New York Town Clerk: If Gays Can Marry, I Can’t Do My Job

OK Barb, fine with us; go flip burgers. If you refuse to fulfill your job requirements, you just won’t have a job. Good riddance.

Cool Barb! Get your 5 minutes of fame…and let someone else do your job while you collect your unemployment!

75 years old? Old bitty needs to STFU and do her job or retire and move to the bible belt along with all of the other delusional thumpers. F’ing rediculous.

This is an all-too-rare opportunity to see a christian forced by law into doing something they think is “immoral” and I, for one, find it immensely satisfying.

I agree with JimG. Do it, Barb, and shut up about it, or get fired. Don’t like it? We don’t care. Your kind pushed your “morality” on us for over a thousand years and it’s time the shoe found itself on the other foot. Don’t feel so good to be the one getting screwed, does it?

Oh, who am I kidding? They’ll just claim “Look at how we’re being oppressed! Ignore that whole majority-with-unprecedented-political-influence bit, WE’RE OPPRESSED GODDA–erm, GOSHDARN IT!”

This could turn into an interesting legal standoff.

She hates gay people so much that she simply can’t see herself fufilling her job requirement of marrying them?

Well, good. Get out of the business. The last thing a happy couple needs on their day is someone seething with bigotry and anxious to let the world know that your love is inferior and immoral.

said she’s morally opposed to interracial weddings and does not intend to affix her signature to any marriage documents for interracial couples.

I thought we settled this mess decades ago. Claiming religion is not a justification for not doing your job.

If enough young people cast their vote, she could be voted out of office.

What this implies though is that every other thing the government does is in keeping with her moral system. Amazing.

44 years ago, there probably was another 75 year old refusing to sign marriage certificates, but for interracial couples.

44 years ago? Alas…

On the bright side, in 44 years, some moron will refuse a marriage to a gay couple and be run out of office by a chorus of universal outrage from elected officials, liberal and conservative.

Couldn’t have agreed more Jim – she can join the pharmacists that refuse to dispense certain prescribed medication for the same reason or the driving instructors who refuse to teach women or the teachers who refuse to teach real science.

The short answer should be – do your job fairly and quit your bigotry or go home.

Why the hell are town clerks elected? It’s not like she has any real power. She performs administrative functions. That should simply be like any other employee of a city.

Nobody is asking her to like her job, they’re asking her to DO her job. She’s not actually hurting anyone, nor is she actually party to the marriage. Nobody is forcing her to have gay sex either.

Think of it as a small corporate merger with benefits that don’t actually concern you.

I worked at a retail store back when retail stores first started opening on Sundays. The Christian employees said they’d never work on Sundays and they would quit before working on Sunday. When our store opened on Sundays every Christian who said they would quit worked their required Sundays. As a matter of fact they were soon volunteering to work on Sundays for the extra money! Christians never let following the commands of their God get in the way of their good lifestyle. ROFL

No, no, no. You have it all wrong. The bible belt starts in upstate (with a few urban exceptions).

It made me laugh that the Politico guy had to explain that she was a R….as if…and no, younger people are not going to vote her out of office, not in a 6K people town in upstate.

“….anybody like that…”? WT*?

in 44 years, some moron will refuse a marriage to a gay couple and be run out of office by a chorus of universal outrage from elected officials, liberal and conservative.

Meanwhile, the Christians of 2055 will point out that everyone knows Jesus supports gay rights, including marriage, and that as a result the GLBT rights movement of 1969-2020 was led by the Christian church. And therefore that “moron” can’t possibly be a Real Christian.

Homophobic churches? Of course not; conventional wisdom will have forgotten that those ever existed. As the 2055 public will recognize, anyone who says Christianity is or has ever been against the full humanity of GLBT people is obviously a fundamentalist atheist who just hates religion.

Lather (abolitionism, women’s rights, workers’ rights, segregation….), rinse, retcon, and repeat. Oceania has always been at war with Eastasia, and True Christianity has always led the fight for human rights.

Jamie:

we are al suppose to be one nation under “GOD”….

No, actually, we’re not.

OK Barb, fine with us; go flip burgers. If you refuse to fulfill your job requirements, you just won’t have a job. Good riddance.

This is exactly what I was thinking 5 seconds into MacEwen’s quote; although it was much more NSFW in my head.

@ jamie: Would you get upset if the clerk refused to approve divorces? What if she refused to provide marriage licenses for people who were already divorced once?

