# Chick-Fil-A President comes out swinging against gay marriage **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [July 19, 2012, 5:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689 "2012-07-19T05:48:54Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2012, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689/161 "2012-07-20T22:58:03Z")
> [@ralph124c](#): > > Chick-Fil-A has not been in any violation of Federal or State law-so how can yo deny them a license? Apparently he **did** deny Walmart, from that very article you cited above, on the basis of it simply not being beneficial for the area or to its employees: > [@](#): > > Menino blocked Walmart from a Roxbury development last year, criticizing the retail giant’s impact on neighborhood businesses and lower-wage workers. So you need to cite something saying that was totally illegal, apparently. ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2012, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689/162 "2012-07-20T22:59:08Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > Hmm considering that, he might just be a union puppet. Is Chick-Fil-A unionized or not? There are tons of non-union stores and fast food joints in Boston. ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2012, 11:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689/163 "2012-07-20T23:06:20Z")
> [@Ferret\_Herder](#): > > There are tons of non-union stores and fast food joints in Boston. Of course, but they may want to block new ones. That’s what’s happening with a Wal-Mart opening in LA, doesn’t mean LA doesn’t have any non-union establishments. ---
**Author:** ![Bosstone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/22d042/32.png) [@Bosstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosstone)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2012, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689/164 "2012-07-20T23:41:10Z")
> [@Ferret\_Herder](#): > > There are tons of non-union stores and fast food joints in Boston. > [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > Of course, but they may want to block new ones. That’s what’s happening with a Wal-Mart opening in LA, doesn’t mean LA doesn’t have any non-union establishments. Exactly. Let’s not let facts get in the way of a good prejudice. ---
**Author:** ![SpoilerVirgin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4491bb/32.png) [@SpoilerVirgin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SpoilerVirgin)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689/165 "2012-07-21T00:26:00Z")
They’re also running into permit problems in [Mountain View, California](http://www.mercurynews.com/peninsula/ci_21117256/opponents-cant-stomach-chick-fil-plans-mountain-view?source=most_viewed). ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689/166 "2012-07-21T00:38:55Z")
Plenty of towns block certain establishments or limit where they can build. There are places that limit locations of churches due to the heavy traffic they can generate. Some towns forbid or highly restrict the location of businesses like porn/sex toy shops. A suburb near where I live put a halt for about half a year on new businesses that do not generate sales tax (like salons and banks and such) because they had so many of those and fewer shops that do bring in sales tax. A number of suburbs near me just got rid of their dry laws within the last decade, and arguments against removing the restriction included hurting the image of the town and/or attracting “unsavory” elements if even a wine store was allowed. If something is considered to be against the best interest of the town, including for reasons of image, it may well be blocked in quite legal fashions. ---
**Author:** ![Ignatz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/3be4f8/32.png) [@Ignatz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ignatz)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689/167 "2012-07-21T02:50:54Z")
You want powdered milk with that? [http://www.starnewsonline.com/article/20120719/ARTICLES/120719591/1037/news?Title=Three-arrested-after-heroin-sale-at-fast-food-restaurant](http://www.starnewsonline.com/article/20120719/ARTICLES/120719591/1037/news?Title=Three-arrested-after-heroin-sale-at-fast-food-restaurant) ---
**Author:** ![Simplicio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c37758/32.png) [@Simplicio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Simplicio)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689/168 "2012-07-21T03:00:58Z")
> [@Ferret\_Herder](#): > > Plenty of towns block certain establishments or limit where they can build. There are places that limit locations of churches due to the heavy traffic they can generate. Some towns forbid or highly restrict the location of businesses like porn/sex toy shops. A suburb near where I live put a halt for about half a year on new businesses that do not generate sales tax (like salons and banks and such) because they had so many of those and fewer shops that do bring in sales tax. A number of suburbs near me just got rid of their dry laws within the last decade, and arguments against removing the restriction included hurting the image of the town and/or attracting “unsavory” elements if even a wine store was allowed. If something is considered to be against the best interest of the town, including for reasons of image, it may well be blocked in quite legal fashions. No doubt. Towns have plenty of leverage to block stores and the like that the local gov’t doesn’t approve of. That said. I suspect trying to block a store due to the personal political activities of the owner would get struck down by the Courts. Especially if the Mayor stated explicitly that that was the reason for blocking the store. ---
