The Beginning of the End of Religious Freedom
宗教自由终结的开始

作者：David Harsanyi @ 2015-8-21
译者：沈沉（@你在何地-sxy）
校对：慕白（@李凤阳他说），小册子（@昵称被抢的小册子）
来源：Reason，http://reason.com/archives/2015/08/21/the-beginning-of-the-end-of-religious-fr

Compelling bakers to bake cakes part of a broader drive to limit faith-based decisions by private businesses.
强迫糕点师制作蛋糕是限制私营企业基于信仰作决策的广泛攻势的一部分

Just in case you need a refresher: Back in 2012, a baker in the Denver suburb of Lakewood was asked by a gay couple to make them a wedding cake—two years before gay marriage was even legalized in Colorado. The owner of Masterpiece Cakeshop, Jack Phillips, declined to participate in Charlie Craig and David Mullins’ celebration because such an event conflicted with his Christian faith.

也许你需要重温一下：2012年，在丹佛市郊的莱克伍德，一对同性恋人要求一名糕点师为他们制作一个婚礼蛋糕——那是科罗拉多州同姓婚姻合法化之前两年的事了。“杰作蛋糕”的店主，Jack Phillip，拒绝让自己参与进Charlie Craig和David Mullins的婚礼，因为这与他的基督教信仰相冲突。

Here are a few things Phillips didn’t do: He didn’t query consumers about their sexual preferences. He didn’t bar same-sex couples from purchasing a cake at a place of public accommodation. He didn’t ask consumers traveling in same-sex pairs to leave his shop. He didn’t hang a “No Gays Allowed” sign in his window.

Phillips没有做以下这些事情：他没有查问顾客的性取向。他没有禁止同性伴侣在公共场所购买蛋糕。他没有要求出双入对的同性客人离开他的店铺。他也没有在窗户上挂“同性恋勿入”的牌子。

What he could never have known when he first opened his shop was that celebrating gay marriages would be a precondition for making a living. And when you consider that there are at least a few dozen other bakeries within a short drive from Masterpiece Cakeshop that could have accommodated the couple’s celebratory pastry needs, why would he?

他刚开店的时候绝对想不到，为同性婚姻服务会成为谋生的前提条件。你想想，“杰作蛋糕”周边极短车程以内就有至少好几十家其它烘焙店，它们原本都能帮这对恋人制作婚礼蛋糕，这让他怎么想得到呢？

Yet instead of exhibiting a basic level of tolerance (or dignity), two priggish bullies decided to call the authorities when Phillips refused to bake them a cake. And the cultural commissars at the Colorado Civil Rights Commission soon ruled that he had discriminated against the couple.

然而，在Phillips拒绝为他们制作蛋糕之后，这两位自命道德高尚的霸道人物，没有表现出起码的宽容（或体面），而是决定报告政府。科罗拉多民权委员会的文化专员很快就裁定Phillips歧视了这对同性恋。

The shop was not only ordered to alter store policy and start baking cakes for gay weddings—or else face debilitating fines, a consequence often reported on by the media—but also forced to provide comprehensive staff training, ensure compliance and then file quarterly obedience reports with the government for two years. In these reports, Phillips has to describe exactly which remedial measures the shop has taken to conform and document the reasons any other patrons were denied service.

这家店不但被勒令店铺更改规定，从今往后要为同性婚礼制作蛋糕——否则就要面临惩罚性罚款，媒体对此后果多有报道——而且还被强制要求开展全面的员工培训、保证遵守规定并在两年内每季度定期向政府提交合规报告。Phillips在报告中必须具体描述店里为了合规都采取了何种整改措施，并要记录店里拒绝为任何其他主顾提供服务的原因。

So, you know, I’m sure this is exactly how Thomas Jefferson imagined America would turn out when he was writing the Declaration of Independence.

所以，你知道的，我确信托马斯·杰弗逊写《独立宣言》时就料到美国未来会变成这样。

Phillips appealed the decision, and a three-panel Colorado Court of Appeals unanimously decided that Masterpiece Cakeshop’s policy against creating wedding cakes for same-sex couples was a “discriminatory and unfair practice,” further ruling that the shop must continue to answer to the Colorado Civil Rights Commission or else be run out of business.

Phillips对这一判决提出了上诉，结果由三人组成的科罗拉多上诉法院一致裁定“杰作蛋糕”拒绝为同性伴侣制作婚礼蛋糕的方针乃是“歧视性的不公正行为”，同时判决该店必须继续听从科罗拉多民权委员会的要求，否则就要停止营业。

Incredibly, the court acknowledged in its decision that it would have looked at the First Amendment arguments more closely had the gay couple ordered a cake with some explicit messaging that advocated gay marriage. In other words, the Colorado Court of Appeals believes that the threshold for denying religious liberty is the presence of advocacy. The court has effectively tasked itself with determining for you when religion should matter.

