my freaking. awesome. life.

Dear Friend of a Person Who is Dear to Me,

This whole Chick-Fil-A thing is getting pretty out of hand.

Yesterday, someone very near and dear to me had an extremely rough time because his friends and family were posting pictures of themselves eating at Chick-Fil-A. He disagreed with the pictures, so he posted the HRC’s response pic.

His friends commented on the picture, but one comment got to me in particular. You, the Friend of a Person Who is Dear to Me, said that all Chick-Fil-A President Dan Cathy did was say in an interview that he agreed with the Bible, and that there is nothing wrong with that. This, my friend by association, is not the truth at all, and it is NOT why there are so many people upset.

If all Dan Cathy did was say that he believed in the traditional family as stated in the Bible then there wouldn’t be much of a fuss. (This is something we could get into, but we won’t… Okay, maybe just a little. I posted this quote on Facebook recently: “The fact that you can’t sell your daughter for three goats and a cow means we have already redefined marriage.” Yup, that about sums it up.) People are allowed to believe whatever they want. They can think that some white dude found some magical plates in a field. They can think that aliens had a nuclear war on Earth. Or they can think that a carpenter-turned-mystic walked on water and died for their sins. Hey, whatever lets you sleep at night.

But when your beliefs start effecting the lives of strangers, that’s when you lose me.

To the Friend of A Person Who is Dear to Me who mistakenly claimed all Dan Cathy did was say he believed in the traditional words of the Bible: You are 100% incorrect, and you should be embarrassed by your ignorance. Do you really think people are up in arms because he said he’s a Christian? Are you actually buying Fox News  when they claim there is a “religious war” happening? Do you honestly believe everything is that black and white, and that when someone questions the morals and ethics of an outspoken Christian, they’re attacking your core values?

Chick-Fil-A has donated millions upon millions of dollars to groups disguised as “Christian organizations” so that they can be protected by people like you when they lobby and push and promote anti-equality policies and legislature through our government. It has donated over $5 million to organizations like the Family Research Council, which, among other things, spent $25,000 lobbying that US Congress should NOT condemn Uganda’s “Kill the Gays” bill.

According to the FRC’s mission statement, the “Family Research Council champions marriage and family as the foundation of civilization, the seedbed of virtue, and the wellspring of society.” Sure, that sounds pleasant enough, but how in the hell does homophobic Ugandan policy fit into that mission? And furthermore, how could any person with upstanding morals not condemn the killing of innocent people? Homosexuality should not be punishable by death, and anyone who thinks otherwise really needs to take a step back and reevaluate their ethic principles.

Peter Sprigg, the Senior Fellow for Policy Studies at the Family Research Council (whatever the fuck that title designates, I really couldn’t give any less of a shit) has been quoted on MSNBC’s Hardball as saying that he believes “there would be a place [in US policy] for criminal sanctions against homosexual behavior.” So not only does the FRC believe that other countries have the right to put homosexuals to death, but also that homosexual acts should be outlawed in the United States. Now, he didn’t say gays should be condemned to death in the US, but it’s not outlandish to assume that if the FRC eventually got their way and could legally ban gay behavior, that their next step would be to make homosexuality punishable by death.

So you see, Friend of Someone Who is Dear to Me, Chick-Fil-A President Dan Cathy didn’t just say that he believed in the traditional words of the Bible. That is not why people are so upset. What Dan Cathy did do is donate over $5 million dollars to organizations like the Family Research Council, organizations that publicly condone homosexuality and lobby for anti-equality legislation. And then Dan Cathy got smug about it, answering in an interview that he was “guilty as charged,” for doing so after his company for the longest time kept its donations hush-hush.

I’ve watched a lot of documentaries on the subjects of homosexuality and religion (thank you, Netflix). This by no means makes me an expert theologist, but most of them concluded that the Bible should not be translated literally and blah blah blah, I know it’s not gonna change your mind, so let’s not waste our time. Here’s what I assume about you:

• You believe that a book written hundreds of years ago by a bunch of different people is the blueprint for how you should live your life so you can be saved. Sure. Fine. Great.

• The “literal translation” of your book says that it is an abomination for a man to lay with another man as he would a woman. Sure. Fine. Great. (The literal translation of your book also says you can’t cut your hair and that if you cheat on your spouse then both you and your spouse must be killed… but those rules are so silly!)

But your book also says that it is part of human nature to sin and do wrong, and that includes everybody, including people like you, who believe the words of an ancient text. And if that’s the case, how can people like you be the Deciders of what is right vs. wrong? You can’t be moral crusaders if it is inherent in your being to be corrupt and bad. Perhaps with this logic you should reconsider your interpretation of your book. Perhaps, as sinful creatures, the idea that you pick and choose what you want to literally translate from your scripture is in and of itself the sin? Maybe the sin isn’t homosexuality. Maybe the sin is the misinterpretation?

So, dear Friend of The Person Who is Dear to Me, I hope you enjoyed your Chick-Fil-A chicken sandwich. And I really do mean that. I think you would agree that you didn’t really do much research into the topic when you posted your ignorant comment on the picture above, and that really you just heard Mike Huckabee declare August 1^st “National Chick-Fil-A Day.” You were told to support your Christian companies, and you did just that. You love your god and you love deep fried chicken. And there’s nothing wrong with that.

But if you ever read this, I hope that you never eat there again. Because if you stopped translating the literal meaning of your book and actually absorbed some of its teachings, you’d realize that supporting a company that generalizes a minority population as degenerates is the sin. That’s the abomination. And if the peaceful and tolerant god from your book really does exist, how’s about you let him run the show from now on. Not Dan Cathy, or Mike Huckabee, or the Family Research Council. Because they are not the Deciders of what is right and what is wrong, and neither are you. And when you bought your chicken sandwich yesterday to celebrate Chick-Fil-A’s strong Christian principles, you participated in hurting thousands of people who have done absolutely nothing to you. At least now you know better. Let’s hope next time you do better.

Sincerely,

A Reader of Many Books