Targeting gay rights

By Randy Sharp - The Boston Globe - Boston.com - Op-ed - News: "Back in 1977, our founder, Donald Wildmon, was flipping through the channels of his television and he was shocked by what he saw. Each of the three networks (remember, this was before cable) was showing scenes of sex, violence, or promiscuity. He thought the content entirely inappropriate for families.

When Wildmon complained to the networks and got no response, he decided the best way to gain their attention was through their pocketbooks. He had monitors watch television for 28 prime time nights. They were told to record every offensive scene and then note the show's sponsor.

When the results came in, we discovered that Sears and Roebuck topped the list of advertisers who sponsored offensive programming. So Wildmon announced that he and his congregants in Tupelo, Miss., would boycott Sears. The media got hold of it, and Sears realized it had a public relations problem on its hands. Wildmon led a protest march in front of Sears Tower in Chicago, and within hours Sears announced it was changing its sponsorship of several questionable programs (I remember ''Three's Company" was one of them.)

Nowadays, the Internet makes it easy for any group to organize a boycott. At any given time, probably every company in America has somebody boycotting it. But there's still power in numbers, and our organization, in concert with other conservative groups, can still generate an enormous number of complaints--anywhere from 100,000 to one million. When that happens, corporations pay attention.

Since Sears, we've boycotted Disney to protest their Gay Days and Procter & Gamble for contributing to a campaign in support of homosexual rights, which we believe would lead to an endorsement of gay marriage.

In May of this year, we announced a boycott of the Ford Motor Company -- it was donating cars to gay causes. Within three days, the Ford Dealers Association called and asked us to suspend the boycott for six months. They said they'd look into our complaints. So we did.

Right now we're looking at Kraft Foods. They've donated $25,000 to support the Gay Games, a kind of gay Olympics, and we've let them know we're not pleased. Kraft says it won't back down, it won't negotiate or compromise. So, yes, it's very possible that within the next year we'll announce a Kraft boycott.

These companies have got to understand that there's power in the consumer. People will go out of their way not to buy a product that supports causes they don't believe in. That's one thing about the American public: Our values are not for sale.

Randy Sharp is director of Special Projects for American Family Association."