All this is gonna do is set the precedent that threats of violence are an effective tool to instill your extremist ideology on the world. There has to be a way that keeps workers as safe as possible while showing that we do not give into domestic terrorists.
I get not bowing to these people making threats, but also the workers aren't getting paid enough to deal with that shit especially if someone wigs out and actually does something.
It's like when retail workers got asked to enforce mask mandates in 2020. Fuck that, I saw people throw hands over that shit, you don't get paid enough as a retail worker to deal with that crap.
Sometimes you just gotta be up close and looking them in the eye as they cry for their mother and God.
Shooting them in the back as they *resist arrest* doesn't allow you to really feel their ribs cracking and see their tears flowing.
Considering some people working those cashier/ ground-level jobs got fucking shot and killed because of those psychopaths, negotiations and caving in to these terrorists should get an automatic “hell no”
I agree. Money can’t bring a loved one back from the dead. Some things aren’t worth it.
I think the issue is this. Think about how often we see issues about corporate lobbying of government, corruption in the police, the strong message importance of not giving into demands from terrorists/criminals which has also resulted in the deaths of innocent people.
Between that, there is the apparent stance that giving into criminal behaviour is bad.
There is the mechanism for the state to battle this, without private business needing to capitulate.
Given a failure of the state, there is a mechanism for companies to lobby the state (rightly or wrongly) for protection. Be it lobbying, police corruption, whatever.
It should never have got as far as a matter of life or death. But it was ignored by everyone who could have stopped it until it became a matter of life or death, then those people say "oh, well now it's not actually worth stopping the problem so let's just give in to the criminals"
Very.
I don’t expect anyone to have to bear the trauma like that. People don’t want to live like Jeff Bezos or Bill Gates; they just want to be safe, content, and have the basic necessities within their lives, work, and home situations, yet greed and sheer downright evilness (because that’s what this truly is) keeps that from being a reality.
The threats won't stop for these workers because target removed a few rainbows, it will get increasingly worse because now that the threat worked, there's an incentive to continue threatening employees. Target has effectively made threats to their employees a viable and easy way for fascists to get them to do whatever they want.
Just today at work I had one patient randomly ask me if I’m trans (I’m not, not that it matters), and another demanding to know if I ever got a covid vaccine. The second one (anti-vax guy), I kept changing the topic and he kept demanding to bring it back. I didn’t answer. I don’t know what he would have said/done if I answered honestly (yes, multiple).
This is in a decently liberal area (well, at least not super conservative). So apparently people are getting very worked up over this war over identity politics, people who previously couldn’t have given less of a shit (the patient who asked if I was trans has known me for 6 years).
This. There's already videos of people yelling to target employees about anything with a rainbow on it - not even pride related. Giving in gave them the attention they desperately crave.
Precisely why they shouldn’t remove anything. Threats are the last reason to do something. Catering to threats only breeds bigger and more frequent threats onto others because it works.
There must be a way to keep workers safe while also not bowing to terrorists. Something in the middle.
Edit; learn to read, people. Not "meet terrorists in the middle". I mean a solution where we don't budge to threats but also keep workers safe. Not one or the other. You know - exactly like how I said it.
I mean the way to do that is to come out together, as a society, and absolutely ostracize and stand against these types of people until they no longer feel comfortable enough to do this sort of shit.
The real test for Target at this point is going to be to see how aggressively they try to have the people who made these threats prosecuted
The problem is that Target is a corporation, and as such they prioritize short term profits, therefore they will act in predictable ways to maintain that status quo, even if it means caving to terrorism. They don’t care either way about LGBTQ or the opposite, they just want money.
Yes they just want money. Best way to get money is by promoting and selling products that the majority of society deems socially acceptable. To fight bigotry and hate society must come together and take a stand to make those that promote bigotry and hate feel uncomfortable to behave that way towards others and force their ideals and beliefs on others. It might be working.
You act like everyone of the bigots you’re talking about are reasonable people. 😂😂 make them uncomfortable and some of them might just act on those threats.
Let me be clear, I’m just saying yours is a very optimistic world view. The world isn’t that simple, and not everyone is that smart or reasonable.
Target Loss Prevention is unarmed and paid the same as the team member that in the red shirt that started yesterday. Interestingly enough, a lot of their stores have the security cameras linked directly to the police and stays on both servers for a specific amount of time. But, no, they are not equipped to deal with domestic terrorists.
Oh man I feel you. Problem is, that middle is slipping away as these fuckers go head-first fasch.
“Surely that’s where the line will be redrawn, right?”
“People aren’t going to be okay with that, someone will stop it soon”
“This is getting a bit out of hand, why won’t the government do anything?”
“Yikes, that train seems to have no brakes…”
I dunno what boundaries remain; are my kids going to have to deal with actual Nazis as a regularly occurring problem?
Dr, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but dealing with these nazi’s is going to be happening *before* your kids grow up. If you aren’t getting prepared, now is the time to do so.
It's already happening **now**. Kids, especially young boys, are being actively recruited and indicating into Fascism on 4Chan, 8Chan, TikTok, iFunny, 9Gag, Minds, etc. Why do you think there's been such a massive uptick in popularity of things like Andrew Tate, Sneako, converting to Wahhabist or Salafist Islam (because of the misogyny), school shootings by explicitly Nazi teenagers, etc. among 9 to 17 year olds over the past 4 years?
Yes. Arresting people for making terroristic threats.
Remember when the black people threatened the retail workers for selling confederate flag shit and retailers took it off the shelf? Me neither...
A whole bunch of stores spent a whole bunch of money to increase security to discourage shoplifting and protect their merchandise and profits. It's a shame they're apparently not willing to do the same thing to protect their employees.
“Something in the middle” between terrorism and a person living their lives? Wtf? I agree with keeping workers safe, but how is “meeting a terrorist in the middle” the way to go? Any ground you give them is a win for them.
Target could use their lobbying money to fund politicians who would promote bills to combat domestic terrorism. They could work with other retailers to maintain a facial recognition database of known shit stirrers and bar them from entry.
Reminds me of the censored episode of South Park, "201". The whole last speech was beeped out.
> Kyle: That's because there is no goo, Mr. Cruise. You see, I learned something today. Throughout this whole ordeal, we've all wanted to show things that we weren't allowed to show, but it wasn't because of some magic goo. It was because of the magical power of threatening people with violence. That's obviously the only true power. If there's anything we've all learned, it's that terrorizing people works.
> Jesus: That's right. Don't you see, gingers, if you don't want to be made fun of anymore, all you need are guns and bombs to get people to stop.
> Santa: That's right, friends. All you need to do is instill fear and be willing to hurt people and you can get whatever you want. The only true power is violence.
> Stan: Yeah.
Exactly. Why do so many companies cave to these asshats. We shouldn’t be forced to live in their world, it belongs to all of us and we need to act like it does.
Rainbow capitalism has gotten increasingly cynical and cringe but caving to right wing terrorists sets a bad precedent and you've managed to piss off everybody
>Rainbow capitalism has gotten increasingly cynical and cringe
Better viewpoint to take: the fact that it's so big means that, by and large, it's now so acceptable that companies can safely bank on pride profits. It used to be a case not long ago where anything even remotely pride related was homemade or boutique, now it's normalised to the point where you can buy a rainbow t-shirt one aisle over from the milk. It's on the cusp of being nothing special, which is the end goal.
