Bakery refuses to make wedding cake for gay couple

Ashers 'gay cake' case: European court rules case inadmissible

Eimear Flanagan

BBC News NI

BBC

A gay rights activist has lost a seven-year discrimination argument over a cake order as the European Court of Human Rights ruled his case inadmissible.

Gareth Lee started legal action endorse in after a Christian-run Belfast bakery refused to make him a cake with the slogan "Support Gay Marriage".

The family unyielding Ashers said the slogan contravened their Christian beliefs.

The European court ruled Mr Lee's case inadmissible, saying he had failed to exhaust all options in the UK courts.

The Belfast man has long argued that by refusing to fulfil his order, the bakery had discriminated against him on grounds of his sexual orientation and political beliefs.

He won his original case and a subsequent appeal in the UK courts, but in the UK Supreme Court disagreed with the lower courts and found in favour of the bakery.

Mr Lee then took his case to the European Court of Human Rights, where it was examined by seven judges who decided, by majori

Colorado high court to hear case against Christian baker who refused to build trans-themed cake

On the heels of a U.S. Supreme Court victory this summer for a graphic artist who didn’t want to design wedding websites for same-sex couples, Colorado’s highest court said Tuesday it will now notice the case of a Christian baker who refused to make a cake celebrating a gender transition.

The announcement by the Colorado Supreme Court is the latest development in the yearslong legal saga involving Jack Phillips and LGBTQ rights.

Phillips won a partial victory before the U.S. Supreme Court in after refusing to make a male lover couple’s wedding cake.

He was later sued by Autumn Scardina, a transgender gal, after Phillips and his suburban Denver bakery refused to make a pink cake with azure frosting for her birthday and to celebrate her gender transition.

Scardina, an attorney, said she brought the lawsuit to “challenge the veracity” of Phillips’ statements that he would serve LGBTQ customers. Her attorney said her cake organize was not a “set up” intended to file a lawsuit.

The Colorado Suprem

'Gay cake' row: What is the dispute about?

In October , the owners of the bakery lost their appeal against the decision that their refusal to make a "gay cake" was discriminatory.

Appeal court judges said that, under statute, the bakers were not allowed to provide a service only to people who agreed with their religious beliefs, external.

Reacting to the ruling, Daniel McArthur from Ashers said he was "extremely disappointed" adding that it undermined "democratic freedom, religious freedom and free speech".

The firm then took the case to the Supreme Court and they won.

The UK's utmost court ruled the bakery's refusal to make a cake with a slogan supporting same-sex marriage was not discriminatory.

Then president of the Supreme Court, Lady Hale, ruled the bakers did not refuse to fulfil the order because of the customer's sexual orientation.

"They would have refused to make such a cake for any customer, irrespective of their sexual orientation," she said.

"Their objection was to the letter on the cake, not to

In narrow ruling, Supreme Court gives victory to baker who refused to generate cake for gay wedding

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Supreme Court gave a raise to advocates of religious freedom on Monday, judgment that a Colorado baker cannot be forced to make a cake for a same-sex wedding, in a case that committed marriage equality and protection from discrimination.

But the perspective was a narrow one, applying to the specific facts of this case only. It gave no hint as to how the court might determine future cases involving florists, bakers, photographers and other business owners who hold cited religious and free-speech objections when refusing to serve gay and queer woman customers in the arouse of the Supreme Court's same-sex marriage decision.

In the decision, the court said legal proceedings in Colorado had shown a hostility to the baker's religious views. Monday's ruling was written by Justice Anthony Kennedy, who also wrote the Supreme Court's lgbtq+ marriage decision.

Similar cases are now working their way through the lower courts.

"These disputes must be resolved with tolerance, without und