Who's Next?

Huffington Post

Today in class the subject came up about a bakery in Oregon, Sweet Cakes By Melissa, that refused to make a wedding cake for a gay couple. I found it extremely interesting that the owners are against something that has very little effect on them, if any.

This reminded me of our unit on slavery and emancipation. It was obvious that the southern states had always wanted to keep slavery legal, as they felt they needed slaves due to the expanse of land to be taken care of. But for the North it was a different story. The northern states often felt they needed someone to look down to, for psychological reassurance that they were not the lowest class. "Even as reform movements arose in the North that condemned slavery as contrary to Christianity and to basic American values, and national debate over the peculiar institution intensified, southern society closed in defense of slavery" (Foner 407).

This reminded me of the bakery in Oregon. In both instances, certain people are being denied of something merely due to the color of their skin, or in this case, their sexual orientation. Both something that cannot be entirely in one's control, and certainly don't warrant inequality and mistreatment. It seems as though society has begun to victimize a certain group of people due to psychological reasons, to feel better about themselves. In the 1800 and 1900s, blacks were always treated as inferior to all others, and not until the late 1900s did blacks fully gain the same rights that whites obtain. Now, the LGBT community is treated as inferior, as lesser than the others; in most states they don't even have the right to marry each other.

Do you think that society constantly needs a certain group to look down to for superiority? Or do you think this is due to the natural instinct for us to reject what is unfamiliar? Or an entirely different reason altogether?

If it is due to the purpose of deflecting attention from ourselves, and ultimately feel better about our lives, then who's next?