One might then conclude that business explicity Pride is actually done out of some level of general desire show genuine support, even at a slight business cost.
This is a bit cynical but I don’t think companies care at all about pride. There may be individuals pushing for it within the company, but buy and large any time a company pushes for a social issue it is to make themselves look better and strategically pivot to appeal to different age brackets.
In this way I think corporate “pride-washing” is very much akin to green washing, acting like the company is carbon neutral or reducing emissions or whatever, when they just want people to feel better about buying their product that everyone knows is harmful. Plastic recycling, green ETFs and “clean” natural gas all fall under this category.
Profit decline due to these efforts is probably exaggerated, too, because people always conveniently ignore their moral values when buying products. We always hear about how horrid Nestle is, or how unethical the mining process is for our phone batteries, but look around and everyone still buys these things.
I agree with you, companies only care as far as their bottom line goes. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that doing pride displays and showing support, even in superficial support, is a bad thing. And there is no such thing as moral consumption under capitalism, and the only solution is to move towards a more worker centric society and eliminate exploitation from these industries. It starts with how you use your vote and your voice, we should advocate for more people to get involved and active.
Correct, but if you read the article it illustrates the incentives are different when the company is already an LGBT ally, revoking support is more detrimental to the bottom line.
You’re making an assumption though – that the 61% wouldn’t mind if they explicitly banned Pride stuff.
I’d say I’m in the 61% – I wouldn’t go to a store because of supporting Pride, but I would avoid a store that explicitly supports bigotry and hate.
So chasing those supposed 25% could mean both the 13% who supports it and chunks of the 61% would actively avoid that store.
This is just one side of the story though. It doesn’t account for people that won’t support a store because it’s seen as “pride unfriendly” or people that will boycott a store after giving in to the crazies and removing pride stuff.
I support pride but That actually shows it is in stores best interest not too support.it 61% don’t care you will get them any way.
So then you have a choice between 13% who support pride or 25% who don’t, if store is just beholden to profit then they will chase the 25
Break out the KKK shirts and the Fuck Your Feeling mugs, we’re in this for maximum profit!!1!
One might then conclude that business explicity Pride is actually done out of some level of general desire show genuine support, even at a slight business cost.
As a gay guy myself, I rather appreciate it.
This is a bit cynical but I don’t think companies care at all about pride. There may be individuals pushing for it within the company, but buy and large any time a company pushes for a social issue it is to make themselves look better and strategically pivot to appeal to different age brackets.
In this way I think corporate “pride-washing” is very much akin to green washing, acting like the company is carbon neutral or reducing emissions or whatever, when they just want people to feel better about buying their product that everyone knows is harmful. Plastic recycling, green ETFs and “clean” natural gas all fall under this category.
Profit decline due to these efforts is probably exaggerated, too, because people always conveniently ignore their moral values when buying products. We always hear about how horrid Nestle is, or how unethical the mining process is for our phone batteries, but look around and everyone still buys these things.
I agree with you, companies only care as far as their bottom line goes. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that doing pride displays and showing support, even in superficial support, is a bad thing. And there is no such thing as moral consumption under capitalism, and the only solution is to move towards a more worker centric society and eliminate exploitation from these industries. It starts with how you use your vote and your voice, we should advocate for more people to get involved and active.
Correct, but if you read the article it illustrates the incentives are different when the company is already an LGBT ally, revoking support is more detrimental to the bottom line.
You’re making an assumption though – that the 61% wouldn’t mind if they explicitly banned Pride stuff.
I’d say I’m in the 61% – I wouldn’t go to a store because of supporting Pride, but I would avoid a store that explicitly supports bigotry and hate.
So chasing those supposed 25% could mean both the 13% who supports it and chunks of the 61% would actively avoid that store.
This is just one side of the story though. It doesn’t account for people that won’t support a store because it’s seen as “pride unfriendly” or people that will boycott a store after giving in to the crazies and removing pride stuff.