While religion is a protected class, political orientation is not protected. It is perfectly legal (and moral) to ask someone if they are conservative before agreeing to do work for them.

You can even cite a policy to really drive it home: "I do not conduct business with racists, bigots, misogynists, homophobes, xenophobes, fascists or any other type of conservatives."

Cool but where do you draw the line? If a taxi driver refuses to drive you is it still fine? What if a teacher refuses to teach your children? Or if a doctor refuses to treat you?

And how do you differentiate between this and say, a shop, or a doctor? Do LGBT people not "have the right to the labour" of those services?

I disagree with that framing entirely. But I'm curious to know how you would differentiate.

Whether you see it or not, your opinion is carving out a way for legal bigotry when done by a christian. Of course an atheist refusing to serve this asshole bigot would open up the door for a religious discrimination case against the atheist because bigots want nothing more than to divide society. We have no obligation to defend a bigot's rights they are actively taking those same rights away from others.

To say that anyone can be a photographer belittles the skill associated with a professional photographer. That's akin to saying that you can hire anyone with a voice to be a singer. Sure, you can, but there's a qualitative difference.

That aside, would there be any sign that the photographer could put on their door that would be illegal? No Blacks, No Jews, No Women, etc… If not, play that to the logical extreme; What if all photographers in town had the same sign? What services are appropriate to deny in entirety to a specific class of people.

This potentially opened the floodgates for discrimination. Unless this is specifically only for for “hired” or “contract” If not…. Coming soon to stores in the south near you

“NO F****TS ALLOWED”

“TRA***ES NOT WELCOME”

No. He gets to choose who to work for. He doesn't get to choose not to work for entire classes of people when those classes are protected.

It's the same as if he said he didn't want black clients.

I don't think he has the right to make his business known publicly if it isn't available to the public-- all of it.

Selective religion to suit their needs. Oldest trick in the literal book.

Jesus was white BTW

/s in case it wasn't abundantly clear

I feel like framing the issue like this kinda dangerous. If a single entity (in this case, a business) is allowed to discriminate against a protected class, then are all businesses that provide that service allowed to discriminate against said class?

It seems as though they would be. That gets us back to a version of the Jim Crow South pretty quickly. How are LGBTQ+ folks supposed to exist as equal members in a society if entire segments of that society are legally allowed to close themselves off? What happens when a business that controls major segments of more important service sectors makes a similar decision (for example, say the only Level 1 trauma center in a city is in a privately-owned, religiously-affiliated medical center that now has a legal precedent to say they won't serve LGBTQ+ patients for religious reasons)?

Same reason black people wanted to eat at the whites only lunch counters.

You're also equating the cause of the feeling of repulsion.

You're repulsed by Nazis because Nazis are evil.

Why are you repulsed by gay people? Hate. Yes, even if disguised behind "religious reasons."

Regardless, I'm not saying that we must force the photographer to "work while being repulsed" (and I wouldn't want anyone on my wedding day that I know is repulsed by it anyway, but I digress.) I'm saying that we must continue peeling off that core of a hateful onion that is religion and bigotry until nothing is left.

And having said that: don't want to deal with "the gays"? Don't start a business in a place where gay people are protected. I'd say this ruling is in the wrong.

Also, I believe the photographer should be able to reject a job due to its type of content. Hear me out. Gay wedding? Yes. Gay wedding with a dildo theme? Nah. Straight wedding? Yes. Straight wedding with a cat killing theme? Nah.