Bay 12 Games Forum

Being a bourbon restricts your ingredients too. Just not as much as tequila. Whiskey can be made from a variety of grains in any proportion.

I'm guessing you think regional culture is pointless. Also, how are food names connected to jingoism?

Quote from: penguinofhonor on June 30, 2015, 06:15:10 am

Quote from: Sheb on June 30, 2015, 01:16:48 am

You know you 'muricans do it too? It's just that a) We tend to have more of them in Europe and b) the list of what is protected doesn't overlap.

We care less though. Our regional names aren't really enforced - there's "bourbon" made outside of Kentucky, for example. I despise it and would make it illegal if I could. I'm sure people from Champagne or Feta feel the same. This might actually be a small part of the treaty I could support.

Hmm I feel quite the opposite. Obviously bourbon can be made outside kentucky. Why should kentucky have a monopoly on the name? It's the same exact product, but if it's made in kentucky it's special and gets a special name because......reasons?

It's absurd. If you feel like bourbon from kentucky is actually better, slap a "made in kentucky" sticker on there and the free market™ can decide if it's worth it or not. Don't try to build some sort of legally enforced monopoly because you don't want any competition.

A special name or a special sticker would functionally be the same. I'd prefer the version that preserves this as something that is traditionally Kentucky.

And it's not about eliminating competition. From the recipe, Jack Daniels could be called a bourbon, but it's from Tennessee and the company has the respect not to market themselves that way. They still outsell every bourbon. Bourbon competes with all other whiskeys, and they get along just fine without hijacking the name.

A good John Oliver segment on transgender issues in America.

He talks about the Kentucky bathroom bill for a bit, and I actually have a couple friends of friends in the video, which is pretty cool.

I found a relevant bit from Justice Kennedy's majority decision, which is 103 pages long and very dry. Here's a comparatively short section where he explains how this is a Fourteenth Amendment issue:

Under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, no State shall “deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.” The fundamental liberties protected by this Clause include most of the rights enumerated in the Bill of Rights. See Duncan v. Louisiana, 391 U. S. 145, 147–149 (1968). In addition these liberties extend to certain personal choices central to individual dignity and autonomy, including intimate choices that define personal identity and beliefs. See, e.g., Eisenstadt v. Baird, 405 U. S. 438, 453 (1972); Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U. S. 479, 484–486 (1965).

The identification and protection of fundamental rights is an enduring part of the judicial duty to interpret the Constitution. That responsibility, however, “has not been reduced to any formula.” Poe v. Ullman, 367 U. S. 497, 542 (1961) (Harlan, J., dissenting). Rather, it requires courts to exercise reasoned judgment in identifying interests of the person so fundamental that the State must accord them its respect. See ibid. That process is guided by many of the same considerations relevant to analysis of other constitutional provisions that set forth broad principles rather than specific requirements. History and tradition guide and discipline this inquiry but do not set its outer boundaries. See Lawrence, supra, at 572. That method respects our history and learns from it without allowing the past alone to rule the present.

The nature of injustice is that we may not always see it in our own times. The generations that wrote and ratified the Bill of Rights and the Fourteenth Amendment did not presume to know the extent of freedom in all of its dimensions, and so they entrusted to future generations a charter protecting the right of all persons to enjoy liberty as we learn its meaning. When new insight reveals discord between the Constitution’s central protections and a received legal stricture, a claim to liberty must be addressed.

Applying these established tenets, the Court has long held the right to marry is protected by the Constitution. In Loving v. Virginia, 388 U. S. 1, 12 (1967), which invalidated bans on interracial unions, a unanimous Court held marriage is “one of the vital personal rights essential to the orderly pursuit of happiness by free men.” The Court reaffirmed that holding in Zablocki v. Redhail, 434 U. S. 374, 384 (1978), which held the right to marry was burdened by a law prohibiting fathers who were behind on child support from marrying. The Court again applied this principle in Turner v. Safley, 482 U. S. 78, 95 (1987), which held the right to marry was abridged by regulations limiting the privilege of prison inmates to marry. Over time and in other contexts, the Court has reiterated that the right to marry is fundamental under the Due Process Clause. See, e.g., M. L. B. v. S. L. J., 519 U. S. 102, 116 (1996); Cleveland Bd. of Ed. v. LaFleur, 414 U. S. 632, 639–640 (1974); Griswold, supra, at 486; Skinner v. Oklahoma ex rel. Williamson, 316 U. S. 535, 541 (1942); Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U. S. 390, 399 (1923).

Also look at all those citations. Judges like their citations. There is a lot of precedent for the Supreme Court deciding on marriage - I feel like the "this isn't a federal court issue" argument is about a hundred years too late.

Quote from: Loud Whispers on June 25, 2015, 08:47:01 am

Obama gettin heckled by transgender mexican activist, becomes Nobamabantatron

Question: Does the USA actually have LGBT detention centres? That sounds like some 1900s shit.
Also are there any sources better than the Mail.

Here's her explanation. Either she or the author of the Daily Mail article left out a "from" in that sentence - she wants LGBTQ people released from regular detention centers. They have a much higher rate of being abused and trans immigrants are often housed with the wrong gender, which is a fucked up situation.

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