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Anybody up for boycotting Barilla Pasta?

 
 
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firefly
 
  5  
Reply Sun 29 Sep, 2013 09:31 pm
@hawkeye10,
Quote:
refusing to use pro gay imagry in their ads is not being insensitive to gays

Agreed, but calling them "fags", as you do, is certainly insensitive.

You really don't get what the boycott is all about. It's not about forcing Barilla to use "pro gay imagery in their ads." This whole issue seems way over your head. You just don't understand what the "fags" are making a fuss about do you?

Barilla told them to take their business elsewhere if they don't like his ads. so they are simply taking him at his word. That should be simple enough for even you to understand it. This isn't about forcing Barilla to do anything, it's about showing that people can take their business elsewhere, plain and simple, particularly when a company invites them to do that.
Quote:
Live and let live is a pretty good way to boost quality of life...

I agree, as long as we are all afforded the same equal protections and benefits of law, and we do not interfere with how others live their lives and what their options are.

So far, that's not true for the LGBT population, particularly in Italy, they do not have legal equality or benefits.

I must say Guido Barilla's response is much more open-minded than yours. In addition to just offering apologies, he has agreed to meet with representatives of the groups offended by his remarks, and has intimated that his thinking regarding families may be behind the times. He really didn't have to do that. I'd give him some credit for being genuinely upset for offending people, because I don't see any evidence that the man is really anti-gay or homophobic.

I suspect Barilla's thinking about what constitutes a proper and traditional "family" is shared by a majority of Italians, certainly of his generation. And he's said all along that he supports gay marriage, it seems to be gays adopting and raising children that bothers him. But, as recently as about 15 years ago, that was also a prevalent view in the social sciences as well. It's very recently that studies have indicated no real disadvantage to children raised by same-sex parents. So, Barilla might personally benefit from learning more about the entire topic--even if the nature of his company's ads never change. He doesn't have to actively promote gay issues, either privately or through his company's ads, but being better informed might help him to alter his feelings about gays and lesbians raising children, and to refrain from making public statements that help to block the ability of homosexuals to adopt children.

I really think the flap with Barilla will die out quickly. The response in the social media got his attention, and he's willing to try to make amends in some way. An actual boycott may no longer be necessary. He's expressed a willingness to sit down and listen to the other side. That's a respectful response. Personally, that's all I would want from the man.

Attitudes about things as deeply ingrained as "marriage" and "family", and how these are defined, don't change overnight, particularly in a country like Italy, where the Catholic church has a dominant influence. Barilla, in voicing his support of same-sex marriage, is already ahead of many of his compatriots. In time, his views of "family", as well as the role of women, that he wants to promote, may also change. Both Barilla and Italy will catch up to contemporary reality, these things just take time. We're not moving all that quickly in the U.S. toward marriage equality.

You, on the other hand, seem unable to either muster respect for gays, or to even refrain from insulting them. Guido Barilla seems light-years ahead of you.

Let me remind you that, without boycotts and demands, and the application of pressure, we'd still have segregated public transportation and facilities in the South. Boycotts, and the power of the purse, have always been an effective tool to help promote social action and change. I'm just not convinced that Barilla is the right target for this one.

You don't agree with the tactics because you don't support the cause. And that's true when it comes to the "niggers" you refer to as well.

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firefly
 
  4  
Reply Sun 29 Sep, 2013 10:07 pm
@hawkeye10,
Quote:
Barilla is the subject of this thread...

I am talking about Barilla.

Why are you bringing up Jesse Jackson? And again trying to see civil rights activism, whether by blacks, or homosexuals, or women, as a form of "extortion"?

People are entitled to enjoy full civil rights, Hawkeye, all people.

Women and blacks had to demand, and protest, and boycott, in order to gain their civil rights, and the LGBT community must do the same now. That's the way that social change and legal equality comes about. It's never handed over willingly by the predominant power structure. It's always a struggle.

