The suggestion, if you don’t want to watch the whole thing: everyone go to Chick-Fil-A on 1 August, and just order a glass of water, nothing more. It’s biblical! They should gratefully fill your order!
I won’t be doing it, though. There is no Chick-Fil-A anywhere near me, praise God.
If you’re doing this, make sure you run out as fast as you can after you get your water, so you don’t get hit by the burning coals they’ll throw at your head.
I’m trying to think of an effective way to barf in one. Sort of a customer clearing-type of hurl.
When I was a teen I worked in a Ponderosa steak house, and I remember one of the other waiters came back to work too soon after a tonsillectomy–mothers day, money to be made, etc. She was apparently bleeding for a while before she could tell that her stitches had come open, and huarfed blood all over the floor right in front of the salad bar. This was in the early nineties in the midst of fear of both HIV and Ebola. People fled the restaurant as if it were on fire.
I would like the same effect, I suppose, but I don’t want to do anything that endangers patrons. Just chicken sales.
Good idea. I hope they lose some money through this action. I also noticed the quote she put on her video that all of the family board of directors “are still married to their ‘first wives'”????? So none of the female members of the family is allowed to run the company? What a bunch of sexist pigs! I know, no surprise there, but still!
The last time I ate at Chick Fil-A was 1997 or 1998, when my sister was visiting me while I was at a university position in Florida that I held for a year. Neither my sister nor I had any inkling about the company’s “Biblical” nonsense. We went through the drive-through, got some meals, within one of which they had given us an audio cassette. My sister popped it into the car’s cassette player. It was some kind of weird “Christian-y” thing for kids, about how they shouldn’t want to grow up too fast – some kid gets a wish to be a grown-up and then is saddled with debt and the like. It made adulthood sound horrific and it was just plain creepy. Why is a fast food chain giving us this weird shit? My sister and I looked at each other, and she ejected the cassette, handed it to my then 2 year-old niece, who made short work of unreeling the tape. And I haven’t been back to Chick Fil-A since.
This whole thing depresses me.
I used to defend Cathy and his decision to close the store on Sundays. I used to say that “here is evidence that you can run your business according to your morals without forcing those morals on others”. Because not running his store on Sundays isn’t forcing anything on me.
Later, one of my friends told me about some of the issues of discrimination against workers at the stores. And I let it slide because I thought that it was just a problem with some of the franchises. I mean, how could the employees possibly act so nice and friendly if things were really that bad at all the stores (Yes, I was stupid).
So I was halfway through fixing my shower (so I had no running water at home) so I’d taken advantage of the fact that I needed to run to Lowes to get some parts and, on my way back stopped at a Chik-Fil-A to wash my hands and buy lunch. I get home, start eating my sandwich and I see one of my friends shared the news on Cathy’s announcement that he was “guilty as charged”. I finished the meal (I’ve lived hand to mouth often enough to not waste food) but I’m not buying it again. I’m not sure I’ll buy it again even if he recants.
Someone linked a nice recipe for “CFA style” chicken that I’m going to try, so with luck I can keep getting the taste without the bigotry.
You can also use Luke 6:30: “Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back.”
Sounds like a great plan. Too bad there’s no CfA within driving distance of here.
I’d go, ask for my drink of water, and also ask to speak to the manager to tell them why. They might not have any influence in the matter, but who knows, they might pass the message up the chain to the franchise owner. “We had some people in here today who said they can’t buy our food anymore since Mr, Cathy donates money to anti-gay groups”.
I’m actually in Texas; I’ll have to pick *which* CFA to drive past, and keep my windows up what with the tolerance slogans on my car.
…Also, can someone please post a video link to whatever that is?
There is one near me. It used to be a tavern/restaurant that I liked going too occasionally. They had this awesome pot roast egg roll appetizer with horseradish sauce that I loved. But it shut down, got torn down, and replaced with a CFA. I never went there before because it wasn’t open on Sundays and I thought it was a stupid thing to do (that’s when I went out most of the time). Unfortunately I live in a town that has one of the highest ratio of churches to people for a burb of its size (what can I say, it’s near the train station and being an Iowan native going too deep into Chicagoland burbs makes me uncomfortable). So of course a CFA was going to be here eventually. I’m surprised it didn’t appear sooner.
so today I learned I have been pronouncing Chick-Fil-A wrong all this time
In Texas they are required by law to give you water for free. If they charge you “for the cup” or require you to buy something report them to the Texas Utility Commission.
I dunno. I’ve had many a cup of water in fast food places, and it’s seldom a big deal.
I don’t drink soda pop very often, and when I am forced to a fast food place by hunger, I really don’t want the sugar or to pay the incredible markup on soda (most fast-food joints make their profit off drinks and french fries). So I ask for water.
Often, even if I don’t ask, I am offered a water cup. And I say cup because many places now have drink dispensers out in the dining area where the customers can serve themselves.
If you go in to a restaurant and ask only for water, you may just be handed a cup and pointed at the dispenser, for a transaction time of two seconds and a physical cost of two cents. If the restaurant has caught on, you may just be handed a cup without even asking.
