About 20 protesters braved thunderstorms Friday afternoon to deliver a message that ExxonMobil Corp. discriminates against its LGBT employees, and to call attention to the need for the federal Employment Non-Discrimination Act. The protest was organized by GetEQUAL.
Three ExxonMobil stations in the Oak Lawn area were targeted. Protesters with signs chanted and talked to passersby.
At the station at Lemmon and Wycliff avenues, the manager complained to police soon after two protesters arrived, telling officers that they were hurting his business. Protester Chastity Kirven said an officer came over and said she was only relaying a message and wasn’t stopping the protest.
“Hurting his business. That’s the point,” Kirven said.
Two hours later, several officers approached the group that had grown to about a dozen at the same station. The officers said the group had to stop using bullhorns because a complaint had been called in from KFC across the street.
I checked with KFC to see if they had called police about the bullhorns in front 0f the Exxon station . People working in the restaurant said they weren’t even aware of the protest and that no one had called the police from there.
Kirven said she assumed it was the same Exxon manager who called the police, this time claiming to be from the neighboring business.
However, protesters complied with the police request and stopped using bullhorns.
At issue was the decade-old merger of Exxon and Mobil. After the two companies merged, the new company’s nondiscrimination policies didn’t include gays and lesbians. Partnership benefits such as insurance coverage for same-sex partners were also eliminated. Exxon had never had this coverage or protection. Mobil had been one of the earliest major companies with progressive employment policies and benefits.
Protests are scheduled at other Exxon stations in a number of cities around the country on Friday, May 21. Then individuals and various organizations, including LGBT and environmental groups, will protest the annual ExxonMobil shareholders meeting on May 26 at the Meyerson Symphony Center in Downtown Dallas. The shareholders’ meeting has been greeted with protesters every year since the merger.
The Meyerson protest begins at 8 a.m. to greet shareholders as they enter the building. The stockholders’ meeting begins at 9 a.m. Only people who own stock in ExxonMobil can attend.
More stupid from self-described “activists.” These publicity stunts don’t get any participation, attention or RESULTS. They are intended to raise money for GetEqual.
GetEqual has been a 6-month waste of $500,000 from Jonathan Lewis (Progressive Insurance). The stunts have been ignored by the media and by the LGBT Community. They do not help us.
Mark Reed claims that we need to “demand” our equality instead of work to gain support from our fellow citizens. He asks us to believe that inconveniencing people at a gas station will actually help us. It is childish.
This small band of self-described “activists” have never provided any evidence of their effectiveness – unless just becoming a “famous activist” is the real goal.
It’s easy to complain. It’s easy to protest. It’s easy to irritate people. It takes some thought and some real concern for our plight to create results. We have made progress in the past few years, but GetEqual and their childish outbursts are jeopardizing that progress.
Please stop. I have no problem with you making yourselves look foolish, but please stop making the LGBT Community look stupid.
“I checked with KFC to see if they had called police about the bullhorns in front 0f the Exxon station. People working in the restaurant said they weren’t even aware of the protest and that no one had called the police from there.”
Protest, what protest?
Priceless.
@AndrewW – I have to say, I am in complete agreement with you as usual! Below is a quote from a “GETEQUAL” member on another post
“you assume I would do something half-cocked. Trust me I am ALL COCK! I will say this NOTHING is getting done talking about it. Like I said if you want to get together and hold them accountable for their actions, lets do that otherwise keep talking about it.
I am going to go GET EQUAL!”
I don’t know about you – but personally, I don’t want, or need someone who is so mature – fighting for my rights – and they wonder why we can’t gain any ground – when it’s obviously because they’re a bunch of 12 year old’s!
Keep it up GET EQUAL, don’t pay any attention to these negative Nancy’s that cant even use their names! @AndrewW you don’t speak for the LGBT community, “call the police”, free speech is protected last time I checked. @BDUB ditto, name calling is inappropriate response, who’s 12?
Many of them just want to be famous – like Mark Reed. He hasn’t thought about being affective, he’s only thought about getting attention.
Thankfully, the GetEqual-Equality-Across-America-Join-The-Impact charades are almost over. There is a lot of real work to do and we don’t need this embarrassing “side-show.”
The person using the names AndrewW and BDUB and who submitted the post claiming to be a GET EQUAL member does not understand the article isn’t about him, his self-pity and his delusions.
@David McFatridge – if you took the time to read my post you’d know – I was directly calling names – calling someone who say’s things a preteen would a 12 isn’t a name….it’s referring to a maturity level.
@ Observer:
The article is about childish attempts to get attention. It is about the demise of GetEqual.
Dallas had QueerLiberaction for a while, until the laughing drowned out their childish rants. Equality-Across-America is gone. Join-The-Impact is gone. ALL of these childish “let’s go complain” groups don’t last long. People understand they are not helpful and potentially embarrassing and counterproductive.
