The world sure has changed from the time of Enlightenment thinkers such as Voltaire. Gone are the days where we can disagree without being disagreeable and without forcing (or threatening to force) others to accept our premises.
Of course, I’m referring to the reactions from some of the Statists we live amongst in regards to Chick-fil-A’s “southern values” stance on same-sex marriage (if you haven’t heard, they are opposed to it) which are laughable at best, scary at worst. The Democrats’ love affair with Statism was on full display when a few prominent mayors (including Thomas Menino of Boston, Rahm Emanuel of Chicago, and Vincent C. Gray of Washington, D.C.) gave serious thought to banning this establishment in their cities simply because they are opposed the beliefs of the company’s CEO, Dan Cathy. Mayor Gray took to twitter that Chick-fil-A is "hate chicken." Mayor Emanuel oddly lamented “Chick-fil-A’s values are not Chicago’s values.” Assuming that's true (which seems impossible considering the vast diversity of Chicagoans), so what? Freedom entails that individuals with various value-systems coexist free from the coercion of others. Not to mention the sheer arrogance on their parts to believe that them being elected mayor grants them the power to enforce any one particular value system on the city. The role of mayor is to ensure the rights of the citizens are protected at the city level. That’s it.
But more than that, this is a great example of the danger of embracing the belief that corporations are not people. Accepting this false premise means that it’s acceptable to initiate force against them, to silence them, even to ban them from a particular area, because only people have rights. The odd thing about this view is that inanimate objects do not hold political views nor do they voice opinions. Of course corporations are people! A corporation is a group of people coming together for a common business purpose. The fact that people join groups (be they a corporation, a charity, a reading/study group, and even a society) does not negate one’s rights as an individual. The reality is that one neither gains nor loses his rights by assembling with others.
The other bizarre thing about this whole controversy is that months ago, President Barack Obama was on the record as being opposed to same-sex marriage. Mayor Emanuel, who oddly enough was President Obama’s Chief of Staff before being elected mayor, never once said that President Obama does not reflect American values or that President Obama was full of "hate." Another fact one should remain cognizant of is that Chick-fil-A has consistently held this view. This is nothing new. It's clear to me that, once again, all this is just a ploy by the left to further distract from the fact that the policies of our Statist president are crumbling our economy and bringing this country to its knees.
On a final note, I couldn’t agree more with the beliefs of Voltaire. I absolutely disapprove of the stance that Chick-fil-A’s CEO has taken, but I defend his right to hold such beliefs and I denounce any political figure who would dare to even suggest using force, threats, and intimidation to silence him. At the end of the day, the beauty of the free market is that if you do not like the policies and views of a business, you are free not to patronize such venue. It’s just that simple. Live and let live to prosper.
