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By Mark Morford, SF Gate Columnist
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
CBS, Google, Levi's, Starbucks, New Balance, and Xerox are among the 70 companies and cities that have signed an amicus brief stating that DOMA, the 1996 federal Defense of Marriage Act, hurts business. --NCRM.com
Woe to you, oh modern card-carrying homophobe. For it can't be easy to be you right now, what with all the terrifying changes taking place, all the dramatic sexual upheavals and flagrant displays of "unnatural" love being hurled like exotic sushi in your plain hamburger face these days. Oh, you poor dear.
I see you there, glumly sipping your Starbucks gingerbread latte while Googling Swedish fetish porn in between checking the latest news on NASCAR.com in your lightly stained Dockers and beat-up Nikes, Cartoon Network blaring in the background, tattered copy of Shooters Monthly on the bedside.
To be fair, I suppose it's too soon to tell if the end of DADT means our valiant U.S. military, during our next war, will end up offering the enemy a giant cupcake disco meth party, instead of kicking ass and keeping those pinko commie terrorists from poisoning the beer supply and stealing your HBO.
Behold, dear homophobe, the upwards of 70 major U.S. companies who have just signed an amicus brief -- basically a formal f-you complaint to the federal government and its odious Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) -- saying the damn thing is bad for business, forces discrimination and inequality in company practices, was written by/for angry encephalitic right-wing thugs who don't know their God from a hole in the seminary wall. I might be making up that last part. But only barely.
Which companies are protesting DOMA, you ask? Starbucks. Google. Microsoft. Levi's. Nike. Time Warner Cable. Aetna. New Balance. Xerox. The list is impressive indeed, especially given how it's more or less an addendum to a much longer list, one that includes all the other enormous U.S. companies who already openly support gay rights, like Apple and Disney and Pixar, like Hershey and Coca-Cola and Dell, American Express and Mattel and even big media daddies like Time Warner, Inc. and Viacom. Et al.
Are you not furious, righteous Republican homophobe? I bet you are. I bet you're dialing your angriest, most confused buds right this moment to write letters, post barely punctuated rants to the hate forums on Free Republic, call in to Rush to demand a Tea Party-wide boycott of every single one of these sicko companies.
I mean, you can't really call yourself a true American, a real Christian and still openly wear Nikes or Levi's, use Microsoft or Google, or watch Warner Brothers movies, can you? If you really walk your anti-gay talk, well, every one of these companies should be banned from your life, right?
It shouldn't be too bad. Easy enough to kick that Starbucks addiction to the curb. Damn them to hell with their Norah Jones and their mediocre espresso, anyway. Same goes for those hippie perverts over at HBO. Can grudgingly live without Air Jordans or New Balance tennies, too.
But hey, you can make do, right? Screw those depraved, godless companies. Who needs 'em? At least you have Fox News. And Exxon. And, um, Pilgrim's Pride. They make deep-fried frozen chicken blobs. So you're good for basic protein. Suck down a giant platter of breaded, hormone-injected patriotism while sipping a silver bullet and watching some NASCAR, and all is right with the world, am I right?
Would you like to read that again? A clearly pro-gay megacorp basically owns the straightest, manliest, most pseudo-macho sport in the entire known world next to beating things with clubs and skinning buffalo with your teeth. Whatever will you do with your boycott now?
Before you answer, might want to check out what else you're going to do without. Time Warner, for one, is everywhere.
Did I forget to mention CBS? That's right. No more "CSI." No more "Survivor." Damn homos are everywhere.
It's OK, take a moment. I can hear your head imploding in abject confusion. How could this be? How could these powerhouse companies be sucked into the vile gay agenda that's destroying the land, brainwashing our kids and making it OK to order arugula salads and enjoy trance music and the BMW 3-Series? Don't worry, homophobic American. No one really expects you to boycott all these companies, or even any of them. No one expects you to actually walk your hateful talk. It's not really possible anyway.
Besides, the backwards lug in you and the jaded cynic in me could easily argue that most of these companies couldn't care less about gay rights, per se. They only really care about the money DOMA costs them. They care about health care expenses, administrative overhead, profit and loss. They only care about, you know, capitalism. And everyone knows, capitalism doesn't discriminate. It's an equal opportunity exploiter.
But unfortunately for you, I'm not sure that really matters anymore. Be it for economic, moral, political or cultural reasons -- or more likely, some wondrous combination thereof -- gay rights and gay marriage are gaining on you. Fast. I know it, you know it, even capitalism itself knows it. Your imminent obsolescence is assured.
Not sure what that means? It's OK. You can Google it.
© 2011 Hearst Communications Inc.
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Mark's column appears every Wednesday on SFGate.com
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