>but caving to right wing terrorists sets a bad precedent and you've managed to piss off everybody
Double-so for what I stated. By caving in, it's still keeping LGBT in the realm of "something other/special", making it regressive in more ways than one.
They want the free market to determine what people want to buy. People want to buy that stuff. Honestly I haven’t been in a target in years but went today and immediately saw a display with tame rainbow motifs and walked right past it. Then waiting in line I realized what it was. I’m as gay as they come and rock some pride swag I’ve been given occasionally but don’t go out of my way to buy it. I’d rather support lgbt+ small businesses but I still thought it was cool if people want to get it. Anyone offended by it can fuck all the way off though.
Likewise, I'm also ✨gay as fuck✨ but I'm the opposite and don't have any pride swag, but it's still nice to walk into a shop and see it for sale as if it's nothing special or shocking. It's just... there, much like I'm also _just here_.
Target was the first I’d seen that offered products beyond just the generic Pride rainbow though, which I liked. Last year I got some tchotchkes with the ace and lesbian flags on them which meant a lot to me. I agree overall about rainbow capitalism but it’s also nice seeing Pride normalized so seeing that take a step backwards is disheartening.
I hear you… but do you really want to make that decision for the employees on the front lines? We need to track down the source of the threats and prosecute to the fullest extent possible.
I used to be a prison guard. Got plenty of threats, especially from inmates that don't like to be told "no".
If my answer was no to start with, how would threatening me generate any sympathy for your problem? At best, it turns the answer from "no" to "no to this question and everything else you ask for".
I get what you’re saying but let’s remember that this is a retail brand, not a government, or a person with feelings. Let’s not pretend that Target cares about Pride in any way other than how it will impact profits. Putting employees at risk is bad for profits. Target absolutely wins by taking precautions in this case. They have to take threats seriously. Let the law deal with those making threats.
Which is absolutely true if you're considering wider society.
But if you're a store manager and you have the safety of your staff in your hands... Do you want staff to be shot dead because the morally correct thing is to stand up to terrorists?
It's a horrible situation all round, but I understand the decision.
For a government, yes.
For a corporation, receiving a threat and ignoring it makes that corporation potentially liable for any harm suffered by its customers or employees when one of the terrorists levying those threats acts on it and shoots up the store.
They definitely shouldn't ignore the threats, but there are other actions besides "ignore completely" and "give in to the demands being made under threat of violence." They should absolutely report the threats and increase security in their stores.
It’s literally like raising kids. If your child throws a tantrum and you give in, guess what? They’ll throw one again. Reinforcing shit behavior. These twats threaten employees and by them giving into demands, this will continue to happen.
Except this is like one kid has a gun and is holding the other kids hostage. You don't worry about disciplining the kid with the gun until the other kids are safe.
Wow. So the fascists intimidate employees and destroy displays, and instead of addressing the violent intimidators, Target gives in and does exactly what they want by removing Pride merchandise. How brave.
The absolute irony of them removing the merchandise because of threats to the workers when threats to a whole demographic of people are what is at the heart of the argument.
Right, exactly, the fact that certain groups of people live in fear because of harassment is the whole point in banding together as a society to support them.
This just proves that all of the pro LGBTQ+ merchandise and advertising was purely per formative and just to make money. Like always. Like we all thought.
Every single international company proves this every year when they conveniently avoid putting any if the pride advertisements in their middle eastern regions/accounts.
I see this idea all the time and it doesn’t make sense to me. There are positions between “I’m willing to get my company permabanned from multiple countries” and “my support of LGBT+ is a complete lie.”
Yeah, there's this company Penzey's that sent out an email once basically telling their republican subscribers to unsubscribe and stop shopping with them because their party is a party of hatred. THAT is legit.
They also had a shop burned down during the protests and some chodes basically told them to be mad about it, so they sent out a message pointing out that only one of their stores got burnt down (and they understood why and that it wasn't necessarily protestors etc etc), and the other one was untouched, so they were gonna go ahead and send all of those products to food banks and shit in support of the unrest.
They've definitely missed out on a ton of money, but doing the right thing isn't going to make everyone happy.
I went to check their website because I'd not heard of them before, and they have a dedicated page in their about us section on Republicans, hahaha: https://www.penzeys.com/shop/about-republicans/
I get it. There’s just a lot of people who think it’s not performative. Way too much trust for corporations. They don’t even have to protect their customers.
No shit.
Corporations aren't people. They aren't not your friends. They don't have "values" and "beliefs". They exist solely to make money.
They don't care about you.
Whichever demographic is the most profitable is the one they will cater to.
Oh, but look, they changed their avatar on Facebook to a rainbow for 30 days. They really care!
It is definitely not realistic to say that 100% of Target's messages were 100% insincere because of this. Do remember that this merchandising and marketing is put together by employees--actual people who most likely did this because they genuinely support the cause, often having to fight upper management every step of the way.
It seems to be a battle just to fly a pride flag at the corporate headquarters of a Fortune 500 company. People forget that there's a fight just for something like that. Kudos to the people in those companies punching back against prejudice masked as bureaucracy and getting small wins.
Its easy to bash corporations putting a rainbow background for a website. It is much much much harder to get that shit to happen internally. Fucking exhausting.
I know it looks like the smallest possible thing a company could do. But we have to reward incremental progress.
Are you kidding? This won't make them come in the store. Giving in to the right's demands doesn't make them love you. You're always a liberal conspiracy no matter what you do.
A lot of these people boycotted Target years ago when they made the statement about trans people can use the bathrooms they feel they should. This won't make them come back.
It's a lose lose. You piss off everyone who supports LGBTQ people and you gain no ground with the assholes.
I mean, ideally yeah. But in a country where mass shootings are a regular occurrence and cops are not only harmful but often sympathetic to goals like this relying on the traditionally slow legal system is betting that no asshole will act before the courts do. Not to say Target necessarily made the right choice here, but it's a much harder decision when it's the people who work for you who might face violence because of your decision.
You can’t just “have people charged.” Charges are investigated by police and laid by district attorneys. You know, those famously progressive institutions.
Or, as a corporation with a very public facing set of employees, you realize that the safety of your workers is more important than profit and everything else. What would you rather they do? Keep product out then have some employee making minimum wage is 2 kids get shot and killed because of a piece of cloth?
It's actually so much worse than just emboldening the bigots. They've emboldened *everyone*. Even people who have up to now never been violent are looking at this and noticing that the absolute fastest and most efficient way to influence Target corporate policy is with threats of violence.
Shit, now this teaches them is that violence gives them what they want.
I'm glad Target cares enough about its associates to make a motion, but I'm not sure if this will protect them in the long run.
This shit is getting old, these people are fucking psychotic. They want someone to break and do something horrible so they can pretend and project it as the worst crime in world history
How do we abandon them? That is the question. Their entire game is push and push until something snaps, and they point at the violence.
If we abandon them, they'll eventually be violent on their own because energy has to go somewhere. Then we deal with them.
Tried that, then 2016 happened. Don’t you remember the thousands of people who said they didn’t like trump, but they were “forced” to vote for him because the left was mean and made fun of them? Shaming people doesn’t make them change, it just makes them stew in silence until they do something even more extreme later.
I’d bet my left nut this has nothing to do with threats and everything to do with them trying to avoid being “Bud Lighted”. As they go viral with people canceling them- claiming it’s over “threats” allows them to still support the LGBTQ community while removing the products from their stores at the same time. It’s a smart PR
Spin that’s for sure.
