The Right-Wing Outrage Generator Tries To Cancel Cracker Barrel

OMG...another reliably "family-friendly" restaurant chain goes "woke"

Better a marvelheaded idiot than a marbleheaded bigot.

• Abhijit Naskar, Honor He Wrote: 100 Sonnets For Humans Not Vegetables

How is it that the hateful and bigoted Rabid Right have co-opted “family-friendly” as if the term was invented expressly for them? They use “family-friendly” to mean “LGTBQ-exclusionary” like it’s a badge of honor. To them, “family-friendly” means hating and excluding the LGBTQ community from anything “good” and “decent” people would want to partake in.

Why? ‘Cuz it’s all about the children, don’tchaknow?

If the haters, bigots, and homophobes were to be anything resembling honest with themselves and the rest of us, they’d just admit that THEY’RE the ones who hate the gays. Their kids, left to their own devices, could probably care less. Sure, they’ll learn to hate soon enough, because their parents will drill it into them, but children don’t exit the womb as haters, bigots, or homophobes. They have to be taught to hate.

Unfortunately, some folks are no longer sufficiently hateful for good, God-fearing, White Conservative Christian heterosexual patriots.

Thus, “Cracker Barrel has fallen.” As in, they don’t hate gays enough.

Ain’t that a bitch?

After the southern-style chain posted that “everyone is welcome” during Pride month, the Texas Family Project (TFP) stated: “We take no pleasure in reporting that Cracker Barrel has fallen.

“A once family-friendly establishment has caved to the mob.”

The Tennessee-based company showing support for Pride month has come as a surprise to many, having once been known as an anti-LGBTQ+ business.

The chain was criticised in the early 1990s for dismissing several workers based on their sexuality. In 1991, the New York Times reported that Cracker Barrel had announced gay employees would be fired as it goes against its “concept of traditional American values”. 

The policy was soon reversed, and the company attempted to repair its image with the queer community. It currently rates 80 out of 100 on the Human Rights Campaign’s Corporate Equality Index.

Too bad, so sad; apparently, the “family” in “Texas Family Project” rough translates to “hatred, bigotry, and homophobia.” Because, if you think about it, those do seem to be the values that some Texas parents are hoping to pass along to their young ‘uns.

If you’re not a White Conservative Christian heterosexual and you ain’t got Jesus, YOU AIN’T SHIT!!!

In its attempt to be more inclusive, Cracker Barrel has succeeded in pissing off the hater/bigot/homophobe community, who evidently believe that the company isn’t sufficiently dismissive of those who are “anti-family.”

Of course, “family” has nothing to do with hatred, bigotry, OR homophobia, yet that’s exactly the connection the Texas Family Project (TFP) is attempting to make. And from where I sit, that’s pretty pathetic.

The problem for TFP is that they fail to understand that family is about accepting those who may be different despite how one may feel about those differences. One doesn’t necessarily have to condone or like that another person is LGBTQ, but that doesn’t come with the right to condemn that person.

I can disagree or perhaps even dislike another person, and still find common ground with them. Even if you disapprove of someone’s lifestyle or who/how they love, it’s their choice, not yours. Of course, you’re free to take your business elsewhere if you’re not comfortable being around LGBTQ people, and I’d say only that I feel sorry for you.

What you don’t have is the right to condemn others who happen to open doors for those who are LGBTQ. That’s their decision to make and their right to do so. You don’t have to agree with that choice, but that’s where it ends. You have no right to enforce your prejudice on other individuals or organizations.

Then again, this is a free country, and dumbasses are gonna dumbass, knowhutimean??

Texas Family Project was clearly unhappy about this growth, tweeting: “Places kids don’t belong: Gender clinics, drag shows, Cracker Barrel.”

Predictably, people wasted no time mocking the dismay of right-wing diners, with one Twitter user claiming “‘Cracker Barrel has fallen’ might be the funniest sentence ever composed using the English language.”

Vlogger and author Hank Green, who is currently undergoing treatment for cancer, joked: “Me: ‘I gotta stop participating in the ridiculousness of modern discourse’. 

“Me two hours later: ‘Do you think they’d let me get a “Cracker Barrel has Fallen” tattoo between chemo treatments?’”

One Twitter user praised the chain’s support of the LGBTQ+ community and progression since the 1990s, recounting: “Couple years ago a Cracker Barrel executive was talking to me and my wife, and we were like, ‘it makes us nervous to go there as queers idk’, and the executive reached into their bag and gave us a stack of meal vouchers and said, ‘when we say everyone is welcome, we mean it’.”

When I lived in Texas, I didn’t feel comfortable going to Cracker Barrel. I knew of their reputation for being anti-LGBTQ, and I wasn’t sure that supporting such a business was the right thing to be doing.

Since then, however, Cracker Barrel management has made it clear that everyone is welcome, and from a business standpoint that only makes sense. Why would a business hoping to make a profit only allow certain types of customers to patronize it? Non-white and LGBTQ dollars are every bit as legal tender as White Conservative Christian heterosexual dollars. If the holier-than-thou brigade has a problem with that, that’s on them.

And TFP’s “Cracker Barrel Has Fallen” has become an unintentional meme that’s being used as a fundraiser, something that can’t be sitting well with the self-righteous ninnies at TFP.

The meme has even reached merch-status, with the Disaster Girls podcast announcing that they had made a series of ‘Cracker Barrel Has Fallen’ products, with profits going to drag charity Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence.

The criticism to the restaurant’s post mirrors several attempts by right-wingers to boycott LGBTQ+ inclusive brands in recent months, with Bud Light, Nike, Doritos and the Disney Channel apparently all off-limits due to adverts and campaigns supporting the queer community. 

Cracker Barrel has not yet responded to criticism of its post. However, it did thank a poster who complimented it, saying it takes pride in creating a “welcoming, safe atmosphere”. 

I can only speak for myself, but it does seems as if bigots and haters like TFP are spending WAY too much time, energy, and brain cells trying to maintain the illusion that they’re better than the LGBTQ community. The reality, of course, is that they’re not better, and while they’re free to their opinions, we all know what opinions are like, right?

Right.

So, no; Cracker Barrel hasn’t fallen, except in the eyes of a few haters and homophobes who believe that “family” is a four-letter word. That only proves that the holier-than-thou folks at TFP have no understanding of what “family” really means.

Perhaps it’s time they got their own house in order before they waste time and energy on how a restaurant chain is treating others. They might learn one very basic truth: Love is easy. Hate is hard to maintain, and it requires far more effort and energy. Even worse, it can be toxic and corrosive to one’s soul.

Love? It take no effort, little energy, and it’s easy to maintain over the long haul. It’s something the good, God-fearing White Conservative Christian heterosexuals at the Texas Family Project could stand to learn.

Because love always wins.