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Sun News : Nanaimo councillors divide and censor

Interesting situation for sure, seems to have people in an outrage online. I am not sure the event in question should have been banned, and does seem the city council wasn't well informed before making a decision and made the decision largely on assumptions and lack of factual information.

Until today, I had never heard of this convention.

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So they banned it because they didn't agree with the views of a director of one of the sponsors? Or did I misread?

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No, that is what I got out of it too, they don't agree with the views of a sponsor and banned the whole thing.

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That is a dangerous precedent they have set!

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Chick fil A are openly anti same sex marriage. They allegedly apply their Souther Baptist views to the workplace, ie no gay staff, no working mums. They donate money to anti gay causes. They are also the only sponsors of these Leadership conventions which are also evangelical Christian cult type things.

No my cup of tea at all, should they be censored? Probably not.

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The article says they are only one of a dozen sponsors no?

Does anyone happen to know the name of the convention in question?

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As I read through the article something didn't seem quite right.

Among the bits that struck me were "the politicians there think highly enough of themselves and their deep thoughts that they actually televise their council meetings."

<usually this would be considered transparency>

There was something about the style.

I went to the top of the report and saw the writer's name. EZRA LEVANT. A name I have come across before and worthy of ignoring as one would ignore The Tea Party.

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I believe the name is leader cast, and from looking on google, the event seems to be mostly local sponsors, I've come across a couple of local websites for it, and each have their own local sponsors from that town or nearby.

I don't know the background of leader-cast itself well enough to go in depth, just saw the hoopla online about the decision in Nanaimo.

Seem to get some big names speaking however.

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Leadercast, google them and Chick a Fil A

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It appears to be the mouthpiece of a church:

Leadercast | Real Life Church

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Ah thanks, you found the link I couldn't.

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It might be a precedent, not sure it is all that dangerous.

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It's that thing about not liking someone's views but defending the right to say them. But when the views are contrary to the laws of the land are they still allowed?

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I have no idea, so many websites linking this leader cast thing to so many different things...I can't tell if its the church doing it, or just selling tickets to it... Either way, I don't think its something that should be banned, doesn't seem to be particular religious or spewing hate from what I can tell.

I am not religious and don't agree with most of what religion talks about, but at the same time those with religious beliefs have a right just as I do, as long as they are following the laws and not doing anything illegal.

This is the actual website for them and its not even on the same side of the country as that church, so hard to tell if its that church running it or just hosting one of the webcasts in that area.

About Us | What is Leadercast?

Just a very interesting situation over there, I've got a couple friends in Nanaimo so its been on FB all day.

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Come on, people in Nanaimo are mostly grown adults with minds of their own and I don't find them to be particularly malleable or overly impressionable. What is the city council so afraid of? Do they really think your average Nanaimoite is so dumb and impressionable that they'll immediately adopt whatever controversial views this simulcast might promote (whether overtly or subtly)? If not, then why is there a need to silence them using outright censorship?

Censorship is definitely not the way to go in order to prove that an idea is wrong. The best way to beat such controversial views is to use rational arguments to punch these ideas in the face by using their own convoluted logic against it. Rational and intelligent people will also follow those who give the best sensible argument for or against any given idea. Everyone in Nanaimo should view this censorship as an insult to their intelligence and cognition processes by the city council.

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Never heard of Chick fil A...is it any good?

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If fried chicken is your thing, then it's not at all bad. Tried in Louisiana earlier this year.

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Ah ok, not really my thing. At least not any more.

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It looks like there are a few restaurant locations in Alberta now. I find it intriguing that they chose to open their first stores in Alberta, the province that's probably most likely to agree with their views.

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Thats a stretch.

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:rofl:

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how is this any different to Pattison refusing to allow athiests to advertise on his billboards?

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Well, I'm not particularly sure if that's why they first opened up shop in Alberta. But it kind of makes sense to sell to those who are more likely to agree with you first. After those people recommend the food, other boycotters might be compelled to change their mind about not wanting to buy their food. If I was on the marketing team for Chick-fil-A, that's what I'd do. Start with a favorable crowd and then work my way up to marketing to the naysayers via social peer pressure.

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Why are Albertans a favourable crowd?

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I's start with coming up with a half decent name rather than something concocted in the pub after far too many pints.

