Blogger Ryan Long penned a breakdown of recent gay rights-motivated boycotts to separate the reasonable (Salvation Army) from the unreasonable (Stoli Vodka). It's a good assessment, and with the ongoing flood of calls for boycotts, its important to set up a system like Long has.
...Boycotts are all the rage these days, it seems. It's weird how many of my fellow liberals and/or gays just expect me to hop on board these bandwagons, and seem surprised when I question them. Let me explain my very simple formula for whether we should boycott a business for being anti-gay. Does the company discriminate against LGBT employees or customers? Are company funds being used to promote anti-LGBT legislation? No? Then I don't feel the need to boycott.
I'm going to humbly add one example from 2011 Long forgot to include, which is understandable because there have been so many. The 2011 boycott and attempted extortion of Target for giving money to a pro-business political action committee that gave money to a pro-business politician who happened to oppose gay marriage.
Target has been a gay ally as an employer, and funds pro-gay events. The relationship to anti-LBGT legislation was strained and was never suggested to be intentional, and using Long's method I believe one should have opted not to boycott.
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