Lowe's Knows (s***)

[Swingandalongonetoleft]

Home-improvement giant Lowe's may need to do a fix-it job on its own image after pulling its advertisements from a new reality TV show about American Muslim families.

 

Lowe's stopped running commercials on TLC's "All-American Muslim," bowing to pressure from a conservative Florida group that threatened to boycott the retailer and other advertisers on the show, which documents the lives of five Muslim families in Dearborn, Mich.

The move has created a backlash, with Muslim groups threatening to boycott the North Carolina-based chain in response.

 

"We're calling for either a boycott or an email campaign or both," Ahmed Rehab, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations in Chicago, said Monday. "This decision is an unwelcome milestone in Islamophobia in this country."

 

Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn., the first Muslim elected to Congress, condemned Lowe's for deciding to "uphold the beliefs of a fringe hate group and not the creed of the First Amendment."

 

Hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons defended the show on Twitter and said he had bought its remaining ad spots. "Just purchased remaining spots for #allamericanmuslim for next week," Simmons said. "The show is now sold out! keep your money @lowes and we will keep ours."

 

The one-hour show, which airs Sundays at 9 p.m., follows everyone from a football coach to a deputy sheriff, depicting the lives of five Muslim families. Since its premiere Nov. 13, the show has averaged 1.2 million viewers, according to Nielsen.

 

Concerned the show presents Muslims as "ordinary folks," the Florida Family Association sent out email alerts to supporters, calling it "propaganda" and encouraging them to forward prewritten emails of complaint to advertisers.

 

"Clearly this program is attempting to manipulate Americans into ignoring the threat of jihad and to influence them to believe that being concerned about the jihad threat would somehow victimize these nice people in this show," the group said on its website.

 

Lowe's made the decision to pull its ads last week, posting an explanation on its Facebook page Saturday.

 

"The TLC program 'All-American Muslim' has become a lightning rod for people to voice complaints from a variety of perspectives — political, social and otherwise," Karen Cobb, a Lowe's spokeswoman, said in an email Monday. "Following this development, dozens of companies removed their advertising from the program beginning in late November. Lowe's made the decision to discontinue our advertising on Dec. 5."

 

Rhonda Sanderson, a Chicago-based public relations expert, said using Facebook to explain was "a really dumb move."

 

While not debating the merits of pulling the ads, Sanderson said Lowe's should not have disclosed its reasoning or used social media to disseminate it.

 

Dorothy Crenshaw, owner of New York-based Crenshaw Communications, a public relations firm, agreed that transparency is not always best.

 

"They either had to stand by their original support of the show, which by all accounts seems to be perfectly innocuous, or they had to very quietly retreat," Crenshaw said. "They had to know that by appeasing some, they would anger others."

 

TLC has no plans to cancel the show, which is scheduled to run through Jan. 8. "We stand behind the show 'All-American Muslim' and we're happy the show has strong advertising support," TLC spokeswoman Laurie Goldberg said in an email.

 

The Chicago activist, Rehab, said a conference call was planned with Muslim groups and other groups to craft a response. He said it is not too late, however, for Lowe's to fix things.

 

"There will be room for reconciliation," Rehab said. "We would call on Lowe's to do the right thing and apologize for their really insane action and to reverse the decision to pull out."

 

Reuters contributed.

 

http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2011-12...im-islamophobia

 

It's really pretty unfortunate that this is the route they took. Florida Family Association (more on them in a bit) is one tiny group that pressured this bigot move by threatening to boycott them. Now, a much larger group of people from all sorts of faiths and races will instead. I'd love to shake of the Thinker at Lowes that thought this was a good idea, just so I could say that I've shaken the hand of the biggest dumbass in the world. I won't shop at Lowe's until that person is thrown out of the company.

 

Even worse is FFA- the "Christian" group behind this. Obviously Christ's teachings aren't too important to them. This is literally a hate group. I'm not aware of any other hate groups being able to spew their s*** like this and be acknowledged by a large nationwide retailer. Anonymous recently attacked their site and disclosed their members private information, which made me feel warm inside - just not as warm as the hell they'll find themselves in during the afterlife, if such a thing exists.

[CrimsonWeltall]

Daily Show skewered the FFA guy pretty bad.

 

His complaint was that the Muslims on the show aren't Sharia-loving extremists. Since we all know that 100% of Muslims are evil, the show must be a lie.

[Balta1701]

The problem of course is that if Lowe's hadn't pulled their ads, no one would have heard about this. Or cared.

[Swingandalongonetoleft]

The problem of course is that if Lowe's hadn't pulled their ads, no one would have heard about this. Or cared.

