Sunday, July 29, 2012

Why I Don't Care About the Chick-fil-A Controversy


I was really trying to avoid writing about this latest stupid media-manufactured controversy, but since it apparently refuses to go away I felt compelled to say something. I just love how liberals and progressives in this country are so smug about how conservatives and reactionaries often whip up "fake outrage" about a particular issue to get their supporters all fired up, and then they constantly turn around and allow themselves get easily trolled by an opposition that is well versed in what buttons it needs to push to provoke a reaction. Pavlov could not have trained his dog any better.

The latest kerfuffle started when Chick-fil-A President Dan Cathy stated during an interview, "We are very much supportive of the family--the biblical definition of the family unit. We are a family-owned business, a family-led business, and we are married to our first wives. We give God thanks for that." Right on cue, pandering politicians like New York and Chicago Mayors Michael Bloomberg and Rahm Emmanuel jumped into the fray, hoping to deflect people's attention from how their policies help fuck over the working and middle classes by demonstrating their "strong" support for gay rights. Because when it comes to massive distractions, few issues are a bigger winner for the non-Republican scum who hold high office throughout the land. Sadly, as a "leftist" officeholder you can get away with pushing through pretty much any old corporation-enriching government policy just so long as you prove your "Kum-ba-yah" credentials to your wine-sipping, brie-nibbling, NPR-listening, Daily Show-watching core supporters.

The whole brouhaha makes me tired for one very simple reason: I hated Chick-fil-A long before that horrible company's president made his idiotic and bigoted statement. Let's examine for a moment what Chick-fil-A really is: a predatory corporation which sells shitty, unhealthy food that greatly contributes to obesity and death from more than 1500 ugly ass stores blighting the lanscape from coast to coast while paying its employees shit wages and having the balls to claim the moral high ground because it gives those same beleaguered employees Sundays off so they can go to church. The fact that the company's president doesn't support gay marriage is just the cherry on a gigantic corporate shit sundae.

Calling for a boycott of Chick-fil-A is particularly stupid. Fact is, if you are a liberal or progressive who really cares about social injustice, public health or the environment you shouldn't have been patronizing this shitty company to begin with, and all a boycott does is create a backlash that will make the reactionaries and conservatives more likely to go to Chick-fil-A for a crappy chicken sandwich instead of, say, Boston Market. In other words, a boycott will change nothing. Oh, and to those libertarians who are defending Chic-fil-A's right to be a bunch of homophobic assholes let me just say: fuck you. To paraphrase George Carlin, only in a nation of unenlightened half-wits would such a terrible company be able to thrive in the first place.

In the end, pointless arguments about Chick-fil-A's gay marriage stance actually serve to subtly legitimize it's horrible business model because in essence liberals and progressives are reduced to saying that it is all right to be a planet-raping, poison-dispensing, low wage-paying fast food chain just so long as you are nice to gay people. And once again through such meaningless distractions, the energy of the American left gets wasted on sheer wankery guaranteed to ensure that there will be no genuine social change in this country.


Bonus: "The clouds will part and the sky cracks open, and god himself will reach his fucking arm through, just to push you down, just to hold you down"

7 comments:

  1. I think you missed what he said that made people so angry; it's a little more inflammatory than what you quoted.

    "..we’re inviting God’s judgment on our nation when we shake our fist at him and say we know better than you as to what constitutes a marriage. And I pray God’s mercy on our generation that has such a prideful, arrogant attitude that thinks we have the audacity to redefine what marriage is all about.”

    http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-leadership/post/chick-fil-a-president-dan-cathy-bites-into-gay-marriage-debate/2012/07/19/gJQACrvzvW_blog.html

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    1. I still don't care. A horrible corporation run by a horrible human being. Par for the course in America these days.

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    2. Could not agree more with what you just posted Bill Hicks. Sadly, that's the norm for these days. To many rotten, horrible corporations running things into the ground.

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  2. Arsenic in Chicken.wv
    Arsenic in Chicken No problem.wv
    Chicken feed additive suspended over cancer fears.wv
    Maryland Becomes First State to Ban Arsenic in Chicken Feed.wv

    (notice the Chick-fil-A media wedge issue isn't there ^ )


    coke open mercury.wv
    Studies Show High-Fructose Corn Syrup Contains Mercury.wv


    coke open genoside.wv
    davidrovics+drinkofthedeathsquads.mp3


    Mad Cow Disease.mp3

    we are we are MERCURY.wv
    Health Impacts of Coal (with coal PSA at end).wv

    germany is now getting 50 percent of their electricity from solar and wind.wv


    Smoke Pink Cigarettes, Fight Breast Cancer.wv

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  3. Right on Bill. Exactly right. Your last paragraph is perfect.

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  4. It would be hard for a progressive to say much these days about any of the traditional progressive issues without the possibility that their remarks could be construed as a slight against their hero and POTUS. So when they want to go off on a good rant and get their dander up there's this little shortlist of safe topics. Gay is on the list.

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  5. Meaningless distraction? For me and millions more like me whose civil rights are being assaulted by the hate-based organizations that this company supports, it's not only meaningful, it's personal and we're angry. I'm guessing that you have never been spat at by a hater or called a "pervert" just for living your life with the person you love. If you had, you might lose that smug "I don't care" attitude overnight.

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