Whatever happened to separation of church and state?

Unfortunately, gender discrimination is a hard argument to win in court, though it shouldn’t be since the laws regarding gender are pretty much the same as the ones regarding race.

The sad thing is that it should be pretty easy to find cases where these same “religious freedom” pharmacists provided medications that might be “against their religious beliefs” to men, no questions asked.      Especially if you really went through Leviticus, Deuteronomy, and the Physician’s Desk Reference with a fine-toothed comb.

I can see making an argument from statutory freedoms conferred by he civil rights act, but it doesn’t violate constitutional rights.  You have no legal right to a pharmacists products however he has the right of free association.  So from a strictly constitutional perspective there is no problem here.  However you are correct to invoke the civil rights act, but that is a statute not a right even given it’s title.

I’m still confused why a pharmacist would have no problems (and this also appear in Saletan’s ramblings) with dispensing viagara (which has only one possible use) to unmarried men, but have great problems dispensing estrogen (and similar) pills to unmarried women when there are any number of non-BC related uses to them.

Ok, that’s a lie, I know exactly why they have no problem. I’d just like to hear them say it with a straight face and not lie…

Some guy:

That’s bogus.  You may have no constitutional right to get drugs, but you DO have a constitutional right to not be given equal protection under the law.  Similarly, you do not have a constitutional right to buy a home, but if you choose to buy a home, you are protected under the Constitution from being refused the home due to your race or ethnicity, etc. etc.  You do not have a Constitutional right to have a job, but if you choose to work, you are protected under the Constitution from being denied that job or treated differently due to immutable characteristics. 

The Civil Rights Act was designed to enforce Constitutional protections.  You have rights protected by the Constitution - the Civil Rights Act was Congress’s way of making sure those rights are enforced.

You sure as hell don’t have any Constitutional right to keep your job after refusing to actually do it.

You have no legal right to a pharmacists products

That’s the whole point of the Civil Rights Act, though.  Black people don’t have the constitutional “right” to service in restaurants or hotels.  So we passed the CRA, which says in no uncertain terms that business owners cannot discriminate on the basis of race, gender, or religion in terms of who they offer services to.  Just as it is now illegal for a restaurant to turn away customers because they’re black, it’s illegal for a pharmacy to turn away customers because they are female.  Or it ought to be, anyway.

“Whatever happened to separation of church and state?”

How is the state involved here?  These are non government employees.

These arguments against why a pharmacist shouldn’t have the right to refuse to serve his/her customers, for this reason or any other, seem sound. Why hasn’t someone sued a pharmacy or a pharmacist in order to force a recognition of the rights of its customers? That’s not a rhetorical question either. I don’t see why someone hasn’t already jumped on this to enforce what appears on its face to be a violation of the Civil Rights Act.

“How is the state involved here?  These are non government employees.”

Pharmacists are licensed by the state.  The state is quite intimately involved in the distribution of drugs, actually.  The issue, in my mind, isn’t the individual stores so much as the state tacitly approving the “right” of state-licensed professionals to discriminate against its customers.

You have no legal right to a pharmacists products however he has the right of free association.

That is not what free association rights are about (in its inception and application over 2+centuries, it’s really been more about forming, joining, or declining to join “associations” like government parties or trade unions—and even in that sense, courts have had to balance rights of association with rights to not be discriminated against, as in the case of clubs with discriminatory entrance requirements).  If it meant what Some Guy thinks it does, then the pharmacist could refuse to serve black people or old people or disabled people or whoever because he doesn’t wish to “associate” with them.  Obviously the CRA makes that unallowable.  So, “some guy” (as if we needed to be told this bs came from a guy), please explain why it is that women’s civil rights can be denied through your misapplication of freedom of association when no one else’s can?  Or perhaps you DO think they should be allowed to serve people of color or whomever else they don’t like associating with?

You may have no constitutional right to get drugs, but you DO have a constitutional right to not be given equal protection under the law.  Similarly, you do not have a constitutional right to buy a home, but if you choose to buy a home, you are protected under the Constitution from being refused the home due to your race or ethnicity, etc. etc.  You do not have a Constitutional right to have a job, but if you choose to work, you are protected under the Constitution from being denied that job or treated differently due to immutable characteristics.

No, no, no, that’s not how it works.  There is no constitutional violation absent state action.  The state and federal governments have the pwoer to regulate private conduct by statute to ban discrimination, although in some rare instances that power can be trumped by the constitutional rights of the would-be discriminators.  And “immutable characteristics” have nothing to do with anything; religion, for example isn’t immutable.

Whatever happened to separation of church and state?

State was for it, church not so much.

“...should be allowed to serve ...”

Obviously, that was meant to read “should be allowed to REFUSE TO serve…”
oops.

And “immutable characteristics” have nothing to do with anything; religion, for example isn’t immutable.

But sex is, and the argument here is that the pharmacist is discriminating on the basis of sex by giving men whatever drugs they have legal prescriptions for, without extending that same service to women. 

Please read the title of the post again, since it seems you’ve forgotten.

The state licenses pharmacists—therefore, they are state actors.

