A shareholder of Ford Motor Company introduced a resolution to have the company remove sexual orientation as a category against which employees could not be discriminated. Most of his ranting, however, had little or nothing to do with non-discrimation policy.
Ford shareholder Tom Strobhar, who is a pro-family activist from Ohio, publicly read the proposed resolution and spoke in its favor. He outlined several reasons why he felt his fellow shareholders should pass the resolution.
“Ford is paying domestic partner benefits while cutting retirement benefits. Our company is closing plants while building gay and lesbian centers,” he stated. In addition, he said, the company gives shareholder money — which Strobhar described as “the fruit of all our employees’ labor” — to the largest homosexual organizations in the country. “These organizations use it to aggressively promote same-sex marriage. In addition, we advertise in publications whose primary focus is gay sex.”
The Ford shareholders voted 95% against Strobhar’s resolution. However, because the issue received more than one percent of the vote, Stobhar can show up next year and spew his bizarre and hateful rhetoric again. The American Family Association considers this a victory:
Dr. Don Wildmon, founder and chairman of the American Family Association (AFA), says he is extremely pleased with the Ford shareholder vote. “The mere fact that five percent voted for this proposal came as a shock. I think it sends a loud message,” says the AFA leader. “And we’re very grateful that we got that five percent and that this issue can come back up again next year. We have a lot of time to work on it.”
While it would be irresponsible for a gay shareholder to waste the time and resources of Ford Motor Company next year with a resolution condemning the AFA and their efforts to encourage discrimination and to harm Ford’s business through a boycott, I would find it pretty funny. Especially if it got more than 5% of the shareholder vote.
Strobhar’s rhetoric is more pornographic than some of the stuff coming out of West Hollywood.
What the pro-tolerance movement really should do is, put forward a resolution that future resolutions may not denigrate any single category of employee or employee family, nor may future resolutions’ supporting documentation contain pornographic or prurient content.
The Ford shareholders voted 95% against Strobhar’s resolution.
That was welcome news, I needed that 🙂
David Roberts
Good for the Ford shareholders!!!!
Hosanna. Maybe I’m not living in a country that’s turning into a nuthouse full of froth at the mouth homophobes!
Wildmon’s claim that the 5% vote sends a loud message is incredible.
Uhmmm, Mr. Wildmon? Five percent means you lost. Badly. And, apart from a large, effective campaign to bring shareholders on board (i.e., managers of mutual funds, pensions, and other instutional investors), you’re wasting your fellow shareholders’ time by pursuing this.
Ford has laid off many people and is closing plants while continuing to lose market share and also continuing to pay for same-sex partner benefits. In my opinion the money paid for those benefits could be put to better use by avoiding the layoff of valuable employees.
In my opinion the money paid for those benefits could be put to better use by avoiding the layoff of valuable employees.
Why not just cut all benefits then? Why single out one group?
It’s funny how no one notices that GM is in just as much trouble financially and the trend hardly starts with the AFA boycott. The arrogance of claiming that an industry heavy in gas guzzling SUV’s might be losing money while gas is at an all-time high is just incredible. However you get an “A” for effort in your attempt to pit one group against the other during difficult times. Usually it’s the poor against the rich, but whatever works in a pinch I guess.
David Roberts
“Why not just cut all benefits then? Why single out one group?”
Because neither Ford nor GM, nor Daimler-Chrysler provides benefit coverage for unmarried opposite sex partners, only for married opposite sex partners. Keep working on making same-sex marriage legal, then maybe I’ll change my mind. But right now, the unmarried opposite sex partners of employees of these companies are being ignored. Why is that fair? You asked “Why single out one group.” I’m not singling out one group. I’ll ask, “Why do same-sex partners get special treatment?”
Why do same-sex partners get special treatment?”
I’ll bite and state the obvious. Opposite-sex couples already have a solution by way of legal marriage at the moment, same-sex partners do not. No matter how committed they may be, no matter how much their needs may necessitate these benefits, they have no recourse as of yet. Employers, in an attempt to break down barriers to new employment and foster existing employee loyalty, are providing an alternative for these same-sex couples who have already been singled out in that they have no legally sanctioned way to codify their relationship. When same-sex unions are recognized in some fashion as a legal coupling, there will be parity and these types of benefits can simply cover legal spouses.
It is important I think to point out that when these programs began, Ford estimated its additional cost of the new benefit at less than $5 million a year, while Ford’s annual health care budget was then $2.4 billion. If I remember correctly, it ended up costing much less.
Regardless, as the subject of the thread explains, the stockholders (the “owners”) of Ford don’t seem interested in rescinding these benefits so they at least must “get it”. I suspect you do, too.
David Roberts
I hope that in the future, all of Don Wildmon’s victories will be as mighty and resounding as this one was.
“Keep working on making same-sex marriage legal, then maybe I’ll change my mind.”
maybe? oh how generous of you.
That is about the most callous argument I can think of. You say that the distinction that should be recognized is a government license. Not a commitment, a ceremony, vows before God and family, a pastor’s pronouncement, mutual care, love, the recognition and support of the family and friends, sticking it out through bad times and good, or any of the other joys and drudgeries of marriage. No, the only thing you think qualifies a couple to be treated by their employer as a family is a piece of paper issued by bureaucrats.
And then you describe a company trying to find ways to treat its gay employees exactly the same as straight employees as “special rights”.
Let me be graciously generous and assume that you simply haven’t thought this through. I’ll presume that you actually care about the logic behind your position and are not simply picking the argument that supports a “treat the gays badly” result.
The logical response to your position is also the accurate one. In almost every instance, businesses that offer domestic partners treat its gay employees to as close of a standard as they can. Where the state, county, or city government has set up a registry, employers almost always require that gay employees are registered before providing any partner benefits.
Where anti-gay politicians have voted down even the most basic of registries, employers usually have requirements that include mutual dependence for a minimum period of time. (heterosexuals who meet and marry one weekend are eligible for benefit immediately and without any restriction).
Additionally, when Massachusetts opened marriage up to gay couples, a number of employers in the state changed their rules. They stopped allowing domestic partner benefits for employees that lived within the state and only recognized married couples, gay or straight.
So this is quite clearly not an example of “special rights”. This is an example of employers setting a standard of mutual care (the whole reason for benefits, after all) and applying that standard to all.