Tag Archives: LGBTQI+

Traditional Values At Exxon

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Exxon has seen the writing on the wall for ‘woke’ corporations. The slogan “go woke, go broke” has come true for more than one business.

Time posted an article on Friday about a recent decision by Exxon.

The article reports:

Exxon Mobil Corp. plans to prohibit the LGBTQ-rights flag from being flown outside its offices during Pride month in June, prompting backlash from Houston-based employees.

Exxon updated company guidance on what flags can be displayed outside its offices, banning “external position flags” such as PRIDE and Black Lives Matter, according to the policy seen by Bloomberg News. In response, members of Exxon’s PRIDE Houston Chapter are refusing to represent the company at the city’s June 25 Pride celebration, according to an employee group email also seen by Bloomberg.

As long as all flags of one type are banned, this is a wise decision. Any flag put up that supports a political organization or position is going to anger someone. It’s better to simply put up the American flag and the flag of the state or country you are operating in.

The article notes:

“The updated flag protocol is intended to clarify the use of the ExxonMobil branded company flag and not intended to diminish our commitment to diversity and support for employee resource groups,” Tracey Gunnlaugsson, vice president of human resources, said in a statement. “We’re committed to keeping an open, honest, and inclusive workplace for all of our employees, and we’re saddened that any employee would think otherwise.”

While the commonly recognized rainbow flag is prohibited, Exxon supports displaying banners and flags with logos of so-called employee resource groups, especially during signature months, Gunnlaugsson said. “The flags are directly related to our business and company support of our ERGs, including PRIDE for LBGTQ+ employees.”

Exxon has made significant strides to improve diversity and extend employee benefits over the last decade, but some workers perceive the row over the rainbow flag as a major setback for LGBTQ employees and their allies. The oil giant was slower than many corporations to provide equal coverage, but added gay marriage benefits in 2014, restored protective-employment language in 2015 and added transgender coverage in 2016.

When it is all said and done, I really don’t care what someone does in their private life as long as it does not directly affect me. There is no reason to celebrate or discriminate against a group of people because of their sexual preference. There really is no reason to air that in public–it belongs in private conversations. A lot of the problems the LGBTQ movement has encountered are the result of their insistence on special recognition and special privileges. There is no ‘straight pride’ flag. Are straight people allowed to have pride?

A Puzzling Move

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On Saturday, The American Spectator reported that last month Secretary of State Antony Blinken removed Nigeria from the State Department’s list of countries hostile to religious freedom. In April, the U.S. government’s own Commission on International Religious Freedom had urged Secretary of State Blinken to keep Nigeria on the list.

The articled reports:

In 2020, the Trump administration designated Nigeria as a “Country of Particular Concern” (CPC) on religious freedom. In a letter, the Family Research Council and host of other organizations committed to religious freedom have asked Biden: “How can it be, less than a year after that significant designation, that Nigeria’s CPC designation has been dropped without a public explanation?”

The groups note in the letter that anti-Christian persecution in the country has grown even more intense since 2020: “The ongoing violence, killing, and displacement against Christians and others have only increased. In fact, during 2021, massacres happen almost nightly, while by day, young boys are killed in the fields. Pregnant women are brutally dismembered, their babies mutilated before their eyes. And now, an entire church congregation has been abducted and held captive.”

Armed Islamic terrorists and radicals “have become even more brazen, torching entire villages and farms, ambushing, and killing innocent people in gory, unspeakable ways,” they write. “Mass killings—the kind that used to be sporadic—are now a national emergency. Catholic News Agency reported in July, ‘an estimated 3,462 Christians have been killed in Nigeria in the first 200 days of 2021, according to a new study. This equates to 17 Christians being murdered every day in Africa’s most populous country.”

The article concludes:

Biden has declared the promotion of transgenderism abroad a “priority” of American foreign policy. That apparently stands at the apex of his hierarchy of rights.  “[The State] Department has committed to increasing U.S. engagement on lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and intersex (LGBTQI+) human rights issues abroad,” says Blinken. “As we do so, we work with partners around the world who bring to bear expertise on their unique challenges and innovative solutions. We recognize that, through these partnerships, we will be able to build a safer, more inclusive global society for all LGBTQI+ persons.”

This is what preoccupied Blinken in the months preceding the collapse of Afghanistan. Then after it fell, he told Congress that he was “focused on” the plight of the “LGBTQI+ in Afghanistan” under the Taliban.

Talk about an “unbalanced” agenda. Blinken can strain at the gnat and swallow the camel. As he trivializes human rights abuses, monstrous ones are occurring in a country that he claims is no longer a foe of religious freedom. Never mind that an organization called Genocide Watch says “Nigeria has become a killing field of defenseless Christians.” The group says that “between 11,500 and 12,000 Christians have been massacred since June 2015 when the Buhari Government of Nigeria came to power. These statistics are based on careful records kept by church groups that include the names of victims and dates of their murders.”

That Biden can overlook this while prattling on about the supposed glories of transgenderism and chastising Russia for its insufficient enlightenment (Blinken said that Biden rebuked Putin at their summer meeting for not supporting the LGBTQ agenda) reveals much about this administration’s bankrupt agenda. Only a president that prizes religious freedom at home will care about its loss abroad.

I believe that our President has mixed up his priorities.