GetEqual was a waste of $500,000. Let’s not do it again. We’re smarter than this and better than this. It is too easy to bitch and moan – it takes some real thought and some real effort to make real progress.
You are right Andrew W.. we should have a meet up among local activists to try and come up with a “REAL STRATEGY TO WIN!” You could maybe host such a gathering at Illume again? Maybe we could watch a poorly produced slide show and video about religion being the enemy and how we need more and more lgbt people to contribute to your and your creepy little boyfriend’s cause? Maybe we could IGNORE history.. like the lunch counter protests and freedom rides of the 60’s (there were people in the African American community who thought these actions were “embarrassing” and “made them look bad”) Maybe we could also ignore your outright lies about other organizations.. QL is still around, so in JTI.. and GETEQUAL and EAA are alive and well also. Ohhh.. wouldn’t this meeting be fun?
People, don’t be fooled.. Andrew W. has been posting on here forever.. he makes up other names and posts to make it sound like he has support.. he lies and says horrible things about people.. not just on here.. but on many many other lgbt blogs..and all because no one wants to get behind his get little “plan” for equality which has yet to materialize. I am beginning to think he is paid to stir up poop on here..
ATTENTION “AndrewW”
“…. – it takes some real thought and some real effort to make real progress.” Those are your words criticizing the protest and protesters against Exxon-Mobil.
I’m curious, what are YOUR real efforts towards real progress on this matter? At least these protesters are doing SOMETHING and trying to make the world (at least for employees of Exxon-Mobil) a more equal place.
I applaud GetEqual’s efforts.
If you have ideas on how we all can work together to make Exxon-Mobil “see the light,” by all means, please let me know and all of us reading, as I am sure we all want to do what we can to help..
Equality is witnessed in many ways and a lot of change in equality law is done through people putting themselves out there and getting noticed. Sometimes it is annoying to other but it does in time get things changed. We do need to be more tolerant of other peoples issues and try to understand that not everyone lives in a perfect world.
@ Denial Cates:
That’s a bizarre, rambling comment.
I wouldn’t worry about me. The fact is the LGBT Community and the Media have dismissed GetAttention. Barney Frank was right these stunts are “childish and stupid.” They also “don’t change any minds.”
Perhaps you and your band of misfits should go urinate in Frank’s office next.
@andrew, perhaps you are happier criticizing other peoples efforts rather than actually doing something to bring about change, yourself.
I have “questioned” the tactics of GetATTENTION. I have asked HOW these childish stunts change any minds? If you believe they DO – please tell us how.
The LGBT Community and the Media (thankfully) have ignored GetATTENTION and other “lets-march-around-and-make-demands” groups. Demanding, especially without a threat, are useless.
These stunts are about fund-raising, they are not about helping our movement because they don’t create any support. We need to people to join us – not run the other way. Bitching isn’t a strategy.
As usual, all this bickering is clouding the real point here.
I find it quite ironic that when a new group or individual raises a controversial issue and decides to act on it, it becomes quickly attacked and ruined by the little political activist gang of friends who join together along with their media friends to squash anyone out who threatens their corporate/political status quo.
Make no mistake, the Dallas GLBT community is run by one small “gang” of people who have influence with the media, the police and with corporate America, all of whose agenda is to maintain and protect the current status quo of corporations and political figures getting ahead while royally exploiting and screwing over the GLBT community as a whole. Anyone trying to do the right thing and speaking out about it is quickly ganged up on and ruined, while our GLBT “officials” look the other way.
As a result, our equality and rights as a GLBT community continue to get shoved further and further to the side. Do you really think those at Exxon who may read these above comments will think favorably upon our community enough to change their policy ?? And even so, the only people I have heard mentioned in this argument has been the gays and lesbians and their issues, what about the bi and the trans people ??
So I say, until both that little gang of criminals combined with the antagonist writers in the GLBT media who support them are held accountable for their actions, then the equality issue will just be more of the same needless bickering with no results, all brought on by people who believe that power and money supersede any degree of human respect for one another.
Martin Luther King called for a boycott of the bus system in Montgomery, Alabama. It worked. When Lt.Dan Choi was arrested at the White House, there was more mainstream media coverage than when 200,000 people marched on Washington DC last October.
Do you really think these actions are being done for childish reasons? I assure you, these individuals have waited a life time for change, are taking serious risks with tremendous courage. They believe so deeply in the need for change that they are willing to rock the boat.
I would love it if the world was fair and rational. But it is not. Our elected officials are too afraid of losing votes. So they sacrifice the rights of American Citizens.
I can understand that this approach isn’t for everyone. But I have yet to hear an alternative strategy that will work. Got one? Share it.