 

If Lowe's hadn't pulled their ads that means they didn't cave in to the demands of a bunch of bigots, and thusly I would have no beef with them. The problem is they did. Not only is it a backasswards and shortsighted approach to business, it's downright awful. I hope they're happy that a small hate group is satisfied with them and will continue to shop there, because now, an even larger group of normal people won't be. I can only hope it ends up hurting them, but that's wishful thinking. Too many people (my own parents and siblings included) are ignorant about Islam and in fact, do think of Muslims as being a bunch of Osama bin Laden's. Weren't most people raised to respect one another? I know they teach that at my church... If falls upon deaf ears to a frightening amount of people- the kind that like to pick and choose what they hear to suit themselves. It would be interesting to see how most Christians would react if they were put in the shoes of a Muslim in America. I can just hear the b****ing, moaning, and outrage. The attitude a big chunk of Christian Americans have towards Muslims and Islam is just the same as the attitude Whites in America held towards Blacks during slavery and through the Civil Rights Movement- LONG after we as a society came to the conclusion that it was wrong as f***, and moved past it!

 

Or cared.

 

I'm Polish Catholic, both as a result of the family I was born into. My parents nearly s*** a brick when they found out that I own and have read the Qur'an. Some of my best friends are Muslim, and have good qualities/go about life in ways that many of my Catholic or atheist friends couldn't touch. I very much care about and am aware of f***s***s like FFA or the other s***bird pastor that burned the Qur'an. It hurts me because like you said- too many people either don't care enough, or can't look past their own f***ing noses to look into other culture's and faiths- let alone accept them. They accept the obscenities these jabroni's spew as truth. Mix in the fact that our Country is fighting a war in an Islamic country, and all of a sudden it makes perfect sense to them. It's my biggest complaint about people I call "my fellow Americans", and I absolutely can see why most of the world can't stand us. To a large degree, I'm right there with them.

 

When 9/11 happened, it was a bigger blow to Muslims in America than to most other Americans. We as a country stood "united" for all of 35 minutes (I'm exaggerating, but you get the point) and went right back to acting like assholes to each other/going about our daily lives (once a year on the anniversary that "unity" returns to an extent). Muslims couldn't do that, because the hate and blame was mistakenly applied to them for the actions of a few. They suffer everyday, and I can't say that about most of the rest of us- save for the families directly affected (this means firefighters and responders at Ground Zero, obviously the people in the buildings and planes, the troops shipped off to fight overseas **as a result, etc.). Why did it take such a tragedy for people in this country to put aside their differences (except for against anybody unfortunate to be Arab-looking/brown, whether they were Muslim or not) and respect each other? What does it say about us as a country that this attitude was so ridiculously short-lived? Why is so many people's first natural reaction/response if the topic of 9/11 is broached one of vengeance and hate?

 

**9/11 is not really the reason we're overseas right now, despite what Bush, Obama, and whoever else doesn't end the war and has the power to would probably want you to think.

 

I try to use as little profanity as possible, but this is a topic that makes me see red, so apologies.

Edited December 16, 2011 by Swingandalongonetoleft

[Balta1701]

"Not caring about some stupid reality show on TLC" does not equal not caring about or respecting other people's faiths.

[Y2HH]

If Lowe's hadn't pulled their ads that means they didn't cave in to the demands of a bunch of bigots, and thusly I would have no beef with them. The problem is they did. Not only is it a backasswards and shortsighted approach to business, it's downright awful. I hope they're happy that a small hate group is satisfied with them and will continue to shop there, because now, an even larger group of normal people won't be. I can only hope it ends up hurting them, but that's wishful thinking. Too many people (my own parents and siblings included) are ignorant about Islam and in fact, do think of Muslims as being a bunch of Osama bin Laden's. Weren't most people raised to respect one another? I know they teach that at my church... If falls upon deaf ears to a frightening amount of people- the kind that like to pick and choose what they hear to suit themselves. It would be interesting to see how most Christians would react if they were put in the shoes of a Muslim in America. I can just hear the b****ing, moaning, and outrage. The attitude a big chunk of Christian Americans have towards Muslims and Islam is just the same as the attitude Whites in America held towards Blacks during slavery and through the Civil Rights Movement- LONG after we as a society came to the conclusion that it was wrong as f***, and moved past it!

