Campbell's Soup and Its Michigan Partner that Thinks Gays are Psychologically Disordered

by Michael Jones · 2010-07-27 09:30:00 UTC
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Meet Request Foods. They're a food business out of Holland, Michigan that works with a bevy of companies to help package and market prepared foods. They also happen to be a company that is "dedicated to placing priority on Christian principles in every aspect of our business." Sounds nice and cuddly, until you peel pack the company's political work, which includes feverishly working hard to keep discrimination against gays and lesbians alive and well in Michigan.

Request Foods joined with the Family Research Council this past week to take an advertisement out in Holland, Michigan's local paper. At issue is the fact that Holland, Michigan is debating an anti-discrimination ordinance that would add sexual orientation and gender identity to the town's nondiscrimination laws. That does not please Request Foods at all, and their advertisement pulls no punches when it comes to blasting the gay community.

The advertisement is offensive on almost every level. It (1) makes the case that people can change their sexual orientation, (2) suggests that gays and lesbians are psychologically disordered, (3) says that gay rights is not a civil rights issue, and (4) argues that gay people never face discrimination.

Again, much like Target and their support for an anti-gay candidate in Minnesota, it looks like retail business sure makes for some strange bedfellows. But in the case of Campbell's Soup, which has received plaudits from LGBT activists for their gay-friendly marketing, it seems beyond frustrating that they would cut a contract deal with a business like Request Foods. Request Foods goes beyond just a company with socially conservative beliefs. They're now spending their capital to try and influence legislation that, if not passed, would keep discrimination against gays and lesbians perfectly legal in Holland, Michigan.

Maybe it's time to send Campbell's Soup a message, urging the company to distance themselves from the anti-gay actions of Request Foods, and throw their collective support behind the Holland, Michigan anti-discrimination ordinance.

As Pride Source notes, the advertisement paid for by Request Foods and the Family Research Council (who themselves have previously called on homosexuality to be criminalized) ran in the July 23 issue of The Holland Sentinel. Here are (among many) some of the biggest lies included in the Request Foods/Family Research Council advertisement:

  • Asking the question of whether "homosexuality is a civil rights issue," the Request Foods/Family Research Council ad says: "Let's not grant special protection to voluntary sexual behaviors that are actually harmful to individuals and to society."

  • On the question of whether people can be cured of homosexuality: "Thousands of men and women have testified to experiencing a change in their sexual orientation from homosexual to heterosexual. Research confirms that such change does occur - sometimes spontaneously, and sometimes as a result of therapeutic interventions."

  • On the mental health of gays and lesbians: "Homosexuals experience considerably higher levels of mental illness and substance abuse than heterosexuals. A detailed review of the research has shown that no other group of comparable size in society experiences such intense and widespread pathology."

Gay people are pathological? We can spontaneously change our sexual orientation? Our "behavior" is harmful to society?

And Campbell's Soup is tied to this company through a 10-year, contractual deal? Why would Campbell's Soup want to partner with a company like this, that clearly wants to see gays and lesbians denied civil rights and treated as if they're diseased or (in Request Foods' own words) "pathological?"

Send Campbell's Soup a message now.  This type of partnership not only betrays their stand on corporate diversity, but it legitimates a company that believes homosexuality is disordered, that gay people can change their sexual orientation, and that gay people are a threat to society.

Photo credit: tanjila

Michael Jones is a Change.org Editor. He has worked in the field of human rights communications for a decade, most recently for Harvard Law School.

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