For that matter, do you eat shelfish? Have you ever worn clothes made of a poly-cotton blend? Have you every prayed where anyone else could see you?

How would you feel if a clerk was a Muslim and refused to enter pet dogs into the pet registry? What if a Muslim refused to sign a fully legal permit to build a pig farm?

This lady has the same logic as pharmacists who refuse to issue birth control for the same religious reasons.

Glad to know these individuals know what’s best for the rest of us.

@Patrick: I had a similar thought. My first job out of law school was with an insurance defense firm. I figured out pretty quickly that making up specious reasons to yank people’s insurance coverage out from under them when they were most in need was, for me, ethically nauseating. But I didn’t insist on keeping my job while refusing to represent my clients.

(Even if I didn’t think such a move would be unacceptably childish on my part, the firm would have bounced me out on my ear if I’d said, “I’m not going to represent our clients or do any work for them anymore. But you had better still keep paying me.”)

Whether one can handle the moral/ethical questions that come with the job is part of determining whether one can handle all the job requirements. “Willing to sign what you are responsible for signing” is just as important as “being able to lift ten pounds repeatedly” or any other necessary skill. If Ms. MacEwan thinks she can’t do that job requirement, then she is not suited to this job and needs to find one in which she can fulfill all the requirements.

“if you all read the bible it states… ”

Funny, I didn’t think biblical scholars wrote like ranting teenagers.

What happened to freedom of choice, whether for morals or the lack of them? Is the freedom to choose only good until you get what you want, and then the freedom to choose goes away? I’m telling you, atheism isn’t in this to do away with religion, but to replace God with their own religion. See “Humanist Manifesto I.” Read also: http://atheistlegitimacy.blogspot.com/ By the way, you did a great job of verbally stomping on Ms MacGewen.

“I don’t know of anybody like that in my town. I’m sure that there might be, but I haven’t heard about anybody.” – Barbara MacEwen, the town clerk in upstate Volney who is responsible for signing marriage licenses in the town.

Ignorance is bliss only for the ignorant. She obviously doesn’t understand because she’s never been exposed. It’s easy to label people “sinners” and “evil” if you’ve never met them and saw for yourself that they are human (just like you) with needs and wants and suffering (just like you). Maybe she would feel differently if she actually got to know some of the people who’s civil rights were being violated, and got to see the extent of their suffering first hand. Maybe then she could see that her cognitive fusion has nothing to do with “gods love” or whatever, and is more about her own primitive, inherited Bronze Age tribalism and xenophobia. Didn’t Jesus teach, “love you neighbor?” I don’t think he said “unless they’re gay.” This is further proof that without understanding there can be no compassion.

As a public servant, her duty is to uphold the state law, not church law. She can resign if she feels her moral duty interferes with legal mandates.

This whole trend of refusing to do the basic duties of your job wihout being fired baffles me. Seems to me, if you want a job, you should be expected to fulfill its basic duties. What kind of world will it be if people are given the okay to do only parts of their job without consequences? The results could be inconvenient and intrusive at least, dangerous at worst. If you can just hide behind your “beliefs” can anyone ever be fired? Couldn’t you just claim to have an ideological issue with whatever I didn’t want to do? Imagining the repercussions of such a precident where I work (in a hospital) is unsettling to say the least.

This is how we solve the job problem. We legalize all the things that crazy right-wing bigots think should be banned, and then wait until they all quit their jobs over it, and then give those jobs to honest, deserving people.

Bleah. You don’t have the right to refuse to do your job because you don’t agree with everyone who crosses in front of your desk. People like this are infuriating.

With unemployment rates what they are, I have no objection to her resigning and allowing someone else to take over that position. Good luck finding a new job, Barbara!

Amish Bus Driver rule. (If you refuse to do some job, you can’t demand to be hired for it.)

This is interesting, though, since the job requirements changed underfoot for her. She originally took the job with the understanding that none of it went against her beliefs (at least, not so much that she’d refuse to do it), and now that understanding has been changed through no action on her part.

So, there’s a conflict. But, in this case, other peoples’ rights are the irresistable force, but she is no unmovable object. The law wins. She cannot keep her current job.

I don’t think she should be “fired”, which is a punitive measure, and she’s done nothing unethical. Perhaps she should be transferred to a different position within the same organization/department or something, one that’s compatible with her beliefs; if that’s not gonna work, then end employment in a non-punitive way (with severance pay, good references, things like that).

