Chicken sandwiches, gay marriage, and freedom of speech

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I wrote last week about Dan Cathy, CEO of fast-food chain Chick-fil-A, who made a big contribution to an anti-gay-marriage organization, and bragged about his morals as he did so. (He made a comment about “all of us here being on our first marriages,” which I think is pretty comical.) He and his company promptly got dumped upon, most publicly and most appropriately by the Henson Company, which broke ties with Chick-fil-A (Henson used to manufacture toys for their children’s meals).  The Hensons then contributed the money they’d received from Chick-fil-A to GLAAD, a prominent gay organization.

 

 

All of this I love.

 

 

The next part becomes more complex.

 

 

Leaders in four American cities – Denver, Boston, San Francisco, and Chicago – have talked about forbidding the expansion of the Chick-fil-A chain in their cities. Is this okay? I’m not sure. I dislike homophobes and prudes, of course, but I can’t forbid them to own businesses, and I’m not sure if I can justify zoning them out of whole cities.  If they were openly flouting the law – refusing service based on sexual preference, or something like that – I might think differently.

 

 

This is the lovely thing about America. You can be as ridiculous as you like, and no one can really tell you to shut up about it. You can be against gay marriage, or women’s suffrage, or the Emancipation Proclamation if you like, and you can even put up big banners in your place of business announcing your political beliefs.

 

 

You’d just better be prepared to lose quite a bit of business.

 

 

To be sure, the homophobes are rallying around the chicken place. Mike Huckabee, the Christian zealot, and Rick Santorum, the animated sweater-vest, have encouraged other zealots and bigots to join them at Chick-fil-A on August 1, to show their “support.” (It’s like the Civil Rights Movement in reverse: lunch counter sit-ins to deny people their rights!) I also saw a lovely photo of Sarah and Todd “Secede From America” Palin picking up their chicken sandwiches and smiling pretty for the camera. (CNN played Pink’s song “Stupid Girls” as background as they relayed the story. Excellent commentary.)

 

 

The natural response for the gay and gay-friendly communities is to boycott Chick-fil-A. Some organizers, more interestingly, are organizing “Gay Day at Chick-fil-A,” to be held on the same day as the Huckabee/Santorum hate rally. This will create, um, an interesting dynamic.

 

 

Myself, I’m with the boycotters. This will be easy for me, because there are no Chick-fil-A franchises in Rhode Island.

 

 

(I was never much for chicken sandwiches, anyway. I’m more of a burger queen.)

 

 

Rick Rick Rick!

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In Graham Greene's novel Travels with My Aunt, the narrator meets his aunt Augusta's “man” Wordsworth through the intercom at the door, and Wordsworth is very rude to him. Later, face to face, Wordsworth is wonderfully friendly. He laughingly apologizes for his rudeness over the intercom. “That little box makes me want to say things,” Wordsworth says.

 

Wordsworth's problem is everywhere these days. Rick Sanchez is its latest victim. I'm not sure if the little box in this case is radio or TV, but either way, it made him want to say things, and he went ahead and said them.

 

I've seen his show a few times, and I thought he was okay. He appeared to be the kind of open-minded back-and-forth anchor I like, and I didn't feel threatened by his show. He was a little on the show-biz side – loud and boisterous – but who minds a bit of that? He looked big and jovial and almost-handsome, which I tend to favor in a newsman.

 

To be fair, he was doing a Keith Olbermann. He was doing news/commentary,with a heavy helping of editorializing on the side.

 

But I certainly never heard him say anything outrageous.

 

Well, he went and did it. He went on the radio, and he began to rant about the management of CNN, which he darkly hinted was full of . . . Jews. Hispanic-hating Jews. (Rick's Cuban-American, by the way.) He claimed that he'd been held back in his career, relegated to a second-rate status, because his bosses didn't think he could do anchor work effectively. Evidently one of them invoked another Hispanic journalist, Jon Quinones, which Sanchez found outrageous. (Without thinking about it too much, I was able to come up with another fairly well-known Hispanic journalist: Geraldo Rivera. Looking him up to make sure, I was surprised to see that Geraldo is half Puerto Rican and half Jewish. Did you know that? The world is far more complex than I thought.)

 

When it was pointed out to Rick that Jews were a minority too, he scoffed. His point seemed to be that they were not a disadvantaged minority.

 

And then he turned on Jon Stewart.

 

I ask you!

 

First he called Stewart a “bigot.” Then he retracted that and said that “The Daily Show” was “prejudicial.” (I'm not crazy about his use of that word. It bothers me when journalists use words sloppily.) His point seemed to be that Jon Stewart is too liberal.

 

I confess I don't watch “The Daily Show” anymore. I love Stewart, I would marry him if I could, he's adorable. But I just don't find political humor funny anymore. It's like making jokes about the death of your family. Things are dire, folks, and I do not enjoy giggling about this stuff. But Stewart is smart and makes excellent points; he says things that I wish I'd said. He is also far quicker than I am, and far more fearless.

 

Does he have overt political leanings? Oh, yes.

 

Is he a journalist? No.

 

Sanchez fell into the same trap that Bill O'Reilly fell into. He challenged Stewart for being biased toward the liberal agenda.

 

Christ, Rick. That's the same as challenging the Smothers Brothers for being biased toward the liberal agenda.

 

Journalists, I think, feel limited by their profession. They must, by their own terms, be neutral. Commentary must be marked as such. They must be fair.

 

But what fun is that?

 

They see the commentators, the blogosphere, the parodists, have a wonderful time out here, spinning and japing at one another. And they want to get in on the act.

 

The best journalists manage to avoid the temptation.

 

The rest of them . . .

 

Well, ahem.

 

Anyway, Rick has been terminated at CNN. This was harsh. I suspect that some will see this as punishment for calling a spade a spade: if you call out the bosses, the bosses will get rid of you.

 

Well, he called out the bosses, all right.

 

I'm sure he will have a career.

 

How long do you suppose it'll be before he shows up on the Fox News Channel?

 

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