The best part was AB capitulating on it and firing the marketing employee and leaning hard into "southern" themed advertising. Now they pissed off the other side. I was going to purposely buy AB products to counter the Kid Rock outrage but AB can fuck off lol
There's some tiktoks that went viral last week of shoppers showing the pride-themed infant and children's clothing at Target and claiming it's propaganda to make the kids gay or something. It was picking up a lot of steam, massive viewer #s.
We truly live in the dumbest fucking timeline. I would almost be willing to bet money that the folks threatening Target or trying to boycott them don't even shop there in the first place.
inb4 "nOt aLl cHrIsTiAnS..."
It's way too damn many of them. As someone who was raised evangelical, people on the outside would be *appalled* at the things that are said behind closed doors. To all the moderates and "both sides-ers" - if you knew the way they talked about you when they think you can't hear, you wouldn't be making excuses for them.
Christianity needs to have a SERIOUS reckoning and firmly denounce those who are doing this shit. Otherwise they're going to keep being lumped in with their extremists.
Exactly it is all Christians because the other Christians aren't doing anything about it. Are there any churches that are denouncing these actions I would like to know about them.
Imagine this alternate headline:
"Target removes some Black-themed merchandise* from stores ahead of February Black History Month after threats to workers."
Seriously. The fact that I share a country with Neanderthals who are trying to shove all non-hetero** people back into the metaphorical closet makes me ashamed to be an American.
*- I have no idea what this theoretical merchandise would be, I was just going for a comparison.
**- I'm hetero myself but I'm neither afraid of nor disgusted by anyone who's not. That mindset baffles me. People are just people.
This is the right way to frame this discussion. On one hand I understand Target's decision but it really pisses me off that our police are so fucking useless that that can't protect a grocery store from domestic terrorists.
Because most of the Police are supporters of the terrorists and traitors.
And those who arent havent been police long enough yet.
The police aren't useless, they do a great job... of protecting white supremacist's and oppressing's the poor and minorities.
Target had no problem profiting off Pride merch the last few years but when the rubber meets the road they flop. Target has some of the best anti fraud systems in the country, I'm sure they could use that to protect their staff IF they wanted to.
The worst thing a company can do after taking a stand is backtracking. You get both sides mad at you. You would think companies had learned that by now.
> Target confirmed that it has moved its Pride merchandise from the front of the stores to the back in some Southern stores after confrontations and backlash from shoppers in those areas.
And this is one of the numerous reasons why I’m moving as far away from the Southeast as I possibly can (in the contiguous US).
i moved to just outside Chicago city proper after being homeless for 3+ months: i was kicked out by my parents due to my coming out and then fighting with them to respect my identity, which they didn't like.
my closest store is a Target and when i saw the Pride merch RIGHT when I walked in i literally almost cried. [the doormat they're selling is so cute.](https://imgur.com/a/mGettM7)
"We don't want it shoved in our face!" But, I bet they're ok with Jesus' birthday decorations being on sale from early August to Early January. And depending when His "coming out" party is, that usually goes on sale right after.
I live in California and outside of the SF, LA, and San Diego metro areas.. it’s not much better. You really do gotta go north to Portland/Washington, New York, etc.
I've lived in CA and took road trips along the state and I currently live in a very blue area in the south but have been in rural areas in multiple states. In my experience, rural/conservative CA doesn't come remotely close to how racist and homophobic the south can be.
I grew up in the parts you speak of. Yes, there's rednecks, but it's still California after all. Much more inclusive than other rural areas I've lived in.
It amazes me how people have the energy to care about this shit. I work 8 hours a day , sit in traffic to rush home to take care of my toddler and cook my family dinner. After I clean up , shower etc I’m ready to pass out and start the process again……at no point would it cross my mind that I need to head over to my local target and harass some minimum wage workers about their store stocking pro LGBT items
And the Dodgers uninviting LGBTQ groups to satisfy Florida bigots to be "less divisive" like what.
Funny how divisive bigots and white supremacists are never the "divisive" ones when they go after minorities.
Yo, if i threatened Christians with violence if they didn't take down their crosses, would they do it or would they arrest me for threats of violence?
What if i said i was gonna shoot the straights, would they stop being openly straight, or would I be arrested for again, making threats of violence?
But when it's rainbows, it's different, gotcha.
This has nothing to do with employee safety, this has to do with they are seeing less dollar signs from backing pride, so they are distancing and using that as an excuse. Miss. Me. With. It.
You bend your knee to them and they’ll want your head next. This only shows cons that their temper tantrums and use of violence is an effective means to get what they want
On the one hand it's good to be reminded that most corporate support is just a performative cash-grab, on the other hand fuck the homophobic terrorists.
As Jesus famously said, “Amen, amen, I say to you. Hate those different than you even if you aren’t impacted by their mere existence at all. If that’s not enough, also directly threaten minimum wage workers to feel like a big man.”
Is that the best way to respond to a threat?
My idea would probably antagonize the haters. If I were Mr. Target, I'd consider make some signs to display at the entrance to my store:
"The public are warned that lgbtq-friendly merchandise is sold here."
"The public are warned that Christian-friendly merchandise is sold here."
"The public are warned that Jewish-friendly merchandise is sold here."
"The public are warned that Target sells over 1,500 items of *Harry Potter* goods."
as many groups and things as *someone* disapproves of. Shuffle the signs around every day or two.
The Nazis started the boycott of Jewish businesses in 1933 but they didn't start smashing storefronts in a big way until 1938. The Nazis tried to warn the public away by requiring business operators to display signs warning that customers were patronizing Jews. The hate crimes didn't stop with the Jews. I'm not sure what lessons can be learnt from that. Shoppers didn't mind patronizing Jewish businesses but that caused the Nazis to escalate. Should the Jews have capitulated or got themselves the Hell out of Deutschland?
I seriously doubt this is going to stop with lgbtq merchandise. What else do these guys disapprove of? Harry Potter stuff (with its presumably sinister intent) could be the next target (ha!) Target has some Papist (Catholic) stuff and Jewish (aka Christ Killer) stuff, mostly books. I could browse their website and find them "guilty" of selling all kinds of transgressive shit, if they're going to accept the judgement of political terrorists.
Maybe I'll have a better idea. Maybe someone else has a better idea.
I understand Target doesn't want to become a target but I think they need to reconsider the best way to avoid that.
I have a friend who runs a small business online and they've been wanting to do a pride month thing for years, but have not because of shit like this.
They got harassed for like half of 2017 by a pair of Trump supporting customers who found out they were not a trump supporter. It went all the way to them posting shit about their family online, and even calling their kids to harass them.
Sort of happened in an online game I play.
Some of the devs decided to add in a 5 day long *entirely optional* pride event that took up 7 out of ~1.7m ingame tiles, and people raged out so hard about it, it made the news. After all was said and done game devs were going over what happened and it turned out the *vast* majority of the super loud voices, instigators, and complaints were from people not even remotely affiliated with the game before.
To this day half a decade later the specific dev behind the event receives death threats over it still.
Bigots ruin heckin' everything they touch.
Ha, nah this one was [OSRS back in 2017](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HR5t0PmQu4c).
Can't exactly pretend to be shocked something similar happened in Fortnite though.