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One is a private company, and one is an arm of the government. Government shouldn't really be in the business of censoring like this.

They had some pretty well known and respected people speaking, so I doubt its your typical mumbo jumbo from the crazy religious types.

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Is it illegal to question laws of the land though? Would a convention discussing legalising marijuana be banned as the views were contrary to the laws?

I don't in any way shape or form agree with religious nut jobs, but they have a right to discuss their beliefs. I would wonder whether the same decision would have been made if it were a different religion involved.

It's not. Doesn't mean that Pattison is right. He isn't however elected to represent a population.

I just saw that Cat Deeley is a host haha!

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Because Alberta sort of has Canada's least LGT-tolerant population. Therefore, there might actually be enough people who'll look the other way and still eat there despite the controversy.

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Sort of, what does that mean? Do you have any evidenced to back up your opinion? Have you ever been to Alberta and witnessed such intolerance? I don't doubt it exists, but I suggest that it is no better or worse in Alberta than in the rest of Canada.

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What I mean to say is that Alberta has a reputation for being overly conservative. A few incidents every now and again also help to reinforce this reputation as being one of Canada's least progressive provinces (who'd probably be less likely to boycott Chick Fil A). If Chick Fil A knows this, then they'd target Alberta as the location of their first store.

I don't exactly know how anti-LGBT different places in Canada are, since I'm not a member of that minority and don't get much opportunity to witness or experience such things. But still, I'm more inclined to believe that Alberta probably has a tendency to be more anti-LGBT than other provinces, mainly because they overwhelmingly vote for the Conservative Party.

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I see, you don't have any evidence.

I'd suggest that you check the results from the 2011 Federal Election and compare, let's say, the election results in SK, NU, YT. But I doubt that that would make any difference to you.

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I never claimed that my conjectures about Alberta's prevailing social and ideological attitudes are fact. Looking over election results for several of Alberta's electoral districts, I have some reason to believe that the majority of Albertans are conservative leaning and probably adhere to some common conservative ideals like anti-LGBT sentiments. Also, Alberta is more urbanized and metropolitan than other conservative-leaning parts of Canada. A good marketing strategy for Chick-fil-A would involve targeting densely populated, conservative-leaning parts of Canada. Calgary seems to be the best candidate in this regard.

Again, this is all purely conjectural. I'm not trying to pass this off as fact. In fact, Alberta doesn't even need to be have very many anti-LGBT conservatives to be Chick-fil-A's first choice. It's the reputation of being like this (whether it's mythical or factual) that would probably attract controversial restaurant chains like Chick-fil-A to invest in starting their first Canadian restaurant in Calgary. Also notice that they're opening it in Canada's third busiest airport (after Vancouver and Toronto both of which have reputations for being extremely liberal and/or LGBT-friendly).

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You might want to "stop digging" at this point.

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They're headquarters is in Atlanta and Atlanta is full of Baptists - I even know a couple of them. The Deluxe Chicken Sandwich has wheat flour, msg and peanut oil to weed out some of the non-believers... but seriously, sure it's possible they're choosing that location because of the conservative biblebelt mores southern Alberta is well known for (birthplace of the Reform Party, no conjecture about it but the smaller cities have more camp meetings and tabernacles on their outskirts), but without having a microphone in their boardroom there's no way to know. The fact that an airport offers a second level of security against protests and vandalism and a buffer against bad local press because the customers are in transit and not local doesn't hurt them either, but diners in an international airport are also more likely to have already been customers in the US or at least have heard the name and big airports are extremely desireable for shops and eateries because there's less competition and the customers are essentialy captives there so the franchises pay top dollar to be there. My friend the jeweller has his pewter pins and pendants in all the Cara shops and it's a substantial help. There are far too many factors in play to say the political make-up of Calgary is the deciding reason they're trying there first. See how some of the facts of this deal seem to work for both arguments? I personally don't think gay sex is enough to sway a major business decision like this but if it cost them a few sales it may make them a few extra to compensate, even if people only go there because they're 'Chick-fil-A curious'.

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I'm not making this up as I go along if that's what you're implying. This is what I thought from the very beginning when I read that they were opening up in Calgary. For the sake of brevity, I didn't initially include all the details I just typed. Also, I mean it when I say that all this is pure speculation. I don't know if it's true since I'm not on Chick-fil-A's marketing team. I'm just making an educated guess based on the limited information I have.