令人难以置信的是，法院在其判决中承认，假如当事的同性伴侣在订购蛋糕时明确传递了提倡同性婚姻的信息，那么法院会更为仔细地考虑宪法第一修正案。换句话说，科罗拉多上诉法院认为，否定宗教自由的门槛乃是公开提倡。法院因此实质上为自己赋予了一项任务：替你决定什么时候宗教是要紧的。

If nothing else, it’s comforting to know that Colorado can force an orthodox Muslim butcher to make sausages for a polyamorous, bisexual bachelor/bachelorette party, as long as no one asks the butcher to outwardly promote swine and free love.

别的不论，以下事实实在让我们感到安慰：科罗拉多可以强迫正统的穆斯林屠户为开放多偶、双性恋的单身派对制作猪肉肠，只要没人要求这位屠户公开推广猪和自由性爱。

In any event, I’m sure there will be an appeal. But seeing as most Americans are fine with gay marriage and simultaneously put off by unpleasant (though deceptive, in this case) words such as “discrimination” and “prejudice,” the courts—nearly always driven by the vagaries of public opinion—will find a way to force all to comply.

无论如何，我确信还会有场上诉。但看到多数美国人都觉得同性婚姻没什么大不了，同时又容易因“歧视”和“偏见”等令人不快（尽管在本案中这一不快是有欺骗性的）的词汇引发反感，几乎总是被反复莫测的公共意见所左右的法院总会找到办法来令所有人顺从。

This will go for any other businesses even tangentially related to weddings, such as food catering, music and so on. And the crusade will accelerate until the legal lynch mob gets to religious institutions. No doubt advocates will work backward to come up with a great legal rationalization for all of it.

这甚至还会延伸到只与婚礼擦边的行业，比如酒席承办、音乐伴奏等等。这场讨伐运动还会愈演愈烈，直到那些利用法律行私刑的暴民们一路杀到宗教组织那里。毫无疑问，支持者们会事后努力，为所有这一切进行法律上的合理化。

All of this is not to say that in American life, the minority should never be compelled to surrender to some form of majoritarianism, judicial force or government. In this case, though, the minority does not have the ability to compromise without abandoning its faith. The other side refuses to compromise precisely because of this reality. And courts and commissions around the country are willing to destroy businesses—businesses that sometimes took a large part of a lifetime to build—by ignoring one of the most vital functions of the First Amendment.

以上所论当然不是说，在美国人的生活中，少数派永远不应该被迫向某种形式的多数主义、司法机关和政府让步。只不过，在眼前的这一案例中，少数派没有能力在遵从自己信仰的条件下达成妥协。而另一方之所以拒绝妥协，恰恰就是因为这一现实。而全国各地的法院和委员会无视第一修正案的最关键功能之一，愿意去摧毁企业——有时还是某些人花了大半辈子才建立起来的企业。

The position of these businesspeople, unlike Southern racists decades ago, in no way undermines the newfound right of gay Americans to marry, nor does it inhibit them from enjoying freedom or finding happiness. In this case, only one side is attempting to legislate morality.

与几十年前南方的种族主义者不同，这些生意人的立场完全不会破坏美国同性恋者新近得以确立的结婚权利，也不会阻止他们享受自由和追求幸福。在本案中，只有一方试图将道德问题法律化。

If you admit—and many rational people do, even those who quarrel with the reasoning behind religious obstinacy—that millions of Christians hold some form of a genuine, long-standing religious conviction that prohibits them from celebrating gay marriages but you still support state coercion against them, then you might as well just concede that religious freedom isn’t compatible with your conception of a contemporary society.

如果你承认——许多理性的人都会承认，即便是那些反对固执宗教思维的人——数以百万计的基督徒持有某种真诚的、存在已久的宗教信念，使得他们不可能去庆祝同性婚姻，但你还是支持国家对他们采取强制措施，那你就不如直接承认宗教自由与你所理解的现代社会不相容。

Whereas at one time the state wouldn’t substantially burden religious exercise and would use the least restrictive means to further “compelling interests,” the state today is inclined to substantially burden a Christian by the mere fact that someone’s feelings are hurt.

从前，国家并不会实质性地增加宗教活动的义务，并以最不具有限制性的方式推动“重大迫切利益”。然而现在，国家已倾向于实质性地加重基督徒的义务，只是因为有人的感情受到了伤害。

（编辑：辉格@whigzhou）

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——海德沙龙·翻译组，致力于将英文世界的好文章搬进中文世界——

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