Message to Corporate Headquarters: It’s time to focus on minding your own business
July 5, 2024
Calvin Mulligan, Futurescapes.ca (c) July 4, 2024 All rights reserved
“They don’t realize that this is the start of something, not the end of something.” (Robby Starbuck)
I’ve long considered the ability to learn from the experiences of others, good or bad, an important measure of intelligence. I’ll illustrate with the classic “hot stove” analogy. Five year old Johnny’s friend, Charlie, puts his finger on a hot element of a stove and screams in pain. Johnny wisely concludes that touching a hot stove is painful and should be avoided. But another of Johnny’s friends, Shawn, who also watched Charlie burn his finger, decides that he needs to find out for himself and promptly sticks his finger on the hot stove with the same painful result. Which of the boys is the most intelligent? Clearly, the stove experience was instructive for Johnny who learned the lesson without the pain.
Both business and non-profit organizations, like people, can learn valuable lessons from the experiences of their peers and thus avoid similar pain. Not all are so inclined however. Other, less observant or intelligent organizations must experience the burn themselves in order to grasp the lesson and integrate it into corporate policy and practice. Recently, Tractor Supply Company (TSC) has provided the corporate world with a graphic illustration of the importance of attending to your business and your customers rather than globalist-approved social-engineering projects. The question of how many other corporations are capable of learning from the experience of TSC remains to be seen.
Tractor Supply Company (TSC), a Fortune 300 company based in Tennessee with over 2,200 stores, was recently boycotted by its conservative customers. The latter were thoroughly offended by the company’s zealous embrace of DEI (“Diversity, Equity and Inclusion”) initiatives and related financial support for woke political causes. Figuratively speaking, it looks like TSC didn’t just stick it’s toe in the DEI “water”, but rather jumped in at the deep end and went all out to capture the DEI Olympic gold. And then someone found out what TSC was spending some of their hard-earned customer dollars on.
As Greg Ritchie of the on-line publication, Messenger, tells the story: “One online commentator, in a post which went viral and was seen by millions, called the company out for: “LGBTQIA+ training for employees, funding pride/drag events, having a DEI Council, funding sex changes, climate change activism, pride month decorations in the office, DEI hiring practices and LGBTQIA+ events at work.
The commentator had been tipped off by a TSC employee who noticed just how far the company had wondered from the core values of its farm and rural customers. (It’s interesting that it was an employee, not the CEO or the Board) The social media commentator was Robbie Starbuck, the X user who exposed the company’s split personality. In a subsequent interview, Starbuck commented: “The company is absolutely stupid for doing this.”
Yes, returning to the hot stove analogy, it was exceedingly stupid. It’s not like the Bud Light and Target stories had faded into the annals of business history. And, it’s not like “Get woke, go broke” (the obvious overstatement aside) had been disproven, particularly among organizations with a conservative customer base. But TSC had to put it’s hand on the stove and then lean on it and boy did it burn. The customer boycott produced a drop of more than $200 in share value in one week and a $2 billion decline in market capitalization.
The customer reaction was enough of a whack on the side of the corporate head to prompt TSC to regain its senses and repent of its woke ways. Last week, it issued a statement which reads in part: “We work hard to live up to our Mission and Values every day and represent the values of the communities and customers we serve. We have heard from customers that we have disappointed them. We have taken this feedback to heart.” The corporation pledged, “Going forward, we will ensure our activities and giving tie directly to our business. For instance, this means we will:
1. No longer submit data to the Human Rights Campaign
2. Refocus our Team Member Engagement Groups on mentoring, networking and supporting the business
3. Further focus on rural America priorities including ag education, animal welfare, veteran causes and being a good neighbor and stop sponsoring nonbusiness activities like pride festivals and voting campaigns
4. Eliminate DEI roles and retire our current DEI goals while still ensuring a respectful environment
5. Withdraw our carbon emission goals and focus on our land and water conservation efforts”
I’m not sure what it was that convinced senior management that there was gold in those DEI virtue-signalling endeavours. Perhaps TSC leadership was counting on the historic leaning of conservatives toward a live and let live philosophy. The problem with that of course is that conservatives were forced to abandon that some time ago by militant leftist antagonists. Leftist activism taught us that continuing to pursue peaceful coexistence in the 21st century was a ticket to oblivion. Yes, it took us some time to figure that out, but we’ve learned that leftist ideologues aren’t interested in civil conversation, “tolerance,” sharing the platform or, diversity of thought despite the pretence to the contrary. We’ve discovered that the radical left have no respect for boundaries. From their perspective, this is a winner-take-all fight to the death and the goal is complete domination.
