Hobby Lobby* isn’t being
fined because they are pro-life. They are being fined because their management
believes they have the right to pick and choose what aspects of health coverage
their employees are allowed to receive simply based on their moral perception
of how their employees might obtain services based on that coverage. This would
be no different than a pencil store run by Jehovah’s Witnesses that refuses to
provide coverage that includes surgical benefits strictly and solely because
they don’t believe in transfusions that are necessary to perform surgery. Or an
employer that has had bad experiences in a Catholic hospital** refusing to
offer plans (potentially even ones that are more cost/benefit effective) that cover
Catholic hospitals and doctors solely on the basis of his bias. Can you imagine
the howls about religious persecution?
The whole “pro-life”
aspect is dubious. It is an “anti-contraception” issue. The management of Hobby
Lobby happens to believe that what the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention declares to be “one of the most significant public health
achievements of the 20th century” is something they don’t believe in. Bully for
them. I strongly support their right to maintain and live that belief. But
their freedom to swing their fist stops at my (or their employee’s) nose.
The argument that they
are being forced to fund choices that are against their beliefs is a logical fallacy
on multiple levels.
One: See the first
paragraph.
Two: I believe the
compensation package of Hobby Lobby employees consists of some level of
currency payment in addition to potential health care benefits. If you we’re to
assume that employers can provide selective coverage solely based on the
employers moral beliefs then you would also have to submit they have the right
to dictate how employees could or could not spend the cash portion of their earned compensation. Even absent any factors that would affect job performance. After
all if their objection is based on the idea that money they supply is indirectly
being used for purposes they find objectionable, the same would apply to services
provided in exchange for money obtained through a paycheck.
Third: It’s not
necessarily a cost issue. From an actuarial standpoint, families that have
low-barrier access to contraception are often, but not always, less costly to
insure.
Fourth: They don’t seem
to have any problem covering vasectomies, which is just another form of
contraception except that it affects men and not women.
There is persecution
involved here. It’s just that it is the manufactured outrage of Persecution
Politics***.
Step 1: Invoke the
slippery slope. If the government can “force” Hobby Lobby to “pay for”
contraception then the next step is to start dragging good Christians from
their homes and off to the concentration camps.
Step 2: Introduce a
secret plot. Suggest that there is connection between some secret plot by
faceless people to destroy religion in America and connect it to the slippery
slope.
Step 3: Add the language
of persecution and the zero sum game. In this pitched battle every victory by
the evil secularists erodes the rights of every righteous Christian whom they
despise. Every perceived slight against Hobby Lobby or O’Brien Industrial
Holdings must then by this logic be fiercely opposed by people of conscious.
Boycott Hobby Lobby, if
you like, because you disagree with the beliefs of their management. I find it
silly and unproductive, but that’s your right. You want to go out of your way to reward a company whose management’s world view is in line with
yours? Go for it! Just don’t do it because you’ve been fed a narrative that
stands up Hobby Lobby’s ability to refuse to provide contraception coverage as
the last defense between you and the destruction of religious freedom in
America. Just remember the next time someone wants to swing their fist of religious freedom it may be your nose that gets in the way.
* - For the purposes of
conversational short hand when I refer to religious rights or beliefs of Hobby
Lobby I’m actually referring to the rights and beliefs of the owners and/or
management of Hobby Lobby. Hobby Lobby is an abstract concept called a company.
The purposes of constructing such a non-tangible entity are ones of societal
benefit. This doesn’t imbue these pieces of legal paper with feeling, thoughts,
beliefs, wants, or desires. A figment of our collective imagination can not
have a belief to even be considered under the umbrella of freedom of religion (or
speech or anything else that could be endowed by a creator, other
supernatural being, or even a just an enlightened society that thinks having a collective set of rights defined is a spanking good idea)
** - For those that know
me and where I grew up. I just want to reiterate that unless I’m in immediate
mortal danger and I won’t survive the trip to the next closest hospital, please
don’t take me to the Catholic hospital in my hometown even if I’m injured in
the lobby of that hospital. I’m ok with driving the extra 20-30 minutes to a
hospital (even Catholic ones) closer to where I now live. My experiences and
those close to me have given me the “belief” that in this particular hospital there
is not always clarity of whether they understand the difference between a
Hospital and a Church and how being one or other affects the relative priority
between saving your soul and saving your life.
*** - Paraphrased from
Blowing Smoke by Micheal Worlaich
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