**Author:** ![dnooman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/839c29/32.png) [@dnooman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dnooman)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 3:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689/169 "2012-07-21T03:47:43Z")
> [@Uber\_the\_Goober](#): > > That’s Mister Manners, thank you very much. > > Sounds like you’re wussing out then. “I’d rather make noise on the internet and holler and mock those who the majority feel are in the wrong so we can all be on the same bandwagon in opposition. You’re a Bad Person for even mentioning that I’m falling short of my potential to effect a social change by stopping my efforts at public mockery. I’m smart enough and a good enough debater to convince most people of whatever I want - but not this guy. He doesn’t deserve it. On with the mocking!” > Is that the jist of your position? Or have I got you wrong? :dubious: Dude, shut the fuck up. Your incessant calls for people, or more specifically, your target **LHOD** , to waste their time trying to reason with a corporate guy who believes in his principles to the extent that he’s willing to make it a public position of the company as a whole, are as tiresome as they are unrealistic. The whole “I don’t have a side in this, but I’m still gonna be a prick” aspect isn’t endearing either. I know, you don’t care, and you can feel free to define your position as the moral high ground. You know as well as anyone else reading this thread that you aren’t being altruistic, but pedantic and ignorant. You managed to avoid my question earlier, but I’ll go ahead and give you the correct answer right now. This guy will NEVER in his entire LIFE change his mind on gay marriage. He went national with it, and made sure his company was associated with those values. He has stock holders to think about, and you think that a well crafted letter to him might make him change his mind? You’re fucking delusional. BTW you aren’t debating anyone here at all. Remember how you have no side in this so you can’t be wrong? I have half a mind to write this guy a letter so that it goes unanswered and we can, with your permission, assume that he’s a bigot. Then we can do what we were going to in the first place. People aren’t “lazy or afraid” to contact this guy, they just know when to not waste their time on something so futile. Apparently you do not, since you think it’s a necessary step in resolving this. It takes a special kind of person to take a ludicrous notion, and then try to shame people for not believing it. Don’t those people usually run cults? ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 4:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689/170 "2012-07-21T04:07:28Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Reminds me of the Safeway worker who was fired because she was in too much pain to smile all the time. :dubious: I call bullshit. I googled this, and the ONLY link that mentioned anything like this was…this thread. > [@Uber\_the\_Goober](#): > > Clearly my point is lost on you. > > Let the guy say whatever he wants. The nutjobs (people with views different than yours), as well as though who aren’t nutjobs (people with views similar to yours). > > The fact that he is permitted to be open about his views gives you the opportunity to learn of them, and if you so desire, attempt to change his mind with rational logical presentation of your own ideas. Or you could skip that step and just call for a boycott. Whatever works for you. > > But let’s not give the guy shit just for saying what he believes. Without that right, you can’t counter his point. if he held the majority accepted opinion (which he currently does not), and you didn’t have that right, you’d never be heard disagreeing with him over the din of the masses. Um no. That’s not how it works. If he wants to say what he wants, and be “open about his views”, well, freedom of speech does NOT mean freedom from consequences, or that people can’t comment on what you’re saying. If he’s going to put his views out there, he’d damn well better be prepared for people to give him shit for them, considering how hateful and digusting they are. Don’t talk the talk if you can’t walk the walk. (As for a boycott, I’ve never even eaten there to begin with) ---
**Author:** ![Uber\_the\_Goober](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/58956e/32.png) [@Uber\_the\_Goober](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uber_the_Goober)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 12:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689/171 "2012-07-21T12:44:44Z")
> [@Bosstone](#): > > Not everyone believes in “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone,” you know. > > I mean, seriously? We’re supposed to call this guy up and try to talk to him before we can make fun of him? Naw, course not. Just don’t take yourself as seriously as \*\*LHoD \*\*is, and fer cryin’ out loud, why not give it a shot? If you believe in your position enough to rant and rave and mock those in opposition to it, why not write the guy a letter? ---
