Apple CEO: Religious Freedom Laws ‘Pretending To Defend’ Religion

Apple chief executive and Alabama native Tim Cook speaks during an Alabama Academy of Honor ceremony at the state Capitol Monday, Oct. 27, 2014, in Montgomery, Ala. Cook and seven others including University of Alaba... Apple chief executive and Alabama native Tim Cook speaks during an Alabama Academy of Honor ceremony at the state Capitol Monday, Oct. 27, 2014, in Montgomery, Ala. Cook and seven others including University of Alabama football coach Nick Saban were inducted into the Alabama Academy of Honor. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson) MORE LESS
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Apple CEO Tim Cook wrote in a Sunday op-ed that he opposes religious freedom laws like the legislation recently passed in Indiana, and argued that the bills are veiled efforts to discriminate.

“There’s something very dangerous happening in states across the country,” he wrote in a Washington Post op-ed. “A wave of legislation, introduced in more than two dozen states, would allow people to discriminate against their neighbors.”

“These bills rationalize injustice by pretending to defend something many of us hold dear. They go against the very principles our nation was founded on, and they have the potential to undo decades of progress toward greater equality,” Cook continued.

Cook promised that Apple will remain “open to everyone, regardless of where they come from, what they look like, how they worship or who they love.”

“This isn’t a political issue. It isn’t a religious issue. This is about how we treat each other as human beings. Opposing discrimination takes courage. With the lives and dignity of so many people at stake, it’s time for all of us to be courageous,” he wrote.

In a Friday tweet, Cook signaled that he opposed discriminatory religious freedom legislation by warning Arkansas not to pass legislation similar to the law signed in Indiana.

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  1. Fortunately, I think it’s clear that this argument is winning the day with the American people, and that Pence’s and others’ ¨It’s all about protecting religious freedom from government overreach!¨ is seen for the obfuscatory Orwellian night-is-day BS that it really is.
    I look forward to the day when Pence has to explain his rationale for repealing the law. Something again about ¨Hoosier Hospitality®¨ I anticipate.

  2. If there is a supreme reality-controlling “god” (which I neither believe nor disbelieve) then I am certain that “he” wouldn’t need a bunch of humans to “defend” his almighty ass.

    Furthermore, didn’t we use to commit people who claimed to be receiving secret messages that only they could hear or understand? Wouldn’t religious kooks that claim they are commanded to “defend” a religion qualify in this case?

  3. If I talk to a six-foot-tall invisible white rabbit, I’m a crazy person. If I talk to god, I’m a person of faith. This always puzzles me.

  4. See, CC, if Billy Bob Boobman in Bumblebee IN has to make a wedding cake for a couple of lesbians, then that nullifies Christ’s sacrifice on the cross, and in turn little Sam and Sally can’t celebrate Christmas anymore.

    Now do you see why this is not about bigotry?

  5. Indeed. Furthermore, if there is such a being, and if it were not as despicable, vain, hateful, jealous, and loathsome an entity as Mike Pence, it would already have smited the living shit out of him for misappropriating its intention and besmirching its identity in order to ostracize and inconvenience a certain class of taxpayers in Indiana simply because of who they love.

    As for me personally, I need no clearer proof that there is no god.

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