Today in why you don't feed squirrels:

Well, what am I supposed to do now? Shop there or not shop there? 

"Whether tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of low-quality flatpack
furniture and sweatshop t-shirts, or to take a slightly longer drive and put up with Walmart."

-Hamlet, on exactly this subject

What? I'm not wrong.

In case you somehow missed this, Target stores and employees have recently been the target (sorry) of right-wing goons who have nothing better to do than to pile into their over-sized Ford F-150's, drive down to the big box stores, and film themselves pestering staff and customers, and even destroying displays and merchandise. Specifically the gay stuff. The retailer's solution however, was not to denounce their actions or ban the goons from the stores, but rather to remove or relocate Pride-themed products. 

The real victim here is good taste.

Which is, you know, disappointing. Look, I don't care about rainbow water bottles and t-shirts with slogans on them, per se. This is just an example of a giant corporation capitalizing on Pride month. What I do care about is that they carry the stuff. Sure, it's mostly cheap gaudy junk, but everything Target carries is cheap gaudy junk, and what's important is the visibility. It's corporate America saying "we recognize your existence enough to view you as an exploitable market." And that's...good. 

Harlan Crow's been voting
with his wallet it for ages.

So my first instinct is, you know, to boycott. To vote with my wallet, if you will. I realize that the company is concerned for the safety of its staff who are facing the phone-wielding asshats in person and that's fair. It just feels like the response should have been to address the people making the threats and not to acquiesce to their incoherent accusations of grooming and satanism. It fits a frustrating pattern of schools, town boards, and public officials punishing the victims rather than the bullies. 

"Do you people even bother reading this?"

-Jesus

The problem here is that the goons are already boycotting Target, but they're doing it because the store carries the rainbow gear in the first place. According to The New York Post--so, grain of salt--the retailer has lost something like ten billion dollars--that's a billion with a "B"-- in stock value from the Conservative boycott. Although I imagine a portion of that might be people like me who are staying away for the opposite reason, but most of it is from the Fox News and Twitter crowd sticking it to them queers and standing up for their extremely dubious interpretation of Christianity. 

I'm not being a dick, they absolutely do
carry Truck Nutz. Ok, and I'm being a dick.
But, I mean, they did start it.

Weirdly, Ted Cruz--and I can't believe I'm citing Ted Cruz--suggests that this boycott won't get the results the bananas-right (of which he's also a member?) want. Target, he points out, is more Disney that Bud Light, that is, there isn't much in the way of an alternative. The ye-haws can drink a Coors, but where else are they going to shop? Walmart? Because they're also drawing fire from these people over their Pride merch. I mean, where are they supposed to buy their Truck Nutz and Styrofoam coolers? Yeah, I'm leaning into the stereotypes. 

Look, I don't want to tell Target how to run their store, but there are two sides here: the one that celebrates differences and accepts everybody and one that knocks over mannequins or whatever because they're butt-hurt that transpeople exist, and if they give in to them over this, they're only going to start throwing tantrums over something else. It's like feeding squirrels. Do it once and they'll never leave you alone.

Except in this case the squirrels are mediocre white dudes who feel
threatened by queer people and take it out on hourly retail employees.