liz_marcs | Fuck the homophobic assholes at Tim Hortons. I'm staying with Dunkin Donuts.

Skip to Main Content

Current Mood: annoyed

Fuck the homophobic assholes at Tim Hortons. I'm staying with Dunkin Donuts.

Tim Hortons just got caught co-sponsoring an anti-equality marriage event in Rhode Island.

Rhode Island, as you know, is the lone New England hold out on legalizing same-sex marriage, primarily because the Catholic Church still have way too much sway over politicians in that state. Although, to be fair to Rhode Island, it does recognize same-sex marriage licenses issues in other states, which means there's a weird situation where gay people in Rhode Island go to Connecticut or Massachusetts to get married and then return home with a marriage certificate Rhode Island will recognize, but won't issue for itself.

The event was sponsored by the excretable National Organization for Marriage (NOM) — aka, the "Gay people should stay in the closet because they're icky" group — which really is a national anti-gay rights organization. According to the Blue Mass blog, it appears that NOM has a butt-buddy in the Tim Hortons organization.

In my mind, that makes Tim Hortons look worse.

Needless to say, Canadians frown on companies who get into bed with American right-wing religious wack-a-loons. The resulting uproar resulted in Tim Hortons pulling out of sponsorship of the event. (Tim Hortons has some store fronts in southern Rhode Island, just in case you're wondering why the company did something stupid like sticking its snout in a Rhode Island issue.)

Well, now that I know what kind of company Tim Hortons is, it appears that I will be sticking with Dunkin Donuts for the foreseeable future.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Know what would be awesome? If a whole bunch of married gay couples (and gay couples with children) attended that event to celebrate their marriage and family.

The terrible thing (association with Tim Horton's aside) is, I see the acronym for the organisation, and then visualise people (read 4chan) going to the event with lolcat placards.

Pandas are too cuddly. How about lizards eating insects, or swine at the trough? (I know... not kind. But these zipper-sniffers really irritate me.)

True, but I still cannot see "NOM" without thinking of icanhazcheezeburger and laughing inside despite the actual content.

Oh, yeah. Between that and the 'teabaggers,' these hatemongers really manage to show themselves as idiots.

There are no Tim Horton's in my neck of the woods, so it's a moot point for me. But if they responded to pressure to pull out should one continue to boycott? Doesn't that defeat the power of the boycott?

I guess it's a matter of principles. If, an organisation, who clearly states in it's charter that it will not support certain functions that are political/religious/etc in nature, then go ahead and do so, and only pull out upon complaint, then wouldn't boycotting only during that period be saying "We don't like that single decision you made, but now that we caught you and you've unmade it, we're friends again"?

If there hadn't been complaint, would they have realised that it was against their charter and withdrawn by themselves? Or would they have happily continued to support NOM.

The boycott should be there to state "We, your customers, do not like the way you have dealt with this issue, and you will need to re-earn our trust in you.". The trust should not be automatically returned upon receipt of issue.

I'm not as informed as I should be. Was this an isolated incident, or part of a pattern? If it's an isolated incident, possibly even a simple mistake, pushed through by one jerk in the organization then the organization as a whole should not be penalized once they have made it right. Depending on what the definition of making it right is.

I admit I'm speaking more from a general standpoint than a specific one, in regards to boycotting.

However, it doesn't mean that the screening for such sponsoring shouldn't perhaps be looked more closely at. If TH state "We will in future check more closely sponsorships before committing", then perhaps that's more of what should be happening, instead of just recanting and doing no more.

It sounds as though there's one asshat in the organization.. the thing to do is see what disciplinary action is taken against him. I would hope firing.

The Tim Horton's organization in Canada immediately repudiated the sponsorship, apologized, and said the franchisee did this against company policy. So I'm actually pleased with the company. I would certainly not patronize the specific franchise that did the sponsoring, but I think the parent organization responded promptly and properly.

I'm a Dunkin gal myself, and there aren't any Tim Horton's near me, but I don't see this as a reason to boycott the company as a whole.

Ermm. Kinda wondering "what kind of company you know Tim Horton's is".

The Blue Mass allegation of an insider connection appears to be unsubstatiated; even so, that's a long way short of "butt buddy".

The CBC news story says TH HQ was called on it, said you're right, we shouldn't be involved in this, so we won't be. Granted, they did fall short of saying so-and-so screwed up, and doesn't work for us any more. But really, what do you want them to do?

BTW, even though TH something of a Canadian icon, it's currently a subsidiary of a US firm (so yes, it's all you USAnians' fault). They're trying to fix that, too.

Oh, Tim Hortons, you seriously dropped the ball on this one. Canada isn't gonna like you so much anymore!

...

While this was definitely wrong and I'm sure Tim's will get yelled at massively here (seriously, after the mess of American groups poking their wallets into the anti-gay marriage debate here, there's not much tolerance for that kind of crap), I'm not seeing how one man's decision translates to the entire company being homophobic assholes or butt-buddies of NOM. Particularly since it seems that once the execs found out what was going on they put an end to it.

There was a news story not too long ago - I didn't save the url because it was just a 'that's interesting' -- saying the parent organization in Canada (whose donuts have gone downhill since Wendy's bought it) is buying back its franchise back.

Some gay-friendly gesture from TH would be a good idea, but really, this does sound like a stupid decision at a local level, not a corporate policy.

I've never been to a Tim Horton's, but I will make sure not to go to one in the future. D:

:( As a Canadian, i will say that I fully believe that this was an oversight/screw up on their part, not something that reflects on Tim Horton's as a whole - maybe the owner of the franchisee is a homophobic ass, but Tim Horton's is a pretty good company in general, having grown up with them. I wouldn't let this cast a pall over the whole company.

I try to avoid most fast food/chain restaurants and support local indie businesses--so I would probably never go to one anyway. But I certainly will avoid ever going to one in Rhode Island.

Considering there was about one Dunkin Donuts location per square block in the Boston area when I lived there, you should be covered for your donut and coffee needs, at least.

Don't forget that Tim Hortons is now in the US thanks to it's partnership/merger with Wendy's.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only