Will Canadian Shoppers Tolerate Target's Anti-Gay Politics?

Attention shoppers: retail giant Target made a mammoth announcement last week, letting folks in Canada know that they just bought the leases of more than 200 Zellers stores. Over the next two years, many of these locations will close down and re-open under the Target name.

It's quite the expansion for Target, as they hope to become not only a giant American retail chain, but a giant chain north of the border, too. But there's a larger question for Canadian shoppers to consider as Target makes this move. As Xtra.ca noted, "How Will Target's Anti-Gay Politics Play in Canada?"

Perhaps that's the $64,000 question. Or, if you will, the $150,000 question, since that's how much Target gave to support the vehemently anti-gay Tom Emmer in his losing gubernatorial race in 2010. Emmer, as many will recall, not only wanted to ban LGBT folks from getting married, but he wanted to ban them from adopting children, too. He also gave money to a ministry that believes it's moral to commit violence toward LGBT people.

Here in the States, Target's anti-gay political donations (which also went beyond just Emmer, to support anti-gay pols like Rep. Michele Bachmann, Sen. Roy Blunt, and Rep. John Kline, among others) have resulted in tens of thousands of people boycotting the store, as well as many others who've joined a Facebook group called Money I Would Have Spent at Target. The goal of both efforts is to show that while giving money to anti-gay politicians might make Target corporate executives happy, it offends LGBT customers who are willing to take their business elsewhere.

Amazingly, Xtra.ca got a hold of a spokesperson from Target to talk about the anti-gay donations here in the States. The reason that's so amazing is because up until now, Target execs have been unwilling to comment on the company's political donations, outside of an August 2010 statement from CEO Gregg Steinhafel, where he apologized if anyone was offended by the donations. (It ended up being a rather hollow apology, because in the weeks and months after Steinhafel's "apology," Target continued to feed money in support of anti-gay politicians.)

But Target spokeswoman Amy Riley said that the company isn't sure whether they'll be supporting political candidates in Canada.

“What we have done is paused, taken the time to think and come up with another process. [As for political donations in Canada], when we go to Canada, we'll take a look at the laws there. We want to be a good corporate citizen,” says Riley.

Good corporate citizen? Well, heck, that's an easy thing for Target to achieve. They could start by refusing to give money to politicians who vote to keep a large chunk of their customer base second class citizens.

Meanwhile, Target caused quite the ruckus yesterday by releasing a Facebook status commemorating Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Target's status: "Martin Luther King Jr. said, 'Life's most persistent and urgent question is, What are you doing for others?’ On this MLK day, how are you using your talents to help those around you?"

Some of the comments are classic, but my favorite is: "Why didn't Target ask themselves that question during the 2010 election when they donated to a man dedicated to hurting an entire population of people -- gays and lesbians in Minnesota?"

Target, perhaps not surprisingly, didn't respond.

Photo credit: robholland