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September 17, 2004
BUY PROCTOR AND GAMBLE
Quick - what's the best possible reason in the world to buy a company's products?
Here's the answer: because conservatives don't want you to.
That's what's happening with Proctor and Gamble. The conservative self-appointed guardians of your morality don't want you to buy their products. Why? Because P&G had the audacity to put a statement on their internal Web site opposing a local statute in Cincinnati designed to deny homosexuals their rights. Heaven forbid a company want to treat all its employees and customers equally, right? So the Morality Stasi are urging a boycott of P&G.
The kicker in this whole thing is the leap of logic these jokers are employing.
The leaders of the groups, Dr. James C. Dobson of Focus on the Family and the Rev. Donald E. Wildmon of American Family Association, contend that by making the statement, Procter & Gamble, based in Cincinnati, is implicitly supporting same-sex marriage.
First of all, if P&G were supporting same sex marriage, good for them. But the thing is, the statute has nothing to do with the marriage issue. Article XII to the Cincinnati city charter specifically exempts homosexuals from equal civil rights protection.
Due to Article XII, it is legal to fire someone for being gay, to deny a gay person housing, or to refuse service to a gay person in a restaurant or in a store. While the city has a civil rights provision in it's charter, gays and lesbians are by law exempted from its protection - making Cincinnati the only city in the country with such a law.
Nice that conservatives are lining up in support of denying Americans their basic civil rights, isn't it? We're not talking about same sex marriage here; while I support it, I can at least understand where people of good faith and good intentions could be uncomfortable with that.
But we're talking about basic human rights here: the right to live wherever one wants and can afford, the right to be served in a commercial establishment, or to do one's job without fear of being fired because the boss doesn't like what you do when you're not working. Apparently, that's too much for conservatives. I'm surprised Wildmon and Dobson haven't tried to mandate separate drinking fountains.
Well, here in Mudgeonland, we don't like to give the Pharisees one solitary inch. (You remember them from the Bible, don't you? The self-righteous pseudo-pious folks who cloaked themselves in religion while persecuting anyone who didn't think, act, or believe as told?) So I am instituting an anti-boycott. (Would that be called a "girlcott?" It is now!) I'm asking you to join me in supporting P&G for their stand against discrimination.
I'll be going out of my way to purchase P&G products in the coming weeks as part of my girlcott. I urge you to do the same; you can find lists of the P&G family of products on their Website. Just to give you a couple of ideas of things to buy, here's a few I'll be buying:
Old Spice deoderant and body spray (sure, I'll smell like a 16 year old on his first date, but the cause is worthy); Aussie Mega or Citrifier shampoo; Zest soap; Noxema facial cleansers; Hugo Boss cologne (easy to do, since I wear Boss anyway); Dawn dishwashing liquid; Mr. Clean; Gain laundry detergent (you could also choose Tide or Cheer); Bounce fabric softener; Charmin; Pepto-Bismol (I swig stomach stuff like soda, so this'll be easy too); Crest toothpaste; Scope; and Folgers coffee. Even my cat Salinger will get in on the act, because from now on he'll get Iams cat food.
These Stasi-wannabes want to say that it's okay to discriminate in America in 2004. I hope you'll join me in opposing their efforts.
