Chick-fil-A's flippant response to years of LGBT controversy: 'Guilty as charged'

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07/16/2012

by Jeremy Hooper

Chick-fil-A has come under fire over the past few years for its strategy retreats featuring anti-equality speakers, its expressed policies against gay couples (married or otherwise) staying at its WinShape retreat centers, and considerable financing of organizations that work to fight equal civil rights for LGBT Americans (among other causes). Company COO Dan Cathy doesn't seem to care:

Some have opposed the company's support of the traditional family. "Well, guilty as charged," said [Dan] Cathy when asked about the company's position.

"We are very much supportive of the family -- the biblical definition of the family unit. We are a family-owned business, a family-led business, and we are married to our first wives. We give God thanks for that.
'Guilty as charged,' Cathy says of Chick-fil-A's stand on biblical & family values [BP News]

I am so tired of them flipping this script. Or trying to, at least. The intense scrutiny over the past few years has been in regard to the company's chosen LACK OF SUPPORT for families like mine. Regardless of where you stand, the placement of LGBT people within our societal picture and within our body of laws is the conversation at hand. That is not the same thing as "support for the traditional family," no matter how aggressively the self-appointed values movement attempts to (mis)name reality!

If Dan Cathy is proud that his company's efforts have alienated a customer base that is only going to grow with every passing year, then he has every right to take that defiant position. Pro-equality companies will do the reverse, despite boycotts from groups like NOM. But refusing to own the facts at hand is not an option for either side. And refusing to own the facts by hiding behind a false layer of "family" support (which, by extension, casts LGBT people and allies out of that same unit)? That makes Mr. Cathy sound a bit like a, well—chicken.