Progressive Pages- Need your feedback!

[fudge stripe cookays]

I just visited DancingBear's thread about wanting to come up with a directory of Repuke businesses to boycott and provide decent progressive alternatives for folks.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=2587076&mesg_id=2587076&page=

I'd like to help any way I can to compile this book.

Here's what I need from ya'll:

Give me the names and approximate locations of any local OK businesses you saw the last year or so with Bush/Cheney signs outside, behind the counters or in windows. Any "I support President Bush and our troops?" or anything equivalent?

Alternately, provide the names and approximate addresses of progressive or Democratic owned or Democratic-supporting businesses you can recommend instead.

Let us know about good AND bad experiences you've had patronizing good or bad businesses all over the state!

Thanks everybody!
Let's hear em!
FSC

[OKNancy]

1. Looks like no one is responding

and I'm glad. If Republicans did this, or if the local Christian community did this I would be outraged. I saw a few businesses, in fact I posted about one, but it is my individual choice to patronize someone or not.

This whole thing gives me the creeps.

[fudge stripe cookays]

2. Fine.

Be outraged. The Christians have already done it. Surprised?

Oklahomans can keep buying from Home Depot, Wal-Mart, and all the other Republican companies, and see their money (in addition to their tax money) financing hate, sexism, homophobia, destruction of the earth, and war.

We'll make our own choices.
FSC

[RoyGBiv]

3. Well ...

I hesitate to do this, but since this individual thread won't fall off the page for some time, I'll go ahead and give my two-cents and risk the flames. Which is to say, I agree.

The main reason I have a problem with this is that it is based on a false assumption, to wit that the political opinions of individual owners and/or employees of a business determine whether that business is a positive or negative influence. Teddy Roosevelt explored something like this with trusts, i.e. the notion of a good trust and a bad trust. Trusts in and of themselves were not bad, but they could be, and it was the bad trusts that needed targeting for regulation.

Furthermore, there are too many opportunities for false assumptions of the observer making their way into such a boycott. I saw a pro-Bush sign on the car of a business I patronize. Does that mean the business is Republican controlled? Does it mean the employees are all Republicans? Or, could the car have belonged to a customer or just one employee? Suppose I saw a sign on a window. Did the business owner put it there? Perhaps an employee did so without the owner's permission. Perhaps a political partisan did it without anyone's permission. IOW, how do you tell?

It's easy to point to Wal-Mart and other businesses as bad influences on our culture and the communities in which they exist. That bad influence may in fact be because the corporate owners are Republicans and run their business as Republicans try to run the country. But, inherently, party politics has little to do with it. I wouldn't care if the company were run by yellowdog Democrats. It is still a blight on many communities for many reasons and should be targeted for a boycott on those grounds alone.

I work for a company with a CEO who is a Democrat and personal friend of John Kerry. The local general manager however is a hard-core Republican. My department manager is a Republican. Most of the people I work with are Democrats. Is this business deserving of a boycott?

Finally, I'll just say that this effort is another form of stereotyping, and I will not participate in it. When I determine which businesses I'll patronize, I look at the whole package and make my own decisions. The business being run by Republicans may or may not weigh in those decisions. Whether it does depends on to what degree the company's business practices are a function of the political opinions the managers and owners hold with which I disagree.

[OKNancy]

4. Big chains..sure

I won't buy from Papa Johns pizza, for example. My objection, and it looks to be yours too, is the local business. The dry cleaner, the diner, etc. If the righties ever did this to me, I would have to declare bankruptcy, since I'm sure in south Tulsa, most of my clients are Repubs.

[nickfaldo7]

5. boycott

I would boycott Big Red Sales. They were selling life-size George Bush cardboard stands during the election. I saw the full-page ads in the Tulsa World.

[OKNancy]

6. LOL

look for my post in this forum

[fudge stripe cookays]

7. Thanks Nick.

It's nice that one person in Oklahoma wants to make a difference. Let me know if you think of any others.

FSC

[melv]

8. Reasors Grocery

All locations in the Tulsa area. They supported and sponsored the "Pro-America Rally" a thinly veiled right wing anger fest hosted by local hate radio host, Michael Delgornio of KFAQ.

[fudge stripe cookays]

9. Gracias, melv!

I'll add em to the stack!

FSC

[RoyGBiv]

10. Excuse me ...

I think it's rather presumptuous of you to assume that because some of us didn't jump on the bandwagon of one idea that we do not want to make a difference.

The list of things I do, both political and not strictly political, to try to change as much of this place as I can for the better is not something I should need list every single time I happen not to like oen idea one person presents. I do these things because I feel I should and don't need to advertise myself. I see many practical problems with the idea you presented here, which I have explained. If you have a different view, please present it rather than obliquely insulting some of us.

Interestingly enough, I personally have been withholding my dollars from many businesses for a very long time from those businesses I know fund causes or work according to a philosophy I think is destructive to the public. I didn't need this election to wake me up to the notion that Big Red, Wal Mart, etc. should not get my business.

I will not get drawn into this game of "my idea is right and anyone who opposes it just doesn't care" with anyone. That in itself is destructive.

[fudge stripe cookays]

11. Well it's rather presumptuous of you...

to assume that because I just started doing this on DU that I haven't been withholding my support from these businesses too. Only now I'm adding to it.

The folks on DU saw a need; I'm helping them fill it.

I'm not saying my idea is right or wrong. Only that the folks who gave me valuable feedback for our list on this forum will make a difference on our list.

You and Nancy responded nastily in your original posts (you even said you were risking getting flamed). You set the tone. I was merely responding to it.

[RoyGBiv]

12. Oh please ...

We responded nastily? How absurd.

Just to spell it out, I suggested I was risking being flamed because at the time I posted, I had already seen more than one post similar to the one I was about to make be drowned in a sea of flames.

Furthermore, that was a nice attempt at turning the tables, but it doesn't wash. Your oblique insult of Nancy and myself was a presumption. My comment about what I do had absolutely nothing to do with you. Again, to spell it out, it's "funny" in a "hmmm" sort of way because I already do what you suggest needs to be done, just not in the way you suggest doing it. The whole "black list" is just a little too McCarthy-esque for my tastes. IOW, I agree with your goal. I don't agree with the method.

My so-called nasty response was practical exploration of the problem with your tactic. You have yet to address that, and until you do, I don't see any sense in continuing the discussion.

OnEdit: If this is what it has come to, progressives setting a bar that demands blind subservience else risk being considered less than concerned (to put it politely), we really are doomed. We've become that which we despise.

[Name removed]

13. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.