**Author:** ![Uber\_the\_Goober](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/58956e/32.png) [@Uber\_the\_Goober](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uber_the_Goober)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 12:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689/172 "2012-07-21T12:58:34Z")
> [@dnooman](#): > > Dude, shut the fuck up. Your incessant calls for people, or more specifically, your target **LHOD** , to waste their time trying to reason with a corporate guy who believes in his principles to the extent that he’s willing to make it a public position of the company as a whole, are as tiresome as they are unrealistic. > > The whole “I don’t have a side in this, but I’m still gonna be a prick” aspect isn’t endearing either. I know, you don’t care, and you can feel free to define your position as the moral high ground. You know as well as anyone else reading this thread that you aren’t being altruistic, but pedantic and ignorant. You managed to avoid my question earlier, but I’ll go ahead and give you the correct answer right now. This guy will NEVER in his entire LIFE change his mind on gay marriage. He went national with it, and made sure his company was associated with those values. He has stock holders to think about, and you think that a well crafted letter to him might make him change his mind? You’re fucking delusional. > > BTW you aren’t debating anyone here at all. Remember how you have no side in this so you can’t be wrong? > > I have half a mind to write this guy a letter so that it goes unanswered and we can, with your permission, assume that he’s a bigot. Then we can do what we were going to in the first place. > > People aren’t “lazy or afraid” to contact this guy, they just know when to not waste their time on something so futile. Apparently you do not, since you think it’s a necessary step in resolving this. It takes a special kind of person to take a ludicrous notion, and then try to shame people for not believing it. Don’t those people usually run cults? U mad, bro? Why not make a pit thread, so nobody can give you a hard time about violating SDMB rules… You’re right, I’m not debating the actual issue of the thread, I’m debating whether or not it’s worth it to engage this guy in a conversation. The outcome of the conversation really wouldn’t matter - and there’s absolutely a higher than average chance his mind will never change. But seriously, calm yourself. In an earlier post I said “Imagine the street cred your ideas would have if you did this.” Try and think of it, I can. It would be frickin AWESOME if \*\*LHoD \*\*or you, or anyone else, made a thread in MPSIMS saying “Hey check this out, I copy/pasted the letter I sent to CFA Pres and here’s his response !” No matter what that response would be, the fact that there would be a response would be awesome. **LHoD** can put words together nicely, as he’s said, and it would be a better use of time with a much cooler impact to target that particular bigot and approach him rationally - just to see what the response would be. And if he changed not his views, but maybe the company’s official position, that would be cool too. Don’t ask, don’t get. And cool it with the “moral high ground” nonsense. You’re reading things into my posts that aren’t actually there - but appear there to \*you \*because of your preconceived notions of what I’m trying to say. I don’t care about this guy, or his views, but a whole lot of people obviously do. And it would be really cool (and in my opinion the right way to go) if someone wrote his ass a letter, called him on the phone, and approached him in the same “Christian” way he believes he approaches the world, and worked on changing his mind. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 1:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689/173 "2012-07-21T13:01:50Z")
> [@Uber\_the\_Goober](#): > > If you believe in your position enough to rant and rave and mock those in opposition to it, why not write the guy a letter? Because the shitstain isn’t worth the cost of a stamp, maybe? ---
**Author:** ![rivulus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/839c29/32.png) [@rivulus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rivulus)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689/174 "2012-07-21T14:53:22Z")
> [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > This really highlights “first world problems” when you are thinking about how you get to define yourself based on what shit you don’t need you happen to buy. You are sort of missing the point here. The bigger picture is about being true to your beliefs by the way you act, whether you live in the first or the third world. We make tiny choices every day, every moment of the day, that define who we are – to ourselves and others. The little stuff we do and choose every day defines us as much, or more, than the big stuff. This is the tiny choice I make when deciding where to spend my money on particular types of food. It’s part of living an intentional life. With the small choices, I learn to judge what’s important to me. That helps with the big choices. That would be true whether I lived in the first or the third world. For example, you made the choice to belittle my statement, by dismissing it as a first world problem. That’s a tiny choice of many you made today that shapes who you are and others’ perceptions of you. