By Tim Dunkin
As
I write this, Chick-Fil-A Appreciation Day isn’t even over yet, but it is
already obvious that the cultural Left in America has been handed an absolutely
huge
defeat today. For those who have been living
under a rock for the past few weeks, Chick-Fil-A’s President, Dan Cathy (son of
founder Truett Cathy), was recently asked by a Baptist publication about his
views on traditional marriage and same-sex “marriage.” Cathy, whose company is well-known for its
support of Christian principles (including closing on Sundays, something almost
unheard-of these days), responded by affirming support for traditional marriage
and opposing same-sex unions. For this,
Cathy and his company have been roundly pilloried in the mainstream media. Radical homosexual activists immediately
demanded a boycott of the restaurant chain, as well as announcing a “kiss in”
to be held at franchises across the country.
Accusations of “hate” and “bigotry” have been flung at the company, and
leftist elected officials in a number of cities have gone so far as to announce
that they will make every effort to force the restaurant chain out of their
cities, or prevent them from starting any restaurants if none already exist
(which is, as it turns out, highly illegal).
Clearly,
the cultural Marxists in America thought that this would be yet another play
from the old gay Mafia playbook – identify an offender who makes the mistake of
opposing the radical homosexual agenda, fix them as a target for the hatred of
the proles, threaten them with official sanction by the apparatuses of the
state controlled by the Left, and watch the offender fold into a quivering
apologetic lump of jello who can then be leeched for funding to be given to
radical homosexual lobby groups as means of penance for their transgression.
Except
that the playbook didn’t work this time around.
Instead
of backing down, Dan Cathy and Chick-Fil-A stood firm. They didn’t apologize and walk back Cathy’s
comments. Instead, they affirmed their 1st
amendment right to say what they want and to hold whatever moral and political
positions that they deemed appropriate.
And as we have been seeing, the people of this country responded
overwhelmingly positively to this company that – unlike so many others that
have drawn the ire of the Left on a hot button cultural issue – kept standing
on its principles. And to the surprise
of many a leftist who haughtily assumes that because they support homosexual
“marriage” and hate Chick-Fil-A everyone else must too, a massive campaign of
support for Chick-Fil-A sprang up across the internet and on social networking
sites like Twitter and Facebook.
Americans by the parcel load responded to the call to come out and eat
at Chick-Fil-A as a show of support to the company, an event which came to be
called the aforementioned Appreciation Day, and which is taking place today,
August 1, 2012.
The
response
to
Chick-Fil-A
Appreciation Day
has been
absolutely
awe-inspiring. A post on Free
Republic asked “Freepers” to share their experiences eating at (or trying
to eat at, assuming you could even get in because of the crowd) their local
restaurants today. I encourage the
reader to visit the thread, but I will tell you what to expect – testimony
after testimony of massively long lines, tied up traffic, standing room only,
and crowds full of polite, well-mannered, friendly people all enjoying the
blissful confluence of quality food and the opportunity to support traditional
marriage and free speech. Michelle Malkin, likewise, posted up her followers’
experiences at Chick-Fil-A today, in which the stories were much the same.
What
explains this tremendous outpouring of support for this restaurant chain?
Frankly,
this is happening because the majority of the American people are simply sick
and tired of having the radical gay agenda forced off onto them. Americans are tired of being flogged as
“extremists,” “homophobes,” “haters,” and “bigots” for simply affirming
traditional marriage. Americans are
tired of being told that they are the dangerous, radical, hate-filled fanatics
for simply thinking that marriage should be between a man and a woman by a
bunch of spittle-flinging gay activists shoving their rainbow triangles in
everyone else’s faces and trying to destroy the lives of those who oppose
them. Americans are tired of voting
against gay “marriage” only to have a homosexual judge strike down the law or
constitutional amendment by judicial fiat.
Americans are tired of radical homosexual activists whining about how
“oppressed” they are while at the same time harassing, giving out the personal
information of so as to incite violence against, and threatening citizens with
harm who had the audacity to exercise their rights to engage in political
action. Americans are tired of left-wing
mayors disregarding the 1st amendment and abusing governmental
authority for the purposes of punishing businesses and individuals who stand on
the opposite side of the aisle from them on this issue. Most of all, perhaps, Americans are tired of
standing by and minding their own affairs while the cultural Marxists in this
country tear down our institutions and civilization around us.
Eating
at Chick-Fil-A today was a way to stick it in the eye of the left-wingers and
cultural totalitarians who can’t and won’t accept that the rest of us simply
don’t agree with them on this and other cultural issues.
Of
course, I’d imagine that the Left is not taking this very well. We know that the national media will do its
level best to downplay today’s events and try to make them disappear down the
memory hole. Unsurprisingly, several of
the reports on the Free Republic thread mentioned the presence of media
reporters – who were interviewing the two or three pro-same sex “marriage”
protestors present at a restaurant, while making a valiant effort to position
their cameras at such an angle as to exclude the lines of customers snaking
their way out of the store and around the building. While there seems to be some local news coverage,
don’t expect the national nightly news or CNN to give this day more than a five
second blurb right before going to a commercial.
I’m
sure that the gay Mafia and its supporters in the broader cultural Left are
consoling themselves today with reassurances that all of these people eating at
Chick-Fil-A are just morons, or toothless inbred hillbillies, or are just there
because they were riled up by their Bible-thumping preachers at their
Bible-thumping churches. I’m sure these
poor little martyrs are clutching their bosoms and opining about the disturbing
level of “hate” that still infests America and that needs to be rooted
out.
What
they don’t understand – what they don’t want
to understand – is that hate has nothing to do with this. The people eating at Chick-Fil-A today don’t
hate them. Speaking for myself, I can
say that I do not hate homosexuals. I
believe their lifestyle choice is immoral and sinful, but I don’t hate them. I don’t wish them ill or want to see them die
or to see harm done to them. I don’t lay
awake at night thinking about how much I despise homosexuals.
However,
I get the distinct impression that there are a lot of people in the radical
homosexualist movement who do lay
awake at night thinking about how much they hate people like myself, and how
much they’d like to harm us and shut us up once and for all.
Nevertheless,
what drives the people appreciating Chick-Fil-A today is that we’re weary of 1%
of the population forcing the rest of us to sit down, shut up, or suffer
negative consequences for not doing so. We’re
shaking off that yoke. By attacking
Chick-Fil-A, the gay Mafia has really assaulted the living, beating heart of
America. The result has been the exact
opposite of what they expected to happen.
We can only hope that this aroused giant will stay awake and will remain
vigilant from this day forward.