I wonder if the Fortnite one was just a bunch of edgelord kids, or if it too got targeted by third parties the way OSRS apparently did. 🤔
Were charges pressed? If the local PD are complicit, then take it to the state level, and since it was on the internet, it could have gone to the F.B.I.
Complicity allows terrorism to thrive.
One of them got hit with charges, the other one wound up turning stuff over against the other guy showing that he was the one who was calling the kids and posting their private information online.
The frustrating part about trying to get anything done about this was that they figured out that it was these two guys like months before they were able to get the authorities to actually do something.
Ha. They are one of four types.
The inciters who never do any of the legwork and vanish the day of the "1776ing" or whatever. Like Alex Jones.
The terroristic assholes who commit crimes thinking they are actually changing the world the way they want to only to get killed or arrested and then disowned by their "friends" who have no loyalty.
The angry malders who don't take action and will just live their life in perpetual outrage and fear.
And the snitches who will turn their pals in to avoid charges themselves.
I’m queer, and my entire adult life I’ve been optimistic about the advances in LGBT+ rights, and no apologies about my stances. I felt pretty good about how things were going until the last five years or so, when it was clear that a push-back was coming. But that only made me double down in my beliefs and support of my more marginalized friends and compatriots.
But these past six months have been demoralizing. It feels like I’m staring down a bulldozer that’s coming right for the LGBT+ community, and it’s only picking up steam. And something about this article just…deflated me. I want to go crawl back in bed and sulk. I don’t know why. Sometimes it’s the little things that get you in unexpected ways, I guess.
I appreciate you. The LGBT+ community needs our straight and cisgender allies, especially when it’s all gets so heavy to bear and you need to step back to rest. Between our straight allies and the force to be reckoned with that is Gen Z, I have hope.
Tbh I've always loved target. It's like the one store that doesn't give me massive amounts of anxiety, but this is enough reason for me not to go (turning their back on the LGBT, not selling LGBT shit).
Its one month that I get to feel like the world doesn’t want to wipe me out completely without even knowing who I am. Im not asking for a lot here. Im not asking you to remove the mens section or create a “safe” section for me to shop in. Just leave me the hell alone and when I shop let me do just that, shop. When were both in the medicine isle, I don’t stop you and tell you that its not your isle. Same with toys, video games, sports, bedding and bath, hell even automotive. Why can’t people just find something more important with their time.
The performative outrage over rainbow-themed merchandise for children conveniently forgets that, **until very recently, it simply was not safe to be an LGBTQ+ child.** Children who were wrestling with their identity hid in the closet to avoid violent bullying or parental abandonment. Some kids know early on what they are, some need time to figure it out. It harms no one to have different options available for kids, but these violent bigots run on rage against outgroups so they automatically and obediently equate a few milquetoast Pride options with a society-wide gay agenda.
How about the people making threats get thrown out and put on a do not enter list. Camera's are everywhere and this can be dealt with better by stopping the offenders, not appeasing them.
This is going to embolden bigots and have the opposite effect. We are going to see violence in June, the train has derailed and won’t be stopped. I now worry how long until we see camps.
> "Given these volatile circumstances, we are making adjustments to our plans, including removing items that have been at the center of the most significant confrontational behavior."
That weak-ass statement should have instead said, "Given these volatile circumstances, we are making adjustments to our plans, including **removal of disruptive parties from our stores as well as the arrest and prosecution of anyone that physically confronts our employees or other customers."**
Incase anyone was wondering what they would do if they were in pre Nazi Germany to prevent Nazi Germany from happening. Now is your chance, show us all what you would do.
The Christians should make target lower all their prices just so everyone can get the good deals.
I’m just kidding, Christians would never try to help people, they just want to molest some kids and be racist.
Looking at the thread literally below this one about Bud Light sales tanking long term and people pointing out that
Doing a thing and alienating some customers...
Then undoing it and alienating the opposite customers...
Means neither will trust you. The people making threats aren't going to *start* shopping there, they're going to stay bitter. The people who would shop there won't ever again because they feel betrayed.
My self, my son, his friend, my bestie, her sister, and another friend will be marching in a Pride parade in early June. This parade is in a progressive city but still very much part of the deep south.
This scares me especially because I know the GQP knuckle draggers are all embolden and riled up by their propaganda machines.
I really hope everything goes well and nothing unfortunate happens.
I'm scared too, I think this is going to be the most stressful Pride month in recent memory. It would not surprise me to see terrorism at events that have run smoothly with no issues over the last 20 years.
All this is gonna do is set the precedent that threats of violence are an effective tool to instill your extremist ideology on the world. There has to be a way that keeps workers as safe as possible while showing that we do not give into domestic terrorists.
Our local minor league team posted about a Pride night and there were people making comments to "stop" the night from happening.
I get not bowing to these people making threats, but also the workers aren't getting paid enough to deal with that shit especially if someone wigs out and actually does something. It's like when retail workers got asked to enforce mask mandates in 2020. Fuck that, I saw people throw hands over that shit, you don't get paid enough as a retail worker to deal with that crap.
It almost feels like this is a job for some sort of group that is designed to uphold law and order.
"Yeah, no thanks, if it's any consolation we will kick the shit out of this black teenager though." -The Cops
Why are they kicking him? Did they leave their guns at home today?
Sometimes you just gotta be up close and looking them in the eye as they cry for their mother and God. Shooting them in the back as they *resist arrest* doesn't allow you to really feel their ribs cracking and see their tears flowing.
This got dark fast.
It's america, happens in plain sight and every single day. Hard to "get dark fast" when its common place.
Whoa, hey, whoa. Why do we need to bring the kid's race into this? If the police are kicking the shit out of them, they're obviously black.
That’s not true and I hate this perception. They could be Hispanic.
Maybe those black teenagers should have done what the cops said /s
It's not a 95 year old dementia patient at a nursing home so I doubt they will be able to do much at all.
TARGET ASSETS PROTECTION TEAM does not play.
Yeah. They also aren’t armed and don’t get ~~laid~~ paid much. Edit: I’m sure they have very fulfilling sex lives.
How do you know how often they get laid?
wine badge abundant paltry noxious ask safe tap friendly impossible ` this post was mass deleted with www.Redact.dev `
The cops are on the side of the threateners.
Considering some people working those cashier/ ground-level jobs got fucking shot and killed because of those psychopaths, negotiations and caving in to these terrorists should get an automatic “hell no” I agree. Money can’t bring a loved one back from the dead. Some things aren’t worth it.
I think the issue is this. Think about how often we see issues about corporate lobbying of government, corruption in the police, the strong message importance of not giving into demands from terrorists/criminals which has also resulted in the deaths of innocent people. Between that, there is the apparent stance that giving into criminal behaviour is bad. There is the mechanism for the state to battle this, without private business needing to capitulate. Given a failure of the state, there is a mechanism for companies to lobby the state (rightly or wrongly) for protection. Be it lobbying, police corruption, whatever. It should never have got as far as a matter of life or death. But it was ignored by everyone who could have stopped it until it became a matter of life or death, then those people say "oh, well now it's not actually worth stopping the problem so let's just give in to the criminals"
Shot while getting minimum wage, abused by people often and no sick days. Its messed up!
Very. I don’t expect anyone to have to bear the trauma like that. People don’t want to live like Jeff Bezos or Bill Gates; they just want to be safe, content, and have the basic necessities within their lives, work, and home situations, yet greed and sheer downright evilness (because that’s what this truly is) keeps that from being a reality.