That’s not how it works, either.  The state licenses drivers, but that doesn’t mean that every traffic accident is a constitutional violation.

Now, if the state were to start denying licenses to pharmacists who fill birth control prescriptions, that would be a constitutional violation . . .

“So we passed the CRA, which says in no uncertain terms that business owners cannot discriminate on the basis of race, gender, or religion in terms of who they offer services to.”

That is true.  But under definition, no-one is being discrminated against here because these pharmacists refuse to sell these drugs to anyone - regardless of race, gender or ethnicity.  So they are in effect treatgin everyone exactly the same.  If I walked up with a prescription for the pill, they woiuldn’t fill it for me either.

We have no proof that they fill the precriptions for Viagara for single men.  That argument is silly without actual proof.

There is no constitutional violation absent state action. 

So you’re saying separate lunch counters for black people and white people is Constitutional?

These things are not happy accidents. Fundamentalist Christian churches are instructing their unemployed members to become pharmacists/medical workers for the express purpose of putting these challenges into courts in order to errode women’s rights. To wring our hands over these pharmacists and their moral qualms is to completely ignore the puppet-strings tied to their hands, which are controlled in a coordinated effort by forces that want a theocracy in this country.

History has shown us what happens when the state does not regulate the medical world. We have the FDA and accreditations (sic?) for a reason. As a society we require a standard of care for someone who calls themselves a doctor, an EMT, or a pharmacist. This standard of care must be maintained—and if that means that a person’s philosophical beliefs make them inelligible for that job, so be it. There are very real, tangible consequences when someone’s intangible, arguably-real religion prevents them from doing their job. The reality should precede potentiality or possibility. Gimme my damn pills.

Please read the title of the post again, since it seems you’ve forgotten.

Please bear in mind that I think what the pharmacists are doing is outrageous, and ought to be illegal, but let’s try to keep our analysis of the issue consistent with the ABCs of constitutional law.  If you’re going to claim that these pharmacists are violating people’s constitutional rights, you’re talking nonsense, and standing in the way of making progress on the issue.

So you’re saying separate lunch counters for black people and white people is Constitutional?

It’s illegal, and properly so, but not unconstitutional.  Requiring separate lunch counters, as the old Jim Crow laws did, is unconstitutional.

rea: It would if it didn’t yank the licenses of those who crashed because they were reading their bible in the passing lane. The pharmacists are failing to perform their duties and getting a pass.

“Fundamentalist Christian churches are instructing their unemployed members to become pharmacists/medical workers for the express purpose of putting these challenges into courts in order to errode women’s rights”

That is the dumbest thing I have ever read.  Everyone here is stupider for having looked upon it.  I’ll counter your made up nonsense about fundamentalist churches wanting to erode women’s rights with a link to my fundamentalist church’s sermon from 2 weeks ago on how the Bible clearly says men and women are to rule the earth equally and that men have no authority over women whatsoever and that traditional teaching surrounding that issue is a miss translation of the original greek.

http://messagetool.thedoor.org/2008/05/on-how-we-treat-daughters-of-eve-part-3.html

I’d say that the second a doctor writes you a prescription, you have a legal right to those products.

Well, not really. If you can’t pay for the drugs (or have some insurance or whatever that pays for them) you can’t get the drugs either.

But seriously, if there’s a pro-life pharmacy in your neighborhood, just go to another drug store. And yes, even if that means driving 100 miles to a different pharmacy. You’d do it if going to X store offended some other of your sensibilities. This is no different.

Dr T, just because your church pays lipservice to equality doesn’t mean dick compared to all of the mega churches reminding wives to be submissive to their husbands as if the Bible began and ended with Ephesians 5.

But under definition, no-one is being discrminated against here because these pharmacists refuse to sell these drugs to anyone - regardless of race, gender or ethnicity.  ..

We have no proof that they fill the precriptions for Viagara for single men.  That argument is silly without actual proof.

Yeah, but it shouldn’t be too hard to get proof.  You subpoena all the pharmacy’s records on a defendant in a n a case of discrimination based on “religious belief” of the discriminator.  You have a nice clear list of every prescription they filled for their whole tenure in the job.  You get your firm’s summer interns to sit down with a bible and the Physician’s Desk Reference and see how many prescription drugs aren’t “kosher” in one way or another.  You cross reference the resulting list of “extrabiblical pharmaceuticals”  with that first list of every drug the pharmacist ever distributed.  What will probably turn up is a plethora of cases where the doctor was perfectly happy to prescribe Viagra to an unmarried man, or prescribe painkillers indicated for the postoperative rehab on a pig heart valve transplant, a pill which contains flax seed oil and cotton byproducts, etc. etc. etc

...as if the Bible began and ended with Ephesians 5.