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689/175 "2012-07-21T15:35:13Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > The best chicken I’ve had there was a drumstick, and the worst was a dried-out room-temperature nearly-inedible chicken biscuit. But to be fair, I haven’t had KFC in a few decades, so I don’t have a good basis of comparison on the drumstick front. > > My family used to go to Bojangles after church, so I’ve got those good memories, and I like the slightly spicy marinade they use for their chicken. I’ve never had Bojangles bone-in chicken, actually. I think that’s because if I’m in the mood for fast food fried chicken like that I just gravitate to KFC. I 95% of the time get their Cajun Chicken Biscuit (basically a fast food piece of boneless chicken sandwiched inside a Bojangles biscuit.) I also think their seasoned fries and hash-rounds are top of the mountain for fast food as well. I don’t know that boneless fast food chicken can ever be truly “great”, but I do think Bojangles has the best product of that type, combine it with their awesome biscuits and to me they are just vastly better than Chick-Fil-A or Zaxby’s. About the only reason I would ever go to Chick-Fil-A really is their peach milkshakes, which around here are always offered for limited times. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689/176 "2012-07-21T15:50:53Z")
> [@Ferret\_Herder](#): > > Plenty of towns block certain establishments or limit where they can build. There are places that limit locations of churches due to the heavy traffic they can generate. Some towns forbid or highly restrict the location of businesses like porn/sex toy shops. A suburb near where I live put a halt for about half a year on new businesses that do not generate sales tax (like salons and banks and such) because they had so many of those and fewer shops that do bring in sales tax. A number of suburbs near me just got rid of their dry laws within the last decade, and arguments against removing the restriction included hurting the image of the town and/or attracting “unsavory” elements if even a wine store was allowed. If something is considered to be against the best interest of the town, including for reasons of image, it may well be blocked in quite legal fashions. I’m in commercial real estate (but luckily not in a highly urbanized area…so getting permits and approvals is typically a rubber stamp thing from local government), and while everything you say is true I would probably agree with the claim that the Mayor of Boston probably can’t blanket ban Chick-Fil-A. Typically a big box superstore is relatively easy for a municipality to prohibit. They require very large plots of land, that always dramatically change local traffic patterns and very often require special exemptions to local zoning laws and etc. That’s why if I want to build a Wal-Mart in Chicago or San Francisco it’s a lot harder than building it in unincorporated county land in Virginia. For sex shops / strip clubs, many local laws allow the relevant bodies to consider them to be anathema to community wants and needs and to limit where they can build this is why in many places I’m familiar with the sex shops and strip clubs get pushed out of the cities entirely. Now in a big city like New York or something you’ll find them inside the city limits but in a lot of smaller towns in Virginia we have no strip clubs or sex shops but then you see them randomly pop up down country high ways out of city limits. Your point about businesses that don’t collect sales tax is also a good example of stuff I know local governments can do. But as for banning a specific chain of fast food restaurants? That’s harder to do. It’s easy to ban Wal-Mart, you just deny them all the special exemptions and clearances that they essentially **will need** to build in downtown of a major city. It’s a little harder to ban a fast food restaurant, if there’s a vacant lot Chick-Fil-A wants to build on that is right across from a Burger King and a Wendy’s, and the lot used to be a McDonald’s then the city definitely can get into a lawsuit it might very well lose if they prohibit Chick-Fil-A from building there. Just one lot, the city can probably come up with a valid excuse, but if all over the city various lots traditionally already used for fast food in which only one specific chain that operates the same as other already functioning fast food restaurants is being routinely denied the right to set up shop and I think you’d get into serious issues in which the city could be successfully sued not only under many State laws but Federal laws dealing with restraint of trade and such. Also, mall food courts I think it’d be very hard for the mayor to successfully prevent a different fast food restaurant chain from coming in. We’d have to really dig into Massachusetts business licensing laws and such to really know what the mayor of Boston could or could not do, but unless Boston/Massachusetts are dramatically different than Virginia I’d be shocked if a blanket ban wouldn’t eventually run afoul of