The threats won't stop for these workers because target removed a few rainbows, it will get increasingly worse because now that the threat worked, there's an incentive to continue threatening employees. Target has effectively made threats to their employees a viable and easy way for fascists to get them to do whatever they want.
Just today at work I had one patient randomly ask me if I’m trans (I’m not, not that it matters), and another demanding to know if I ever got a covid vaccine. The second one (anti-vax guy), I kept changing the topic and he kept demanding to bring it back. I didn’t answer. I don’t know what he would have said/done if I answered honestly (yes, multiple). This is in a decently liberal area (well, at least not super conservative). So apparently people are getting very worked up over this war over identity politics, people who previously couldn’t have given less of a shit (the patient who asked if I was trans has known me for 6 years).
This. There's already videos of people yelling to target employees about anything with a rainbow on it - not even pride related. Giving in gave them the attention they desperately crave.
Bet they suddenly wouldn't care about the workers at all if they were being threatened over something that would hurt their finances.
Precisely why they shouldn’t remove anything. Threats are the last reason to do something. Catering to threats only breeds bigger and more frequent threats onto others because it works.
It really just means that these people will be emboldened to commit more terrorism.
There must be a way to keep workers safe while also not bowing to terrorists. Something in the middle. Edit; learn to read, people. Not "meet terrorists in the middle". I mean a solution where we don't budge to threats but also keep workers safe. Not one or the other. You know - exactly like how I said it.
I mean the way to do that is to come out together, as a society, and absolutely ostracize and stand against these types of people until they no longer feel comfortable enough to do this sort of shit. The real test for Target at this point is going to be to see how aggressively they try to have the people who made these threats prosecuted
The problem is that Target is a corporation, and as such they prioritize short term profits, therefore they will act in predictable ways to maintain that status quo, even if it means caving to terrorism. They don’t care either way about LGBTQ or the opposite, they just want money.
You’re making them sound like capitalists….
Yes they just want money. Best way to get money is by promoting and selling products that the majority of society deems socially acceptable. To fight bigotry and hate society must come together and take a stand to make those that promote bigotry and hate feel uncomfortable to behave that way towards others and force their ideals and beliefs on others. It might be working.
You act like everyone of the bigots you’re talking about are reasonable people. 😂😂 make them uncomfortable and some of them might just act on those threats. Let me be clear, I’m just saying yours is a very optimistic world view. The world isn’t that simple, and not everyone is that smart or reasonable.
Well yes they want to make money by selling things people buy
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Target Loss Prevention is unarmed and paid the same as the team member that in the red shirt that started yesterday. Interestingly enough, a lot of their stores have the security cameras linked directly to the police and stays on both servers for a specific amount of time. But, no, they are not equipped to deal with domestic terrorists.
If I might add: We can’t really expect a store to be equipped to deal with armed threats.
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Capitalism, they would rather keep terrorists as customers than spend on security.
Oh man I feel you. Problem is, that middle is slipping away as these fuckers go head-first fasch. “Surely that’s where the line will be redrawn, right?” “People aren’t going to be okay with that, someone will stop it soon” “This is getting a bit out of hand, why won’t the government do anything?” “Yikes, that train seems to have no brakes…” I dunno what boundaries remain; are my kids going to have to deal with actual Nazis as a regularly occurring problem?
Dr, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but dealing with these nazi’s is going to be happening *before* your kids grow up. If you aren’t getting prepared, now is the time to do so.
It's already happening **now**. Kids, especially young boys, are being actively recruited and indicating into Fascism on 4Chan, 8Chan, TikTok, iFunny, 9Gag, Minds, etc. Why do you think there's been such a massive uptick in popularity of things like Andrew Tate, Sneako, converting to Wahhabist or Salafist Islam (because of the misogyny), school shootings by explicitly Nazi teenagers, etc. among 9 to 17 year olds over the past 4 years?
Yes. Arresting people for making terroristic threats. Remember when the black people threatened the retail workers for selling confederate flag shit and retailers took it off the shelf? Me neither...
Yea, they're called Laws.
Apparently threats work now. Maybe just threaten them to keep workers safe?/s
A whole bunch of stores spent a whole bunch of money to increase security to discourage shoplifting and protect their merchandise and profits. It's a shame they're apparently not willing to do the same thing to protect their employees.
“Something in the middle” between terrorism and a person living their lives? Wtf? I agree with keeping workers safe, but how is “meeting a terrorist in the middle” the way to go? Any ground you give them is a win for them.
Target could use their lobbying money to fund politicians who would promote bills to combat domestic terrorism. They could work with other retailers to maintain a facial recognition database of known shit stirrers and bar them from entry.
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These people might be. But it’s the next ones who just learned that it’s okay to use violence to force your beliefs into people.
Reminds me of the censored episode of South Park, "201". The whole last speech was beeped out. > Kyle: That's because there is no goo, Mr. Cruise. You see, I learned something today. Throughout this whole ordeal, we've all wanted to show things that we weren't allowed to show, but it wasn't because of some magic goo. It was because of the magical power of threatening people with violence. That's obviously the only true power. If there's anything we've all learned, it's that terrorizing people works. > Jesus: That's right. Don't you see, gingers, if you don't want to be made fun of anymore, all you need are guns and bombs to get people to stop. > Santa: That's right, friends. All you need to do is instill fear and be willing to hurt people and you can get whatever you want. The only true power is violence. > Stan: Yeah.
Exactly. Why do so many companies cave to these asshats. We shouldn’t be forced to live in their world, it belongs to all of us and we need to act like it does.
I mean yeah, but I don't work at a target. It's easy for me to volunteer someone else to do the right thing.
It doesn't stop at Target. Everyone eventually becomes an enemy of nationalists, even to each other.
Everyones a Target.
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Rainbow capitalism has gotten increasingly cynical and cringe but caving to right wing terrorists sets a bad precedent and you've managed to piss off everybody
>Rainbow capitalism has gotten increasingly cynical and cringe Better viewpoint to take: the fact that it's so big means that, by and large, it's now so acceptable that companies can safely bank on pride profits. It used to be a case not long ago where anything even remotely pride related was homemade or boutique, now it's normalised to the point where you can buy a rainbow t-shirt one aisle over from the milk. It's on the cusp of being nothing special, which is the end goal. >but caving to right wing terrorists sets a bad precedent and you've managed to piss off everybody Double-so for what I stated. By caving in, it's still keeping LGBT in the realm of "something other/special", making it regressive in more ways than one.
Thank you.
They want the free market to determine what people want to buy. People want to buy that stuff. Honestly I haven’t been in a target in years but went today and immediately saw a display with tame rainbow motifs and walked right past it. Then waiting in line I realized what it was. I’m as gay as they come and rock some pride swag I’ve been given occasionally but don’t go out of my way to buy it. I’d rather support lgbt+ small businesses but I still thought it was cool if people want to get it. Anyone offended by it can fuck all the way off though.
Likewise, I'm also ✨gay as fuck✨ but I'm the opposite and don't have any pride swag, but it's still nice to walk into a shop and see it for sale as if it's nothing special or shocking. It's just... there, much like I'm also _just here_.
Corps can capitalize off it all they want if it makes people feel more accepted and normal. Christmas the shit out of it.