Someone really ought to put together a wingnut bible. The first chapter or so of “Genesis,” the Sodom and Gamorrah stuff, that one verse out of “Leviticus,” a few snippets from Saul, and the bloodier parts from “Revelations.” Top it all off with excerpts from Limbaugh’s last book, and you’re done…

“Dr T, just because your church pays lipservice to equality doesn’t mean dick”

Au contraire - because you and your ilk define fundamentalist churches as one big group that aims at eroding women’s rights, when the truth is there are many churches that spend a great deal of time supporting women’s rights.  To be sure, there are churches that teach that men have authority over women, but they are fewer and fewer and not the definition of what a fundamentalist church is anymore in this country.  Find some new vocabulary if you want to be taken seriously, cuz right now you sound like a tin foil hat wearer

Dr T—As someone who has spent time in both a fundamentalist and non-fundamentalist church, I am most definitely not a tinfoil hat wearer. To my knowledge, the Southern Baptist Convention never did retract its statement telling wives to submit to their husbands. And the majority of fundamentalist (not evangelical, fundamentalist) churches vehemently oppose abortion, and birth control as well.

my fundamentalist church’s sermon

You should have said this first; we could have stopped paying attention to you earlier.

But seriously, if there’s a pro-life pharmacy in your neighborhood, just go to another drug store. And yes, even if that means driving 100 miles to a different pharmacy. You’d do it if going to X store offended some other of your sensibilities. This is no different.

Because everyone has a car, 4-6 hours to spare on the round trip, and money to blow on gas so they can pick up medicine that’s been prescribed by their doctor, because an anti-choice pharmacist’s right to force his beliefs on his clients is sacred.

Jackass.

Au contraire - because you and your ilk define fundamentalist churches as one big group that aims at eroding women’s rights, when the truth is there are many churches that spend a great deal of time supporting women’s rights.

If they are so busy supporting women’s rights then why haven’t they spoken up regarding this issue?

I kind of would like to see a link from Mighty Ponygirl on that claim.  Not that I think its too crazy to be true, but it sounds like a good read.

Au contraire - because you and your ilk define fundamentalist churches as one big group that aims at eroding women’s rights, when the truth is there are many churches that spend a great deal of time supporting women’s rights.

Stop threadjacking.  The point of this thread is not the subtle difference between fundamentalist churches who oppose women’s rights and fundamentalist churches who support them.  When we (by “we” I mean Pandagonians in general) are discussing fundamentalist Christians in this particular context of this particular thread, we’ve already agreed that we’re talking about the ones who oppose women’s rights.  In short, we’re not talking to you and we’re not here to discuss those subtle differences.

Back to the issue at hand.

Personally, I would have no problem with pharmacists refusing to fill certain prescriptions as long as they post a large, legible sign at the entrance to the store stating exactly which prescriptions they will not fill, including all names for that drug (like the trade name and generic name).

Of course, they’ll never do that, because they’ll lose business once people find out that they’re discriminating against certain customers.  You’d think that if they were completely convinced that this was the right and moral thing to do, they’d be willing to take the hit in their pocketbooks, but I guess making a sacrifice for your own moral beliefs is beyond their comprehension as long as they can make other people make the sacrifice on their behalf.

Sharon, I hope you never visit an emergency room where the doctors have a moral objection to providing medical care to narrow-minded, mean-spirited jerks. 

Also, what about the fact that physicians prescribe birth control pills to treat a variety of medical conditions as well as to prevent pregnancy.  Long ago I had a girlfriend whose menstrual periods were agonizingly painful until her doctor prescribed the pill, which greatly relieved her pain.  In what moral universe could it possibly be acceptable for a pharmacist to call her a slut and send her away to suffer?  Maybe pharmacists should also be allowed to make women take lie detector tests so the pharmacist can determine whether he approves of the reason for the prescription.

Seraph, not to mention that everyone has a private plane to fly to Europe for BC pills, if this madness keeps spreading in America.

Gods help us if Europe tanks on this - then I suppose we’ll be told that if we don’t like it, we can all learn to make the BC pills we need in our basements.

When you’re to the right of the Jehovah’s Witnesses on almost any subject, you’re pretty fucked up.

Although you see how popular the left is when it defends the Jehovah’s Witness position on the pledge of alliegence.  Probably cost Dukakis the election in ‘88, and if he’d won, nobody would have heard of Bush the lesser.

Does anyone know if there’s any truth to the rumor I heard that Walmart as a whole isn’t carrying any BC pills anymore, or was that a pharmacy-by-pharmacy basis?

Mnemosyne, I think the big sign up front was something Saletan said had to be there before he would approve of the pharmacist’s decision.  Not that it matters what Lord Will thinks of course.

The way I see it, this is as much an issue of elitism as it is anything else.  If a server in a resturant refused to serve shelfish to customers due to her religious beliefs (you know- Lev./God hates shellfish!), she would be fired, 10 minutes flat. No one even thinks about concience clauses for waitpersons, because of course, they don’t “count”.  However, pharmacists, because they belong to a far more elite group, are naturally entitled to be safeguarded against doing things which are against their religion, right? 

When really, the pharmacist themselves is just a glorified waitperson.  A prep cook at best.  The doctor is the one who makes the “moral” call about prescribing the medicine; the pharmacist merely “serves” the medicine to the patient.

