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Conservatives – good at buycotts, bad at boycotts

Conservatives – good at buycotts, bad at boycotts

Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day has proven something I’ve noticed before.

Conservatives are very good at buycotts, but very bad at boycotts.

There have been attempts by some conservative and religious groups to boycott various businesses over political issues. But I can’t think of one, at least not recently, that has caught on.

Or that has been as nasty, vicious and sustained as the boycotts and intimidation of businesses run by Color of Change, The “Human Rights Campaign,” Media Matters, the anti-Israel BDS movement, and other left wing groups.

I’m not saying there haven’t been conservatives who have tried to run nasty and vicious boycotts, but doing so on a regular and sustained basis is the province of the left.  And the left does it so much better.

Today proves, however, that conservatives can do buycotts quite well.

I think the buycott-boycott divide reflects the personalities of the conservative and liberal movements in the age of Obama.

The threat to free speech represented by the actions of the liberal political leaderships in Chicago, Boston, San Francisco, D.C., New York, and Philadelphia should be the ultimate wake up call.

If given the chance, the liberal boycott movement will cross the line, and there will be many politicians willing to help them do it.

Which is why it is so important to fight the boycotts — don’t let them get near the line.

Update:  h/t HotAir

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Comments

Well, lefties are more aggressive, nasty and vicious than conservatives…

    Tamminator in reply to WarEagle82. | August 1, 2012 at 9:50 pm

    Conservatives want to lift up, not cut down.
    It’s that simple.
    That’s our philosophy in a nutshell.

    Cassandra Lite in reply to WarEagle82. | August 1, 2012 at 11:15 pm

    Yes, we’re more quiet. For instance, without anyone noticing, we have effectively boycotted every (well, every one that I can think of) far-left Hollywood idiot to the point that their movies no longer “open,” as they say, and their star salaries have plunged precipitously.

    Someone’s going to write well and accurately about this someday, but it’s pretty clear that one of the primary reasons for the Hollywood slump is that half of the American population is unwilling to shell out cash that ends up in the pockets of those who have such overt contempt for this country and those who deign to disagree politically.

There’s another difference. A buycott requires a single, short-term commitment. You show up at the business on a given day and you buy something, then you’re done. A boycott, on the other hand, requires sustained effort — you have to keep reminding people to avoid the targeted business for weeks or months, and they have to keep the outrage burning. In effect you have to be willing to structure your life around your politics on a continuing basis. Conservatives, by and large, aren’t willing to do that.

    Awing1 in reply to Kyle Haight. | August 1, 2012 at 7:45 pm

    Probably because Conservatives have other things to do.

    jdkchem in reply to Kyle Haight. | August 1, 2012 at 8:42 pm

    In other words conservatives have jobs.

      n.n in reply to jdkchem. | August 2, 2012 at 12:07 am

      And children to raise. Evolutionary fitness is, ironically, not a natural state. It requires effort to motivate. So does respect for individual dignity and the intrinsic value of human life. All of which, apparently, are incompatible with left-wing principles.

      I wonder if the DNC will embrace yet another dysfunctional behavior. I thought their effort to normalize the elective termination of voluntarily conceived human life would be their final solution; but, apparently, their proud march to extinction must be accelerated. Fortunately, their promises of (false) instant gratification are increasingly falling on deaf ears.

      That said, once fundamental corruption is dealt with, then the real work of dealing with corruption in the exception begins. There will be no positive progress until the former is ended and the latter is exposed for correction.

        Reticulator in reply to n.n. | August 2, 2012 at 2:20 am

        Somebody is using his own private definition of evolutionary fitness. And maybe somebody would be more at home with the Soviet Lamarckian version than the scientific version.

    JackRussellTerrierist in reply to Kyle Haight. | August 2, 2012 at 3:03 am

    Conservatives also know at some level, no matter how detestable an action taken by the business in question is, that the business represents capitalism and jobs, and with smaller businesses somebody has worked hard, slept little and risked and sacrificed much to get that business going. We also know that whatever action it was that they took, most often it is a result of pressure from the left and, not always but most often, feel victimized by a ginned-up leftwing controversy that they wish would just go away. This is all less true of large corporations, of course.

    What they don’t realize is that if they’d just stand up to the pressure, we’d stand with them as we did today.

    Alan Kellogg in reply to Kyle Haight. | August 2, 2012 at 5:59 pm

    Don’t forget, you can always patronize a business if you find out you like their product.

Makes sense.

Conservatives are good at building and constructive, beneficial endeavors. Between hard work, family time and everything else, there just isn’t much time for boycotts.

Liberalism, on the other hand, lives off of destruction.

I think the nature of conservative boycotts are different than lefty boycotts for a lot of reasons.

First or all, we conservatives have jobs and families to raise. We have important obligations and we attend to them. Lefties? Not so much…

I boycott lots of services and businesses. I rarely go to a single cinema in the course of a year. I do this because so many actors are left-wing idiots who mock people like me. And I don’t want to waste the time or money to purchase their tickets to make them wealthier so they can give more money to BK or Michael Moore or whomever. But of course, nobody necessarily knows I am boycotting virtually all of Hollywood.