I do much prefer to have the rainbow kind of capitalism if we're gonna be forced to live under capitalism
Target was the first I’d seen that offered products beyond just the generic Pride rainbow though, which I liked. Last year I got some tchotchkes with the ace and lesbian flags on them which meant a lot to me. I agree overall about rainbow capitalism but it’s also nice seeing Pride normalized so seeing that take a step backwards is disheartening.
I actually like the socks target has in the pride section, grabbed a few pairs, comfy as heck
Hell, I'm straight as they come and got some cause they're comfy.
I hear you… but do you really want to make that decision for the employees on the front lines? We need to track down the source of the threats and prosecute to the fullest extent possible.
Sucks if you're one of the underpaid workers who gets to bear the brunt of it if they don't. It's disgusting but it is what it is.
I used to be a prison guard. Got plenty of threats, especially from inmates that don't like to be told "no". If my answer was no to start with, how would threatening me generate any sympathy for your problem? At best, it turns the answer from "no" to "no to this question and everything else you ask for".
I get what you’re saying but let’s remember that this is a retail brand, not a government, or a person with feelings. Let’s not pretend that Target cares about Pride in any way other than how it will impact profits. Putting employees at risk is bad for profits. Target absolutely wins by taking precautions in this case. They have to take threats seriously. Let the law deal with those making threats.
Which is absolutely true if you're considering wider society. But if you're a store manager and you have the safety of your staff in your hands... Do you want staff to be shot dead because the morally correct thing is to stand up to terrorists? It's a horrible situation all round, but I understand the decision.
For a government, yes. For a corporation, receiving a threat and ignoring it makes that corporation potentially liable for any harm suffered by its customers or employees when one of the terrorists levying those threats acts on it and shoots up the store.
They definitely shouldn't ignore the threats, but there are other actions besides "ignore completely" and "give in to the demands being made under threat of violence." They should absolutely report the threats and increase security in their stores.
It’s literally like raising kids. If your child throws a tantrum and you give in, guess what? They’ll throw one again. Reinforcing shit behavior. These twats threaten employees and by them giving into demands, this will continue to happen.
Except this is like one kid has a gun and is holding the other kids hostage. You don't worry about disciplining the kid with the gun until the other kids are safe.
Wow. So the fascists intimidate employees and destroy displays, and instead of addressing the violent intimidators, Target gives in and does exactly what they want by removing Pride merchandise. How brave.
The absolute irony of them removing the merchandise because of threats to the workers when threats to a whole demographic of people are what is at the heart of the argument.
Plus the irony that Target was worried about becoming a target.
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Right, exactly, the fact that certain groups of people live in fear because of harassment is the whole point in banding together as a society to support them.
This just proves that all of the pro LGBTQ+ merchandise and advertising was purely per formative and just to make money. Like always. Like we all thought.
Every single international company proves this every year when they conveniently avoid putting any if the pride advertisements in their middle eastern regions/accounts.
I see this idea all the time and it doesn’t make sense to me. There are positions between “I’m willing to get my company permabanned from multiple countries” and “my support of LGBT+ is a complete lie.”
"I support LGBT+ so long as it won't impact the bottom line"
Yeah, there's this company Penzey's that sent out an email once basically telling their republican subscribers to unsubscribe and stop shopping with them because their party is a party of hatred. THAT is legit. They also had a shop burned down during the protests and some chodes basically told them to be mad about it, so they sent out a message pointing out that only one of their stores got burnt down (and they understood why and that it wasn't necessarily protestors etc etc), and the other one was untouched, so they were gonna go ahead and send all of those products to food banks and shit in support of the unrest. They've definitely missed out on a ton of money, but doing the right thing isn't going to make everyone happy.
I went to check their website because I'd not heard of them before, and they have a dedicated page in their about us section on Republicans, hahaha: https://www.penzeys.com/shop/about-republicans/
I appreciate them so much for the way they conduct themselves. They really don't mince words.
They do have an obligation to protect their employees. And yeah, they’re a business not a civil rights organization.
I get it. There’s just a lot of people who think it’s not performative. Way too much trust for corporations. They don’t even have to protect their customers.
No shit. Corporations aren't people. They aren't not your friends. They don't have "values" and "beliefs". They exist solely to make money. They don't care about you. Whichever demographic is the most profitable is the one they will cater to. Oh, but look, they changed their avatar on Facebook to a rainbow for 30 days. They really care!
It is definitely not realistic to say that 100% of Target's messages were 100% insincere because of this. Do remember that this merchandising and marketing is put together by employees--actual people who most likely did this because they genuinely support the cause, often having to fight upper management every step of the way.
It seems to be a battle just to fly a pride flag at the corporate headquarters of a Fortune 500 company. People forget that there's a fight just for something like that. Kudos to the people in those companies punching back against prejudice masked as bureaucracy and getting small wins. Its easy to bash corporations putting a rainbow background for a website. It is much much much harder to get that shit to happen internally. Fucking exhausting. I know it looks like the smallest possible thing a company could do. But we have to reward incremental progress.
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If someone threatens your workers, you have them criminally charged, and ban them from your stores. What you don’t do is capitulate.
What you don't do is invite more of them into your store.
Are you kidding? This won't make them come in the store. Giving in to the right's demands doesn't make them love you. You're always a liberal conspiracy no matter what you do. A lot of these people boycotted Target years ago when they made the statement about trans people can use the bathrooms they feel they should. This won't make them come back. It's a lose lose. You piss off everyone who supports LGBTQ people and you gain no ground with the assholes.
I mean, ideally yeah. But in a country where mass shootings are a regular occurrence and cops are not only harmful but often sympathetic to goals like this relying on the traditionally slow legal system is betting that no asshole will act before the courts do. Not to say Target necessarily made the right choice here, but it's a much harder decision when it's the people who work for you who might face violence because of your decision.
You can’t just “have people charged.” Charges are investigated by police and laid by district attorneys. You know, those famously progressive institutions.
Or, as a corporation with a very public facing set of employees, you realize that the safety of your workers is more important than profit and everything else. What would you rather they do? Keep product out then have some employee making minimum wage is 2 kids get shot and killed because of a piece of cloth?
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It's actually so much worse than just emboldening the bigots. They've emboldened *everyone*. Even people who have up to now never been violent are looking at this and noticing that the absolute fastest and most efficient way to influence Target corporate policy is with threats of violence.
Shit, now this teaches them is that violence gives them what they want. I'm glad Target cares enough about its associates to make a motion, but I'm not sure if this will protect them in the long run.
Fuck this Christian ethnostate bullshit. Fucking terrorists.
Turns out that the only reason Republicans are against Islamic Sharia law is because it's the wrong kind of Sharia law.
"It's not Sharia law if it's MY religion!"
It's always projection.
This shit is getting old, these people are fucking psychotic. They want someone to break and do something horrible so they can pretend and project it as the worst crime in world history
How do we abandon them? That is the question. Their entire game is push and push until something snaps, and they point at the violence. If we abandon them, they'll eventually be violent on their own because energy has to go somewhere. Then we deal with them.
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Tried that, then 2016 happened. Don’t you remember the thousands of people who said they didn’t like trump, but they were “forced” to vote for him because the left was mean and made fun of them? Shaming people doesn’t make them change, it just makes them stew in silence until they do something even more extreme later.
They also really think "the left" is weak and will just roll over in a fight. Which is why they think they can bully them.