I think if legal strategies would focus on the elitism angle, perhaps using reductio ad absurdum to show how impossible it would be for a functioning society to continue if we equally honored everyone’s right to a concience clause upheld by law, and then set up the other possibility as unequal recognition of concience (status quo), thus creating a double-bind, we might actually get somewhere with this.  Really- the fundies are targeting this to bring about the end of contraception/abortion/women’s bodily autonomy via the back door.  I think those on the opposing team should start seeking out some back doors of our own.

Neko Onna, it’s also because birth control has to do with women having the freedom to have sex, and eating shellfish does not.

Mnemosyne, I think the big sign up front was something Saletan said had to be there before he would approve of the pharmacist’s decision.  Not that it matters what Lord Will thinks of course.

Yes, but in my case I’m suggesting it because I know they’ll prescribe the pills rather than publicly advertise that they’re being discriminatory assholes, which reveals their “moral stance” for exactly what it is:  power-tripping.  Saletan actually thinks he’s proposing a workable compromise.

There’s much I’d like to contribute to this topic, but I just woke up and I suspect I have a slippery hold on logic just now.

I will settle for saying that if any pharmacist ever pulls this on me over contraception of any stripe, I will play the part of a contraception-using pro-lifer and ask him which abortion clinic is paying him to drum up business.

I think if legal strategies would focus on the elitism angle, perhaps using reductio ad absurdum to show how impossible it would be for a functioning society to continue if we equally honored everyone’s right to a conscience clause upheld by law, and then set up the other possibility as unequal recognition of conscience (status quo), thus creating a double-bind, we might actually get somewhere with this.

I see you also remember the Muslim taxi drivers in Minneapolis who were refusing to transport customers who carried bottles of alcohol and the outcry from the right wing about how they were discriminating against their customers by insisting that their religious beliefs trumped the right of passengers to get a ride home from the airport.

It will work for normal people to point these hypocrisies out, but people like sharon will never, ever understand why discriminating against someone because of your Christian beliefs and doing it because of your Muslim beliefs is exactly the same thing.  As far as they’re concerned, Christianity = correct, so if you do it for a Christian reason, it’s good.  On the other hand, Islam = wrong and bad, so if you discriminate based on a Muslim reason, that’s bad and deserves an indignant outcry.

You know, our Founding Fathers really knew what they were doing when they wrote right into the Constitution that you can’t discriminate based on religion (see “religious test for office”).  It would be nice if people on the right wing would wake up and recognize that.

I wonder…  If a pharmacy decides they want to market themselves as a place that will always distribute birth control, do they have the right to ask a potential employee about their religious beliefs and if they would have any problem with upholding the pharmacies stated goals?  If so, would they have the right to not hire that pharmacist based on their beliefs?  If not, why not?

Neko Onna, I agree, and am astonished that more attention doesn’t focus on the Muslim cab driver cases early last year.

It seems that Muslim cab drivers were refusing to carry blind passengers because the Quran forbids “carrying” (in your arms) unclean animals like, say, dogs, and the cabbies had interpreted this as an injunction against “carrying” (in the cab) seeing-eye dogs and their owners.

The mentality then was that those terrorist brown people could take a long walk off a short pier. But I don’t see a difference here - except that I think the Muslims have a BETTER case than the Christians, since the Bible doesn’t mention BC pills.

Mnemosyne beat me to it. *sheepish*

Neko Onna, it’s also because birth control has to do with women having the freedom to have sex, and eating shellfish does not.

Also, there’s the question of whose “religious freedom” is involved.  While I’m aware of a few Christian groups that keep at least some of the Old Testament dietary laws - I know the Seventh Day Adventists avoid pork - this particular ban is more associated with Jews.  And let’s not even get started on Muslim cab drivers who refuse to give people rides if they’ve been drinking.  If you don’t belong to the right religion, then you don’t have religious freedom.  Or shouldn’t, anyway.

To be fair, this isn’t limited to Christians.  This is more or less what fundamentalism means.

Also, there’s the question of whose “religious freedom” is involved

Good point.

And both Mnemosyne and Faye beat me.  And said it better, no less.

If a pharmacy decides they want to market themselves as a place that will always distribute birth control, do they have the right to ask a potential employee about their religious beliefs and if they would have any problem with upholding the pharmacies stated goals?  If so, would they have the right to not hire that pharmacist based on their beliefs?  If not, why not?

No and no.  That would be religious discrimination.  However, they do have the right to fire a pharmacist if that pharmacist refuses to do the job they were hired to do, since (if the pharmacy markets themselves as carrying all forms of contraception) they were well aware of what the job entailed.  If someone has a moral problem with a job’s duties, then they shouldn’t take that job.

Was that supposed to be a “gotcha”?

I can see if the pharmacy is a “members only” type deal, like a Sam’s Club (whose pharmacy, btw, is open to all).  Then they could limit their customers to members, and they can order membership anyway they like.

But if a pharmacy is open to the public?  The customers’ freedom of religion should win out over the business’.  B/c they don’t have to serve the public, but if they do, they cannot discriminate based on religion or gender.

Are pharmacies required to serve the public?  If so, they cannot discriminate with creed or gender.

These state ‘consciousness’ laws need to be challenged.
—————————
Sharon, shut the fuck up.  You make your opposition’s point.

do [potential employer] have the right to ask a potential employee about their religious beliefs

No, they can never ask about religious beliefs b/c they cannot discriminate on that basis.  Even asking the question will open them up to lawsuits.