I don’t watch TV. Period. I only listen to news and talk radio. But of course, nobody necessarily knows I am boycotting TV and other media.

There are dozens of stores like Home Depot, Sears, JC Penney, and now probably Target, that I do not shop at.

I don’t vacation in certain places. I probably will never go to Disney World.

But of course, nobody necessarily knows I am boycotting those stores or tourist venues.

Sometimes I tell the stores why I don’t do business with them but frankly, I know they don’t care. Their decisions aren’t made on economic considerations but on ideological ones. They don’t care what I do i most cases. The president Jim Henson Company doesn’t care that I am going to buy MORE from Chick-fil-A and less of the Muppets (though I don’t think they own the Muppets any longer) BECAUSE of her silly tantrum.

    WarEagle82 in reply to WarEagle82. | August 1, 2012 at 8:26 pm

    Of course, sometimes you have to tell people you are boycotting them.

    I recently got a fundraising call from my alma mater. The young skull full of mush making the call was so excited to tell me of the great things that the dean was doing. The dean had invited non other than Maya Angelou to address an audience on campus and he wanted to know if I agreed how wonderful and exciting this was and wouldn’t I want to donate something to the school to bring more speakers like this to the campus.

    My response was, “Of course not! Maya Angelou is a Marxist AND a terrible poet! Why would I want the dean to bring more people like her to campus?” Then I asked if he could help me arrange a small gift to the Ludwig von Mises Institute which is just across the street from the campus.

    Typical answer. “Ludwig von Mises Institute, what’s that?”

    The woman has written SIX AUTOBIOGRAPHIES by 2002! Who does she think she is, Barack Obama?

    Sometimes you just have to tell them…

    Yeah, the Jim Henson company no longer owns the Muppets. They’re owned by Disney. But since you mentioned boycotting Disney World (??) you’ll probably want to still avoid them.

    I’m with you on avoiding most movies and I don’t go to Citgo stations, but mostly I can never remember what I’m supposed to be boycotting or why.

    When I was a teen my dad had a list of companies to boycott because they supported Planned Parenthood. There were dozens of conglomerates on the list with hundreds and hundreds of stores/restaurants/brands to avoid. I swear, I wouldn’t have been able to shop/eat anywhere or buy anything at the grocery store if I followed some boycott lists.

“Today proves, however, that conservatives can do buycotts quite well.”

There are at least two great reasons for this…

1. we are POSITIVE; and,

2. we have disposable income (when you have to borrow money from mommy, AVOIDING a purchase is not a big deal)

La.

    1. We embrace evolutionary fitness as a defining feature of our society because we desire a future for our children. The future does not end with our individual passing.
    2. We respect individual dignity, so we reject progressive involuntary exploitation on principle, which requires us to have jobs, even jobs which “Americans” do not want to do.

      Reticulator in reply to n.n. | August 2, 2012 at 1:09 am

      Embrace?? It just is. It’s not something to embrace or reject.

      For some reason that I can’t quite decipher I am reminded of how I enjoy listening to the loons when I visit my parents’ lakeside home.

Also notice the demeanor of the crowds; smiling faces, patiently waiting in line and having fun being there kind of people the pictures I saw.

That’s what conservatists are; nice people. People you want for neighbors or friends.

Good people standing up for what’s right.

    JackRussellTerrierist in reply to jakee308. | August 2, 2012 at 3:15 am

    Nobody was raped, robbed or stabbed, nobody defecated on the sidewalk, nobody blasted crap music at 100 decibels, nobody dropped trash where they stood, nobody tried to cut in line and then started a ghetto-fest fistfight over it, nobody stampeded the place injuring or killing employees to get the last piece of chicken, and nobody walked off without paying.

    The most telling difference between them and us is that there is no need for cops when conservatives gather. Violent cluster-funks are not our style.

NC Mountain Girl | August 1, 2012 at 8:19 pm

I haven’t watched network TV in years. I almost never go to a movie anymore. I haven’t bought a newspaper for years either. I don’t shop at Target or Home Depot anymore. When I get an on-line market research poll I make sure I say I have a very negative image of Progressive Insurance, Goldman Sachs, etc. etc. I even stopped using a local handyman when he told me he gets all his news from The Nation. It’s just that I almost never tell people why I do -or rather don’t do – these things.

If you look at the market share of most news programs and the butts in the seats index of movie attendance (gross divided by average ticket price) it’s clear people like me have done a real good job. The problem is since most of these products are being driven by ideology and not economics it can’t end until the company goes bankrupt. At which time the leftists will blame capitalism itself rather than their failure to respond to customers.