So, admittedly it took us a some time to figure out how to confront the activist left’s massive propaganda machine. But at some point, we realized the smears, deceptions, sleights of hand, red herring distractions and straw man tactics were all it had — an assortment of rhetorical fallacies. Its arguments are essentially devoid of substance. We tried to bring reason, objective truth and time-tested principles to the debate and the wokesters replied with insults, lies de-platforming campaigns, intimidation and false claims to the moral high ground. And let’s not overlook their all-time favourite tactic — playing that well-worn victim card.
We took a lot of beatings, but we learned to defend ourselves. Remember when Hillary Clinton tried to smear all those disinclined to vote for her “a basket of deplorables”? Conservatives didn’t run; they fashioned the insult into a badge of honour and it boomeranged back. It’s a text book example of what I call “rhetorical jiu-jitsu”. We also learned that memes can be the equivalent of missiles in information wars. Consequently, we’ve developed an army of rapid response digital warriors capable of delivering devastating meme strikes on leftist points of vulnerability.
So yes, we conservatives have learned how to fight. Bud Light, Target and now Tractor Supply can attest to that. And we’re still improving our ability to target and take down activist woke positions. This struggle in the larger arena is far from over, however. As Robbie Starbuck, recently put it: “They don’t realize that this is the start of something, not the end of something.” The Tractor Supply win aside, my career experience tells me that big organizations in particular are seriously hearing-impaired. Part of the problem is that senior management relies too heavily on PR and communications specialists to objectively interpret incoming signals from from customers and members of the public. And then, after the damage is done, senior management again relies on these same blind-in-one-eye specialists, to make the problem go away.
PR spinmeisters, famous for their non-apology apologies like “mistakes were made” are all about advocacy and fixate on the messaging. Confronting the issue or point of contention head-on is an entirely different matter. So, for those fervent adherents of the DEI cult, here’s few candid pieces of advice from your friendly futurist.
- Don’t rely on your PR department to either read the writing on the proverbial wall or save your butt after you’ve taken a hit. I haven’t met a PR practitioner yet that isn’t infected with the delusion that it’s inevitably a matter of getting the messaging right. Nope! Ultimately, no amount of spin closes the divide between differences in core values and principles. Try spinning the carving up of teens genitals and hormonal castration as “gender-affirming care” to conservatives and see how far that gets you. And after that, try spinning pedophilia as “love.” Conservatives aren’t buying it. They’re naming names and in some jurisdictions legislating the death penalty (See Tennessee reference below).
- DEI is yesterday’s management virtue scorecard and it’s past its best-before-date. It’s unduly narrow, divisive and often discriminatory (anti-white). If there’s concrete evidence that DEI commitments produced significant gains in organizational productivity or performance over the longer term, I’d love to see it. Most of the measuring appears to centre on DEI scores. Logic tells us that this kind of motivation could perversely lead to actual declines in corporate IQ and performance. It’s a pretty safe bet that Intersectionality-skewed thinking has penetrated HR departments and it’s not exactly a merit or performance-oriented philosophy. What do you think it does to employee morale when employees are subjected to HR’s shaming harangues and indoctrination? The Covid Propagandemic was a major test of an organization’s real values. Those that mandated get vaxxed-or-get lost failed that test big time. They can now explain to employees that were ostracized and unemployment or coerced into getting an often-injurious or fatal concoction how important diversity, equity and inclusion is to their company.
- The over-reach of the LGBT+ XYZ movement is apparent — even to many members of the gay community. Have you ever noticed how the voice of political lobbies that perennially play the victim card eventually starts to sound like noise? This is particularly true when they have already been granted the coveted “Protected Class” status by their governments. No, LGBT+ activists didn’t manage to get their flag planted on the moon yet, but that’s okay. Now, it’s roll back time. Organizations could demonstrate some foresight by “de-rainbowing” their organizations in light of the fact that their actual mandate probably has nothing to do with the social engineering campaigns they routinely adopt by proxy on behalf of the radical left. And importantly, the reputational risk is growing with each new letter and sexual kink added to the gender alphabet.
