Planned "Kiss-In" Event by Gays an Anti-Climax: Chick-Fil-A Reports "Business as Usual" on Friday

August 4th, 2012

Planned "Kiss-In" Event by Gays an Anti-Climax: Chick-Fil-A Reports "Business as Usual" on Friday

Posted by: Barry Secrest
Published on August 4th, 2012 @ 12:06:01 pm , using 719 words

Posted in Events and Issues: Credible Resources

Associated Press

ATLANTA (AP) — Chick-fil-A set a one-day sales record on Wednesday amid an ongoing controversy over a company executive's public stance against same-sex marriage, company officials said Thursday.

The Atlanta-based company confirmed in a statement that the sales record was broken Wednesday after it was declared "Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day" by former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, a Baptist minister and Fox News talk-show host.

Chick-fil-A vice president Steve Robinson said the company won't release sales figures for Wednesday. Customers lined up outside restaurants and the Rev. Billy Graham, the 93-year-old evangelist, dined on a Chick-fil-A lunch on the record-setting day.

"We are very grateful and humbled by the incredible turnout of loyal Chick-fil-A customers on August 1 at Chick-fil-A restaurants around the country," Robinson in the statement.

Restaurant chain president Dan Cathy told the Baptist Press last month that the company was "guilty as charged" for backing "the biblical definition of a family." Gay rights activists and others answered with calls for boycotts. They plan a national "Kiss In" at Chick-fil-A restaurants on Friday to protest the owners' position. They are asking people of the same sex to show up at Chick-fil-A locations and kiss one other.

"We understand from news reports that Friday may present yet another opportunity for us to serve with genuine hospitality, superior service and great food," Robinson said.

Politico Tomer Ovadia indicates "Kiss-in" basically fizzles......

Same-sex marriage supporters took their turn Friday to voice their opinion of Chick-fil-A, staging a “kiss-in” at locations nationwide to show their opposition to the chicken chain president’s endorsement of “the biblical definition of the family unit.”

By mid-afternoon, nearly 14,000 Facebook users had subscribed to the “National Same Sex Kiss Day at Chick Fil A” event — a number that pales in comparison to the some 630,000 who subscribed to Wednesday’s “appreciation day” — while some users posted photos on the event page of men kissing men and women kissing women.

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Meanwhile, an online petition written by Marci Alt of Atlanta and sponsored by the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, invited Chick-fil-A President Dan Cathy to join her, her wife and two children for a meal “with an LGBT family.” The petition had more than 2,500 digital signatures as of Friday afternoon.

“Mr. Cathy has his opinion, but he should hear from us and from fellow Christians who disagree — and he should know how his donations are hurting families here in Georgia,” the petition reads.

A Chick-fil-A spokesman addressed the controversy — but not Alt’s invite — in a brief statement on Friday: “At Chick-fil-A, we appreciate all of our customers and are glad to serve them at any time. Our goal is simple: to provide great food, genuine hospitality and to have a positive influence on all who come into contact with Chick-fil-A.”

Not all Chick-fil-A supporters were OK with the public displays of affection, though, as Rhode Island state Rep. Dan Gordon tweeted, “A ‘kiss-in’ at Chick-Fil-A? You really think that’s going to help your cause? No one wants to see a mass of anyone mugging-up. #ProTip”

While the kiss-ins appear to have occurred without incident, the exterior of a Chick-fil-A in Torrance, Calif., was defaced with graffito reading, “Tastes Like Hate,” NBC4 in Los Angeles reported. Police are investigating the crime, according to The Associated Press.

Asked about the kiss-in on Thursday, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee — who orchestrated Wednesday’s “appreciation day” — said “more power to them,” and former GOP presidential candidate Herman Cain said, “it’s their right.”

To counter the kiss-in, some Chick-fil-A supporters planned Friday to mail their receipts and emptied fast-food bags to Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Boston Mayor Tom Menino, both Democrats who have said the restaurant isn’t welcome in their respective cities — and whom New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, an independent, addressed on his weekly radio show.

“It isn’t the right thing to do and it isn’t what America stands for,” Bloomberg said about the mayoral vows to block Chick-fil-A, according to the New York Post. “And those people who don’t like [Chick-fil-A] don’t understand their rights were protected by people who took a difficult position in the past and stood by it. They stood up so everybody else would be free.”