Chic-fil-a, What the Cluck?

"Have you heard about Chic-fil-a? Did you drive past Chic-fil-a today? I heard on the radio about what was going on over at Chic-fil-a!" If you happen to live a typical life such as I, then you probably heard one of these statement today. Drones of people coming out in support of the 'foul' servers. I rolled my eyes, thoughts of dread at the thought that people are now going to associate bigotry with people who believe businesses have the right to run their business their own way. You then hear about what is being planned for Friday, when a counter sign of support for the gay community will take place at Chic-fil-a's across the country in a public display of support with a public display of affection.

What is going on!?! The countries fury over the rights of same sex couples rights versus religious morals will be served up on a kaiser bun and a side of fries. We have everything from small town politicians to Kermit opining on the hateful statements made by Chic-fil-as' COO and President Dan Cathy.

Turns out Gonzo doesn't want you to eat more chicken.

But after talking aloud about how crazy this whole thing was getting, I paused for a minute and realized that I didn't hear this story break, I heard about Lisa Henson reacting as she scoffed at the comments in questions and pulled her companies Muppets from doing business with Chic-fil-a. Then You heard as disapproval poured in from all corners of the world. Tom Menino from Boston, Rahm Emanuel from Chicago, half a dozen celebrities in Hollywood, but you don't hear the statement that dropped this who issue into the fryer. I felt the need to go out and find the specific verbiage that began this torrent of anger;

"We are very much supportive of the family, the biblical definition of the family unit... We are a family owned business, a family led business, and we are married to our first wives. We give God thanks for that."

There it is. My first reaction was at the jab to divorcees with the "first wives" comment. Obviously he is opposed to the idea of same sex marriage, but I guess I was a bit disappointed in the lack of vehemency. Where is the "...and they will burn is hell!" or "... and that is why I am directing our stores to stop hiring and to stop serving to the gays."? It's not there. This is about as plain spoken and simple of a statement in support of traditional marriage as you can get. Now don't get me wrong. It would make me think twice about finally going to the one Chic-fil-a within 50 miles for the first time in about 3 years anytime soon. I have no problem with same sex couples having the opportunity to wed, and look forward to the day when this is no longer greeted with such controversy, but this stance is so far from new or truly controversial. Heck, up until about three weeks ago every president in history has come out in support of traditional marriage.

My point is this. This is someone who nobody knew, talking to a news outlet that I was unfamiliar with until today (and you can ask my boss, I do a lot of web surfing for obscure news stories), about something that has been in the public arena of discussion for decades, why do we give a flying cluck? Now we have Mike Huckabee calling for days of support, a Wendy's franchise owner showing his support, and people coming to the defense of business independence.  Someone out there made a decision to take a statement that would have been forgotten as soon as it was made and turn it into a rallying point for both sides. We live in a country that appears to be pretty 50/50 on this topic, and rather then pushing this to the 98/2 split that I feel is ultimately inevitable by showing the face of homosexuality as people who are just as human as anyone, with the same emotions and wants, someone took the steps that  prompted potentially hundreds of thousands flocking to these less then gourmet restaurants in a sign of solidarity. So I say, poorly played whoever did this, poorly played indeed.