The numbers just don’t favor what was attempted in banning Chick-Fil-A. The gay population is somewhere less than 1% but inflated by the weird people they attract. Every state that put it to the voters to approve gay marriage failed. Those states that have gay marriage laws acquired them via judicial activism. Clearly, those who disapprove of gay marriage vastly outnumber those who approve and since this vocal and obnoxious minority always insists on responding to their losses with threats to that vast majority, they can’t win if we choose to fight.

This was the perfect opportunity to show just how futile it is for a miniscule minority to try to strong-arm the majority. Their only victories to date have been by cheating using crooked judges.

The Reuters headline tells me everything

“Same-sex marriage foes flock to Chick-fil-A chain”

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/08/01/usa-gaymarriage-chickfila-idUSL2E8J19AM20120801

southcentralpa | August 1, 2012 at 8:37 pm

Speaking of buycott, I think I mentioned it in the tipline once, but apparently Sodastream is on teh BDS crowd’s hit list, they work really great, and they’re available at Staples (among other places).

Make of it what you will…

here is a prime example in the Chick -Fil- A dust up ….. conservativess buy the product ….liberals call in bomb scares as they have today in at least one Chick – Fil – A …look at the Tea Party and occupy * SHRUG * ….one left the place cleaner than they found it ….the other had to be run out by the police then pest control had to be called in to get rid of the vermin …occupy raped….robbed ….looted …..burned ….. murdered

I called in an order to Chik Fil A today about 10:45 AM, local time, for three of us, and they said they were sooo busy they couldn’t fill it. People were lined up outside and around the block. Sooo, I got Popeyes, instead.

It looks like the Gaystapo is losing this one.

Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter

It’s somewhat analogous to the battles between the Native Americans and the Europeans who conquered them. The NAs won some spectacular short-term victories (Custer, St. Clair) but were incapable of the same sustained effort and drudgery that the Euro-Americans could put on. The NAs had lives to live, and friends and family to socialize with. They couldn’t be in a state of military readiness day in and out. Making a living consumed most of their time. The Euro-Americans had resources to burn, and were able to keep up an unrelenting pressure. They won.

    jdkchem in reply to Reticulator. | August 2, 2012 at 1:49 pm

    Is this one of O’Barry’s shovel ready jobs? Nothing you claim has any basis in fact. Technology and numbers defeated the native Americans. Mostly numbers as the native American population had been decimated by disease.

quiksilverz24 | August 1, 2012 at 8:55 pm

Perception and Reality are two different things. The perception is that no one is going to CFA today according to the MSM. The Reality is that lines are forming for miles out the front door, requiring police to direct traffic.

Don’t accept the narrative that is sold to by the MSM.

so this is what piety and politics has devolved to : what fast-food joint you patronize.

    WarEagle82 in reply to el polacko. | August 1, 2012 at 9:55 pm

    It some ways, it may appear so. But the deeper issue is whether you support the barbarians at the gates or the people who stand behind thousands of years of Western Civilization and the values of individual liberty and freedom.

    Don’t lose site of the forest for the trees…

    el polacko, you might want to read this. Hopefully you can recognize yourself:

    They are capable of only seeing isolated events and individual threads, not the tapestry of tyranny that has turned a simple protest buying of chicken sandwiches and waffle fries into a fed-up Republic’s sudden self-awareness.

Alternate theory: Rahm Emmanuel, evil genius, is SO pissed at Valerie Jarrett that he’s secretly campaigning for Romney by brilliantly finding a way to actually motivate social conservatives.

Seriously though, when have you ever seen a nationwide mobilization of social cons on, well, anything?

Nixon notoriously coined the “silent majority” term, Hillary tried to pick it up. Neither were actually supported by a majority of anyone, silent or not, at the time they made their claim. The real ‘silent majority’ in America, now as always, are hardworking married couples, generally religious, too busy to be activists in a cause. The outrages of Progressives over the past few years have been politicizing such people to an extent never seen before. The internet has allowed dissemination of real news and allowed people to communicate with each other through many new channels.

My prediction: Blowout in November. Romney wins by at least as much as Obama did last time (7%), R’s get about 55 Senate seats (yes, I know at the moment it looks like 53 is the most we can hope for).

Millions of people over the past few years have been continuously outraged over policies that are simply NOT American. There’s bound to be a backlash.

    Rosalie in reply to Aarradin. | August 1, 2012 at 9:39 pm

    After reading your comment, I think I’ll turn off my computer now and cling to what you predicted. For the sake of our country, I hope you’re right.

Conservative, good at buycotts, but lousy at choosing presidential candidates

    No. If you are referring to Tea Party conservatives, we don’t yet have the power to influence the nomination of conservative candidates and so we didn’t have any to vote for this year. We are a bottom-up grassroots and that is how we are quickly gaining power.

    If our entrenched criminal class doesn’t finish us off during the lame duck session this fall, we might still be able to prevent Romney & Friends from capping off the Bush/Obama legacy of one-world-without-borders government.