That said, they can clearly tell the applicant what the job duties entail, and dispensing any drug to any patient forthwith unless there seems to be a medical contraindication (say different doctors prescribing medications that would interfere with one another).  If the applicant doesn’t want to dispense certain kinds of drugs, they can bring up their objections and lose the job there, or they can take the job, fail to do the job, and lose the job then.

The job is to dispense medication.  The customer’s right to receive the medication should be decided by the doctor alone.

Amanda, I didn’t mean to suggest that pregnancy isn’t a medical condition or that desiring to avoid it, for any reason whatsoever, is not “legitimate.”  I was trying to point out that even if the “logic” of the anti-birth control pharmacist is accepted for argument’s sake (i.e., that it is morally correct to deny women access to birth control in order to restrict their sexual/reproductive freedom), there would still be an enormous moral and practical problem with carrying it out, due to the varying medical uses of birth control (some of which even hardcore fundies would, one hopes, concede are legitimate).

Mnemosyne beat me to it. *sheepish* smile

See what you can do when you spend your time at work surfing the internet and not doing the job they pay you for? 

Also, there’s the question of whose “religious freedom” is involved.

Well, exactly.  That’s where the double bind part comes in.  The argument plays out like this:

Right now, we privelege an “elite” with legally upheld concience clauses. (membership in that elite can be defined by religious affiliation, employment, social class, etc.)  If this is the “right” thing to do, then it should be extended to everyone, every time, because priveleging an elite is a bad thing (quote precendent about equal access, etc).  If we do that, however, society grinds to a halt.  The Muslim taxi driver in MN who doesn’t want to drive blind people in his taxi, the Leviticus-loving server who won’t bring out your shellfish, etc. now all have perfectly legal standing for their refusals.  And we all know that you can’t have a functioning society where any person at any time can just opt-out of their work on concience-based grounds.  For one thing, the legitimate use of this strategy would be daunting enough, given the huge number of different (and sometimes bizzare) interpretations people come up with for religious strictures.  For another, we all know that opportunists will latch on to this as a way to get out of doing parts of their job they see as undesirable. SO, the only reasonable option is to strike the concience clause in it’s entirety, and instead insist that all employers fully disclose the nature of what an employee might be asked to do in the fulfillment of their job descriptions so that they can decide to opt-out of any employment that might conflict with their religious views BEFORE there is a problem.

In my opinion, that’s how you use their crap against them.

If you are a professional, you are bound by professional standards—upheld by the state—to provide services to all comers. If you’re a lawyer, and hitler is your client, you have to defend hitler to the best of your ability. If you’re a doctor, and hitler comes in with a gunshot wound, you have to save his life. And if hitler’s doctor writes him a prescription and hitler walks into a pharmacy to purchase the medication he needs, then the pharmacist has to provide it.

I’m somewhat curious where people get the idea that they get to pick and choose which professional standards they get to adhere to.

If you want to lord over your authority to pick and choose who gets to receive proper treatment, there are plenty of positions available in middle management, and even pharmacists have assistants over whom they can abuse their authority, if they so choose. However, when dealing with clients, a whole other set of professional obligations takes over that forces them to put their personal prejudices aside.

In what moral universe could it possibly be acceptable for a pharmacist to call her a slut and send her away to suffer?  Maybe pharmacists should also be allowed to make women take lie detector tests so the pharmacist can determine whether he approves of the reason for the prescription.

As if these holier-than-thou pharmacists really care whether the woman has a “legitimate” reason for a prescription. In their twisted worldview, women are second-class (at best) citizens who deserve to suffer simply for being a woman. It’s all right there in their holy book, ergo it’s religious discrimination when they are required to do their job and provide legally prescribed medications to women. The fact that the woman on the other side of the counter does not share the pharmacists religious beliefs doesn’t matter. She couldn’t possibly be discriminated against for her religious beliefs because, well, she’s a woman. (And once the Dominionists get their way and rewrite the civil rights laws to cover only religious discrimination, she won’t be able to claim gender discrimination either.) After all, it’s her own fault for not being born a white male.

Mnemosyne, I couldn’t figure out if you meant ME or YOU.

To be fair to the fundamentalists - because I used to be one, when I was young and didn’t know better - it’s not usually that they think Christian = Good, Muslim = Bad as a way to resolve the tension between these points. Most often, I find that they haven’t bothered to consider the full impliactions of their stances.

A moral refusal law seems fair on the face of it - the woman can get her medicine from the “other” pharmacist on duty and the Christian pharmacist can sleep well at night. Most don’t consider (and then don’t accept) that it’s likely that this may cause an undue burden on the woman, because they haven’t considered that it might be possible that only one pharmacist is on duty, or that all the pharmacists in town feel the same way, or so on.

They also don’t consider that if pharmacists get this ability, EVERYONE ELSE does to, and there’s a LOT of things out there that YOU don’t object to that other, sane people do. How many people have even taken a cab drive? Not as many as some think. How many have taken a dog on a cab? Who knew, before those flaps in Manhattan, that Muslims weren’t allowed to carry dogs in cars, and who would have thought that blind people might be affected? Probably not many. Most Christians don’t even realize that many people - including, but not limited to, Jews - observe Old Testament dietary laws!

