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Volvo, a division of Ford, continues to run ads in gay publications like The Advocate, despite the American Family Association declaring victory in its boycott of Ford. (Photo courtesy The Advocate)
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P.O. Drawer 2440
Tupelo, MS 38803
662 844-5036
www.afa.net
P.O. Box 6248
Dearborn, MI 48126
800-392-3673
www.ford.com
Editors’ note: Action Alert is a twice-monthly opinion column encouraging readers to speak out on a current controversy. Send ideas to editor@sovo.com.
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HOME > VIEWPOINT > ACTION! ALERT
By: RYAN LEE
COMMENTS |
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and you come across a giant oak or maple tree
lying on its side.
Besides the tree stands an unremarkable
looking man, who loudly huffs and
puffs as he pounds on his bare chest and
flexes his muscles.
“I ripped this big maple tree up out of the
ground with my own two hands,” the barechested
man says. “I pulled the roots out of
the dirt, threw the heavy bark across my
shoulders, and then body-slammed this beast
onto the ground.”
If you’ve got any intelligence, you may look
around for signs to let you know if the man is
telling the truth. Did rain saturate the soil and
loosen the tree’s roots? Did animals compromise
the tree’s foundation by chewing holes
near the base? Was it cut down as part of a
larger logging operation?
If you’re a member of the media or some
gay rights groups, you accept the bare-chested
man’s story as gospel. Then you spread the
word as far as you can, about the man with
enough might that he can rip 200-year-old
maple trees out of the ground with his own
two hands.
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bare-chested man, and the trees he regularly
takes credit for tearing down are Fortune 500
companies that his American Family
Association says support the “gay agenda.”
Wildmon most recently set his eyes on
Ford, calling for a boycott of the company in
spring 2006 because the automaker offered
domestic partnership benefits to gay employees,
sponsored gay rights organizations working
to support same-sex marriage and advertised
in gay media outlets.
“Ford has abandoned any pretense of
being neutral in the homosexual marriage
debate,” Wildmon said last June in a prepared
statement. “They are going for the whole ball
of wax, including homosexual polygamy.”
Last week, Wildmon called off the AFA’s
boycott after Ford allegedly agreed to stop
advertising in gay publications and supporting
gay rights groups. He’s currently beating
his chest and flexing his muscles, claiming
that Ford sales were down almost 10 percent
each month during the two-year boycott.
Major media outlets bought in. “Score
another victory for the American Family
Association,” the Wall Street Journal
reported in a story about Christian conservatives
taking their case to corporate boardrooms.
Even liberal media outlets like
Radar magazine reported that “Ford Bends
Over for Conservative Group,” accusing the
automaker of “capitulating” to the AFA’s
“homophobic demands.”
But Ford executives say, essentially, that
Wildmon is full of it.
Ford representatives did not respond to
interview requests by press time, but in a
written statement to Adweek, Ford spokesperson
Jim Cain said the company did not cave
into the AFA’s demands as claimed.
“We are committed to treating everyone
fairly and with respect, including our dealers,
customers and employees,” Cain told Adweek.
“Ford will continue to market its products
widely to attract as many customers as possible,
and make charitable contributions to
strengthen communities to the extent business
conditions allow.”
Ford continues to offer DP benefits to gay
and lesbian employees, Ford divisions such as
Volvo continue to advertise in gay publications,
and Volvo remains a major corporate
sponsor of the Human Rights Campaign, the
nation’s largest gay rights group.
Cain said that poor sale figures have
caused Ford to cut back on its corporate giving
and advertising, though Adweek noted
that Ford’s advertising budget remained relatively
stable over the last three years.
slumping Ford sales in 2007, although Ford
clearly isn’t the only company wading
through financially difficult times.
“AFA did try to take credit for our decline
in sales,” Ford spokesperson Kristen Kinley
told Southern Voice in 2007. “Our response to
that has been that there are a lot more powerful
market forces at work than the AFA.”
Wildmon and the AFA have an embarrassing
modus operandi: They routinely lob outrageous
allegations against corporations, call
ambiguous boycotts whose success is impossible
to measure, announce they are ending the
boycott and celebrate their demands being
met. Each and every time, the corporation
denies paying attention to the AFA’s demands
and reaffirms its gay-friendly policies.
In fall 2004, the AFA said that Procter &
Gamble’s public support of a non-discrimination
ballot initiative in its hometown
of Cincinnati equated to an endorsement
of same-sex marriage. The religious
group launched one of its famous boycotts,
then called it off in spring 2005
claiming that Procter & Gamble fired an
executive who worked on behalf of the
non-discrimination law.
Procter & Gamble actually gave that executive,
Gary Wright, a paid leave of absence to
work on behalf of the non-discrimination initiative,
then left the company to work on
behalf of gay rights full time.
Wildmon also called for a boycott against
Kraft Foods for its support of the Gay Games,
and the makers of Miracle Whip flipped
Wildmon the bird and proceeded to be a major
sponsor of the 2006 games in Chicago.
Most infamously, Wildmon and the AFA led
a nine-year boycott against Disney because of
the annual Gay Days at Disney World. The
AFA ended the boycott in 2005, taking credit
for the departure of several Disney executives.
But even Wildmon had to admit that the
boycott was fruitless, and was “lost among the
other battles being fought on a crowded cultural
battlefield.”
If only the media and gay rights groups
would realize how the AFA is, and stop giving
credit where none is due.
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