Chik-Fil-A is Dumb
That’s right. They’re a dumb, backwards-looking company run by a dumb, backward-looking, bigoted asshole who should keep his mouth shut and make sandwiches.
First, and let’s be clear about this – Jesus does not have anything to say about homosexuality. Paul has one line to say about it, and the Old Testament has a few things to say about it. If you are a Christian, and accept the teachings of Paul, you must also accept that female pastors are not allowed in the church, ever, and that women are not allowed to talk in church, and that slavery is acceptable. If you accept the Old Testament scriptures, then you must also accept that you can never wear clothing of mixed fibers, that rape victims must marry their attackers, and that shellfish are evil. Do you accept those things? Because if you don’t happily and wholeheartedly embrace all of them, you’re a bloody hypocrite.1
If you accept the teachings of Jesus, you must accept “So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you.” and “Love your neighbor as yourself.” As I mention here, there are many interpretations of the Bible, and yours isn’t the correct one. So if you’re going to hate gay people, or even use that familiar Christian bullshit cop-out “Love the sinner, hate the sin”, at least have the decency to admit that you are choosing an interpretation of the Bible that requires you to treat people poorly because of their inborn nature. And then you should feel bad.
On to Chik-Fil-A. Why they bother to take a stance on this issue is beyond me. I don’t really see it helping their business, especially when blatant and ugly homophobia is becoming so frowned upon – as it well should be. This issue is starting to more than resemble the Civil Rights Movement we saw in the 1960s, and anti-homosexual sentiment will – in what I think will be very little time – quickly be seen as an artifact of a of a backward and primitive time, like using the n-word today.
Further, by failing to denounce this blatant and dangerous ignorance and hate, Christians everywhere are complicit in spreading stigmatization to all gay people in the world. When you fail to condemn, or worse, voice your support for people like Cathy, you become part of the problem. You are complicit in the culture of fear and hatred in which gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people are denied the right to see their loved ones as they lay dying in hospitals. You are complicit in spreading the hate that makes people torture and murder gay youth. You have the blood of every young, frightened, gay youth who was bullied and tormented into suicide on your hands. Look at these, the least of these that you deem to treat with contempt.
They are people. They are children. They are human. They are scared, lonely, confused, and many are treated poorly by their peers. Every one of the people in those pictures found themselves so utterly alone, so cut off from humanity and hope that they thought the only way out was to take their own lives. Think about that for a second. They didn’t choose to be gay or lesbian any more than you, selective-verse-following condescending Christian, decided to be heterosexual.
You are responsible for supporting policies that tear people apart, policies that treat them like second-class citizens, laws that keep people who love each other from being able to spend their lives with each other, or condemn them to “halfway” marriage without all the special treatment that you feel so strongly that you deserve.
You would deny another the benefits you have received from your status as white heterosexual.
I sincerely hope that Chik-Fil-A has a change of heart, though I don’t see that happening. What I also hope, and what I also think is more likely, is for other Christians who have some sense or morality to wake up and realize that the support for people like Cathy and the Boy Scouts of America and other organizations that treat entire sections of society poorly because of something that is not their choice is wrong, and to stop doing it.
Exit, stage left.
Sparks
1. Go ahead. TRY to debate me on that.