The problem here - at least among the sheep - isn’t blind hatred, rather it is insularity, and lack of imagination. I agree with Neko - the answer is to careful, repeatedly explain what happens when you take this to the logical extreme.

Variations of this game is super-popular, definitly since Esau days.

Just worry about one person, or group’s right to the affirmative, and maliciously neglect the people whose rights would be trammeled if the original group’s rights were affirmed.

Or just look at Bush Vs Gore.

allow me to illustrate how much bullshit this “just go somewhere else” business is…

“But seriously, if there’s an anti-minority apartment complex in your neighborhood, just go to another apartment complex. And yes, even if that means driving 100 miles to a different city.

um. how about fuck you and the horse you rode in? that’s not acceptable for minorities, and it’s not acceptable for women.

If a pharmacy decides they want to market themselves as a place that will always distribute birth control, do they have the right to ask a potential employee about their religious beliefs and if they would have any problem with upholding the pharmacies stated goals?  If so, would they have the right to not hire that pharmacist based on their beliefs?  If not, why not?

My neighborhood pharmacy has dealt with this very nicely.  You see, when the Morning After Pill went “over the counter” in New York State, they called up one of the smaller city papers and got themselves a nice little interview as an area pharmacy that was championing the pill and would make sure to have it in stock at all times.  They pasted a clipping of the article in a prominent spot in the front entrance, so that anyone who cares can see that this is a contraception-affirming pharmacy.

As to hiring practices vis a vis their outspoken position, I would guess that the clipping in the window probably discourages applicants who want specifically to decline to prescribe birth control,.  And if it was unclear, I think it would be pretty easy to make their stance known without openly asking about the religious beliefs of the applicant.  This is one of the nice parts about small businesses—hiring isn’t done by some impersonal HR wonk or management trainee, it’s done by the owners of the pharmacy who will be working closely with that person every day and seeing them in action.

We keep discussing this topic, yet it never gets old.  I’m still riled after all these months.

All the ins and outs of the US civil rights code I’ve been reading above lead me to ask—has anyone heard of these kinds of refusals happening in Canada?

I also wonder if not just BC etc are being withheld, but also Valtrex.  I had shingles some years ago and was prescibed Valtrex to kill my chicken-pox cooties.  It wasn’t until after that condition cleared up that I learned that Valtrex is commonly prescribed for herpes…(apparently I was the last person on the planet to know this—no wonder the pharmacist looked at me with such sympathy).  Has Valtrex been refused by these so-called moralists, because it’s considered an STD medication, and if so, has it been refused to both men and women?  More fodder for any future legal-case research, perhaps.

If you’re a lawyer, and hitler is your client, you have to defend hitler to the best of your ability.

Most lawyers are under no obligation to represent just anyone who walks through the door.  However, our Constitution does guarantee every defendant a competent defense, so eventually someone, a public defender or an attorney forced by court order, would have to defend him.

The doctor analogy is better, particularly in this instance.  In an emergency situation and when there are no other doctors around, a doctor must provide medical services to someone in need.  No exceptions.

Regarding hiring, an employer is not legally allowed to ask about religious beliefs, but the employer is most definitely allowed to say “this is what this job requires, can you do that?” and if not, refuse to hire.  So you cannot ask about someone having a religion that requires them to strictly observe the sabbath, but you can say “this job requires working on Sundays (or saturdays), will you be able to do that?” 

According to employment laws and court decisions, so long as a requirement is a “bona fide occupational qualification,” then it is perfectly allowable to deny employment to someone who does not have or will not perform the BFOQ.  In some (though very few) situations even immutable characteristics can be BFOQs—for example, being female could be a BFOQ for modeling maternity clothes.  If something really and truly is a BFOQ, then an employer can refuse to hire anyone who doesn’t provide that, regardless of whether the underlying reason for not having/doing the BFOQ is a protected category like religion.  I think any pharmacy who did NOT want to allow this BS would have no problem at all arguing that filling all legally written prescriptions is a BFOQ for the job of pharmacist in their store.

I wonder… If a pharmacy decides they want to market themselves as a place that will always distribute birth control, do they have the right to ask a potential employee about their religious beliefs and if they would have any problem with upholding the pharmacies stated goals?  If so, would they have the right to not hire that pharmacist based on their beliefs?  If not, why not?

You have the right as an employer to ask an interviewee “This job requires that you supply birth control to customers who have prescriptions from their doctors. Is there any reason you would be unable to do the job?”

They don’t have to tell you anything about their faith. For all you know, their hand might catch fire if it came within a foot of a birth control pill. But if it makes them unable to perform the job you’re hiring for, you don’t have to hire them.

You are allowed to refuse to hire people for jobs they are incapable of. You don’t have to hire a blind person as a pilot. You don’t have to hire someone as a construction worker if they can’t lift a certain weight.

Ach, pipped to the post by CalliopeJane.