- Children are out of bounds. Conservatives are no longer going to ask politely. Your company would be wise to disassociate itself from any activist group or activity that a) targets legislation that protects children from sexual exploitation or b) supports the sexual indoctrination of children, trans grooming (e.g. tranny story time with kids), gender transitioning of children or tilts toward pedophilia under some other label. Such activities are against the law in some jurisdictions.
My final comment to senior management is simply that the tide has already turned in favour of de-globalizaiton and decentralization. We’ve entered an era of globalist deprogramming. And that means it’s time to declare your independence from your (globalist) management influencers (McKinsey, Deloitte, KPMG, Bain, BCG, etc) and their juniors in the DEI consulting ecosystem. Tractor Supply appears, in effect, to have done that. The hive-minded globalist Borg does’t care about you or your company’s well-being. It’s time to focus on minding your own business. Ultimately, your customers, your employees and your bottom line will be the better for it
– Calvin
End Notes:
Meet the man who saved Tractor Supply by defeating Woke activists https://www.tiktok.com/@george.gmwuko_2126_461/video/7386472577763527979
Tractor Supply loses billions in stock collapse as woke left activism exposed https://stateofthenation.co/
Tractor Supply turns back on going woke https://messenger-news.com/2024/07/03/tractor-supply-turns-back-on-going-woke/
Tractor Supply ends DEI initiatives after customer backlash ‘It’s time to expose Tractor Supply’ https://www.wthr.com/article/news/politics/tractor-supply-ends-its-dei-climate-initiatives-after-conservative-backlash-company-political-activism/531-31a283f9-f7a8-4f95-8e76-46404d1b69d6
How Tractor Supply decided to end DEI and fast https://www.wsj.com/business/retail/how-tractor-supply-decided-to-end-dei-and-fast-16b45803
Khazarians using DEI to destroy airline industry (Two Jet Blue airlines collide in Boston) https://revolver.news/2024/02/and-so-it-begins-two-jetblue-airplanes-collide-in-boston/
The quiet desperation of woke fanatics https://www.sott.net/article/473635-The-quiet-desperation-of-woke-fanatics
D.E.I. goes quiet https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/13/business/dealbook/dei-goes-quiet.html
The DEI roll back https://www.sott.net/article/488113-John-Sailer-The-DEI-rollback
How scientific materialism begot woke ideology https://www.sott.net/article/486799-How-scientific-materialism-begot-woke-ideology
The recognition of reality destroys the dystopian dreams of the Borg https://www.sott.net/article/488948-The-recognition-of-reality-destroys-the-dystopian-dreams-of-The-Borg
Dr. Jordan Peterson calls out PRIDE month as a celebration of hedonism https://www.naturalnews.com/2024-06-10-jordan-peterson-pride-month-celebration-of-hedonism.html
The woke movement is actually cultural enslavement. The culture war is a fight to stop it https://alt-market.us/the-woke-movement-is-actually-corporate-enslavement-the-culture-war-is-a-fight-to-stop-it/
In Europe, people are saying “no” to war and woke culture https://www.sott.net/article/492407-In-Europe-people-said-no-to-war-and-woke-culture
Tennessee law allowing death penalty for pedophiles goes into effect; only democrats oppose it https://www.sott.net/article/492802-Tennessee-law-allowing-death-penalty-for-pedophiles-goes-into-effect-only-Democrats-oppose-it
Detrans: True stories of escaping the gender ideology cult https://www.amazon.ca/Detrans-Stories-Escaping-Gender-Ideology/dp/1684515017
Young detransitioners lead the charge agains the corrupt medical and educational establishment https://chroniclesmagazine.org/web/young-destransitioners-lead-the-charge-against-corrupt-medical-and-educational-establishment/
Most gender-confused kids ‘grow out of it’, according to landmark study https://www.mercatornet.com/most_gender_confused_kids_grow_out_of_it_according_to_landmark_study
Texas supreme court upholds ban on gender-affirming care for transgender minor https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/texas-supreme-court-upholds-state-ban-on-gender-affirming-care-for-transgender-minors#:~:text=The%20Texas%20law%20prevents%20transgender,to%20taper%20off%20their%20use.