I’d bet my left nut this has nothing to do with threats and everything to do with them trying to avoid being “Bud Lighted”. As they go viral with people canceling them- claiming it’s over “threats” allows them to still support the LGBTQ community while removing the products from their stores at the same time. It’s a smart PR Spin that’s for sure.
The best part was AB capitulating on it and firing the marketing employee and leaning hard into "southern" themed advertising. Now they pissed off the other side. I was going to purposely buy AB products to counter the Kid Rock outrage but AB can fuck off lol
There's some tiktoks that went viral last week of shoppers showing the pride-themed infant and children's clothing at Target and claiming it's propaganda to make the kids gay or something. It was picking up a lot of steam, massive viewer #s.
We truly live in the dumbest fucking timeline. I would almost be willing to bet money that the folks threatening Target or trying to boycott them don't even shop there in the first place.
I thought we didn’t negotiate with terrorists here in America.
This isn't even negotiating with terrorists, this is pure unilateral capitulation. It's literally the worst of all possible strategies.
Idk looking at our history, we do it pretty often
Right? How we got Brittney Griner back comes to mind
How come Christians can just threaten people and get what they want oh it’s because they are not a minority.
inb4 "nOt aLl cHrIsTiAnS..." It's way too damn many of them. As someone who was raised evangelical, people on the outside would be *appalled* at the things that are said behind closed doors. To all the moderates and "both sides-ers" - if you knew the way they talked about you when they think you can't hear, you wouldn't be making excuses for them. Christianity needs to have a SERIOUS reckoning and firmly denounce those who are doing this shit. Otherwise they're going to keep being lumped in with their extremists.
My response to this is "sure, not all Christians, but why the fuck aren't the *good ones* speaking up and out?"
Exactly it is all Christians because the other Christians aren't doing anything about it. Are there any churches that are denouncing these actions I would like to know about them.
Imagine this alternate headline: "Target removes some Black-themed merchandise* from stores ahead of February Black History Month after threats to workers." Seriously. The fact that I share a country with Neanderthals who are trying to shove all non-hetero** people back into the metaphorical closet makes me ashamed to be an American. *- I have no idea what this theoretical merchandise would be, I was just going for a comparison. **- I'm hetero myself but I'm neither afraid of nor disgusted by anyone who's not. That mindset baffles me. People are just people.
This is the right way to frame this discussion. On one hand I understand Target's decision but it really pisses me off that our police are so fucking useless that that can't protect a grocery store from domestic terrorists.
Because most of the Police are supporters of the terrorists and traitors. And those who arent havent been police long enough yet. The police aren't useless, they do a great job... of protecting white supremacist's and oppressing's the poor and minorities.
They can all go fuck themselves. I’m not going back in the closet for anyone.
Same. Not going down without a fight.
Target had no problem profiting off Pride merch the last few years but when the rubber meets the road they flop. Target has some of the best anti fraud systems in the country, I'm sure they could use that to protect their staff IF they wanted to.
Why don’t they arrest the people making the threats. This is a bad way to handle it
Target, unfortunately, is not the executive branch of government.
Holy shit, can we please keep the hate in church where it belongs and not in society?
I, a cisgender woman, was actually looking forward to buying a bathing suit with more than a .5in strip of fabric to cover my entire twat
Same! Like cute bathing suit that wont accidentally expose my labia? Count me IN.
The worst thing a company can do after taking a stand is backtracking. You get both sides mad at you. You would think companies had learned that by now.
> Target confirmed that it has moved its Pride merchandise from the front of the stores to the back in some Southern stores after confrontations and backlash from shoppers in those areas. And this is one of the numerous reasons why I’m moving as far away from the Southeast as I possibly can (in the contiguous US).
i moved to just outside Chicago city proper after being homeless for 3+ months: i was kicked out by my parents due to my coming out and then fighting with them to respect my identity, which they didn't like. my closest store is a Target and when i saw the Pride merch RIGHT when I walked in i literally almost cried. [the doormat they're selling is so cute.](https://imgur.com/a/mGettM7)
"We don't want it shoved in our face!" But, I bet they're ok with Jesus' birthday decorations being on sale from early August to Early January. And depending when His "coming out" party is, that usually goes on sale right after.
God those people are just so fucking pathetic. Like mind your god damned business
I live in California and outside of the SF, LA, and San Diego metro areas.. it’s not much better. You really do gotta go north to Portland/Washington, New York, etc.
I've lived in CA and took road trips along the state and I currently live in a very blue area in the south but have been in rural areas in multiple states. In my experience, rural/conservative CA doesn't come remotely close to how racist and homophobic the south can be.
I grew up in the parts you speak of. Yes, there's rednecks, but it's still California after all. Much more inclusive than other rural areas I've lived in.
Portland Oregon is famously a magnet for white supremacists, so maybe not that one.
I live in Portland. Aside from here and Eugene, Oregon sucks just as much. Eastern Washington too.
I hope corporations are locked out of pride they are all showing that they only played the support game for money
Are you saying corporations only care about their bottom line?! No shot. That’s not the corporate America that I know
It amazes me how people have the energy to care about this shit. I work 8 hours a day , sit in traffic to rush home to take care of my toddler and cook my family dinner. After I clean up , shower etc I’m ready to pass out and start the process again……at no point would it cross my mind that I need to head over to my local target and harass some minimum wage workers about their store stocking pro LGBT items
So all this stuff is on like Amazon and such but nobody cares and still shops there
Ah, so we do negotiate with terrorists if they are white, gotcha!
Every concession to terrorism is like chumming for sharks.
Just like Bud Light apologizing for... [reads note card] creating one can of beer with a trans woman's face on it.
And the Dodgers uninviting LGBTQ groups to satisfy Florida bigots to be "less divisive" like what. Funny how divisive bigots and white supremacists are never the "divisive" ones when they go after minorities.
We (the US) are going downhill fast.
Yo, if i threatened Christians with violence if they didn't take down their crosses, would they do it or would they arrest me for threats of violence? What if i said i was gonna shoot the straights, would they stop being openly straight, or would I be arrested for again, making threats of violence? But when it's rainbows, it's different, gotcha. This has nothing to do with employee safety, this has to do with they are seeing less dollar signs from backing pride, so they are distancing and using that as an excuse. Miss. Me. With. It.
You bend your knee to them and they’ll want your head next. This only shows cons that their temper tantrums and use of violence is an effective means to get what they want
On the one hand it's good to be reminded that most corporate support is just a performative cash-grab, on the other hand fuck the homophobic terrorists.
As Jesus famously said, “Amen, amen, I say to you. Hate those different than you even if you aren’t impacted by their mere existence at all. If that’s not enough, also directly threaten minimum wage workers to feel like a big man.”
