My sons love Doritos. Jesse is a Nachos Doritos guy, and Jason, always his own man, loves the Ranch flavored.
I love the It Gets Better Project. They have provided inspiration and tangible help for teens at risk for suicide. It is a cause that no one in their right mind could be against. Yes, Mike Huckabee, you can take that for all it’s worth — you’re an idiot.
The recent campaign in which Doritos sold bags of rainbow chips to raise money for the It Gets Better Project brought smiles across our household. The campaign went well and before we could get on the computer to order our special bag, it was over. Sold out.
Mike Huckabee, a financial wizard of the Bigotry Industry has stepped in to demonize the efforts however. Huckabee does this under the guise of being “Christian.” He claims that Christianity is important to him. Unfortunately, few have done so much harm to the true precepts of Christianity as has Mike Huckabee. I would go so far as to say that Huckabee is to the heart of Christ what Judas Iscariot was to Jesus. He betrays it with a kiss.
The Huckabee Hate Rainbow: No matter what Christian value he tramples, whether it is abuse of children, incest, dereliction of duty or feeding a rich man’s greed, Mike Huckabee is for it, as long as it is anti-gay.
A rich man donates to hate, Huckabee organizes a campaign to make him richer. A homophobe incest abuser is found out, Huckabee rationalizes away all he has done. A woman dishonors her office and tries to humiliate loving families, mocking them for wanting to be married, and there is Huckabee holding her hand in front of a stolen rock anthem. Now, Huckabee is attacking an organization that has saved the lives of thousands of teens. All of this done under the banner of “Christianity.” If you believe him, Huckabee press has gutted the soul of Christ of its love and compassion and replaced it with bigotry and homophobia.
“Meet your new sick partner,” Huckabee sends to Doritos, framing the It Gets Better Project as a “hate group.” As he does so, he tweets to his legion “Stand by me,” otherwise translated as “send money.”
How does Huckabee justify this categorization of an organization that is so profoundly good as being something so heinously bad? Two words: Dan Savage.
Dan Savage loathes Huckabee. Dan Savage is also famous for loathing Rick Santorum. Both those men, and others who have received Savage scorn deserve exactly what they got. Dan’s tactics are not gentle, nor are they the type that will be discussed at the family dinner table. Dan Savage is the LGBTQ version of Donald Rumsfield. He embraces “Shock and Awe.” He seeks to appall and disgust the card-carrying homophobes to their pearl-clutching cores. He succeeds.
Savage made a recording, not for the faint of heart, that turns a Savage/Huckabee handshake into a sexual chronicle would make even the most sexually free go “Ewww.” For the sexually repressed, it just makes their head explode. You can see what I meanhere. Of course, taking that piece of Savage’s work and equating it to what is being done at the It Gets Better Project, is like taking mainstream Christianity and comparing it to this.
Exploding heads are a good thing for Huckabee. He has long learned that when a homophobe gets irate, he or she goes for their wallet. So as Kim Davis no longer is of use to him, he has now taken aim at the corn chip.
As he does, so have I, in my own letter to Doritos.
Dear Doritos,
It was with great joy that my family and I saw your latest campaign “There is nothing BOLDER than being yourself” campaign. I am happy for your success and the contribution you have made to the It Gets Better Project.
That success is not without cost, obviously. You have earned the vitriol of the people of a certain mindset, particularly those who are followers of Mike Huckabee.
Huckabee has publicly addressed you and attempted to integrate your campaign with an attack made on him by Dan Savage. The two events are non-sequiturs.
While Dan Savage came up with the idea for the “It Gets Better” inspiration to save lives, his editorials and the It Gets Better Project organization are unrelated entities.
That Huckabee does not understand the Savage piece about him is irrelevant to your efforts. Huckabee missed Savage’s intent on the recording. Savage has an in-your-face X-rated style undisputedly. He sought to show that homophobic oppression is as vile and disgusting to families such as mine as descriptive sexual concepts are to Huckabee.
There is a big difference between the harm of Huckabee’s rhetoric and that of Savage, however. While Huckabee may be shocked at Savage’s tone and verbiage, Huckabee’s parents will not walk in finding him cutting himself or reaching for narcotics. Huckabee’s loved ones will not wake to find out that he had gotten up early that morning and stepped in front of a train.
The victims of Huckabee have done exactly those things, and it is to them that the It Gets Better Project makes its outreach.
So thank you for your small campaign. I am confident that the viral stir it has made within progressive circles will help drive your business up. The backlash you are getting from those on the other side will die down. As they write out their protests on their Apple devices, post them on Facebook, they will soon be informed that both those entities have been far more LGBT community progressive than Frito Lay has been able to be.
While this note is a “thank you” letter, I actually mean it to be a letter of request.
Eat your own chips. More specifically, please take your own campaign slogan to heart. You encourage the eaters of your limited run colored chips to be BOLD.
Please, Doritos, be bold yourself. Put your rainbow chips in wide circulation. Don’t just let this be a limited campaign for the benefit of social media and a single check to the It Gets Better Project.
Let this be a message that American families see on each trip to the grocery store. Let the teen who is contemplating suicide because they fear the homophobic reaction of the world around them, that Mike Huckabee would prefer they live in, see the chips that tell them they are not alone.
As Huckabee tries to hijack the narrative and choke us all with homophobia, grab it back, and take it to the next level.
Do it. Be BOLD.
Huckabee’s hate then won’t have a chance. The mass crunching on a global scale will drown it out as a new brand of love hits the scene… one with a hint of spice, cheese and a kicky chili flavor.
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