What happens when there's a clash between holy motivations and homosexual machinations in Hollywood?

If a recent allegation made against the ABC producers of "One Life to Live" is any indication, they could use some soap to clean up their agenda. Show regular Patricia Mauceri claims she was fired from the program because she refused to engage in pro-homosexual dialogue contrary to the religious convictions integral to her character — a character she helped create based on her own faith. FoxNews.com reports on the story, writing:

Mauceri played the recurring role of Carlotta Vega on "OLTL" for the last 14 years. But when she objected to how the writers wanted her deeply religious character, a Latina mother, to handle a storyline involving homosexuality, she objected. And for that she claims she was fired.

. . . "I did not object to being in a gay storyline. I objected to speaking the truth of what that person, how that person would live and breathe and act in that storyline," she said. "And this goes against everything I am, my belief system, and what I know the character's belief system is aligned to."

Not surprisingly, an ABC spokesman called Mauceri's claim "frivolous," thus denying that her religious stance inspired her termination. Yet this is about as believable as the notion that Carrie Prejean's opposition to faux marriage didn't cost her points in the Miss USA Pageant.

Yet, whether you think Mauceri's firing was just or not, the issue raises a larger question: Should an employer even be required to have "just cause" before firing an employee?

This isn't a difficult question if you understand the principle of "freedom of association." It simply isn't the role of our government to tell a business owner whom he may and may not exclude from an establishment created with his own money.

Yet many recoil at this idea. It conjures up images of bygone days, of signs stating "Whites Only" or "Irish and Jews Need Not Apply." And, yes, this is one side of the coin — but there is another side. Today there are courts applying "protection" against discrimination not just to categories of race, ethnicity and sex but also to what people euphemistically call "lifestyle choices," things such as cross-dressing. Yet is having government force schools and day-care centers to hire cross dressers any less destructive than having a few business owners discriminate unjustly?

First understand what "discrimination" means. While the word has a negative connotation today, it simply means to choose one or some from among many. It's something we all do, when shopping, choosing a spouse or friends, when buying a pet. It's also exactly what you do when hiring employees. You discriminate between the qualified and unqualified, the experienced and inexperienced, and the intelligent and the less so. Now, here some may say, "Wait, Duke, come on, those are legitimate bases on which to discriminate." I agree, but it's not quite that simple. What constitutes being qualified? What if I say that a cross-dresser isn't qualified to work in a day-care center because part of the job is setting a good example for the children? You might respond that such a thing isn't really a bad example or that it's wrong to discriminate based on appearance. Yet would you take the same position if a day-care operator refused to hire a skinhead with a Swastika on his forehead? 

We could fight over this subject for a long time, and our civilization is doing just that. For example, the Boy Scouts has been sued by a girl who wanted to be a "boy" scout, homosexuals who oppose its prohibition against homosexual members, and atheists who oppose having God in its pledge. Hey, there are a lot of people today who want to impose values on entities they don't own, and they've made judges the ultimate arbiters of what constitutes unjust discrimination in entities they don't own. But there is a better solution.

Freedom of association.

It's also a more moral solution, and I'll illustrate why. We all agree that I have the right to include in or exclude from my home whomever I please. Now, why should I lose this right simply because I decide to erect a few more tables and chairs and start selling food? Does the fact that some rationalizing Supreme Court justice once called such establishments "public accommodations" change the reality that my home-cum-business was created with my own money and by the sweat of my own brow?

What makes this worse is that Big Brother's intervention doesn't even ensure fairness. Government bureaucrats aren't angels but, rather, just people like anyone else, and they bring their own set of biases to the table. They are not, for instance, nearly as likely to investigate discrimination against whites and men as they are discrimination against minorities and women. Of course, you may say that you don't trust a given business owner any more than the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), but there is one big difference: the business owner only has dominion over his one business.

The EEOC has dominion over every business. 

Also, personally, I'd like to know where I stand. For example, years ago I knew a woman of Japanese descent who told me that she once entered a Korean restaurant and was told, "We don't want your kind in here." Now, would it have been better if they'd been forced to serve her? I don't think I have to tell you what can happen when someone who hates you is handling your food. Yuck.

Really, the best way to handle overt, unjust discrimination collectively is through scorn and ostracism. As for individually, we might take a lesson from former presidential nominee and Arizona senator, the late Barry Goldwater. After being denied access to a golf club that discriminated against Jews because he had Jewish ancestry through his father, he issued the following classic response: "Well, can I at least play nine holes?" Humor can win you many more converts than anger.

However we handle it, one thing is for certain: Forced unjust integration is no better than unjust discrimination. And it's far worse when the unjust discrimination would be practiced by only the few but the unjust integration is forced upon the many. 

Selwyn Duke is a columnist and public speaker whose work has been published widely online and in print, on both the local and national levels. He has been featured on the Rush Limbaugh Show, at WorldNetDaily.com, in American Conservative magazine, is a contributor to AmericanThinker.com and appears regularly as a guest on the award-winning, nationally-syndicated Michael Savage Show. Visit his Website.

TrackBack URI for this entry

Comments (9)

Subscribe to this comment's feed

Show/Hide comments

Ehhhh, Lowly rated comment [Show]

..., Lowly rated comment [Show]

danwhitehead1 said:

	Once again - - - - - - and as always, Mr. Duke hits the nail rigth wquare on the head.
	report abuse vote down vote up

September 11, 2009
Votes: +3

danwhitehead1 said:

	Oops - - - - - - Obviously, I meant "square", not "wquare".
	report abuse vote down vote up

September 11, 2009
Votes: +0

danwhitehead1 said:

	And one more thing - - - - - - I've NEVER known a more "holier than thou" collection of hypocrites than the "liberal" left.
	report abuse vote down vote up

September 11, 2009
Votes: +4

mary ann said:

	star scrubbed? patricia exercise her rights what she believes in, and god bless her. Where is our freedom of speech, press? Never mind who is being offended we still a republic.
	report abuse vote down vote up

September 11, 2009
Votes: +4

gmhudson said:

Who is the real Hippocrite? Why fire her, Patricia has the right to quit. If someone is asking her to do something against her values she has the duty to Quit!!! Where are her principles?? No one is twisting her arm to do stay there. Quitting is the only just solution. She can find work elsewhere doing something she truly believes in. I wouldn't do that either but I would look for work eslewhere doing something I truly enjoyed!! The employer should be able to fire her for any reason, even (for example), if he didn't like the way she parts her hair.

report abuse vote down vote up

September 11, 2009
Votes: +1

danandbeth2003 said:

... What is wrong with these people, this woman made a stand based on her religious principles. Based upon what I am reading these people in favor of her being fired would understand if an openly homosexual person was fired for their lifestyle. Christianity is her lifestyle does she not have the right to live it. I am all in favor of open debate and hopefully those writing and agreeing with this firing are just playing devils advocate to open up some debate.

report abuse vote down vote up

September 13, 2009
Votes: +2

Charles_Byrd said:

	Soaps My mother religiously watches Soap Operas (her favorites are All My Children and One Life to Live) and she tells me that whenever the writers try to do a story arc sympathetic to the gay cause, the arc doesn't last very long because fans will react negatively.
	report abuse vote down vote up

September 14, 2009
Votes: +1