State law. I think a mayor could make it very **difficult** on a fast food place, and deny some locations from being constructed (essentially any area where the Chick-Fil-A would be going in as a new fast food restaurant in a community that didn’t already have zoning for business in that lot and didn’t already have fast food restaurants nearby); but a city as big as Boston there’s going to be tons of opportunities to buy up old fast food buildings and lots that are no longer used but probably have fast food neighbors and etc…and those are the scenarios where I think it’d be hard to blanket ban Chick-Fil-A. He’d have to be very careful too, because if he approved _another_ fast food restaurant in that same lot while routinely denying Chick-Fil-A across the city that could be a problem. Generally cities that prohibit Wal-Mart from building in a location don’t then turn around and let Target come in. Although some cities that block Wal-Marts do let Targets come in, that’s usually because with big box stores essentially every zoning and permit action is extremely unique because of the big impact it has on the locality. Another thing to consider, even in small cities in Virginia I’m familiar with the Mayor would not have the power to deny individual businesses from setting up shop. In a lot of small towns I’m familiar with there is an independent zoning board and building authority that approves building permits, zoning permits and etc, and the mayor doesn’t have any veto power over the decisions of those boards. In a city as big as Boston I wouldn’t be surprised if they had something similar. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689/177 "2012-07-21T15:58:59Z")
> [@FriarTed](#): > > That’s why the Biblical ideal is given in Genesis 2: 23-25 and reinforced by Jesus in Matthew 19: 4-6. It’s very apparent that the polygamy of Jacob, David, and Solomon were the results of human failure & did not have good results. Genesis 2: 23-25- 23 The man said, “This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called ‘woman,’ for she was taken out of man. ” 24 That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh. 25 Adam and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame. So, in spite of the fact it never once refers to it as any form of ideal, we are to believe that the _ideal_ is for a man to get naked with his own she-clone. Though I have to wonder how ideal that particular union was considering that it got the couple and all of their descendants expelled from paradise until the end of time. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689/178 "2012-07-21T16:47:43Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > My biggest problem with these types of boycotts is that in general they don’t effect the corporation much but can do harm to the francise owner. And do you know what his stance on the issue is? I agree that the boycott’s not likely to hurt the company- Chik-Fil-A being strong in the überconservative parts of the country it might even gain them some business (wouldn’t it be funny if the owners are really a pack of flaming queens manipulating prejudice for profit?). I do boycott them (and I did used to eat there occasionally) for solely personal reasons: I doubt I’ll make a dent on their balance sheet, but at least I will know that none of _my_ money is going to them or, through them, _Exodus_ or _Focus on the Family_ (two of the more diabolical organizations they’ve donated to). ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689/179 "2012-07-21T20:33:02Z")
> [@rivulus](#): > > You are sort of missing the point here. The bigger picture is about being true to your beliefs by the way you act, whether you live in the first or the third world. We make tiny choices every day, every moment of the day, that define who we are – to ourselves and others. The little stuff we do and choose every day defines us as much, or more, than the big stuff. This is the tiny choice I make when deciding where to spend my money on particular types of food. It’s part of living an intentional life. With the small choices, I learn to judge what’s important to me. That helps with the big choices. That would be true whether I lived in the first or the third world. > > For example, you made the choice to belittle my statement, by dismissing it as a first world problem. That’s a tiny choice of many you made today that shapes who you are and others’ perceptions of you. It wasn’t really hard to belittle, it’s rare to see someone speak so deeply about how minor, irrelevant life choices on consumer products / fast food that “define who we are.” That’s ridiculously stupid. If you feel like you’re defined by what crap you buy then more power to you, but I think that’s ridiculous. ---
**Author:** ![elbows](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b3f665/32.png) [@elbows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elbows)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689/180 "2012-07-21T20:59:13Z")
No, what’s a little ridiculous is people boycotting Boy Scouts, who have no moral compunctions regarding their Chinese made Iphones or Indonesian, sweat shop, Nike’s. Those they _cannot_ live without. It’s a crazy world! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chick-fil-a-president-comes-out-swinging-against-gay-marriage/628689.md?page=10)