    If we are still around in 2016, we will probably be selecting the next GOP presidential candidate. Otherwise, it will be Jebbie.

    jdkchem in reply to Ediv710. | August 2, 2012 at 1:52 pm

    Says the fool who voted for Barry O!

>> And the left does it so much better.

I disagree. The left is all bark and no bite when it comes to boycotts. Example: Wal-mart. It’s a little passe these days, but leftists used to whine about Wal-mart CONSTANTLY. They exploit the poor; they have bad business practices; they treat their employees bad; they refuse to allow unionization; they have terrible service; blah blah blah etc. etc. And for so many years, I’ve heard average Democrat saying that they REFUSE to go to Wal-mart based on principle. They boycott it. They’d much rather shop at the Mom and Pop Store that the eeeevil Wal-mart is putting out of business with their Low Low Prices.

Well you know what? Maybe the elitist left can afford to go without Low Low Prices, but the average Democrat can’t. So they whine and moan and complain how life isn’t fair and that Wal-mart is the devil – but at the beginning of every month, they’re still spending all their money there (or is it their food stamps). And even when you CALL THEM on that hypocrisy, they refuse to stand by their boycott. They begrudgingly admit that they willingly spend their money because “they can’t afford not to.”

It’s easy to boycott when you have no stake in what you’re boycotting. But that’s rarely the case with the average left-wing Democrat. Leftist’s only “successfully” boycott that which they didn’t care much about in the first place, and don’t mind going without. Any other time, they cave as soon as they realize that the “evil” thing they’re boycotting actually benefits them a lot more they want to admit.

    Aarradin in reply to AT. | August 1, 2012 at 11:57 pm

    The only thing approaching a principle with the Left’s abuse of Walmart is the union issue. If Walmart were a union shop, they’d love everything else about it. Everything else was merely pressure on them to accept unionization, whether their employees wanted it or not.

Everyone should watch this. It is powerful. Obama and friends are gonna have a cow…

http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=D9vQt6IXXaM&hd

    JackRussellTerrierist in reply to WarEagle82. | August 2, 2012 at 4:10 am

    WHOA. That’s a beauty.

    “….and stand the test of fire….”

    Just wow.

      Fantastic video – and I’m a pro-choice, pro-civil ceremony, small-government person.

      To head-off some remarks
      – against partial-birth and late-term abortion
      – I think Roe v Wade was a despicable court decision but is an excellent *political* compromise (first trimester)
      – I think marriage is a religious union
      – I had a civil ceremony with my wife in 1996. So, if marriage is something sanctioned by a religious body than I am not married. But the state has a purpose to. I have legal rights through this state-granted license. It is the legal rights (visit in the hospital, etc) that ought to be extended.

      OK fire away.

        – I think Roe v Wade was a despicable court decision but is an excellent *political* compromise (first trimester)

        Alas, we disagree. Murdering a 3 month old human is never an excellent compromise of any sort…

          The crux of the matter is defining when one becomes a human being. To me there is not a simple point. To say, as some do, that life begins at birth makes no sense to me. I won’t elaborate as I feel we agree here.

          At the same time I don’t think that a two-cell pairing (a zygote)is a human being either. At what point does humanity start. After the first split, the second – I don’t think so. And, neither do millions of others. (The amount of people who think a certain way doesn’t make the position right or wrong.)

          And so the abortion debate is born.

          I think our point of agreement is that the expansion of Roe v Wade from first trimester to including partial-birth abortions has been a travesty.

Raquel Pinkbullet | August 1, 2012 at 10:16 pm

Behold, Liberals of America. . . Chick-Fil-A Day is the way you make a point. . .

No arrests, no drugs, no screaming, no hippie freaks doing indecent things in tents, no poo on police cars, no vandalism, no rape, no murder, no blaming someone else, no screaming profanity, no destruction of property, no littering, no misuse of public services, the place left nicer then when they got there, people treating others well and being patient and polite, using capitalism and the power of the dollar to show support, acting like civilized human beings instead of wild animals. . . Just about the thousandth example of how Conservatives protest and gather every single time. . . There are no examples at all of a conservative gathering or protest going any other way, regardless of what the MSM would like you to believe. . . Liberals and OWS could stand to take a lesson. . .

Many conservatives are either too busy with their lives or simply in denial about the threat facing them.

It’s come to this: either get politically involved for the rest of your life, or don’t complain when, at the hands of tyranny, you lose your liberty, your property and possibly your life.

Could it be that Americans prefer to go with instead of go without especially when it comes to food? After all, the mostly overweight American public will gladly stuff their face than go on a diet.

(This was a feeble attempt at some “dark” humor as oppose to “light” fare.)

Raquel Pinkbullet | August 1, 2012 at 10:25 pm

Oh one other thing you lefties better realize. For every person who went to Chic-Fil-A today there are hundreds of others who didn’t make it and the vast majority probably own guns. Keep it up and you just might get a civil war. Care to guess who’ll win?

