring people who call me Clopper - or any variant of same.

Penguin wrote:

A shining beacon of sanity in this asylum!

whoa whoa whoa leave me out of this ok

Not you, love, go back to sleep.