The Anti-Gay Starbucks Boycott
On Tuesday, Andy reported NOM's displeasure at Starbucks' endorsement of marriage equality. More wingnuts have since voiced similar sentiments, and now they're calling for a boycott.
RightWingWatch recorded this cornball radio address from Family Research Council president Tony Perkins:
There's more than coffee brewing at Starbucks. There's controversy too. Hello, I'm Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council in Washington, D.C. Starbucks is stirring the pot all right, but with a liberal agenda that's got customers shaking their heads. In the fight over marriage in Washington State, the Seattle company is picking sides. Last week, the chain announced it'll join the attack on marriage and endorse homosexual unions. Spokesman Karen Holmes said, "This important legislation is aligned with Starbucks business practices... It is core to who we are and what we value as a company." Well, it may be at the core of who Starbucks is, but it's not at the core of who America is. Voters overwhelmingly believe in man-woman marriage--and they've passed 30 straight amendments to prove it. If Starbucks thinks people like their radical agenda, I hate to spill the beans. But people can get their caffeine fix anywhere. So if Starbucks wants to focus on politics, then its profits are on dangerous grounds.
... and HuffPo directs readers to this press release from USA Christian Ministries, entitled "Christians Boycott Starbucks -- Because Romans 1 Explains Starbucks Hate God," which reads, in part:
... There is an 80% Christian majority in the USA and 1-2% homosexuals.
“Christians are upset with Starbucks for turning against God, but we are glad to know that Starbucks doesn’t pretend to be for Christians,” said Pastor Steven Andrew, who is president of USA Christian Ministries. He calls every Christian and church to boycott Starbucks. Leviticus 18:22 says, “You shall not lie with a male as with a woman. It is an abomination.”
“This boycott is important because God blesses those who obey Him and judges those who don’t obey Him (2 Chronicles 19:2),” he adds.
Don’t expect to hear sermons with “grab your Starbucks” or to see Starbucks served at churches. “Starbucks is no longer fashionable. If your church still uses Starbucks, then your pastor is a friend of the world,” he adds. God calls those who oppose Him “haters of God” (Romans 1:30).
It is hoped that Christians will quickly share this boycott with their church.
A curious point: As HuffPo points out, Starbucks is joined in supporting marriage equality by Microsoft and Google. Why aren't Rev. Andrew and Tony Perkins calling for a boycott of those companies? Too inconvenient? You know, once upon a time, the True Believers could build arks and part seas and roam the desert with naught to eat but manna from heaven. If nowadays they can't even abide a few months without operating systems and search engines, I say they're not very serious about this whole "faith" thing at all.
Um, I boycott starbucks because their coffee is unhealthy, expensive, and tastes like crap.
Posted by: Reader | Feb 4, 2012 10:40:26 AM
Wonder if this will work as well as their Home Depot and Disney boycotts? HA!
Posted by: ChrisQ | Feb 4, 2012 10:45:07 AM
I subscribe to the whole "right side/wrong side of history" viewpoint. Time will tell if these wingnuts are correct or civil rights prevail!
Posted by: Tophu628 | Feb 4, 2012 10:47:04 AM
When are they going to stop using leviticus. It is the easiest way to call out their hypocrisy.
That was so 3,000 years ago.
Posted by: JackTwist | Feb 4, 2012 10:49:30 AM
Do you suppose Tony Perkins will have to stay off MSNBC as a political analyst now since Starbucks is a sponsor of "Morning Joe".
Posted by: Tim NC | Feb 4, 2012 10:53:42 AM
Hey kids, it's time for another episode of Fairy Tale Theater.
Posted by: Dearcomrade | Feb 4, 2012 10:59:36 AM
"If your church still uses Starbucks, then your pastor is a friend of the world,” he adds."
If your church uses Starbucks...they are misusing money that should be going to help the poor and less fortunate.
Posted by: Taylor | Feb 4, 2012 11:03:04 AM
There is always Linux
Posted by: Steve | Feb 4, 2012 11:04:21 AM
I'm guessing they picked Starbucks because Google and Microsoft are too pervasive and much more difficult to avoid (you wouldn't be able to watch those gospel hymns on YouTube or, for most people, even turn on your computer). Go for the low-hanging fruit, and then pray for a domino effect.
Posted by: John | Feb 4, 2012 11:07:58 AM
Because wingnut bigots don't know how to use 'puters or the google on the internets
Posted by: Gunga Dean | Feb 4, 2012 11:14:45 AM
I wish it could be made clear to these mental misfits that the supposed intellectual arch that connects old testatment condemnation of homsexuality with christian condemnation of the same does not exist. Not only was the concept of sexuality in general non-existant until the late 19th century, but there isn't even an insinuation of man-on-man sex in the new testament...ANYWHERE!
Posted by: Michael B. Murphy | Feb 4, 2012 11:16:13 AM
Now sit back and watch Starbucks sales increase... LOL...
Posted by: MikeH | Feb 4, 2012 11:16:59 AM
I love the argument that Starbucks should side with the "christians" because there are more of them. Go terror of the majority!
Posted by: mike128 | Feb 4, 2012 11:25:02 AM
Why, Miss Tonette! How you DO run on! As if ANYONE cares what a hateful bigot like you has to say. But I guess it behooves us to support Starbucks now, so I'll be stopping by more often in the future, rest assured. Miss Tonette will go down in history as a very, very minor George Wallace figure. Her days are numbered. She should move to one of those gay-hating African countries. Oh, wait, I forgot, she hates blacks too.