If there is no dispenser, they could just keep a stash of filled cups on the counter, and again speedily handle your request. Drive-throughs often have automated dispensers, and so do the walk-up counters. They are designed to be fast, after all.
And, of course, if you aren’t getting charged for the water, there is no cash-register dance, and no time wasted there.
I don’t know what set-up Chick-fil-A has, but I don’t see this as being an effective boycott technique, financially.
As a point-making dance, it may be a way to show how many people care about the issue, but I fear the Christians will just feel persecuted and spin it somehow. Plus you are going to be standing there with your cup of water in a place filled with supporters of the restaurant’s policy on that day.
I’m not saying to not do it, (and would never say such a thing), I’m just saying that it might not work the way some folks expect.
If you do go, I applaud you.
Ohhhhhhhhh!
That’s their name!
For some reason I’ve kept reading it as “Chick-a-fil”. I never got the pun.
Until all this silliness, I thought it was Chick-fil-Uh.
I agree with Menyanbal that it’s probably not gonna be a big deal, and pass largely unperceived.
But if not, you’ll very likely be inconveniencing and annoying the wrong person. I have worked in a few restaurants, and know a lot of people who do. I haven’t seen any Chick-whatever here in LA, but generally speaking for restaurants, and especially cheap food ones, the people who interact with customers -waiters, buspeople, sometimes cooks- could not give less of a shit about the restaurant’s politics, much less what the corporate office has to say. They’re just glad they’re working, and most of the time, it’s their interactions with good/bad/difficult customers what can make or break their day.
No surprise, they have a bad history of discriminating against female employees, too. source
Also:
I’m protesting by refusing to even try to spell their name correctly. It’s a fool’s game anyway.
I don’t live by a chicafil either, which is just fine because I couldn’t stomach the idea of being around so many poisonous people to make a protest.
And I though it was some kind of putty you put in cracked walls. Perhaps for decorative DIY enthusiasts.
Great video, but there’s no way in hell I’d do the asking for water thing. Individual Chick-fil-A workers and even franchise owners are under no obligation to conduct business according to biblical principle, and it would just accomplish making their work day a misery.
Go kiss someone of the same sex in the parking lot on August 1st. Makes a statement, continues the boycott, and doesn’t worsen the day of anyone who doesn’t deserve it.
Whenever my hubby asks if I want to go out for dinner, it’s usually to CFA for a chicken sandwich and beer …….on a Sunday. (No, they don’t sell beer on Sundays here.) He’s such a peach!
I respect the CFA for sacrificing Sunday sales based on their principles – but not for supporting groups that take away the rights of others. Let them donate their money to the poor, the hungry, the homeless…as in Matthew 25:35
If you want to make your own CFA fried chicken sandwich: Hilah’s Chik-Fil-Gay sandwich: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eNq8r4S5jSk
If you go in and ask for water and tell them why you are there, that’s not nothing. It will be a topic of conversation. Word will trickle upwards. It will help keep the pressure on.
Perhaps a good idea noted in this comment on the youtube clip :
Flash mob potential?
No Chick-Fil-As anywhere near me that I know of.Actually, far as I know, we don’t ’em here in Oz at all.
I like Chick-fil-a as a chain but I don’t like the way they inflict religion on their customers or their staff or in what charities they choose to sponsor.
Anyway I’d have thought the best way to protest them is organise some gay days. Fill the place up with well behaved gay people enjoying themselves and behaving in an entirely orderly, respectable albeit “affectionate” manner, holding hands, kissing etc. And wait to see the reaction.
The Chick-fil-A in Springfield, Missouri, on this August first Appreciation Day, had people standing in line outside and cars backed up in both directions.
http://bottomline.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/08/02/13088211-chick-fil-a-protest-marks-rise-of-eat-in-movement?lite
The picture is captioned: A Chick-fil-A employee hands out water at a “Chick-fil-A Is Anti-Gay!” protest Wednesday in Hollywood. Other outlets were mobbed as patrons showed their support for the chain.
Exactly what I thought would happen—I didn’t post it here before because I thought that some Chick-fil-A people might read it and learn. The obvious thing to do to stop the just-a-cup-of-free-water protestors was to give them water outside the restaurant. If a line of Chick-fil-A supporters are standing outside in the hot sun, the logical and nice thing to do was give them cold water, for free. The protestors get lost in the supporter crowd, and would look like total idiots going on in and asking for water. Neat trick, that man (who looks like a manager, not a line employee).
Now I will say, if you went into a Chick-fil-A and asked only for water, you’d not be a paying customer and could be chucked out if you started wasting the restaurant’s time or annoying the real customers.
If you want to harass a restaurant by costing it money, go in at a busy time and sit at a table as long as possible. Order something cheap, of course. Yes, ask for water—not buy soda pop, that’s where much of their profit is. Do not buy french fries, that’s the other big profit maker. Order something difficult—chicken strips at a burger place are almost never kept ready during slow times.
Keep in mind that sit-ins are an old game, and nowadays just wind up bothering the workers.
http://gawker.com/5931631/this-verbal-ambush-of-a-chick+fil+a-employee-got-a-tucson-cfo-fired
The word “privilege” comes to mind:
Again, completely wrong target.