Posted by Morbo
Across the country, outraged fundamentalist Christians are threatening to boycott Target stores because the Minneapolis-based chain has excluded Salvation Army bell-ringers from its establishments this holiday season.
Target officials say they don’t allow other groups to solicit in its stores, and they no longer want to make an exception for the Salvation Army.
Salvation Army solicitors and their red bells are a familiar sight this time of year. You might be tempted to toss some spare change in their kettles. Morbo urges you to think twice.
The Salvation Army is a religious denomination that holds to a rigidly fundamentalist worldview. To the Army, gay people are misguided and in need of religious conversion. Similarly, alcoholics, the homeless and others in trouble could use a dose of that old-time religion.
Despite this militantly fundamentalist outlook, the Salvation Army is adept at tapping the public treasury. It runs taxpayer-financed social services in many parts of the country. The problem is, it wants to take your tax support and still run programs rife with fundamentalist religion.
In 2001, The Washington Post reported that Salvation Army officials had arranged a backroom deal with the Bush administration: In exchange for funding and the right to discriminate in hiring, the Army would issue a high-profile endorsement of the “faith-based” initiative.
In other words, the Salvation Army wants to take your tax dollars yet still retain the right to fire you or anyone else if that person fails to meet certain religious criteria. Not only could non-Christians be fired, but so could gay people, single moms and virtually anyone who fails to measure up to the Army’s moral standards.
This is no academic concern. Real people are affected. In New York City, 18 current and former Salvation Army employees are suing the group, asserting that they were subjected to intrusive questioning about their religious practices and sex lives — even though many of the Army’s programs are funded by the taxpayer.
The crackdown came after a new Salvation Army official took over the New York operations and decided to make them more “Christian.” Some employees said they feared the information was being collected so the group could purge non-Christian and gay workers.
Morbo says the Salvation Army gave up its right to discriminate when it began supping at the federal trough. There are plenty of groups that help people in need without imposing religion on them or subjecting employees to narrow religious qualifications. Skip the red kettles and give your change to these groups this holiday season.
And keep shopping at Target. The chain is going to need some backbone to stand up to the Religious Right. Plus, its prices really are rock bottom! Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, it’s not Wal-Mart! (This has been a non-compensated endorsement.)