Meanwhile, all you do is bitch and moan, in thread after thread, about how men, mainly white heterosexual men, are losing ground. What you fail to see is that that ground has become more level for others. White straight guys can't run the show and call all the shots any more. That's not a tragedy--it's a move toward greater equality. That's why all your whimpering and sniveling about the "abuse" of men generally falls on deaf ears. Most people can see the larger picture, and, unlike you, they can also look beyond their narrow self-interest and actually consider the greater good.

Why don't you want to see the LGBT community have exactly the same legal rights and protections you have? And how would you propose they go about getting them?

If nothing else, this dust-up with Barilla has brought attention to issues that matter to the LGBT community, particularly in Italy. And maybe that will help the currently pending anti-discrimination legislation passed in the Italian senate. That alone would be a good outcome to all of this.
hawkeye10
 
  -2  
Reply Sun 29 Sep, 2013 10:28 pm
@firefly,
when you start your Hawkeye thread why dont you start by listing the rights I want to deny the sexually confused and sexually strange. as a BDSMer and swinger one would think I would support such out of self interest if nothing else, but apparently I dont.

Btw when I talk about the sorry state of men I dont make any breaks, it is all men who are disadvantaged by the effort to make sure that women get more resources than men, and the consideration of men as second class citizens.

division and triangulation are schemes you go back to again and again Firefly, did you for by chance once sit at the feet of Bill Clinton? and your own personal language too! a thread on you seems to be in order.
firefly
 
  2  
Reply Sun 29 Sep, 2013 11:02 pm
@hawkeye10,
Quote:
why dont you start by listing the rights I want to deny the sexually confused and sexually strange. as a BDSMer and swinger one would think I would support such out of self interest if nothing else....

Let's start with the fact that you don't understand the difference between sexually preferred behaviors, like your preference for BDSM, and sexual orientation that is an inborn integral part of one's identity, and that determines sexual gender preferences for both LGBT individuals and heterosexuals alike.

This has nothing to do with sexual preferences you have as "a BDSMer and swinger". Your sexual orientation is simply heterosexual, or that's all you've acknowledged. And the civil rights issue would be that, whatever rights and legal protections you have, by virtue of being heterosexual, should be extended and applied and available to those of other sexual orientations as well. There is nothing "sexually strange" about homosexuality--it's a naturally occurring behavior. I'm not sure the same can be said of BDSM practices, the enjoyment of pain, and inflicting it, is considerably more strange and unnatural.

But don't hold your breath until I start a thread about you--I can't think of a more boring topic.

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firefly
 
  3  
Reply Sun 29 Sep, 2013 11:22 pm
@hawkeye10,
Quote:
I believe that it is clear that it is time to add gay rights to the list of issues...

No, the only list that gay rights belongs on is the list of civil rights and protections available to all.

If you want to have "an honest conversation" then explain why homosexuals should not have all of the civil rights, and benefits, and legal protections available to heterosexuals.
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OmSigDAVID
 
  -3  
Reply Mon 30 Sep, 2013 12:57 am
@hawkeye10,
hawkeye10 wrote:
I believe that it is clear that it is time to add gay rights to the list of issues where the militant activists are all on one side if the issue, and thus can and do squash any effort by the society to launch an honest conversation. if anyone deviates from the script they swarm and launch vigilante action.
Let the record show my favoring
feeble government, in the knowledge that personal freedom
and the jurisdiction of government are INVERSELY PROPORTIONAL. I favor liberty.





David
Bentinie
 
  2  
Reply Mon 30 Sep, 2013 08:58 am
@firefly,
Quote:

Are you threatening to boycott A2K? That would be too good to be true.



