I’ve always loved the Muppets. My family used to gather on the couch and watch “The Muppet Show” together and the theme song send a warm, welcome wave of nostalgia over me from its very first notes. And now those loveable fuzzballs become even more sensational, inspirational, celebrational and Muppet-ational with their stance on the homophobic fast-food company Chik-fil-A and gay marriage. This week, the Jim Henson Company posted this on its official Facebook page:
The Jim Henson Company has celebrated and embraced diversity and inclusiveness for over fifty years and we have notified Chick-Fil-A that we do not wish to partner with them on any future endeavors. Lisa Henson, our CEO is personally a strong supporter of gay marriage and has directed us to donate the payment we received from Chick-Fil-A to GLAAD.
Now, I realize the Jim Henson Company sold the Muppets to Disney long ago. But it’s really the spirit of Henson and his fuzzy faced friends that I am celebrating here. I love the Muppets, Fraggle Rock, The Dark Crystal – all his goofy and gangly and good-natured creations. They are the epitome of that rainbow connection, where the lovers, dreamers and even me can be embraced for exactly who we are. Keep your fried chicken, Chik-fil-A, and your embarrassing damage control attempts. Nothing tastes as good as equality feels. Happy weekend, all.
5 comments:
What is the most disturbing is why does Chik Fil a need to announce this stance at all? Are they running for public office? Why is it a question asked of anybody? Chik fil a is not anywhere around me and possibly not in my state. I don't eat at places like that anyway. What an idiotic forum to air your religious views.
I've never seen the Muppets, but with the Jim Hensen Company being behind possibly my favourite sci-fi show of all times, Farscape, I'm very very glad to hear how awesome they are in other respects as well. Go JHC!
I’m in Illinois where one of the Aldermen has announced his intention to block Chik Fil A’s permit application to open in his ward, primarily because of the company’s bigoted views. Needless to say, this has opened up our city to a huge debate, involving the mayor and other public leaders. One franchise owner has reached out to the mayor to ask for a dialogue to discuss how allowing CFA to open another location will bring badly needed jobs to the city.
A friend of mine opened up a discussion on FB, pointing out what she feels is the hypocrisy of boycotting the company because of ideological differences and not because the company has actually done anything discriminatory when we are in turn demanding equality and freedom from discrimination ourselves. She obviously doesn’t know that the company donates SERIOUS cash to organizations that interject their hate into the current political scene.
To this I say, Mr. Cathy (President and king of chicken) is entitled to believe whatever he wants to believe. This is America. He is also allowed to speak his beliefs (sanctimonious as they may be) and he is allowed to operate his company as he sees fit, as long as it follows the legal statues. The company can open their stores in whatever community will have them. It’s up to us, the consumers, to make our views known.
We can boycott (if that’s how you show your outrage and displeasure), we can peacefully protest in front of locations (if you have free time and like to do that). Or you can do like me, go in to the nearest location wearing a provocative rainbow-covered t-shirt, order one of their delicious breakfast sandwiches, be pleasant, smile and point out to the cashier that they just took the order of a supporter of marriage equality and basic human rights and ask them if they noticed anything different. Did my head spin around? Did the skies open up?
Some minds only change with one-on-one interactions. Is that going to change the company overall – maybe not. But it makes me feel better that I put my face on the “marriage equality” issue for someone. It’s much easier to discriminate against a group, but not so easy face to face when you see the person.
Great post, wonderful picture(!!), interesting (and debatable) issue.
This isn't to stir up controversy, but I wonder what readers think of Alexandra Petri's article in the WashPost on the topic: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/compost/post/chick-fil-a-the-greek-olympian-and-the-sandwich-problem/2012/07/25/gJQAjvyj9W_blog.html
I'm not a Chick-fil-A fan by any means, personally, but I think she has a point. If we shunned everything produced by terrible people, we'd have infinitely fewer ground-breaking products, you know?
She makes an interesting case for buying what you like and then donating money to GLAAD or HRC if you wanna get political. That seems like a good tactic to me.
Sorry, I hope that doesn't get anyone's blood pressure up. Whenever I debate anything, it's not about winning, it's about learning. (Philosophy major for life, for better or worse.)
Love you all, even if we disagree (especially the tireless, talented author of this blog, obvs).
What fucking good does showing a t shirt to some bored slave for minimum wage do? The people behind the counter are NOT Mr. Cathy, he's at home wrapped in comfort and self-righteous bigotry and all he'll ever 'register' from such an encounter is ANOTHER SALE. Can you see how your protesting t shirt for the benefit of the clerk sends the opposite message of what you are trying to accomplish? Yeah, boycotting products does indeed involve some sacrifice. Yeah, Cathy can believe and donate any way he likes. But continuing to buy Mr. Cathy's product and enabling him to continue to use his wealth to discriminate against some is NOT a protest. I can't believe the inherent stupidity of this suggestion. Troll, maybe? More Chik-Fil-A publicists hiding as 'commenters'? Fuck you and fuck the hateful Mr. Cathy. AND FUCK CHIK-FIL-A TO DEATH.
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