From: The Christian Post:
S earch engine titan Google announced Saturday its new "Legalize Love" campaign to pressure countries where it has offices to give gays, lesbians, bisexuals, and transgenders more rights and recognition.
Titan?
More like Goliath, at least to the Christian Right. And any stones thrown will
be to little avail:
The
analogy of Goliath will no doubt be used by social conservatives, but a more
apt analogy might be one of a mother forcing bad tasting medicine on a petulant
child: Google's stance as the"new" corporation (and one in
opposition to ones like Mitt Romney's Bain Capital) has been one of a young
parent nurturing the future of global corporations.* And when those
corporations need to have a stern hand regarding their health in social issues,
the powerful mother Google is there to see that steps are taken to remedy
ills.
Google, long known for
their pro-LGBT business practices, has a clear goal. The company's Mark
Palmer-Edgecumbe says: "We want our employees who are gay or lesbian or
transgender to have the same experience outside the office as they do in the
office. It is obviously a very ambitious piece of work."
Google
will join forces with other
non-government organizations (NGO's) to lobby the governments of countries troubled with systemic gay rights problems and
in which Google has
offices: Dubai, Poland, Singapore, Russia, Ukraine, Beijing, Malaysia, Taiwan, Kenya, Ghana, Nigeria, Senegal,
and Egypt. It has started unleashing ads in Poland and Singapore.
The "Legalize Love" Spillover
The formal scope of Legalize Love may be enough to cause nightmares to social conservatives, but the real scope is like an Armageddon to those who have made inroads in exporting hate to countries like Latvia, Moldova, Uganda, Kenya, Ghana, Russia and the Ukraine. The rabid "evangelicals" who have made inroads in these countries may find themselves out in the cold on this one. African nations eager to embrace Rightwing Christianity but who also want to enter into the 21st century with technology may find their allegiances shifting: "treat all our employees with respect and allow them their rights." The campaign may slowly undo the work of such preachers as Rick Warren, Scott Lively and Lou Engle (the last two highly involved in Uganda's "kill the gays" bill).
Boycott
Blues
In the
past, social conservatives have taken on the likes of JC Penney, Starbucks, and
Home Depot. Those boycotts have been almost fruitless. By contrast, however,
Google has more assets and equity than the three retail giants combined. And
its international scope is astounding: it processes over one billion search
requests per day and runs over one million servers. In other words, the sun
never sets on the Google empire.
Buster Wilson, the general manager of the
AFA's radio network, said on AFA Today that a Google boycott "is going to be a
hard one for a lot of us" but will "test the meat of our convictions."
After boycotts of
JC Penney, Starbucks, Girl Scout Cookies, Lowe's, Home Depot,
Nabisco's Oreo cookies, and the GAP, there surely is no meat left - only
gristle.
* Fortune magazine ranked Google as
number one on its 100 Best Companies To Work For list for 2012.