Here we go again. The owners of the bakery in Gresham, Oregon that refused to make a wedding cake for a same-sex couple last year are back. This time, they’re serving up “ex-gay” cakes.
The last we heard from Sweet Cakes by Melissa was in a hastily handwritten note taped to the store’s front door that read:
This fight is not over. We will continue to stand strong. Your Religious Freedom is becoming not Free anymore. This is ridiculous that we can not practice our faith. The LORD is good and we will continue to serve Him with all our heart.
The bakery closed its doors last September after being exposed for denying a wedding cake to a lesbian couple and calling them an “abomination unto the Lord.”
The women filed a complaint with the Bureau of Labor and Industries, which launched an investigation to determine if the owners of the bakery, husband and wife Aaron and Melissa Klein, had indeed violated the law. It was determined that, under Oregon’s Equality Act of 2007, people cannot be denied service by a private business based on their sexual orientation.
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As a result, the Kleins said they were victims of the “gaystapo.” They also claimed that all the bad PR had caused them to lose more than 50% of their business, which forced them to move the store back into their home where they had originally started it.
Whomp, whomp.
“It isn’t easy to take a stand sometimes,” the Kleins wrote on their Facebook page. “Sometimes it’s a little scary but God will carry you through and be with you every step of the way.”
But, as promised in their note back in September, the fight is not over.
Sweet Cakes by Melissa recently posted a photo to Facebook of cakes baked for the Restored Hope Network, a conservative group that encourages LGBT individuals to pray the gay away. The photos were accompanied by the caption: “What a wonderful ministry!”
The Restored Hope Network works to pair people with “unwanted” same-sex attraction to a network of Christian counselors who can “cure” them. The organization’s executive director Anne Paulk, claims to be an “ex-lesbian” and has been a vocal advocate for gay reparative therapy for years, despite the fact that her former “ex-gay” husband re-came out as gay earlier this year.
Sweet Cakes by Melissa’s Facebook post has received more than 300 “likes” and 160 comments, though most of the comments have been critical of the bakery.
“You may believe what you wish, but when you discriminate against people based on creed, color or sexual orientation, you are a bigot,” one person wrote.
“Ex gays are still gays, so you guys are basically serving gays,” another person commented.
The case between the lesbian couple and Sweet Cakes by Melissa is still ongoing. Unless a settlement between the two parties can be reached, a hearing is scheduled for October.
lykeitiz
Baking their hate-cakes from home and spewing their venom online are both perfectly fine.
But when they walk out their front door, they need to treat everyone with respect.
Maybe they’re learning that.
andy_d
@lykeitiz: As distasteful as I find their (IMO) venom and warped beliefs, I totally agree with you.
Bad Ass Biker
Oh, those poor christians; always persecuted for their beliefs.
Cam
At the end of the day, their bigotry cost them their business. So they can make as many cakes as you want for Ex-Gays. Doesn’t change the fact that bigotry cost them.
Gothrykke
Am I the only one here who looks at their shit cake work and think it was more that than the bruhaha that sank their awful business?
Cam
Actually taking a closer look at their picture, I think I understand why they work with Ex-Gays.
tsmithknox
“The LORD is good and we will continue to serve Him with all our heart.”
Who are they kidding? If you worship a deity the expects, or even condones, treating people badly, then you are mean and your god is evil.
bcbear4u
Seriously. My local supermarket makes a better looking cake than these pieces of shit. And without any bigotry attached. How do I know? I ordered a cake depicting two grooms and it turned out perfectly. The baker even congratulated me on my big day. (The cake was for two friends who were recently married when our state began allowing same-sex couples to marry; sadly not for me yet…).
Ron Jackson
Someone there should notify the local health department that they are running a bakery from home. In most jurisdictions you still gotta abide by all the local laws. Can be tough in a house.
LuckyboyLA
Oregon has some hard core everything cases. These two, survivalists ,Neo-Natzis, anti-gov groups, some hot kink gay men in Portland; If you watch Grimm like me on NBC ‘cos of super handsome David Giuntoli, even a population of Vesson. I dunno, remote vast nowhere of wilderness 800 miles from SF, next stop 3hrs Big Time Seattle?. I’ve been up there a couple times. OR in places looks like a Star Wars planet. Wouldn’t be surprised to see someone come out of the trees in camo/face paint carrying an AK-47 rifle and say they were ‘Hunting’.
james_in_cambridge
@LuckyboyLA: Gotcha! Avoid Oregon at all costs! Thanks for the heads up!
Though I looked it up and Obama’s margin of victory in Oregon was almost equal to his margin here in Massachusetts so the vast majority of you can’t be that bad.
Lvng1tor
Hate Cakes….just like Granny Thurman used to make.
1EqualityUSA
The taste of hate. If this is Christianity, it’s ugly. These two are ugly. The way the circulation is leaving the skin on his nose as he crinkles it is ugly. The color of this woman’s pre-diabetic gums is ugly. Their cakes are ugly. Their beliefs are hate, cloaked in Biblical illiteracy. They deserve each other. They deserve to go out of business.
Xzamilio
Mmmmmm… religion. Preaching tolerance and love since the Incquisition
Spike
Gotta love when the gaystapo show up and destroy someones business!
The power of the gaystapo!!!!
HughJ
@Spike: What gaystapo? It says right in the article that “all the bad PR had caused them to lose more than 50% of their business.” Translation: Customers exercised their right to choose, and took their business to competing bakeries. No “gaystapo” forced the Kleins to close their doors. The free market did.
Cam
@Spike:
So then you are anti-capitalist are you? Because, what you have just advocated is that people should be FORCED to patronize a business they do not want to patronize.
If a video got out of the owner of a restaurant peeing in the soup before they serve it and their business closed, guess what, THEY are the ones that ruined their business, NOT the customers who decided not to go.
This couple preached hate and their customers decided to shop someplace else, THEY ruined their business with their bigotry.
But again, you are obviously anti-American and feel that people should not have the freedom to choose where they want to spend their money.
1EqualityUSA
I totally read Spike’s message as sarcasm to the max.
james_in_cambridge
@1EqualityUSA: +1
Xzamilio
@Cam: Seriously, dude? Take it down a notch… he was being facetious, you DEFCOM 1 nut!!
Xzamilio
@Cam: *DEFCON
Yeah I typed it wrong… are you gonna launch a self-important paragraph attacking my typo??
Cam
@Xzamilio:
So lets see, I pointed out what that guy was actually saying and since you couldn’t argue with it you have to scramble to come up with something and that was it?
If you can’t argue my point at least try a little harder to come up with a decent distraction.