 

 

 

I'm Polish Catholic, both as a result of the family I was born into. My parents nearly s*** a brick when they found out that I own and have read the Qur'an. Some of my best friends are Muslim, and have good qualities/go about life in ways that many of my Catholic or atheist friends couldn't touch. I very much care about and am aware of f***s***s like FFA or the other s***bird pastor that burned the Qur'an. It hurts me because like you said- too many people either don't care enough, or can't look past their own f***ing noses to look into other culture's and faiths- let alone accept them. They accept the obscenities these jabroni's spew as truth. Mix in the fact that our Country is fighting a war in an Islamic country, and all of a sudden it makes perfect sense to them. It's my biggest complaint about people I call "my fellow Americans", and I absolutely can see why other countries can't stand us. To a large degree, I'm right there with them.

 

I try to use as little profanity as possible, but this is a topic that makes me see red, so apologies.

 

Other countries only claim to not like us, because it's fashionable to do so.

 

In reality, they love us.

 

They also have the very modern "short attention span syndrome", and people conveniently allow them to forget the past. I mean, after all, the excuse that "we've changed our wayward ways" only goes so far, in that not long ago these same countries that look down upon us did some of the most unforgivable/heinous s*** the likes of which we still haven't come close to touching. And the only reason many of them aren't still doing it, is because at some point in the past, they lost some rather important wars.

 

And people have the right to be "ignorant about Islam", or the Quran, or Catholicism, etc. Far be it for me to say, but just because YOU decided to care about Islam and read up upon it, don't point fingers at others for "being ignorant". It's not ignorant to NOT read up on something that exists, because I have to tell you, there are religions out there that YOU'VE never heard of, thus you're ignorant, too, by your own definition. Look, we only have so much time in our lives, and just because a person doesn't decide to educate themselves on something (or EVERYTHING), that doesn't mean their ignorant. It just means they have different priorities than you.

 

If you spent your ENTIRE LIFE studying religions, both past and presently existing, and lived to be 100, you'd die well before you got half way through knowing much about religions.

[Iwritecode]

Other countries only claim to not like us, because it's fashionable to do so.

 

In reality, they love us.

 

They also have the very modern "short attention span syndrome", and people conveniently allow them to forget the past. I mean, after all, the excuse that "we've changed our wayward ways" only goes so far, in that not long ago these same countries that look down upon us did some of the most unforgivable/heinous s*** the likes of which we still haven't come close to touching. And the only reason many of them aren't still doing it, is because at some point in the past, they lost some rather important wars.

 

And people have the right to be "ignorant about Islam", or the Quran, or Catholicism, etc. Far be it for me to say, but just because YOU decided to care about Islam and read up upon it, don't point fingers at others for "being ignorant". It's not ignorant to NOT read up on something that exists, because I have to tell you, there are religions out there that YOU'VE never heard of, thus you're ignorant, too, by your own definition. Look, we only have so much time in our lives, and just because a person doesn't decide to educate themselves on something (or EVERYTHING), that doesn't mean their ignorant. It just means they have different priorities than you.

 

If you spent your ENTIRE LIFE studying religions, both past and presently existing, and lived to be 100, you'd die well before you got half way through knowing much about religions.

 

I think the ignorant part is thinking something about a certain group of people without actually taking the time to learn about them.

 

If you've never heard of a religion then you can't form an opinion about the people that practice it.

 

 

[Swingandalongonetoleft]

"Not caring about some stupid reality show on TLC" does not equal not caring about or respecting other people's faiths.

 

I wasn't referring to the reality show. I haven't seen it either- had no idea it existed, and probably still won't sit down to watch it. I don't like reality tv. It's about the principles behind it, though, along with everything else I just finished editing in that essay above your post (It being Lowe's caving in to the demands of that bigot group). Lowe's is most guilty of giving a hate group a voice. And of making a short-sighted ass backwards business decision. Would you shop at a store that gave in to the KKK's demands? That's what it's about.

[Y2HH]

I think the ignorant part is thinking something about a certain group of people without actually taking the time to learn about them.

 

If you've never heard of a religion then you can't form an opinion about the people that practice it.

 

Some people DO take the time to learn about religions and are still considered ignorant by the followers of that religion -- take the now deceased Christopher Hitchens for example -- I guarantee he knew more about Islam than most people ever will yet I guarantee most followers of Islam would vehemently disagree with Hitchens opinions of that religion.

 

I haven't heard of or bothered to study MOST religions, but I CAN have an opinion on them. Oh, and I do. That doesn't make me ignorant, either. What it makes me is smart.

