Can a business refuse their service based on my political views?

B

brianna_chelsea

New member
I just recently put a dress on layaway at an online clothing website. I put down a deposit of $25, while the dress cost $75, leaving a balance of $50. The owner of the website and I e-mailed back and forth a number of times concerning the dress, so I decided to add her e-mail address to my address book.

About a week later, I forwarded two political based e-mails to everyone in my address book. Because I had added the aforementioned owner earlier, she received these e-mails. She sent me back two scathing e-mails concerning the views put forth by the forwarded e-mails. She also told me that she refunded my money for the item I put on layaway, saying that because I "forced my political views" upon her by forwarding these e-mails to her, I lost a chance to work with her. Is this refusal of service political discrimination?

Any and all help would be appreciated. Thanks so much!!!
 
Good question. I don't think it comes under freedom of expression, but you could probably make a case she breached a contract for arbitrary and capricious reasons. You hardly "forced" your political views on her. She has a delete button. Her claim would only begin to make sense if she had told you to remove her from yr mailing list and you had instead sent repeated messages of this kind.

As she is a retailer, open to the public, I find it odd she used the phrase "work with her". You weren't entering in to a partnership. She is a retailer and you are a customer.

I think it would be hard to pursue, though, since you lost no money. You did lose time, effort, and equal access to a product. But how seriously the court would take it I don't know.

Edit: A problem I have noticed with this forum. They tend to always side with a business owner, always saying they "can refuse service to anyone" as a mantra, when this is not true in many instances. Can be a complex area of law. But they don't want to hear that.
 
this just seems hilarious to me. I suppose after apologizing to her for sending those emails and she still refused, it is her loss of business i suppose.

I don't know what legal action you could take against her here. I suppose the result would be FORCING her to sell you the dress.
 
NOT illegal at all. Since you lost no money, you can't really sue. Anyway, she's under no obligation at all to give you service.
The only way to get back at her would be for "breach of contract" but that would only work if you were losing money or time. For example, if she was making you a wedding dress and on the day of your wedding, gives you back your money instead of the dress because your in a different political party. E.D.
 
she is not employing you she is refusing service . There is a difference and it is not illegal. If you were her employee then yes it is illegal in this case its not.
In you case if your case if its just the dress u want explain the mistake to the person that it was an accident sending it. Buy the dress and both go your seperate ways. Nothing illegal here
 
She didn't refuse service because of your political views, she did it because you're a jerk. Only jerks forward emails to everyone in their address book.

If you want to discuss political issues in email, that's what email lists are for. She didn't want her inbox cluttered with every thought that crosses your mind, and the mind of everyone else you have in your book. She has a space limit on her email account. When you send a non-business related email, you might very well have taken the space that a business email might have received. ALL businesses are plagued with spam, and are constantly fighting to retrieve their storage space.

Never, ever forward an email to your whole address book. Every email program has a way to make lists of people, for instance, I have one list that only goes out to my family, and one that goes out to my coworkers, and several more that go out to different interest groups. My coworkers don't need to know how I gushed over my nephews new puppies (he breeds them as a business) and my nephew doesn't want to know about the IP searches that I've run on a new troll on the message board. Make sure that every email you send is RELEVANT to everyone you send it to, and that they WANT to receive such email. If you can't take the time to do this little thing, then don't be surprised if people start blocking your email.
 
Yes. Why would she want you cluttering up her business account with spam e-mails? Think about what it would be like for her if all her customers did that.
 
she is not employing you she is refusing service . There is a difference and it is not illegal. If you were her employee then yes it is illegal in this case its not.
In you case if your case if its just the dress u want explain the mistake to the person that it was an accident sending it. Buy the dress and both go your seperate ways. Nothing illegal here
 
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