"What's Goin' On?"

With accolades to Marvin Gaye (and co-writers Al Cleveland and Obie Benson of the Four Tops), I have to wonder, today, what's goin' on?

I've written before how, purportedly, the British fife and drum corps played a popular British song, The World Turned Upside Down, when Cornwallis (actually, his aide General John O'Hara; Corny feigned illness--a bout of the gout--so he wouldn't have to give his sword to George Washington--ick!  How demeaning!) surrendered at Yorktown.  Yep, the Americans under Washington defeating the might British army under Cornwallis?  The world must have been turned upside down.

And it seems, more and more every day, today's world is turned upside down.  I know things are changing, sometimes for the better.  That's good.  A lot of things need to be changed.  Other times I can't at all get my mind around things, what people are thinking, if they are at all.

An op-ed in yesterday's newspaper cited the state of Colorado's continued efforts to ruin the business (the life?) of the baker who refused to bake a cake for a gay couple's wedding based on his religious beliefs.  The Supremes, in a "narrow victory" ("narrow" in scope only; it was a 7-2 decision) for the baker, ruled in his favor.  I won't argue, at least not today, the merits of the baker's case.  No, today it's the persistent attacks on him and those who believe like him (or at least attacks intended to intimidate them into submission).

First, and I know I'm likely beating a dead horse, the state of Colorado's efforts are being led by unelected officials.  I've written ad nauseum about Big Government, the Deep State.  It's not just the rotten politicians and their self-serving interests and actions.  It's the bureaucrats who often are accountable to, well, nobody.  They make up rules and regulations that often times are not even reviewable by other branches of government, including the courts.

These unelected Colorado officials lost in the Supreme Court, but they continue their assault.  In what appears to be a contrived effort, more complaints have been brought against this baker (and those who profess similar religious beliefs).  The Colorado Civil Rights Commission has sided with activists seeking to destroy the baker.  (Apparently, freedom of religious beliefs is no longer a civil right in Colorado?)  There must be a way to rein in these smug, arrogant, self-righteous (There!  Did I make my views clear there?) bureaucrats.

Second, and more to my point, is the idiocy of the activists.  Complaints, this time, against the baker stem from his refusal to bake other cakes, cakes requested by the activists.  One asked him to make a cake with "an image of Satan smoking marijuana."  Huh?  Yep.  The baker refused.  But that's not the end.  Another request was for "a three-tiered white cake" that included "a large figure of Satan licking a 9-inch black dildo."  Oh, and the request continued, "I would like the dildo to be an actual working model that can be turned on......"  This has to be fabricated, right?  (But not in today's world, where a crucifix placed in a beaker of urine, among other such works, is considered art.)

What to call this?  Lunacy?  Depravity?  Who are these people?  What kind of people would order such a cake?  Perhaps they thought they were being humorous?  Nah, that wasn't it, not at all.  Then, when refused, they filed a complaint with a government agency, an unelected government agency.  To top it off, the agency accept the complaint and is acting on it.

Why isn't the government, Big Government, investigating people who make such complaints?  (Yes, I'm being facetious, but only partially.)  At the least, why hasn't every newspaper in the country printed the names of such depraved people?  I wonder how their families, neighbors, and co-workers would respond.  Noting the continued national slide into depravity/degeneration, maybe they would see the complainants as champions, some sort of heroes/heroines.

I have no problem with asking for a wedding cake to celebrate a gay wedding.  That's fine with me.  If a gay couple wants to get married, hooray for them.  I hope they are happy.  I also have no problem with one, due to religious beliefs, refusing to bake such a cake.  Go find another baker!  This is America!  Use your money to fight against what you perceive as prejudice by taking your business elsewhere.

But all this stuff with "a dildo" is too much for me, beyond the Pale, far beyond it.  I'd like to interview these complainants.  "What kind of people are you?" I'd ask.  "How did you even come up with such a thing?"  (That's easy to answer.  "I found it on the Internet."  Besides, with the depraved state of modern creativity in the arts......)  "Are you complaining against the refusal to bake a cake with 'Satan' or the refusal to bake a cake with 'a working dildo'?"  Of course, is there a difference?  Perhaps so, especially if this is an attack on religious freedom.

I can just see their responses to me, their arrogant, self-righteous responses.  Again reaching back several decades, Bob Dylan once wrote, "The times they are a-changin'."  (Note I said, "wrote," not "sang."  That was deliberate.)  Yes, they are.  But not all of the changes are good.