Also, I've never been to Alberta (unless you count the inside of Calgary International Airport), so I wouldn't know for absolute certain what people from there are like. Based on what I see in the news and other media, I have my own opinions and ideas about what Albertans might be like. But my views about Alberta (like their higher tendency to be anti-LGBT) aren't ironclad. They're opinions, not facts, and they can either be changed or reinforced by experience and additional evidence. In a few weeks, I'm actually moving to an area of BC that's supposedly just like Alberta. All these negative Albertan stereotypes aren't stopping me. I won't go around being rude to or distrustful of people on the basis of mostly anecdotal evidence and stereotypes. Everyone I meet will start with a clean slate, just like everybody else.

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Nice analysis. I really don't know exactly what made their marketing team decide on Calgary International Airport, but they're there for one or a multitude of reasons. Given my limited experience in marketing, if I was on their team, I'd suggest seeking out the most densely populated conservative-leaning metropolitan areas in Canada (wherever they might be) and market to them first. The use of the airport location would also be a major upgrade to this marketing plan.

I don't really think Calgary is all that bad. My opinion of modern Calgary is that it's really diverse with respect to different social attitudes and belief systems. It seems to be a city that's in the process of moving away from being traditionally over-conservative to becoming more modern and enlightened.

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HMSHost owns and operates the Calgary airport location, and they already have franchising rights to Chick Fil A, it may not have even been Chick Fil A who had the interest in having a location there, and was likely HMSHost who was in need of replacing the Harvey's they owned in that location who chose to open one there.

Based on the comments made by the corporate person in the articles I saw, doesn't really sound like they have an expansion planned for Canada at this time.

This isn't the first time there has been a franchise in Canada, there was one in 1995, but it didn't last too long.

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Yes I am implying that "you are making this up as you go along". You say you don't have much experience in marketing and you have never even been to Alberta, yet you see it as reasonable to expound some nonsensical ill-informed opinions and then repeatedly back them up. There is nowhere in BC that is "just like Alberta" FFS, it's a bit like saying there's somewhere in Lancashire that's just like Yorkshire. At least you realise that basing your opinions on anecdotal stereotypes is never a good thing.

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OK, there's no way for me to prove that I didn't make this up as I went along. But I definitely know that I wasn't. I should have typed out my full explanation from the get-go, but that ship has long sailed. By "somewhere in BC that's supposedly just like Alberta", I'm referring to an area that's widely regarded as being culturally similar to Alberta in a lot of ways. I should really choose my words more carefully.

Also, I know that I'm no expert on Alberta or marketing tactics. I said that this was all pure speculation and that I wasn't trying to pass it off as fact. My opinions (if you can call them that) about Alberta are based on occurrences and statistics that I usually read about in the news media, some of which reinforce the negative stereotypes (and others that contradict them). I'm not even sure if "opinion" is the right term to use, because my impression of them is nowhere near ironclad or dogmatic.

To put it accurately, I'm mostly neutral on the Alberta issue since there is no conclusive evidence. However, I'm the kind of person who likes to prepare for the worst and hope for the best. Given all these negative anecdotes, occurrences and alleged trends present in Alberta, I feel like there's more of a need to prepare for negativity in Alberta than anywhere else in case some or all of the stereotypes might be true. I'm not LGBT, but I am a member of another minority group that some (as in a small, yet adequately significant number of) Albertans are allegedly not too fond of. Truth be told, anyone should be extra prepared for anywhere, because the stereotypes about places like Vancouver and Toronto being tolerant could very well be exaggerated. You'll never really know until you get there and start interacting with people and society at large. This is why I'm giving everyone a clean slate regardless of what their city is well-known for (whether it's positive or negative). My impressions about Alberta are more skewed to the negative side due to trepidation that I have no problem with overcoming in split-second.

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Chick-fil-A’s expansion strategy — 108 new locations this year — includes moving into areas where its politics are unpopular.

Individual franchises are working to overcome the political stigma; in California, a franchise offered free meals last year to gay marriage advocates.

Chick-fil-A Comes To Canada With Calgary Airport Location