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Loading ...Neff: Thank Campbells for not giving in
The American Family Association is asking its members to send a condensed letter of outrage to the world’s first makers of condensed soup.
Campbell advertising in The Advocate fueled the AFA campaign. The ads featured a recipe for a butternut squash bisque made with Swanson chicken broth and depicted a lesbian couple and their young son in the kitchen, at “home for the holidays.”The last line of ad copy read, “This holiday season, serve a special meal no matter the size and structure of your family. The secret is Swanson.”
The tone of the AFA form letter, posted on the organization’s Web site, is simmering rather than boiling:
“I am disappointed that Campbell Soup has decided to help promote the homosexual agenda and same-sex marriage. Your decision to support the homosexual agenda and same-sex marriage is unacceptable. I will alert my family and friends about your decision. Campbell Soup will no longer have an image of a clean and wholesome, all-American company. Now it will be known as the company which believes homosexual practice and same-sex marriage are good for our country.”
I’m pretty sure the group still would have objected had the ad contained a recipe for good old-fashioned chicken and rice.
Yes, the AFA doesn’t think Campbell’s is so M’m! M’m! Good!
I briefly went through a period of annoyance with Campbell’s, not over advertising but because the company’s Curly Noodle soup is so m’m good yet I couldn’t find a can in any grocery store within 20 miles of my apartment. I know, you’re thinking what’s the difference between Campbell’s Curly Noodle and Campbell’s Chicken Noodle? Well, I’ll tell you, there is a vast difference.
Curly Noodle contains curly noodles.
I was and still am a Campbell Kid. I was having a good day at school when I opened my lunch box and found hot soup and a Hostess Ding Dong instead of a bologna sandwich and a Little Debbie snack cake. I was having a perfect snow day with school closed when I trudged home from a snowball fight or sledding for hot soup with my mom.
Andy Warhol, as if you didn’t know, was a Campbell Kid too, but perhaps not as enthusiastic as I.
“I used to drink it,” he was quoted as saying. “I used to have the same lunch every day, for 20 years, I guess, the same thing over and over again.”
In fact, a lot of people going back a lot of generations can probably say they were Campbell Kids and probably are now Swanson on-the-go adults, as maybe still Campbell Kids at heart. At the last potluck I attended, probably half the dishes on the table contained a Campbell product of some sort, including four green-bean casseroles made with cream of mushroom soup.
The AFA did not call for a boycott of Campbell Soup, but some of its members probably made up their minds not to stuff their turkeys with dressing made with Swanson broth.
And then, there are the letters — easily fired off from the AFA Web site to Campbell corporate in Camden, N.J.
So it seems appropriate that we let Campbell know that while the AFA stews, we dine.
Take time for a hot lunch today.
And while you go searching for G, L, B, T in a bowl of Campbell Kids Alphabet Soup, pen a letter to Campbell Soup president Donald Conant (douglas_r_conant@campbellsoup.com).
Tell him you are pleased the company did not let the AFA bully it into pulling advertising in The Advocate. Tell him you appreciate that the company earned a 100-percent ranking in the Human Rights Campaign’s corporate index. Tell him you grew up a Campbell Kid.
And please, tell him to make more Curly Noodle.
Compassionate Christians and Americans are asking its members to send a condensed letter of support to the world’s first makers of condensed soup.
I am disappointed that the AFA has decided to lead the religious right-wing agenda of discrimination and hate towards people who are different from them. Your decision to support this straight agenda of being discompassionate unlike your leader, Jesus, is an unacceptable display of what it is to be a christian. I will alert my compassionate, straight family and friends about your decision. Campbell Soup will continue to have an image of a clean, christian-like, wholesome and loving company which believes that we are all created equal.
Now tell me; do members of the AFA regularly read the Advocate??
My extremely positive e-mail has been sent to Campbell’s. Ya know, maybe I’m over-emotional but when I read something like this it brings tears to my eyes.
Great column Lisa, as always (yours and Jennifers are the main reason I still read/respond to these blogs!)
I’ve sent along an e-mail to Mr. Conant and I’m hopeful that our appreciation will more than offset the sad efforts of the AFA.
Once corporations stop pandering to these fringe groups, we’ll all be better off.
Good news that not every company can be bullied. However, I will not be running out to find that curly noodle soup.
Campbells soup is full of chemicals and salt, and shouldn’t be a staple in anyone’s diet.
Ms. Neff, I’m surprised you went to a pot luck with lots of campbells’ products….how fifty’s. I thought we were still reliving the 70’s! Must be way ahead of us in South Florida.
OK, in all seriousness, thanks for pointing this out. Again, too bad they don’t make much that I would dare serve my family.
I’m glad Campbell’s has stood firm. I also…I just don’t get what’s going on in people who have so much time to get so worked up over something so minor. OK, so the god squad get some notion that the “traditional family” is endangered–what does it say that somebody feels that a chicken-broth ad with a lesbian couple is an existential threat? I wonder if it’s just bigotry, or if it’s full-on religious ideation, because it sure as hell looks like some of these people could do with an in-patient stay to address their fixation.
Letter sent!
I have sent a letter of support to Campbell’s. It’s bad enough that the AFA thinks we are unworthy of equal rights; now they apparently think we are unworthy of food as well.
I wonder who in the AFA takes the time to read all the LGBT magazines looking for major brands that they can boycott. I’m sure the person who’s on the mailing list gets a lot of crap….
Letter sent!
I wonder what kind of person who’s job it is at the AFA to read through all the LGBT magazines, just to look for major brands to boycott. Would it an individuals address or a “company” address on those mailing lists? Either way I’m sure they get a lot of crap from their counterparts.
I also wonder if anyone with that job has changed their mind after reading some of the substance in the magazines? You can find some good articles in any of them…..
I sent an email in support of Campbell’s. Go do the same.
e-mail sent
I had no idea that haters like that read GLBT magazines and other media forms of reading. Imagion that. Something tells me that they look at GLBT media forms just to have something to complain about. But I don’t think I’m the only person that thinks so.
I’m not sure about the soup because I never had squash before, but hey, it must be pretty good. I guess Campbells soup is only for open-mind, diverse, and kind indvidiuals. More chunky soup and low sodium soup for me!
Letter sent (from Canada)
Um, why is the AFA reading mags that are … well more or less for the glbt community? I think I’d be pushing it a bit far if I said (with all due respect) that they were self-hating closet queens. But then stranger things have happened.