Give her the chance to have the luxury of being bigoted where it can’t affect others.

Vystrix, that’s true, but she’s choosing to run for re-election for a job whose requirements have changed. It certainly undermines the argument that it’s not her fault the requirements changed since she’s essentially volunteering to keep it. She can’t be transferred, either; it’s an elected position.

If a job’s requirements change (as when emergency contraception became available in the U.S.), the person doing that job either adapts or has to resign.

I like to point out that she did say she would only refuse to sign these certificates if she could do so “legally.” I presume that means she will sign them if she is legally bound to.

…the Blue Oyster Bar?

*rimshot*

(old “Police Academy” joke, for those who remember the 1980s)

Time to go ole’ woman!

I wish her the best of luck in finding a new job. Where she never has o interact wi gay people, ever. Seriously, um, good luck.

Surely she doesn’t sign the marriage licenses for those who are on their second or third marriages?

People who refuse to do their jobs for whatever reason should be fired.

Aaaargh! I’m sick of this shit. If your religion prevents you from doing your job, GET ANOTHER FUCKING JOB!

jamie wrote:

i love those who say they are gay i dont judge them just like jesus having compassion for the drunkerds, hores

jamie, you apparently need a little Sesame Street learnin’….

“one of these things is not like the others”

If you cannot recognize that a loving relationship between consenting adults of the same gender is _completely different_ than vices like drunkenness, then something is really skewing your judgement.

If she doesn’t like it why doesn’t she hand in her resignation form now?
People would be better off without her bigoted & hateful views.

I’m sure that plenty of people would be happy to do the job should she prove unwilling or unable to do it.

As Vystrix so wisely says “Give her the chance to have the luxury of being bigoted where it can’t affect others.”

Christopher Hitchens is right–religion poisons everything.

Marriage is not a right, regardless of what some judge said in Loving V. Virgina. (a Case about interracial marriage). Marriage is a privledge, a gift set aside by God for 1 man, and 1 woman, just like true love is. By granting homosexuals their “right” to marry, we are also taking away the rights of anyone who opposes gay marriage. Everyone needs to conform to rules, and normsm and morals.. Homosexuals don’t want to conform, they want to piss and moan like some little 4 year old sissy, until they get their way, and the rules are re-written to suit only their selfish wants, and desires.

When marriage became a legally binding contract recognized by the state and U.S. governments, it ceased to be an exclusively religious act. As such, marriage is subject to the United States Supreme Court’s decision in Everson v. Board of Education in 1947 – the wall of separation of church and state, which has been consistently reiterated and upheld since. One of the reasons this country exists is due to the desire to be free of religious oppression. What you believe, as evidenced in your comment above, is a direct threat to that freedom. Religious oppression applies to non-religious individuals and groups. It doesn’t just apply to you, the religious individual and groups.

As you didn’t state your particular church affiliation, I’m going to assume from this point forward that you believe yourself to be a Christian. If you were, you would know that Luke 6:27-31 states “But I tell you who hear me: Love your enemies, do good to those
who hate you, [28] bless those who curse you, pray for those who
mistreat you. [29] If someone strikes you on one cheek, turn to him the
other also. If someone takes your cloak, do not stop him from taking
your tunic. [30] Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what
belongs to you, do not demand it back. [31] Do to others as you would
have them do to you.” Luke 6:36 states “[36] Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.”

You say, “Everyone needs to conform to rules, and normsm and morals.” Are you so sure about that? How would you know what sin was, or how to be good, or how to be kind if you did not not have others different from you to show you how not to be? You say that homosexuals want the rules re-written to suit only their selfish wants, and desires. I believe that we are here for others. I believe that the greatest gift is to love and be loved in return, as eden ahbez so eloquently wrote. When you oppose gay marriage, you deny people who have spent their
entire lives together supporting and uplifting one another. When you oppose gay marriage, you deny love in any form other than your own strict definition. You deny those different from you the opportunity to say goodbye in a hospital bed.
You, individually, are responsible for the incredibly destructive pain and grief that is a direct result of your narrowness. You allow, condone and encourage the hatred and damage done by bullies who prey on LGBTQ youth. You allow, condone and encourage the murder of those different from you. You allow, condone and encourage a fourteen year old boy to commit suicide. You,
individually, are responsible for that. You deny other human beings
the basic civilities and rights that you so covet for yourself. You,
individually, are responsible for that.