Edited December 16, 2011 by Y2HH

[Swingandalongonetoleft]

And people have the right to be "ignorant about Islam", or the Quran, or Catholicism, etc. Far be it for me to say, but just because YOU decided to care about Islam and read up upon it, don't point fingers at others for "being ignorant". It's not ignorant to NOT read up on something that exists, because I have to tell you, there are religions out there that YOU'VE never heard of, thus you're ignorant, too, by your own definition. Look, we only have so much time in our lives, and just because a person doesn't decide to educate themselves on something (or EVERYTHING), that doesn't mean their ignorant. It just means they have different priorities than you.

 

I guess that's not how I meant it. I don't know much about Wiccans, Buddhists, etc. - but it doesn't mean that I'll pass judgement or paint their entire religion and all who subscribe to it with a broad brush. That's exactly what a whole hell of a lot of Americans did and keep doing after 9/11.

 

I think the ignorant part is thinking something about a certain group of people without actually taking the time to learn about them.

 

If you've never heard of a religion then you can't form an opinion about the people that practice it.

 

This is exactly what I meant.

 

I haven't heard of or bothered to study MOST religions, but I CAN have an opinion on them. Oh, and I do.

 

See, I just can't understand how someone can do that - especially if that opinion is negative and based on inaccuracies (not you in particular- I have no idea what you're opinion is) such as the afore-mentioned non-Muslim American's view of anyone that even resembled a Muslim after 9/11. Something like that can be pretty damaging to someone. FFA and the dumbass Qur'an burner are my examples - people won't find out for themselves that this is bigotry on-par with s*** the KKK does and blindly assume it's true, making the lives of many people miserable, and in some cases, dangerous. Of course many of you will remember the attacks on people shortly after 9/11. That's f***ing embarrassing and pathetic. In one case (a knife attack on a taxi driver IIRC) the guy even forgave his attacker and argued against the judge coming down too hard on the attacker. I'm glad the judge disregarded him and threw the book at the guy.

 

As for Hitchen's - I'm not exactly familiar with his negative stance on Islam (past the fact that he had a negative stance), or the rationale behind it.

Edited December 16, 2011 by Swingandalongonetoleft

[Y2HH]

I guess that's not how I meant it. I don't know much about Wiccans, Buddhists, etc. - but it doesn't mean that I'll pass judgement or paint their entire religion and all who subscribe to it with a broad brush. That's exactly what a whole hell of a lot of Americans did and keep doing after 9/11.

 

You keep pushing this pseudo anti-American crap...and it doesn't fly. You act as if the rest of the world isn't the exact same, or even worse in many cases.

 

It's not just Americans that do that. The ENTIRE f***ing world does it. You and a lot of other people in this modern era make this mistake repeatedly, and annoyingly, as if the rest of the world is this enlightened world of awesome, where nobody hates anyone and puppy's remain young forever.

 

Yes, some Americans are dumb asses.

 

Unfortunately, dumb isn't indigenous to the USA.

 

Hell, go to a foreign soccer game and wear a ManU jersey in the wrong stadium. Then let's see how enlightened these savages are.

[Balta1701]

I wasn't referring to the reality show. I haven't seen it either- had no idea it existed, and probably still won't sit down to watch it. I don't like reality tv. It's about the principles behind it, though, along with everything else I just finished editing in that essay above your post (It being Lowe's caving in to the demands of that bigot group). Lowe's is most guilty of giving a hate group a voice. And of making a short-sighted ass backwards business decision. Would you shop at a store that gave in to the KKK's demands? That's what it's about.

You went after me hard, very hard, said that:

 

"It hurts me because like you said- too many people either don't care enough, or can't look past their own f***ing noses to look into other culture's and faiths- let alone accept them. They accept the obscenities these jabroni's spew as truth".

 

And yet you don't seem to care about the show either.

 

Like I said, had lowes not done this, no one would have cared about the show, or anything the Florida Family Association or whatever this group is called actually says. By listening to them, they have given this show an enormous amount of free publicity.

[Y2HH]

You went after me hard, very hard, said that:

 

"It hurts me because like you said- too many people either don't care enough, or can't look past their own f***ing noses to look into other culture's and faiths- let alone accept them. They accept the obscenities these jabroni's spew as truth".

 

And yet you don't seem to care about the show either.

 

Like I said, had lowes not done this, no one would have cared about the show, or anything the Florida Family Association or whatever this group is called actually says. By listening to them, they have given this show an enormous amount of free publicity.

 

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed...-ratings-272479

 

Yet it lost more viewers AFTER the Lowe's debacle.

[EvilMonkey]

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed...-ratings-272479

 

Yet it lost more viewers AFTER the Lowe's debacle.

Maybe because the show sucks? Just sayin.

