Twitter CEO's Restaurant Choice Ignites Controversy

After criticism, Jack Dorsey laments eating at Chick-fil-A during Pride Month
By Newser Editors,  Newser Staff
Posted Jun 12, 2018 11:37 AM CDT
Twitter CEO Ignites Ruckus With Fast-Food Meal
A file photo of Twitter's Jack Dorsey.   (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer, File)

It started innocently enough: Jack Dorsey, CEO of Twitter and Square, tried to plug his latter company by tweeting that he'd saved money by using its mobile payment service. The problem, at least in some eyes, is that he saved that money while eating at Chick-fil-A. The fast-food chain is held in low regard in the LGBTQ community thanks to CEO Dan Cathy's opposition to gay marriage, and June just happens to be Pride Month, explains USA Today. Lots of people picked up on this combo of facts on Twitter, notably CNN's Soledad O'Brien, who tweeted, "This is an interesting company to boost during Pride month, @jack." That caught the attention of Dorsey, who replied, "You're right. Completely forgot about their background." If anything, that only intensified the controversy.

  • In an editorial headlined "Jack Dorsey Chickens Out," the conservative editorial page at the Wall Street Journal finds it hard to believe that Dorsey "was assailed, and then apologized, for eating at one of America's most popular fast-food restaurant chains." Maybe "he thought a chicken sandwich is merely a meal, but now he knows it's also a political statement."
  • Marco Rubio complains that Dorsey was "bullied" into an apology and that the "lunacy has gone too far." In response to Rubio, actress Patricia Arquette says it's conservatives who have gone overboard on this one. "Special needs and sick refugee children are being torn away from their mothers arms at the border," she writes. "Terrified. This is a crime against humanity. But (you're) more concerned with chicken slinging homophobe."
  • Business Insider has more on the back-and-forth slams, while the Advocate notes that the chain's reputation as being anti-gay seems to be fading from public consciousness.
(More Jack Dorsey stories.)

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