Two facts: 1. I love the taste of Chick-fil-A. 2. I haven’t eaten there in three years.
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plenty of reasons for the latter a couple weeks ago. And then perhaps you saw this “Chow Down at Chick-fil-A” video making the rounds last week. If not, feel free to watch about 30 seconds, get the gist, and make the decision if you want to watch the rest. (If you don’t, no one’s going to blame you.) Whether or not the video’s actually “successful” at achieving its goal is up for debate, but the whole thing got me thinking again about the fast food chain’s delicious chicken sandwiches. And then it reminded me never to eat there again.
It’s all part of my extremely small-range, highly focused, and not super difficult—self-immolation, it is not—one-man protest. In a fiscal sense this protest is costing them about $30 on their annual budget. Does an act that small really accomplish anything other than keeping me from the delectability of their mouth-watering chicken?
As the video hints at, and we all know by now, the CEO of Chick-fil-A, S. Truett Cathy, is kind of a dick. It’s still worth mentioning again. Born and raised a Southern Baptist in Georgia, the 91-year-old uses his belief system of The Bible + The Jesus = Superiority to inform how he runs every aspect of his company. And he throws gobs of money into the coffers of anti-gay organizations, most recently factions proliferating backing for Proposition 8. I’d rather have food poisoning than spend $30 a year to support that.
On to this week’s roundup.
– In perhaps the most horrific story of the week, a gunman with cryptic al-Qaeda ties killed a Rabbi, his two young daughters, and a third young child at a Jewish school in France, reportedly doing so in order to “avenge Palestinian children.” French police eventually shot him in the head.
– Speaking of the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian border war, the human rights group B’Tselem released their annual violence report about the goings-on in that area for 2011. Among their findings: Israeli security forces killed 105 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, including 37 innocent bystanders.
– Last Tuesday, the ninth anniversary of America invading Iraq, a whole lot of car-bombings left 45 people dead and 216 wounded.
– Nigerian police took out nine gunmen suspected of being part of the extremely violent Islamist terror organization Boko Haram, whose name apparently means “Western education is a sin,” which, you know, is a stupid fucking name.
– Three Tibetans who’ve been on a hunger strike for the past month outside UN headquarters in New York finally called it off—and presumably immediately ate about a dozen hot dogs—after officials promised to finally look into this whole Tibet/China thing. China, meanwhile, called the Dalai Lama a Nazi.
– Pope Benedict, sensing weakened souls waiting to be feasted upon, told Cuba that communism clearly isn’t working—which, you know, is kind of ironic because that’s basically what the Jesus was all about—and that they should let the Catholic Church step in and clean up their mess.
– A roadside bomb in Afghanistan, most likely work of the Taliban, exploded as a security patrol was trying to defuse it, leaving eight total dead, including one US soldier.
– A private bookstore in Canada sold their last copy of the 160-page book A Gift for Muslim Couple, a guide that gives Muslim men all sorts of advice, especially when it comes to beating and controlling their wives.
– In Louisiana, a pastor was arrested after going old school with his punishment style and using his belt to beat two young boys, ages 9 and 10, who were “acting up” during a prayer service.
– A 15-year-old girl living in South Africa was tortured for three days and finally murdered—by a disgusting-enough method that, well, I’m just going to advise finding it yourself rather than typing it out for you—after her relatives thought she was possessed by “demons.”
– A Muslim woman living in San Diego was beaten to death; her attackers left behind a note telling her to “go back to your country.”
– A female coach and teacher in a Washington Catholic school was caught diddling a minor. She also, of course, previously worked for an organization who taught kids to never have sex before marriage.
– Rick Santorum, when he’s not getting introduced by insane Christian pastors basically trying to start a religion war in America before creepily ending their sermons with Nazi-like salutes, is officially praying for Dan Savage.
– Think someone’s personal religious-based beliefs don’t affect your life? Wait until the inevitable measles outbreak happens.
– So Idaho went ahead and passed one of those ultrasound-before-abortion bills that are all the rage these days. Meanwhile, an Arizona GOP legislator (a female one at that!) wants to force women to watch a full-blown video of an abortion before getting one themselves.
– Hey, Tim Tebow! Remember that thing? He got traded to the Jets last week after his Denver Broncos signed a much-better-at-the-sport-of-football person Peyton Manning. This upset pastor Pat Robertson, who’s using his prayers to urge God to injure Manning.
– And finally our Hero of the Week: Ohio State Senator Nina Turner, so sick of these anti-women, anti-reproductive bills being passed all over that she introduced a bill that would make it much tougher for men to get boner pills. While this technically happened last week, we couldn’t let this slip by without mention. So: Well done, Senator!
Previously – Inform a Rep About the Vag
@RickPaulas
