Since 2014, the McArthurs. a lovely Christian couple who run a bakery in Northern Ireland, have suffered a litigation nightmare, since they turned down a request from LGBT activist Gareth Lee to bake a cake bearing the words “Support Gay Marriage”.

At this time, same-sex marriage was not legal in Northern Ireland, and it has never been democratically legalized since (it was imposed by the authoritarian decree of the Westminster Parliament against the will of the Northern Ireland people.)

Gareth Lee set out to entrap and humiliate the McArthurs, because as soon as they politely declined, on the grounds that, as Christians, they did not support this view, he sued them for discrimination. At first, he won and was awarded compensation. The judge at circuit level absurdly commented that to be discriminated against “because he was gay” was “humiliating, hurtful etc etc” whereas in fact, for the Ashers to be bullied in this way by an aggressive activist, and subjected to a lot of hate mail, was humiliating and hurtful.

After a four-year ordeal, the McArthurs got justice from the UK Supreme Court, which in 2018 correctly upheld their right not to be forced to say something they did not agree with. Compelled speech is a violation of the individual’s human rights. They had refused the contract, and would have refused it whoever brought the request, so this was not “discrimination”.