Firefly, YOU ROCK!
0 Replies
 
Setanta
 
  2  
Reply Mon 30 Sep, 2013 09:21 am
@OmSigDAVID,
Typical David lunacy . . . this has nothing to do with government. Government is not involved in this controversy, and no one has suggested that they should be.
OmSigDAVID
 
  1  
Reply Mon 30 Sep, 2013 11:40 am
@hawkeye10,
hawkeye10 wrote:
I consider it extortion when the leader of a mob goes to a businessman dictating terms, and the businessman knows that if he refuses then the mob will shut him down. the italian mob did not usually put guns to heads, or say any threats, but everyone knew that if the terms were not agreed to then trucks would be set alight, workers would be maimed, and business would dry up. we put guys in jails for doing that, as we should. the St Pete fags probably do not have business cards for their mob but it does not matter, JCBOY has already proudly confessed that they are an organized mob bent on extortion.
U dont usually ignore questions addressed to u, Hawkeye,
but u did not tell me whether I was an extortionist or not.
Inquiring minds wanna know.





David
OmSigDAVID
 
  -1  
Reply Mon 30 Sep, 2013 11:51 am
@Setanta,
Setanta wrote:
Typical David lunacy . . . this has nothing to do with government.
Government is not involved in this controversy, and no one has suggested that they should be.
It appears that u r just not smart enuf
to understand the applicable concept, Setanta.

Hawkeye wrote:
I believe that it is clear that it is time to add gay rights . . .
Clearly, he was referring to a statutory scheme
qua the delineation of those aforesaid rights.
Statutes are the handiwork of governments. Do u get the idea now ?





David
Moment-in-Time
 
  3  
Reply Mon 30 Sep, 2013 11:51 am
@firefly,
Quote:

Are you threatening to boycott A2K? That would be too good to be true.



Firefly, you are simply terrific! I admire your exceptional skill in responding to a very difficult a2k poster.
0 Replies
 
hawkeye10
 
  -2  
Reply Mon 30 Sep, 2013 12:11 pm
@OmSigDAVID,
extortion requires an organized effort to extract deal terms from another, if you simply boycotting a business with like minded people then you are not an extortionist. the St Pete fags practice extortion, the action against Barilla is not. if we see the gay rights pressure groups calling for boycot till they get some stated damands met then they will be attempting extortion.
0 Replies
 
jcboy
 
  11  
Reply Mon 30 Sep, 2013 12:13 pm
@hawkeye10,
hawkeye10 wrote:

I consider it extortion when the leader of a mob goes to a businessman dictating terms, and the businessman knows that if he refuses then the mob will shut him down. the italian mob did not usually put guns to heads, or say any threats, but everyone knew that if the terms were not agreed to then trucks would be set alight, workers would be maimed, and business would dry up. we put guys in jails for doing that, as we should. the St Pete fags probably do not have business cards for their mob but it does not matter, JCBOY has already proudly confessed that they are an organized mob bent on extortion.


The word on the street is they’re organizing somewhere in Washington State. Cool
Rockhead
 
  4  
Reply Mon 30 Sep, 2013 12:16 pm
@jcboy,
there would be some irony points in that...
firefly
 
  3  
Reply Mon 30 Sep, 2013 12:30 pm
http://www.slate.com/content/dam/slate/blogs/outward/2013/09/27/barilla_pasta_boycott_in_italy_italian_lgbt_life_and_homophobia/1380318595.jpg.CROP.promo-mediumlarge.jpg

Quote:
Sept. 27 2013
Why the Barilla Boycott Matters to Italian LGBT People
By Lorenza Antonucci

If you haven’t read about the Barilla LGBT boycott yet, here’s a brief update: Yesterday, the president of the company, Guido Barilla, said that he “would never do (a commercial) with a homosexual family” because he doesn’t “agree with them,” and suggested that if gays didn’t like it, they could get their pasta elsewhere. This caused outrage around the world and activists quickly issued calls for a boycott of the company.