Dan Cathy calls Rick Warren ….best day ever

How Bad Was The Chick – Fil – A Boycott Fail …..This Bad

http://rightwingfringe.blogspot.com/

    WarEagle82 in reply to Aggie95. | August 1, 2012 at 11:07 pm

    But which side of the “Gay Marriage” issue is Rick on this week? And is he going to host another “Brokeback Church Forum” to promote Obama again in 2012?

MaggotAtBroadAndWall | August 1, 2012 at 10:59 pm

I’m not sure it is fair to say that conservatives do buycotts well as a general principle. I think we did this one EXTREMELY well because we’d reached a boiling point. Huckabee mentioned it, but frankly I did not see a huge push for it on the conservative blogs or conservative media. However, many of us felt compelled to make a statement. Maybe this is why:

1) We were fed up with being labeled bigots solely so the progressives/liberals/leftists could advance the radical homosexual political agenda. Falsely and repeatedly labeling someone a bigot does not advance the civil debate. It shuts it down. We were being shut out of the debate before there was a debate. So we pushed back. HARD. Maybe it’s backfired on them.

2) The mayors and the Chicago alderman demonstrated how non-chalantly they are willing to abuse their government power and trample on our liberty to advance the radical homosexual agenda. Personally, that’s when my blood really began to boil. The Constitution has been gutted after a centruy of judicial activism. We have few liberties left. And now we have petty tyrants willing to abuse their power to take away our most cherishyed freedoms – the freedom of speech and religion? Maybe (hopefully) people are finally waking up and understand how perilously close we are to losing all of our freedom and becoming a police state.

I am hopeful that the huge turnout today was as much about a mass recognition that we have gone too far in allowing the government that we elect to usurp our liberties, as it was a protest about gay marriage.

It was time to take a stand.

    Conservatives are revolutionaries in character. They are not generational progressives — rebels with a cause and without a clue. The Declaration of Independence describes this character. The threshold of revolution has not been reached, let alone breached. This is why we target the government for reform instead of enacting a private police action against private interests.

    Still, peering into the abyss for too long does prompt a reaction from an otherwise tolerant people. Not even a replacement population (both legal and illegal) is sufficient to maintain the illusion of a functional society, let a lone a viable population. Some people simply have a better comprehension and respect for an inviolable natural order. The rest are either ignorant or submersed in their dreams of instant gratification (i.e. physical, material, ego) without perceived (the feedback loop has been subverted) consequences.

      TrooperJohnSmith in reply to n.n. | August 2, 2012 at 8:22 am

      “Still, peering into the abyss for too long does prompt a reaction from an otherwise tolerant people. Not even a replacement population (both legal and illegal) is sufficient to maintain the illusion of a functional society, let a lone a viable population. Some people simply have a better comprehension and respect for an inviolable natural order. The rest are either ignorant or submersed in their dreams of instant gratification (i.e. physical, material, ego) without perceived (the feedback loop has been subverted) consequences.”

      Dayyy-um! Wow. Your prose are concise, direct and visceral! You’re like the Patrick O’Brien of political commentary!

Well, I was a little early this week on my going to Chick-Fil-A and couldn’t make it out again today. Hope I’m forgiven. But the important thing is to keep it going.

Forbes has an interesting article on fast food places, Republican versus Democrat. Looks like our lunch is pretty secure. Let the libs try to boycott. 🙂 http://www.forbes.com/sites/lauriebennett/2012/07/23/red-plate-blue-plate-fast-food-by-political-persuasion/

Henry Hawkins | August 1, 2012 at 11:25 pm

I only ask that liberals next attack a chain of surf ‘n turf restaurants. Chicken sandwiches are OK, I guess, but I’d much prefer to down steak & lobster for the cause.

Naw, but seriously…..

This event transcends conservatism, in that a sizable number of people who supported CFA today are not conservatives or Republicans, but simply people who place high value on our First Amendment rights. Today’s outporing of support was a gestural protest by large numbers of people who are not otherwise organized and who will separate by tomorrow (though within their numbers were a great many who are organized/connected – TP-ers and churchgoers in particular). This group will not be meeting to decide what to do next. It was a true flash of a peaceable grassroots uprising.

The secondary story in this is perhaps the more important one. How did so many people simultaneously get the idea to demonstrate support for our First Amendment rights with a Chick-fil-A Day? It is clear that we now have a highly effective national communication network -totally outside the mainstream media apparatus – that is readily available to and for people who value traditional American cultural norms and the US Constitution. I think this will be remembered as the event where cable TV news, the conservative blogosphere, interpersonal email, and Twitter conjoined and coalesced into the informational vector that can enable the taking back of America from progressivism, the Washington DC establishment (especially RINOworld), and the legacy old school network media.

I think that a goodly half of the people who ate at CFA today where folks who sympathize and agree with Tea Party sentiment, but are too busy or hesitant to officially join a Tea Party local org. I have always said the Tea Party is an idea, not an organization, and there can now be no doubt it has been normalized and mainstreamed into the general American public.

