Chick-Fil-A is in trouble over its owner’s stand on gay marriage – but will it matter?
The background
Chick-fil-A may serve up delicious waffle fries and fried chicken – but it’s the side of homophobia that has some Americans demanding a boycott.
Chick-fil-A is a fast food chain best known for two things: It’s “Eat Mor Chikin” adverts, feature cheeky cows coercing the American consumer to indulge in their culinary rival, the chicken, instead, and its strong Christian ownership. In the past, Chick-fil-A has been criticized for being closed on Sundays, out of deference, the company says, to its employees’ religious preferences.
But in recent days, the fast food chain has come under fire for its owner’s stance against same sex marriage: Dan Cathy, president of the $4 billion a year company, recently told a Christian newspaper that the company was “guilty as charged” of accusations that it is against same-sex marriage, adding that he believed in the “Biblical” definition of marriage. Since then, the mayors of Boston, New York and Chicago have vowed to fight against the restaurant’s opening in their town, protests have sprung up at Chick-fil-As across the country, and some gay rights groups are planning a same-sex “kiss-in” at local Chick-fil-As on August 3. At the same time, Christian groups are proposing a Chick-fil-A appreciation day to support the company’s conservative stance.
Eating a chicken sandwich has never been so political.
Boycott Chick-Fil-A
Chick-fil-A makes a mean chicken sandwich, but Eliot Spitzer wrote at Slate, there are other places to get a chicken sandwich. “If you really don’t think gays and lesbians should have the same rights as everyone else, and you oppose same-sex marriage, stop by Chick-fil-A. If you truly believe gays and lesbians should be second-class citizens, and if you sincerely don’t want them to marry the people they love, stop by Chick-fil-A,” he said. “But the same goes for those of us who support same-sex marriage and have what we consider to be a broader view of civil rights. We should boycott Chick-fil-A. These are our consumer dollars—and they’re part of our voice.”
Cathy should learn to separate his views from the business
“The issue isn’t that Dan Cathy disapproves of gay marriage; that’s hardly a shocker in a business so infused with Baptist values that its outlets are closed on Sundays,” wrote Diane Brady at Bloomberg’s BusinessWeek. “The problem is that he crossed the line in letting his faith become less about inspiration than alienation.” That he holds these values isn’t the problem, but rather how those values will impact his judgment and business activities, and perhaps how he may treat gay and lesbian employees and customers.
Someone is using fake Facebook profiles to defend Chick-fil-A? So says BuzzFeed.
Cathy being punished for ‘mainstream’ views
Marriage is not a “civil right”, no matter what gay-right supporters say, argued Rick Moran at conservative blog American Thinker. “Marriage is a privilege – but calling it a civil right is now part of the national narrative for gay marriage proponents because it sounds really cool and you can bash your political opponents for opposing it.” Concluded Moran, “Chick-fil-A President Dan Cathy holds fairly mainstream religious views on the subject of gay marriage so what he is being punished for is standing up for his faith.”
This is bigger than Chick-fil-A
Richard Viguerie, blogging at Conservative HQ, declared that the “relentless war by the left on Christians and biblical values has reached a new and more frightening phase” with the mayors’ opposition to Chick-fil-A. Their opposition reveals that the Democratic Party “has now, once and for all, dropped all pretense of respecting the values held by tens of millions of American Christians and has instead launched a concerted attack to undermine those values in favor of the radical homosexual agenda.”
Antoine Dodson, of “Bedroom Intruder” fame, however, isn’t going to stop eating at Chick-fil-A just because he’s gay. “Chick-fil-A makes good meals and I eat there,” he says.
More on gay marriage
- Church of England lashes out government’s gay marriage plans
- Obama in favour of gay marriage
- Boris Johnson pulls anti-gay bus ads