Posted by: Abel | Feb 4, 2012 11:31:25 AM
Leviticus also prohibits marking one's body. Why don't these wingnuts protest tattoo shops? There's at least as many of those as Starbucks.
Posted by: Latebrosus | Feb 4, 2012 11:50:55 AM
Uh, MICHAEL, what about Paul's diatribe against homosexuality in ROMANS 1, huh??!
Posted by: nikko | Feb 4, 2012 12:04:37 PM
I hope this helps with the lines on Sunday around 100pm...LMAO...but I doubt it!!!
Posted by: Mickey | Feb 4, 2012 12:13:28 PM
80% of Americans may belong to some Christian denomination (including Catholic), but only about 25% are snake worshipping, speaking in tongues, home schooling zealots.
Shall we also bring up that among the 80% they all think the other "has it wrong" and are "going to hell" for not being what they think is a true "christian?"
Posted by: QJ201 | Feb 4, 2012 12:14:42 PM
Nikko, the word for homosexual did not exist 2000 years ago. The word Paul used was "arsenokoitai", and nobody knows for sure what that word means, since his was the first recorded instance of it ever being used. The best any modern scholar has ever been able to come up with literally is, "abusers of themselves with mankind."
Most actual scholarly interpreters take this word to mean something like, "pedophile" or "prostitute". In any case it is understood to denote an uneven exchange in terms of the power dynamic. Anyone who says they know for sure that means gay is just plain wrong and/or lying!
Posted by: Michael B. Murphy | Feb 4, 2012 12:25:00 PM
I honestly doubt that 80% of Americans are Christians. And even if it is anywhere at all close to that, I'd wager that of that 80%, at least 50% is "in name only" and non-practicing. The vast majority of folks I know (gay AND straight) may have been raised in some sort of church, but most of them have left, if not completely turned their backs on, religious institutions.
Sidenote (someone mentioned boycot of Home Depot): American Family Assn did the boycot of Home Depot, not the Family Research Council. And as an employee of the Orange Box, I'm proud to say that the company continues to steadfastly stand by its values of inclusion and support of the LGBT community.
Posted by: jim | Feb 4, 2012 12:42:41 PM
@ Mr. Murphy: while multiple Scriptures are no doubt misinterpreted for all kinds of reasons, and Paul, specifically, might be mistranslated, your regurgitation of the Social Constructionist assertion that "the concept of sexuality in general [was] non-existant until the late 19th century" is just as ludicrous and empirically WRONG as they are.
A number of scholars with an actual understanding of ancient languages and use of primary sources such as John Boswell and Ricktor Norton have demolished the historically illiterate Social Constructionists whose real agenda is to try to shove the square peg of dime-store Marxist economic analysis down the round hole of sexuality. Quote:
"John Boswell points out that the ancient Romans had no abstract word for ‘religion’, though they obviously had religions including Christianity itself. There is no Classical Latin word equivalent to the modern concept ‘family’, yet the Romans had families of various sorts and we can appreciate the differences between ancient and modern families without abandoning the word itself.
But the fact of the matter is that a great many indigenous societies did have words for ‘the homosexual’. By this I mean that they had words which identified a homosexual personality type, not matching the sexological psychopathological personality disorder (which, baldly stated thus, undoubtedly is a modern social construct), but words roughly equivalent to modern queers – words which demonstrate a consciousness (albeit often contemptuous) of a queer stereotype or gay identity. Here are just a few words for queers from many hundreds: in the Middle East the xanitha plays the receptive role with older or richer men; in Nicaragua el cochon; in Italy the arruso and ricchione, and femmenella, little female, for the transvestite; Loca and maricón in Latin America; the teresita in Argentina; bicha and veado in Brazil; masisi in Haiti; zamel in North Africa. In many languages the generic term for a male homosexual is derived from a female name: Spanish maricón and mariquita derive from María; Italian checca derives from Francesca; Flemish janet derives from French Jeannette; a Portuguese queer is an Adelaida; in England queer men have called themselves Marys, Mary-Annes, mollies, nancy boys, nellies." - "The Myth of the Modern Homosexual," by Rictor Norton.
http://rictornorton.co.uk/homomyth.htm
Posted by: Michael Bedwell | Feb 4, 2012 1:19:40 PM
"There is an 80% Christian majority in the USA and 1-2% homosexuals."
Even if this is number is true, which I highly doubt it, then what they are suggesting is basically 'majority rules'.
If that's the case, African-Americans would still be working in fields and getting lynched on a daily basis.
It really infuriates me to see the AAs on the other side of the fight. It is just wrong and MLK would be so so disappointed at what is happening right now. He didn't die for his own people to turn into those whom he fought against.
Posted by: gayalltheway | Feb 4, 2012 1:22:08 PM
"If your church still uses Starbucks, then your pastor is a friend of the world"
Wait... being a friend of the world (and of life) is a bad thing? If you're a Christian, yes, yes it is. 1 John 2:15-17
Yet another reason why I'm not a Christian.
Posted by: Randy | Feb 4, 2012 1:39:13 PM
Brandon: Your comments are wonderful! Thank you for pointing out the dumb-shittitude of the wingnuts.
Posted by: JT - the real one | Feb 4, 2012 1:41:36 PM
@Michael Bedwell: Agreed. I would also add Louis Crompton's brilliant "Homosexuality and Civilization" to your list of evidence against the (usually) preposterous constructionist view of sexuality.
Posted by: RyanInSacto | Feb 4, 2012 1:43:58 PM