If a pharmacist decides, for whatever reason, that a patient shouldn’t get the medication prescribed, couldn’t that also be considered practicing medicine without a license, in some sense?

What happens if a pharmacist looks at a prescription and says, “Oh, this drug has bad side effects—I can’t let you take it”? The pharmacist is neither qualified nor licensed to make that decision: only doctors are.

Essentially, the pharmacist is saying, “Because I think one possible side effect of the birth control pill (i.e., early stage miscarriage or “abortion”) is bad, I can’t let you have that prescription.” But there are thousands of other drugs that may have similar possible side effects, which is why nearly every medications carries the warning “Talk to your dr. if you’re pregnant or planning to become pregnant.”

Is it up to pharmacists, then, to determine whether a patient is pregnant or planning to become pregnant before filling any prescription? And do those pharmacists have the right (or the obligation) to refuse a pregnant woman any prescription that might harm the fetus or increase the risk of miscarriage? Or refuse to give a pregnant woman her husband’s Propecia (since just handling it carries risk)? 

Presumably, the doctor discussed the medication and the possible side effects with the patient, and they concluded the benefits outweighed the risks. Does the reason the pharmacist has decided the drug’s side effects are “bad for this patient” really matter? The pharmacist does not have the license, the training, or the right to override the doctor’s decision. (I mean, could a pharmacist said “God told me in a dream not to give you this prescription” and get away with it?)

If a pharmacist decides, for whatever reason, that a patient shouldn’t get the medication prescribed, couldn’t that also be considered practicing medicine without a license, in some sense?

One of the pharmacists at my husband’s work got fired for changing doctor’s orders without authorization.  So, yes, it’s a VERY big deal if you have pharmacists making their own decisions about what medication the patient should get.

A moral refusal law seems fair on the face of it ...

No, it isn’t fair.  It’s bullshit.

Unless your employer is asking you to do something that is illegal, I fail to see why you get to pick and choose which job duties you will perform.  If I am employed as a car salesperson and I refuse to sell gas guzzling SUVs because I think contributing to green house gases and propping up Big Oil is morally reprehensible….my boss has every right in the world to fire my tree-hugging ass.  End of story.

You are always free to decide that your job duties are ethically or morally reprehensible.  And you are free to leave that job, if necessary.  But in the real world, the grown up world, you are not free to tell your boss what duties you will and will not perform, and still retain your job.

Pharmacists are getting a pass because this is about “belief,” which in this country (and probably elsewhere) trumps reason.  So if my imaginary friend in the sky tells me that uppity womens shouldn’t be having sex unless they are married and working on a quiver full of children, then, in this society, I get out of doing my job.  Basically a pharmacist’s right of refusal is nothing more than misogyny protected by “freedom of religion.”

No, I meant the question in that, how is the only person with any rights the middle man.  The employer can’t question a potential employee’s religion even if it will interfere with them carrying out their job.  The customer isn’t supposed to be able to complain if that employee isn’t doing their job because that’s religious discrimination.  It seems to me that some of these people are becoming pharmacists for the sole reason of fucking shit up.  I’m a vegetarian, so maybe I’ll get a job with McDonald’s and refuse to serve anything but sodas and fries.  I know McDonald’s is all about the burgers, but I don’t think they should be able to question my belief that burgers are wrong.  Oh but wait, that’s just a belief, not a religion.  But since I’m an atheist that’s as close as I can get.  Doesn’t really seem fair.

The employer can’t question a potential employee’s religion even if it will interfere with them carrying out their job.
You can’t question their religion, but you can tell them that the job requires dispensing birth control and ask them if there is anything at all that will prevent them from doing that. If they say that they are unable to do that, then they are not qualified to be a pharmacist. Doesn’t matter what the reason is.

Pharmacists are getting a pass because this is about “belief,” which in this country (and probably elsewhere) trumps reason.

When you get down to it, it’s not even “belief”, it’s “belief in certain claims about the subordinate status of women and gay people.” Just try believing that people have a right to food, shelter and clothing, or that property is theft…

Oh, and that whole “they’re just refusing to dispense certain drugs” crap was adjudicated decades ago. Take a look for “disparate effect”. Lunch counters couldn’t get away with not serving people who just happened to have frizzy hair, banks couldn’t get away with refusing mortgages to people who just happened to live in particular zip codes, manufacturers couldn’t get away with refusing jobs to people who just happened to have uteruses.

Again, not trying to troll, but from my own fundie experience, I doubt that ALL the pharmacists hate women. Or even hate “women who have sex”. I’d be willing to bet, in fact, that there is - somewhere - a female, unmarried, sexually active (but with condoms!) pharmacist who doesn’t want to hand out BC.

You have to understand that there is a HOARD of misinformation out there in the fundie community about BC pills “causing” abortions and THINK OF THE LITTLE CHILDREN!! Yes, a proper pharmacist should know better, but I have known a LOT of people who have been trained to think that given a pastor’s opinion on one side and science’s “opinion” on the other side, the pastor is right and the scientists have been deluded by Satan. That’s why we have this Evolution/Intelligent Design problem, too.