You might think that this is just another Chick-fil-A case in which LGBT activism becomes a simplistic decision about being for or against a corporation, as J. Bryan Lowder argued here yesterday. But there is more to this story: Since the controversy started in Italy and involves an Italian company, it’s really about the state of LGBT life in my home country. I understand and agree with Bryan’s concern about not transforming LGBT activism into implicit support of corporate personhood, but as an Italian who immigrated to the U.K. (partly because I’m LGBT), I can assure you that is not what’s happening. When angry Italian people started tweeting about Barilla’s statements, they were not only calling for the boycott of a specific company—they were protesting against a system of legitimized public homophobia.

Guido Barilla’s comments are just the most recent in the barrage of bigoted public declarations that Italian LGBT people read on a weekly basis coming from MPs and other public figures like famous football players, actors, and now also corporate officers. But what made this time different was that, in a country where there is no public condemnation for homophobic speech, boycotting a specific brand is the only practical way of fighting back. Italian LGBT people and Italians sympathetic with the cause have started tweeting with the hashtags #boycottBarilla and #boicottaBarilla and making fun of Barilla’s advertisements. These viral protests have in turn attracted even more support through social media and involved non-LGBT people in the discussion, which is genuinely unprecedented in Italy.

To understand this response, you need to understand the larger state of gay rights in the country; this campaign is not only about the comments themselves. Regardless of what statistics say about the state of homophobia in Italy, there is a general feeling of exasperation among LGBT people there. Just a few days ago, the Parliament decided to respond to a rise in homophobic violence in the last years with an anti-homophobia law, but LGBT activists called it “useless” since it protects anti-gay speech within political, cultural and religious groups. The debate accompanying the law has been characterized by homophobic remarks from members of various political parties who continually spoke of a “right not to like gays” in terms of freedom of speech. So, when Guido Barilla shared his bigoted opinions, his comments became a casus belli to talk about how far the normalization of public homophobia can go.

But the real power of this boycotting campaign is that it has spread over the Italian borders due to the smart use of social media to attract wider European and international attention. While Guido Barilla might have naively thought he was merely in line with “the spirit of the times” in homophobic Italy, his comments sound even more misplaced in Barilla’s global market where many countries have laws that protect gay families. Yes, I know it’s sad that we must engage with corporate forces to start a conversation about LGBT rights in Italy, but if the Italian political institutions do not respond to our demands for protection, what else would you suggest we do?

Now, if you are concerned that your boycott of Barilla in the U.S. or elsewhere won’t have any effect, be assured that Italian politicians are already paying attention. During a political discussion in the Italian Parliament on the "Barilla case" yesterday, an MP from the Lega Party decided to provoke two openly gay MPs with a fennel bulb (finocchio is the Italian slang for “faggot”) and to try to physically assault one of them. I know this scene might sound surreal, but it is indicative of the state of affairs in Italy. In such a charged context, even a simple public boycott becomes a very political gesture.

In the end, this Barilla campaign is not really about the potentially minor impact of boycotting—it’s about the possibility of protesting itself. And it’s about how an invisible minority of LGBT people is finally finding a way to speak for itself to a national and international audience. In a country where there are very few public intellectuals speaking for the LGBT community (and many scared just to come out), this feels grass-roots, this feels fresh. Even if it fades quickly, at least it gave us a chance to talk about the terrible situation of the gay people in Italy—and for that, the campaign deserves your respect.
http://www.slate.com/blogs/outward/2013/09/27/barilla_pasta_boycott_in_italy_italian_lgbt_life_and_homophobia.html

hawkeye10
 
  -3  
Reply Mon 30 Sep, 2013 12:32 pm
@jcboy,
doubtful, washington state is not a banana republic, what flies in Florida does not work here.
0 Replies
 
jcboy
 
  7  
Reply Mon 30 Sep, 2013 12:34 pm
@Rockhead,
Rockhead wrote:

there would be some irony points in that...


Last I heard they were calling out the West Coast Mobster’s called “The Killer Queens”

0 Replies
 
 

 
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