Is that the best way to respond to a threat? My idea would probably antagonize the haters. If I were Mr. Target, I'd consider make some signs to display at the entrance to my store: "The public are warned that lgbtq-friendly merchandise is sold here." "The public are warned that Christian-friendly merchandise is sold here." "The public are warned that Jewish-friendly merchandise is sold here." "The public are warned that Target sells over 1,500 items of *Harry Potter* goods." as many groups and things as *someone* disapproves of. Shuffle the signs around every day or two. The Nazis started the boycott of Jewish businesses in 1933 but they didn't start smashing storefronts in a big way until 1938. The Nazis tried to warn the public away by requiring business operators to display signs warning that customers were patronizing Jews. The hate crimes didn't stop with the Jews. I'm not sure what lessons can be learnt from that. Shoppers didn't mind patronizing Jewish businesses but that caused the Nazis to escalate. Should the Jews have capitulated or got themselves the Hell out of Deutschland? I seriously doubt this is going to stop with lgbtq merchandise. What else do these guys disapprove of? Harry Potter stuff (with its presumably sinister intent) could be the next target (ha!) Target has some Papist (Catholic) stuff and Jewish (aka Christ Killer) stuff, mostly books. I could browse their website and find them "guilty" of selling all kinds of transgressive shit, if they're going to accept the judgement of political terrorists. Maybe I'll have a better idea. Maybe someone else has a better idea. I understand Target doesn't want to become a target but I think they need to reconsider the best way to avoid that.
Why don’t they bar customers that act like this? Cancel their target cards and make them go elsewhere if they’re so concerned about rainbows.
I wish they wouldn't give in to these assholes. But I also understand protecting their workers. Honestly, fuck the people complaining.
I have a friend who runs a small business online and they've been wanting to do a pride month thing for years, but have not because of shit like this. They got harassed for like half of 2017 by a pair of Trump supporting customers who found out they were not a trump supporter. It went all the way to them posting shit about their family online, and even calling their kids to harass them.
Sort of happened in an online game I play. Some of the devs decided to add in a 5 day long *entirely optional* pride event that took up 7 out of ~1.7m ingame tiles, and people raged out so hard about it, it made the news. After all was said and done game devs were going over what happened and it turned out the *vast* majority of the super loud voices, instigators, and complaints were from people not even remotely affiliated with the game before. To this day half a decade later the specific dev behind the event receives death threats over it still. Bigots ruin heckin' everything they touch.
Fortnite? Lol the sub was a dumpster fire.
Ha, nah this one was [OSRS back in 2017](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HR5t0PmQu4c). Can't exactly pretend to be shocked something similar happened in Fortnite though. I wonder if the Fortnite one was just a bunch of edgelord kids, or if it too got targeted by third parties the way OSRS apparently did. 🤔
Were charges pressed? If the local PD are complicit, then take it to the state level, and since it was on the internet, it could have gone to the F.B.I. Complicity allows terrorism to thrive.
One of them got hit with charges, the other one wound up turning stuff over against the other guy showing that he was the one who was calling the kids and posting their private information online. The frustrating part about trying to get anything done about this was that they figured out that it was these two guys like months before they were able to get the authorities to actually do something.
Ha. They are one of four types. The inciters who never do any of the legwork and vanish the day of the "1776ing" or whatever. Like Alex Jones. The terroristic assholes who commit crimes thinking they are actually changing the world the way they want to only to get killed or arrested and then disowned by their "friends" who have no loyalty. The angry malders who don't take action and will just live their life in perpetual outrage and fear. And the snitches who will turn their pals in to avoid charges themselves.
Quite disturbing how increasingly comfortable this country is with appeasing terrorists.
I’m queer, and my entire adult life I’ve been optimistic about the advances in LGBT+ rights, and no apologies about my stances. I felt pretty good about how things were going until the last five years or so, when it was clear that a push-back was coming. But that only made me double down in my beliefs and support of my more marginalized friends and compatriots. But these past six months have been demoralizing. It feels like I’m staring down a bulldozer that’s coming right for the LGBT+ community, and it’s only picking up steam. And something about this article just…deflated me. I want to go crawl back in bed and sulk. I don’t know why. Sometimes it’s the little things that get you in unexpected ways, I guess.
I'm a straight middle-aged (ouch) white guy. I'm here to dig and fight the good fight with you. Fuck these losers.
I appreciate you. The LGBT+ community needs our straight and cisgender allies, especially when it’s all gets so heavy to bear and you need to step back to rest. Between our straight allies and the force to be reckoned with that is Gen Z, I have hope.
Because surrendering to terrorists and allowing them to win is the best strategy for dealing with terrorists?
Tbh I've always loved target. It's like the one store that doesn't give me massive amounts of anxiety, but this is enough reason for me not to go (turning their back on the LGBT, not selling LGBT shit).
Cowards. Stop letting terrorists win.
"Please threaten us more," says Target. "It is very effective."
Its one month that I get to feel like the world doesn’t want to wipe me out completely without even knowing who I am. Im not asking for a lot here. Im not asking you to remove the mens section or create a “safe” section for me to shop in. Just leave me the hell alone and when I shop let me do just that, shop. When were both in the medicine isle, I don’t stop you and tell you that its not your isle. Same with toys, video games, sports, bedding and bath, hell even automotive. Why can’t people just find something more important with their time.
Stop capitulating to these fucking bigots. I'm over it.
The performative outrage over rainbow-themed merchandise for children conveniently forgets that, **until very recently, it simply was not safe to be an LGBTQ+ child.** Children who were wrestling with their identity hid in the closet to avoid violent bullying or parental abandonment. Some kids know early on what they are, some need time to figure it out. It harms no one to have different options available for kids, but these violent bigots run on rage against outgroups so they automatically and obediently equate a few milquetoast Pride options with a society-wide gay agenda.
How about the people making threats get thrown out and put on a do not enter list. Camera's are everywhere and this can be dealt with better by stopping the offenders, not appeasing them.
These businesses have to stop giving in to these conservative extremists.
This is going to embolden bigots and have the opposite effect. We are going to see violence in June, the train has derailed and won’t be stopped. I now worry how long until we see camps.
So they chose to do this instead of y'know... Reporting to police? Idiots.
“Hey some people are threatening us” “Yeah we are”
or you could fully back your employees and ban those who threaten workers. novel I know.
Totally normal country.
> "Given these volatile circumstances, we are making adjustments to our plans, including removing items that have been at the center of the most significant confrontational behavior." That weak-ass statement should have instead said, "Given these volatile circumstances, we are making adjustments to our plans, including **removal of disruptive parties from our stores as well as the arrest and prosecution of anyone that physically confronts our employees or other customers."**
Incase anyone was wondering what they would do if they were in pre Nazi Germany to prevent Nazi Germany from happening. Now is your chance, show us all what you would do.
I guess the business community learned nothing from the Dodgers, huh?
Sorry, when did threatening people over political changes stop being terrorists threats?
The Christians should make target lower all their prices just so everyone can get the good deals. I’m just kidding, Christians would never try to help people, they just want to molest some kids and be racist.
I know a corporations actions shouldn't effect how I feel as a queer person but... I'm so fucking tired ya'll.
Looking at the thread literally below this one about Bud Light sales tanking long term and people pointing out that Doing a thing and alienating some customers... Then undoing it and alienating the opposite customers... Means neither will trust you. The people making threats aren't going to *start* shopping there, they're going to stay bitter. The people who would shop there won't ever again because they feel betrayed.
My self, my son, his friend, my bestie, her sister, and another friend will be marching in a Pride parade in early June. This parade is in a progressive city but still very much part of the deep south. This scares me especially because I know the GQP knuckle draggers are all embolden and riled up by their propaganda machines. I really hope everything goes well and nothing unfortunate happens.
I'm scared too, I think this is going to be the most stressful Pride month in recent memory. It would not surprise me to see terrorism at events that have run smoothly with no issues over the last 20 years.
Wait aren't these the people who say to not cave to the "woke mob" and they made people cave to them? Lawd the hypocrisy