And I’m not suggesting that there isn’t plenty of mysogyny to go around - because there IS. But I do think that some of these people really just do believe that BC “kills babies” and that they should be able to issue condoms as well. I’ve had to explain to my own parents about 30 times now that EC is NOT “that RU-something abortion pill”, and - while they believe me - their pastor, news media, Focus on the Family newsletters, and everything else they know, love, and trust is implying/stating something very different.

I - personally - think that this debate gets farther in the Real World by arguing Ignorance, rather than Sexism, because it’s much easier for someone to accept that maybe a “good person” like Ol’ Ben Down At The Pharmacy is mistaken, rather than a secret woman-hater who wants to see them all die.

I know McDonald’s is all about the burgers, but I don’t think they should be able to question my belief that burgers are wrong.  Oh but wait, that’s just a belief, not a religion.  But since I’m an atheist that’s as close as I can get.  Doesn’t really seem fair.

For a better example, think of an Orthodox Jew who gets a job at McDonald’s.  If they refuse to serve bacon cheeseburgers, they’re basically fired.  And this can be accomplished without McDonald’s asking about their religion - they could just say, “The job is that you have to serve all our food, including bacon cheeseburgers, and if you have a really big problem with that, you can go get a job somewhere else.” 

However, as discussed in another thread on this same topic recently, Orthodox Jews are aware of their minority status and the problems that their religious purity laws present, so they deliberately approach things in a way that presents a minimum of snafus like this.  Dominionists, , on the other hand, have only adopted these convoluted rules in order to present problems for others and in hopes that it will enable them to undermine the legal underpinnings of secular society.  Which is a whole different thing, obviously.

Yes, a proper pharmacist should know better, but I have known a LOT of people who have been trained to think that given a pastor’s opinion on one side and science’s “opinion” on the other side, the pastor is right and the scientists have been deluded by Satan. That’s why we have this Evolution/Intelligent Design problem, too.

Yes, and those people should probably not complicate matters by trying to get into a line of work that is on the “science” end of that continuum.  This is why ID needs to be kept out of public school classrooms and tudents who have only been exposed to ID and not real science should have a hard time getting into college, and an impossible time getting into science majors and science-oriented professional programs. 

Look at it this way.  I have somewhat of a “woo” view of medicine, especially in terms of thinking that sometimes acupuncture or meditation or st. john’s wort, or whatever, will probably do nicely and you really probably don’t need to be taking all those psych drugs.  If I had decided to become a pharmacist, and thought it was OK to refuse to fill prescriptions for Ritalin or Prozac,  I would be pounding the pavement for a job in a different industry postehaste..  Your personal opinion of medicine, or science, or religion, or what the fuck ever, has shit all to do with how you dispense drugs if you are a pharmacist, and if you think that any of those beliefs will make your job as a pharmacist problematic, you probably should have thought about that before you spent good money going to pharmacy school.  Period.  That’s all.  End of fucking story.  Anyone who doesn’t grasp that should have their license yanked.

Pharmacists are essentially in the role of importers. Very few prescriptions are filled with products made in the same state. Big Pharma is multinational, and even the ones whose offices are located in the US actually manufacture a large percentage of the drugs in Canada or overseas.

Pharmacists are required to call the doctor if the pharmacist refuses to dispense the medication. Some drugs are never carried by some pharmacies as stock, though they may be available by special order. These are IV-administered drugs (only some pharmacies have the ability to make up solutions), HIV meds (in the past, when med regimens were very complex, and special training was needed for proper patient education, only a few pharmacies in a city would dispense HIV meds), “orphan drugs” (rare diseases), cancer chemotherapy.

For a pharmacist to refuse to fill and to retain the prescription is grounds for state licensure review.

I don’t see an obvious way to discipline the pharmacy for never stocking OCP in the first place. I do think that one obvious way to deal with the pharmacy would be for the citizen or organization to send a letter to every doctor in the pharmacy’s area, stating that in at least N patient encounters, employees of pharmacy X stated that pharmacy X doesn’t carry and will not fill OCP orders (or whatever the problem is). Doctor’s office addresses are public record. No politicking in state legislatures is needed. The docs get used to sending patients to other pharmacies for OCP, and eventually, all prescriptions, by force of habit. The marketplace disciplines the troublesome pharmacy.

Because everyone has a car, 4-6 hours to spare on the round trip, and money to blow on gas so they can pick up medicine that’s been prescribed by their doctor, because an anti-choice pharmacist’s right to force his beliefs on his clients is sacred.

No, because if you want contraception, you go to a pharmacy that will dispense it for you. Jackass

Weak, Sharon. Weak.

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Along the lines of that Daily Kos entry about EMTs linked a few days ago, here’s a link I always like to drop in discussions about this that describes how far-right-wing medical groups are deciding who can get what care.

One thing that continues to frustrate me about the pharmacy refusal debates is that all the attention is paid to the rights of pharmacists to religious freedom, and none is paid to the rights of their customers that are being violated.

You can’t violate rights that don’t exist. There is nothing….NADA….in law that says you have an absolute right to birth control. It can’t be banned by government, but nowhere does it say that the private sector must make it available.

It’s a stupid arguement.