I do believe there may be a new political sheriff in town, and just in time for November, when all the bad guys will be standing still directly down range.

A tip o’ the hat to Huckabee (it hurts me to offer it) and conservative bloggers everywhere for their part in bringing about what I believe may be a catalytic event for this growing movement of regular Americans aching to return our country to something we recognize, respect, and love.

    HH, your post addresses something that I was just thinking about. I was thinking about why I, as someone who is a religious agnostic and who would be fine with gay marriage becoming legal, couldn’t stop grinning and nearly cried when I saw some of the photos from CFAs today. Why was it so affecting? Why were we all so interested?

    I think it was because I really loved the fact that people were getting off their duff to support the 1st amendment, that it was a truly organic, grass roots middle finger at the fascist left. I find it amazing that so many ordinary people took the time to make this happen and were happy to do it even if they had to stand in line for 2 hours.

    Truly awesome.

    I am a Gen X-er. I was born cynical, in the year of Watergate. I have spent the last 4 years believing that Reagan was our last chance and that Obama would win a second term. I sometimes think that nothing can save us, that we’re going the way of Rome. But for some reason, this day makes me hopeful again. Maybe we have another chance.

    Awesome!

      JackRussellTerrierist in reply to angela. | August 2, 2012 at 4:28 am

      You are NOT alone, and there is hope – not just daydreamy hope, but real, factually-founded hope.

      Keep fighting……and pray. Pray that people show up, that people will take the time to inform themselves and then show up when needed. It isn’t much to ask, so there’s good reason to have hope.

      Henry Hawkins in reply to angela. | August 2, 2012 at 1:21 pm

      “HH, your post addresses something that I was just thinking about. I was thinking about why I, as someone who is a religious agnostic and who would be fine with gay marriage becoming legal, couldn’t stop grinning and nearly cried when I saw some of the photos from CFAs today. Why was it so affecting? Why were we all so interested?”

      Our respective reasons for being so interested are variations on a theme – some were motivated solely because they are against same-sex marriage, others motivated in support of freedom of religion and speech, some just to stick it in a lib’s eye, yet others by all of the above.

      As for why is was so affecting, I can only speak for myself, but my experience was nearly identical to yours, likely because we are similar. I am an atheist, but a ‘quiet’ one. I have no beef with the existence of any religion nor with any adherents, nor do I much care who may be allowed to get married. However, there is a price one pays for being non-religious – we don’t meet on Saturdays or Sundays en masse, nor do we enjoy the social aspects of being part of a group of like-minded people. We are a bit more separated, to the extant of that absence, from society as a whole. Most of us have other social interactions, of course, but few if any as pervasive or enjoying the historical tradition of belonging to a mainstream church, temple, or mosque. The word ‘communion’ is primarily understood as a religious sacrament, but it has a secular definition as well: an act or instance of sharing intimate fellowship or rapport. I think what so moved folks like you and I – and it put a lump in my throat as well – was the realization that our support and respect for the First Amendment are deeply and widely held in America, and though our absence of religious beliefs in a deeply religious country can be somewhat isolating, we realize we are not alone in our constitutional patriotism.

      “I am a Gen X-er. I was born cynical, in the year of Watergate. I have spent the last 4 years believing that Reagan was our last chance and that Obama would win a second term. I sometimes think that nothing can save us, that we’re going the way of Rome. But for some reason, this day makes me hopeful again. Maybe we have another chance.
      Awesome!”

      I am a boomer myself, born in 1955. I was 8 when JFK was killed, 12 for the summer of race riots (evacuated from our Detroit home in July ’67), 13 when RFK and MLK,Jr were killed, and Watergate was the background tape for my late teen years. Viet Nam anti-war protests ran the entirety of my politically formulative years, as did the ever-present leftist screeching on just about everything in the late 60s, early 70s. I share your cynicism, and like you, I never let it devolve into defeatism or apathy. We have every reason to feel hopeful, though I might hesitate a bit at the word ‘chance’. We didn’t encounter the events of yesterday, nor the affect it had on us, by chance. We looked at it and for it quite on purpose, and we were moved. Awesome, indeed!

      I have about twenty years on you, age-wise. I have learned and suspect you have as well that everything is cyclical, but because there will never be another 1980, there will never be another Reagan. But the reparatory goodness of the Reagan era will come again in a different time with a different hero. Faith, like communion, is not wholly owned by organized religion, and I have faith in the power of the American people to draw up and declare, “ENOUGH!” when the situation merits it. That situation is clearly here. Despite my atheism, afforded to me by the First Amendment, wherever there is a governmental assault on religion, I will be front and center -armed if necessary – arm-in-arm with my religious fellow citizens to defend our American right to freedom of religion and expression.

    There may be cross-correlation, but any relation to The Tea Party is only incidental. That movement is specifically concerned with corruption in the government, its sponsorship of private-sector corruption, and authoritarians’ penchant for progressive involuntary exploitation.

