AFA: Home Depot 'Digging In' On Pro-LGBT Causes

The home improvement culture wars are hell.

On one side, we have Home Depot, who appear to want to be on the right side of history. They have adapted policies supporting LGBT rights and diversity (including same-sex marriage), and they even sponsor gay pride events.

OH NOES!

On the other side, we have Lowe's. If you recall, Lowe's pulled ads from the reality show 'All American Muslim' after caving to pressure from the Florida Family Association and supporters. (Home Depot did not.)

In addition to showing their colors on the issue of religious and ethnic diversity, Lowe's doesn't fare so well on LGBT equality either. Lowes scored a 30 on the Human Rights Campaign's 'Corporate Equality Index (PDF),' which ranks workplaces on LGBT equality. Home Depot, on the other hand, scored an 85.

The American Family Association, the SPLC-designated hate group masquerading as a 'pro-family' non-profit, issued a boycott of Home Depot back in 2010 due to their decision "to sponsor and participate in numerous gay pride parades and festivals. Most grievous is The Home Depot's deliberately exposing small children to lascivious displays of sexual conduct by homosexuals and cross-dressers, which are a common occurrence at these events."

While the AFA crowed just weeks ago that Home Depot appeared to be silently caving to the pressure from the AFA boycott (the AFA also asks that supporters 'pray for Home Depot Chairman Frank Blake to make wise decisions regarding his company's direction'), it appears that now the AFA believes Home Depot is doubling down.

Randy Sharp, AFA's director of special projects:

"Once we brought that to light, Home Depot made a public statement to everyone who contacted them and said [essentially] 'No, we haven't changed any policies. When it comes to homosexuality, homosexual marriage in our culture, we will continue to support it financially.'"

According to Sharp, Home Depot is breaking its own written policies by giving to homosexual events.

"Home Depot has a policy regarding grants and donations," he points out. "They will give cash and they will allow their employees to march in uniform in homosexual 'gay pride' parades. However, if a local church or Christian ministry were to have a parade, Home Depot would not donate to that and ... would not allow their employees to participate while in uniform."

Yesterday, Home Depot issued a statement to the AFA:

"We have never changed our commitment to diversity and inclusion of all people, and we have no intention of doing so. Nor have we changed our apron policy or the guidelines for our charitable giving."

The AFA responded to this by alerting their supporters that Home Depot is "digging in."

"Home Depot said it will continue to support homosexual activities," states their alert to supporters.

If Home Depot is "digging in," I know of a place where all of us should be purchasing shovels.

The Un-Aired Lowe's 'All-American Muslim' Commercial

In case you've been living under a rock this month, you're aware that Lowe's is receiving a great deal of criticism for pulling their ads from the TLC reality show All American Muslim.

Lowe’s yanked their ad from the series after the Florida Family Association encouraged members to email the program’s advertisers.

The FFA stated:

“The show profiles only Muslims that appear to be ordinary folks while excluding many Islamic believers whose agenda poses a clear and present danger to liberties and traditional values that the majority of Americans cherish. Clearly this program is attempting to manipulate Americans into ignoring the threat of jihad and to influence them to believe that being concerned about the jihad threat would somehow victimize these nice people in this show.”

Now viewers can finally view the un-aired Lowe's commercial.

OK, not really. The below satirical video was directed by Gregory Bonsignore, and stars Rizwan Manji and Parvesh Cheena, from the NBC sitcom Outsourced. (Read more about the project here.)