Chick fil A Day Wasn't About Free Speech

Yesterday at Chick-fil-A, part of the nation showed up to support either
1) free speech, or
2) the politics of anti-gay-marriage.

But when the mayor of three prominent cities say Chick-fil-A is not welcome in their cities, is it because the mayors have a deep seated belief in social equality, meaning they don't like the politics of a biased company against a large part of their constituency;

or is it really because they don't support free speech?

The Tea Party on Facebook reported, "The National Organization for Marriage, which opposes gay unions, urged a boycott when General Mills and Starbucks came out in favor of same-sex marriage."

So this doesn't seem like a free-speech debate to me. It seems totally politically-centered. Yet I know there must be some who went to a Chick-fil-A to support free speech.

Yet, who was actually saying it was a free speech issue? CNN reported that "now a population already sharply divided over same-sex marriage is collectively less informed about the First Amendment," adding that the Amendment "does not protect you from private individuals' negative reaction to your speech." Exactly. How do you separate the "free speech" from the message contained in it?

The Houston Chronicle said people were showing up to support the anti-gay-marriage view. Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee dubbed it 'Chick Fil A Appreciation Day'. Do you think it was over the issue of free speech? This former Baptist minister-turned-mushy-conservative former Governor, US News.com said, "wrote that he was 'incensed at the vitriolic assaults' made on Chick-fil-A as a result of their stance against gay marriage." Those 'assaults' were not made because someone protested the right to free speech. USA Today.com said he wanted people to "get behind Chick-fil-A as the company takes a stand against same-sex marriage."

The Daily News of Los Angeles said the company's free speech wasn't at issue. Instead, it said, "If it's OK to choose between McDonalds and Jack in the Box based on which clown mascot you like better, it should be OK to choose between Chick-fil-A and its competitors based on the images their logos conjure up."

Well, speaking as a gay man, every person and every company has a right to free speech. And a call for a boycott is never a boycott against their right to say what they want; it's always about the substance of the speech. I will not eat anywhere that is against my natural law right to association-through-government-sanction. The wall of separation between church and state ought to extend also to marriage.

Individual sovereignty means freedom from government interference, and when we are not allowed to legally do what straight people do outside of a church, that is, get a civil marriage rather than a religious one, then there is no separation of church and state for anyone who is not heterosexual.

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