OPINION:
When I first read “Atlas Shrugged,” I thought all businessmen were heroes who carried the world on their broad shoulders. Now I see them for what they really are — more Wesley Mouch (one of the villains of the Ayn Rand novel) than Hank Rearden.
Corporate America has joined the left’s war on American values and is committing slow suicide in the process.
Anheuser-Busch hired a person who was assigned male at birth who dresses in drag and wears heavy makeup to push Bud Light.
At its Pride Night celebration, the Los Angeles Dodgers presented a Community Heroes Award to the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, whose heroism consists of dressing outlandishly to mock the Catholic Church.
Since it hooked up with influencer Dylan Mulvaney, Bud Light’s sales have plunged 25%. Many distributors can’t even give it away.
Who would have thought that a dude in an evening gown wouldn’t appeal to beer drinkers?
On Pride Night, there were more people protesting outside Dodger Stadium than there were in the bleachers. No matter. For these corporate giants, loss of sales and stock value are a small price to pay for membership in the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Club.
A list of companies celebrating Pride Month includes Apple, Reebok and Mercedes-Benz. Walmart has a children’s Pride collection, which includes T-shirts and backpacks. And what parent wouldn’t be proud to have their toddler in a Pride onesie?
Corporate America is also keen on killing its future customers. Companies such as Amazon, Levi Strauss and Yelp will pay expenses, in some cases up to $4,000, for employees to travel to abortion-providing states.
Since Republicans want to cut taxes and fight inflation and regulation, you’d think CEOs would be in their corner. Not a bit. In 2018, most companies financed the party that hates business.
Citigroup gave 60% of its campaign cash to Democrats. Facebook kicked in a whopping 91% to them. Apple gave 87% of its political donations to the party of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez — Charles Schwab 69%, Pfizer 64.3%, and AT&T and Bank of America 60% each.
Even more high-profile than the Dodgers and Bud Light is the Happiest Place on Earth, as it styles itself. The fight the Walt Disney Corp. picked with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has been making headlines for over a year.
When the state Legislature was considering the Florida Parental Rights in Education Act, a measure aimed at keeping sexual indoctrination out of K-3 classrooms — intentionally mischaracterized as the “Don’t Say Gay” law — the Disney Corp. came out foursquare against it. Mickey and Minnie Mouse led the charge riding the Gender Unicorn, which depicts gender identity as fluid.
Florida revoked Disney World’s special administrative status, and the company retaliated by canceling a billion-dollar building project. Disney CEO Bob Iger must be tickled hot pink by the results.
In February, Mr. DeSantis had a 60% approval rating with Florida voters. In May, Forbes reported that in the three-month period ending in April, Disney lost 3.6 million subscribers for its direct-to-consumer streaming service. In a just-released I&I/TIPP poll, 46% said they opposed corporate social activism, compared with 17% who supported it.
The house that Walt built has become a grotesque caricature of its once wholesome self.
At California’s Disneyland, a man with a mustache in a dress, designated an “apprentice fairy godmother,” greets customers at the Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique.
By undercutting the family, corporate America weakens the bedrock of society. But the investment giant BlackRock rewards companies that promote “woke” ideology.
Today’s corporate honchos aren’t men of vision but bureaucrats who climbed the corporate ladder rung by greasy rung. They are trained by the same academic leftists who indoctrinate journalists and teachers.
That’s why CNN, the American Federation of Teachers and Disney all support cultural Marxism.
Business leaders want to be in with the in crowd. Whether they’re at a chamber of commerce luncheon or a charity benefit, they don’t want to be shunned for not hoisting the rainbow flag on Pride Month.
Most U.S.-based businesses are now multinational. They no longer identify with American values like patriotism and the Judeo-Christian ethic.
But the green agenda and Pride Month are seen as having universal appeal — except in the Arab world, where the Pride logo is conspicuously absent from corporate websites.
Lenin once famously remarked that capitalists would sell communists the rope they used to hang them. An updated version of that is corporations pushing the values that alienate their customers and will lead to their eventual demise.
• Don Feder is a columnist with The Washington Times.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.