    I don’t believe that The Constitution addresses evolutionary fitness. There is no legal redress to prevent normalization of a dysfunctional behavior. Still, as good as the framework it provides, we cannot with a clear conscience ignore reality, and the constraints imposed by the natural order. Not if we value human life and desire a viable future for our children and society.

    Then there is the matter of a selective rule of law, which has a storied history, not only in America, but throughout the world. It does not engender positive progress and should be rejected with prejudice. The officials targeting Chick-fil-A for retributive justice are wrong in both principle and the letter of the law. Furthermore, the government has no right to undermine the viability of the people it serves.

“Today the tea party was out in force to show its true racist face. We have a Black president in office and the racist, homophobic tea party organizes a rally featuring that most stereotypical of foods, fried chicken. What’s next? Watermelon?”

Brian Ross ABC News Classically Trained Professional Journalist, reporting from Obama’s lap.

Back to you George…..

    Juba Doobai! in reply to Anchovy. | August 2, 2012 at 1:47 am

    LOL! I hope you keep that meme about Brian Ross going. We want it to spread. The more folks see it, they’ll pick it up and run with it.

The dirty little secret is that economic boycotts don’t work UNLESS the target blinks. Some threats of a boycott cause this – it was Jesse Jackson’s favorite extortion tactic. But they never amount to a blip from a revenue point of view if the management has any spine at all.

Some of the lefty boycotts go on and on. Did you know they are STILL boycotting California grapes, the original Cesar Chavez boycott from the late ’60s? Catch any of your lefty friends sipping a California wine and ask them how they can support oppressing migrant workers.

theduchessofkitty | August 2, 2012 at 1:05 am

Someone at Ann Althouse’s blog offered this comment, but the last paragraph is it:

“The large crowds across the US today should also worry the pants off Obama. Religious conservatives have figured out how to use social media. And it will be used heavily to organize for November.”

Oh yes.

When will the left side of this country realize they have been Breitbarted? Slow on the uptake, they are.
#War

If Chick-Fil-A were kosher I’d definitely have gone there today.

I was at a comedy show tonight, in a room full of lefties, and the host said some nasty things about Chick Fil A. And about Michelle Bachmann (who deserves it) and her husband, and about Rick Santorum (who doesn’t).

I went to a Chick-Fil-A today in Penscola, FL on Bayou Blvd. It was around 3:30 pm and I assumed the crowds would have dwindled by then. But I wanted to show my support and I was hungry.

Happily, my assumption was way off.

The place was packed, traffic backed up in the street, 2 lanes going through the drive-thru, lines 8 across and 10 deep inside.

I finally got my spicy chicken sandwich combo and enjoyed every minute of waiting.

The staff and crowd were jovial. It was similar to some tea party events I went to in 2009 without the signs (the sign was just showing up).

[…] the blog Legal Insurrection has a great point about the overwhelming success of yesterday’s Chick-Fil-A Appreciation day: Conservatives are very good at buycotts, but very bad at […]

Alan K. Henderson | August 2, 2012 at 6:05 am

Hm, conservatives are good at buycotts, good at being uplifting and supportive. The Left is good at boycotts, good at going negative, tearing things down.

went to Chik Fil-A this evening after class; approximately 1945 local. The line to the counter inside was at the door and the drive through line snaked all the way around the building and into the parking lot of the major pharmacy/convenience store next door. The Chik Fil-A parking lot was filled to capacity and the parking lot for the pharmacy/convenience store had only those spaces next to the building unoccupied. There were people of various colors, nationalities and religions inside. I say religions because I saw a family dressed in traditional Indian garb; the woman had a bindi, the man a tilak. (That’s a dot on the forehead for those of you who are more tolerant and politically correct but who do not know what those terms mean.)

I didn’t see anyone getting stoned, accosting women (or children), ‘mic checking’, crapping on the police car parked in the lot next door, yelling the phrase of the day or spouting the latest SCUM or administration talking points, getting in others face(s), generally acting rude and obnoxious, wearing clothes with rude or demeaning slogans or images, or otherwise behaving like some imbecilic, knee jerk liberal telling everyone else how ignorant and racist they were for buying ‘hate chikin’.

And tomorrow, when the gay rights activists and their associated and allied political groups make their meager and ineffective counter action, no elected political leader will deem them to be apostates or kaffirs and call for them to be beheaded or stoned. There will be no ‘honor killing’ of girls or boys who counter protest. Sure there may be idiots like the Westboro Church who speak their mind and protest but they rank right in there with the Chicago mayor, the alderman and other ass hat clowns who are so mentally, fiscally and socially detached from typical society they feel like they are somehow superior to the Hoi-Polloi; the people who vote for them and give their office its legitimacy.

Churches and their congregations do not have to subscribe to political correctness and have their beliefs judged or sanctioned by the state…yet. That’s a practice employed by the politically correct. A practice of socialists, fascists, communists, dictatorships and tribes in Africa, South America, and Indonesia. But after all, isn’t the beauty of America that you can say what you want, believe what you want, buy what you want or don’t buy what you don’t want (except health insurance), live where you want, pray how you want and to who you want, and even whine and complain when you cant afford to do the things you want but can turn around and castigate others because they don’t give you enough of their money to do those things.