[Balta1701]

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed...-ratings-272479

 

Yet it lost more viewers AFTER the Lowe's debacle.

The last episode aired 5 days ago and I for one hadn't heard about Lowe's pulling its ads until this week. The publicity boom hadn't started when the last episode aired. However:

 

Maybe because the show sucks? Just sayin.

 

This is probably also true.

[EvilMonkey]

CAIR and other Muslim groups didn't seem to have an issue threatening the show 24 when it decided that ONE year out of its entire run, the bad guys would be Muslim extremists. I guess it is only good when applied by one side?

[EvilMonkey]

The last episode aired 5 days ago and I for one hadn't heard about Lowe's pulling its ads until this week. The publicity boom hadn't started when the last episode aired. However:

 

 

 

This is probably also true.

I watched 2, it was awful. I will admit I went into it with a negative bias, but it was still very bad. And the one where the guy had to get rid of his 14 year old dog because his Muslin wife didn't like dogs and her dad wouldn't pray in THEIR house if a dog was there just killed me. I been searching for that dog ever since.

[Balta1701]

CAIR and other Muslim groups didn't seem to have an issue threatening the show 24 when it decided that ONE year out of its entire run, the bad guys would be Muslim extremists. I guess it is only good when applied by one side?

I count at least 4 seasons where the bad guys were Muslim extremists. Season 2, Season 4, Season 6, and Season 8.

[EvilMonkey]

I count at least 4 seasons where the bad guys were Muslim extremists. Season 2, Season 4, Season 6, and Season 8.

Oddly I only watched the odd numbered seasons until the 8th. Kinda funny.

[Swingandalongonetoleft]

You went after me hard, very hard, said that:

 

"It hurts me because like you said- too many people either don't care enough, or can't look past their own f***ing noses to look into other culture's and faiths- let alone accept them. They accept the obscenities these jabroni's spew as truth".

 

And yet you don't seem to care about the show either.

 

Like I said, had lowes not done this, no one would have cared about the show, or anything the Florida Family Association or whatever this group is called actually says. By listening to them, they have given this show an enormous amount of free publicity.

 

Balta, I misunderstood your original post. I wasn't addressing the show itself in that post, and actually thought I was agreeing with you ("because like you said- too many people either don't care enough") Definitely not attacking you personally, sorry if it came across that way.

[Y2HH]

The last episode aired 5 days ago and I for one hadn't heard about Lowe's pulling its ads until this week. The publicity boom hadn't started when the last episode aired.

 

Not true.

 

From the link I posted: This recent episode, which aired two days after news broke of Lowe's controversial departure as advertiser, continued a downward trend in numbers, not benefiting at all from the added attention. It dropped from a .4 rating in the key demo from the previous week, and fell below the 1-million mark for the first time.

[Balta1701]

Not true.

 

From the link I posted: This recent episode, which aired two days after news broke of Lowe's controversial departure as advertiser, continued a downward trend in numbers, not benefiting at all from the added attention. It dropped from a .4 rating in the key demo from the previous week, and fell below the 1-million mark for the first time.

It's not true that I didn't hear about it last week? Why I'm downright befuddled, I don't know when I heard about it last week but you tell me that it's not true that the story became a major story this week. Amazing how the discussion on this site only started in the last day or two, I guess that's the message board clock getting confused again. Has someone accelerated the servers to 0.999c?

[StrangeSox]

Maybe because the show sucks? Just sayin.

 

This was more or less my response when BigSqwert posted this in the Dem thread. I saw one preview for it and rolled my eyes.

[Swingandalongonetoleft]

Never got into 24 either. Or Lost, sadly. I plan on changing the latter after I'm done plowing through my un-watched seasons of Parks and Rec, Curb Your Enthusiasm, and Aqua Teens.

[Y2HH]

It's not true that I didn't hear about it last week? Why I'm downright befuddled, I don't know when I heard about it last week but you tell me that it's not true that the story became a major story this week. Amazing how the discussion on this site only started in the last day or two, I guess that's the message board clock getting confused again. Has someone accelerated the servers to 0.999c?

 

I don't know when you heard about it or not...but two days AFTER the Lowes story broke, the show aired and the ratings went down, they didn't benefit from any news of it. How that has anything to do with what you're saying, I'm not sure.

 

I'm not saying as the story gains tons of momentum it may or may not see a short term spike...I'm simply saying that thus far, it hasn't really helped it. And based on the comments in this thread of the show, I hope it doesn't...because it sounds like another stupid reality TV show the world can do without.

Edited December 16, 2011 by Y2HH