Brighten your day: Mess with bigots!

[pegkerr]

coffeeem posted this:

The American Family Association is doing a website poll in the hopes of determining that, yes, Americans hate homosexuals, and would go fifty miles out of their way to avoid shopping at a supermarket where the bag-filler-upper might be gay. (Hey, it's their fantasy, not mine; I'm just describing the outcome.)

So please, visit their poll page at http://www.afa.net/petitions/businesses/businesses.asp! Answer their question honestly! And yes, they ask for your mailing address and e-mail, but if you answer the way I did, I kind of doubt you'll be hearing from them anytime soon.

Right now the vote stands:

If a corporation supports the homosexual agenda [their words, not mine], you would:

Be more likely to do business with that company. 6,238
Be less likely to do business with that company. 188,722
It would not affect my buying decision. 3,946

Let's change that ratio!

Cross-posted to green_stripe.

Edited to add: It looks as though the poll has been taken down sometime today.

As coffeeem notes, pointing to this January 04 Wired article, these people are slow learners.

Comments

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

As I said in coffeeem's comments section, nearly verbatim:

I do get e-mail from these nutjobs from answering one of their surveys before. But I think it's a good idea to keep an eye on what groups like this are doing and how they're trying to change our culture. And I find most of the e-mail very cheering: "FORD MOTORS SUPPORTS HOMOSEXUAL AGENDA!" says the subject line, and "YAY FORD MOTORS!" says me.

Also -- I forgot to say this over at Emma's -- their from-lines show up in my inbox as "American Family Ass." I am juvenile enough to find this amusing.

[legomymalfoy.livejournal.com]

I would, but that would mean actually going to the site. Which I just cannot bring myself to do.

Hell, I'd love to shop in an ALL GAY SUPERMARKET. That would be awesome.

[dd-b.livejournal.com]

The page that's linked to above has one paragraph describing what some businesses are doing (in uncomplimentary terms of course) and then the one-question poll. So you wouldn't be exposing yourself to large amounts of their opinion by going there to vote. On the other hand you'd be showing up as a hit to their site. On the gripping hand you'd be voting against their position in their poll. So do whatever you need to do to be you :-). But I thought describing what the page the link takes you to might be useful information for you.

Sphincter conservatives have no credibility

[barondave.livejournal.com]

Done.

I'd be willing to bet, despite their attempt to avoid such, that some auto bots added a lot of the votes. Or else they just lied.

It's interesting how the haters phrased the question. As I've said, my only problem with "the homosexual agenda" is that they schedule lunch too late.

Re: Sphincter conservatives have no credibility

[dd-b.livejournal.com]

Did your verification image say "once"? Mine did, and it made me a bit suspicious since it's a word relevant to why they'd be using verification at all.

Re: Sphincter conservatives have no credibility

[daharyn.livejournal.com]

mine said "taxes", which I also kind of thought was weird... ;)

Re: Sphincter conservatives have no credibility

[sternel.livejournal.com]

Mine was "weight."

I also gave them the dummy email address I keep solely for answering surveys like this one. I only check it once a month or so.

Re: Sphincter conservatives have no credibility

[qwyneth.livejournal.com]

Mine was quiz.

Re: Sphincter conservatives have no credibility

[barondave.livejournal.com]

I didn't notice a "once" or any modifier, but I didn't look closely (probably should screen capture this stuff, for giggles). I don't see anything that would prevent anyone from voting many times, as long as they did it manually, and I'm suspicious of the bot catcher.

[joel-rosenberg.livejournal.com]

Well, of course you'll be hearing from them, and repeatedly, no matter which box you check -- they're trying to get your email (and, IMHO, properly so -- they tell you that, and how to remove yourself from their email list) on their website, so that they can email you again.

Not a big deal, IMHO; that's what adaptive spam filtering and mail list removal are for, if you don't want to hear from them.

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure I mind. It will serve as a reminder of what we're fighting against, and perhaps an insight into their thinking. We'll see . . . perhaps I'll change my mind if I hear from them too frequently or if their e-mails are too toxic to bear.

[juliansinger.livejournal.com]

They're often toxic, but on the other hand it helps me to track who's being supportive and what minor-but-relevant political efforts I can work for (or against, as the case may be.)

I use a spamtrap email for it, mind you, and don't check it daily. Just when I can.

[joel-rosenberg.livejournal.com]

I don't think it's likely to do you any harm -- and, of course, it's your choice.

That said, I don't think that the real problem in getting society-wide adoption of "the homosexual agenda" are the anti-gay activists. The folks I know who are opposed to, say, SSM, and with whom I've discussed the issues don't see the FRC and AFA as exactly "thought leaders."

[johnridley.livejournal.com]

One of the many reasons to have your own domain; so that you can create innumerable throw-away email addresses for places like these. They work, but you can discontinue them at any time. Just call me ribbit332552@hauntedfrog.com...

[joel-rosenberg.livejournal.com]

Or get a few throwaway email addresses and don't bother checking them. That is what hotmail is for, isn't it?

[johnridley.livejournal.com]

Sure, but I use them for lots of things that I need to get a response from, and this is a lot easier than logging in to hotmail, and it keeps me away from that evil pit. I just set up a dozen or so, use them as needed, they all forward to my main address so I don't have to mess with remembering to check anything. If an address starts to get spammed, I just delete it.

[qwyneth.livejournal.com]

What concerns me is that after I voted the numbers read exactly the same as the numbers you saw. I then voted a second time, using an old email address, and saw the exact same numbers.

[liadan-m.livejournal.com]

I've seen the exact same numbers all week. It's a scam.

[qwyneth.livejournal.com]

Bah. And here I thought it would be impossible for me to have less respect for them.

[pameladean]

I did this a while ago, I forget at whose behest. They sent me a follow-up email asking that I confirm my email address, and I marked it as spam and haven't seen anything from them since. I don't know, however, if they wait to count your vote until you confirm your address for them. It didn't say so.

P.

[http://users.livejournal.com/anam_cara_/]

Hmm. I wonder how often the ratios are updated? After I submitted mine, the numbers shown to me were the same as what you have posted. The fact that they show the numbers kind of invalidates the 'study' they're doing though.

[huladavid.livejournal.com]

Thanks to both you and Miss Em.

Just took the survey, and I'm forwarding it to my family.

[sraun]

I remember this one from a month or two back - when I followed your link, I got a 'page not found' error.

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

Yep, it looks as though the poll has been taken down sometime today.

As coffeeem notes, pointing to this January 04 Wired article, these people are slow learners.

[johnridley.livejournal.com]

That's funny (in its own way). When their organization tries to run a biased poll within a closed community with the probable intention of representing it as an unbiased voter poll, they're representing the voting public to the lawmakers. When it doesn't turn out how they liked, the gays have made some kind of mockery of things and have done something underhanded to forward their agenda.