Isn’t it ironic that the ‘elite’, the most ‘enlightened’, the ‘politically correct’ disparage the exercise of religious freedom, protect those who would limit or eliminate religious freedom, and generally behave in the most sycophantic and hypocritical manner?

Americans are the most tolerant, forgiving, caring people in the WORLD.

I know this because I have been to a lot of other countries in the world and seen how they live. Only in America can you be considered poor and have running water, electricity, a TV and a cellphone. If you think we are some kind of degenerate or unjust nation I strongly encourage you to go live in another country; like oh, I dont know, say in the middle east. Under a different political system; like say…Communism in North Korea. Then revealuate your condition after a year and report back with defense of your previous assertion.

Americans have shed more of our own blood and spent more of our own money and invested more of our own efforts for other countries in the name of democracy and freedom than any other civilization in the history of the world and done so in less than 250 years. And what do we get for our sacrifice? Just a lot of bitching and whining and vile invective from them in addition that crap from our own politicians and ‘stars’ and the ‘other 99%’…usually in the same breath that tell us we need to spend more or pay more taxes to support them.

If this is the national equivalent of a middle finger response from America’s hoi-polloi, it’s plebes, it’s ‘uneducated’ or ‘unsophisticated’ or otherwise politically incorrect masses, I can only wait with baited breath for the bitch slap that is coming in November.

God bless America!

I stopped buying from Amazon and switched to Target. Now Target has been supporting liberal causes. Staples was on my “no buy” radar for years when they came out for gun control, so I switched to Quill, until Quill bought Staples. This is becoming too confusing, I want to support businesses that support conservative values, but the liberals are buying up all of the businesses. Where can I spend the money that Obama and the liberals enable me to earn and let me keep after paying higher taxes and fees?

    Towson, most of them aren’t “supporting liberal causes”, they’re paying protection money. Remember how Occupy didn’t want the rape victims to call the cops because it would hurt “the movement”? They know that lefty outrage is easily bought off. And none of them want to be the next “Gibson Guitars” where bureaucrats are arbitrarily targeting them.

    Rosalie in reply to Towson Lawyer. | August 2, 2012 at 8:23 am

    I look at it this way: I’m helping those employees who work for them. They have a job and are not on welfare, and that’s a good thing. I bet many of those employees disagree with what they’re doing too.

    If you think about where most of the people managing these companies received their education, you can understand why they think the way they do.

I think conservatives CAN boycott, when something gets them really offended. I heard a lot of folks dropped HBO.

That said, your point is on the money. Honestly, the default position of most corporations may not necessarily be fiscally liberal, but they are certainly socially liberal. I can’t keep track of what companies whose politics I don’t like; the list would be far too long. But I can’t blame them too much. That’s the way the culture and political correctness is going. It’s bad to stand out and shout a viewpoint that’s contrary to the prevailing winds.

But then there are the companies that intentionally push things further left. I can probably remember a dozen or two of the most egregious offenders, but the rest? In the end, being able to provide good products and services to my family at good prices is more important. Maybe that’s short-sighted, but I’m only human.

[…] on fast food for freedom”.Instapundit has a big roundup from yesterday.It makes sense that capitalists would be better at buycotts than boycottsI have some thoughts about the day, myself (and they might surprise some given this, but […]

It’s not enough to buycott Chick-fil-A. We need the same amount of enthusiasm and turnout on November 6th if we want to get rid of Obama.

Just as a note, the Family Research Council would disagree that conservatives are bad at boycotts: http://www.frc.org/op-eds/planned-parenthood-girl-scout-cookie-monster

Phillep Harding | August 2, 2012 at 3:47 pm

Just scanned the responses, not read them. Looks like people have accepted the main idea of the post.

Actually, there is something else going on, IMO, and that is publicity.

Conservative boycotts do not get a lot of publicity from the legacy media, so they look smaller and less effective than they are. The nattering class does not even know what is going on.

If the general public did know, there would be a very different selection of movies and television shows around, and networks that show up Fox news as pandering to the left.

stukinIL4now | August 2, 2012 at 6:55 pm

As I posted elsewhere yesterday, here’s the difference:
The left criticizes, threatens, divides, boycotts, harms, breaks down, destroys.
The right cares, gives, tolerates, unites, encourages, creates, supports, builds up, and as you cleverly put it, buycotts.

And yesterday was just a dry run for Nov 6.

Even in the Liberal sate of California the line wrapped around the building.

http://bluecollarphilosophy.com/2012/08/chick-fil-a-was-packed-at-california-location-power-of-the-buycott-pictures-and-video/

I got there around 6:30pm and the line was about the same length when I left. One employee said it was like that all day. California, remember we voted against gay marriage.