On Friday, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a Christian web designer has the legal right to turn away same-sex couples. The landmark decision is controversial not only because it opens the door for future “religious” objections to working with marginalized classes of people, but also because the case itself is based on a purely hypothetical situation.

The case titled 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis represents another battle in the ongoing war between advocates fighting against discrimination and those fighting for “religious freedoms.” The plaintiff, a graphic designer, wanted to expand her business into making wedding websites, but she claims her religious views prohibit her from participating in same-sex weddings.

The plaintiff worried that she would be liable under Colorado’s Anti-Discrimination Act (CADA) should she refuse a gay couple’s request. CADA prohibits a public accommodation from discriminating against customers on various grounds, including sexual orientation. “Public accommodation” includes most public-facing businesses. The plaintiff sued the state to obtain a legal declaration of her right to refuse to work on same-sex weddings based on her religious views.

In a majority opinion penned by Justice Gorsuch, the Court ruled that she has such a right. Making a website is “expressive conduct,” ruled the majority, protected by the First Amendment. Subjecting the plaintiff to liability under CADA for refusing to work on a same-sex wedding is tantamount to compelling the plaintiff to speak against her own beliefs. The First Amendment protects “artists, speechwriters, and others whose services involve speech” from being forced to endorse ideas with which they do not agree.

The Court’s three liberal justices dissented. Justice Sotomayor wrote that, in making this ruling, “the Court, for the first time in its history, grants a business open to the public a constitutional right to refuse to serve members of a protected class.” The majority’s reasoning could just as easily be used to permit a business to refuse service to interracial couples, disabled couples, or any other family they do not consider “traditional.” The Constitution “contains no right to refuse service to a disfavored group.”

Moreover, explained Justice Sotomayor, CADA does not compel the plaintiff to endorse any particular speech; she “remains free under state law to decide what messages to include or not to include.” Under the law, she simply cannot “offer wedding websites to the public yet refuse those same websites to gay and lesbian couples.” In granting a “license to discriminate . . ., the immediate, symbolic effect of the decision is to mark gays and lesbians for second-class status.”

The Court has faced heavy backlash since the ruling, and not only for the implications of the opinion. The matter’s procedural background suggests the conservative majority went out of its way to issue a major, broad-reaching, controversial ruling when arguably the Court should not have heard the case at all.

To bring a lawsuit, a plaintiff must have “standing.” Standing means a cognizable injury--the defendant did something that harmed the plaintiff. Plaintiffs can also sue based on “imminent injury,” meaning they are about to be harmed. A plaintiff cannot sue merely because they believe there’s a possibility that they might be harmed in the future.

Historically, the Supreme Court has been especially wary of ruling on future or hypothetical injuries, because the Court does not like to be in the position of issuing “advisory” opinions. They wait until a conflict has actually occurred and then rule on how that conflict should be resolved. 303 Creative LLC appears to fly in the face of that long-standing practice.

The plaintiff in 303 Creative LLC was not sued after refusing to make a same-sex wedding website. In fact, she doesn't even make wedding websites; she simply has plans to enter into the wedding website business in the future. In court filings, she claimed that a man asked her to make a website for his wedding to another man, but investigators found that no such request was ever made. The man she claimed made the request told reporters that he didn’t even know his name was referenced in a lawsuit, and that he was “incredibly surprised given the fact that been happily married to a woman for the last 15 years.”

The conservative majority in 303 Creative LLC was entirely unperturbed by the lack of actual injury. It’s enough, according to the Court, that the plaintiff was considering entering the wedding website business, might be asked to make a gay wedding website, might refuse to do so, and then might be sued under Colorado’s Anti-Discrimination Act (CADA).

The opinion is rife with hypothetical language--the plaintiff “worries that, if she enters the wedding website business,” she would suffer harm. She “has yet to carry out her plans” to make wedding websites but she “worries if she does so, Colorado will force her” to betray her religious views. Similar contingent language would have caused the Court to shy away from taking a case in the past, especially on such a hot-button issue.

For their part, the plaintiff’s attorney still claims she received a request for a same-sex wedding website. Whether she actually received a specific request did not appear to factor into Gorsuch’s decision whatsoever. The conservative majority of the Court appeared perfectly happy to stick to hypotheticals if it meant establishing the precedent it sought to endorse.