BOYCOTT STUPIDITY: Support BP Franchise Owners!
BP franchisees are small business owners.
They are employers, taxpayers, homeowners & community members.
They have expenses, loans, payrolls and mortgages to pay.
They have families to support.
Yet their American dreams and livelihoods are under attack by a huge insurgency of adversaries calling for their demise and plunge into bankruptcy.
Some of these adversaries are well-meaning but misinformed activists who are either too callous, too lazy, or too empty-headed (or all of the above) to actually think through their call for the destruction of local small business owners.
Others calling for a BP station boycott are rich & powerful groups and celebrities who are shamelessly exploiting an environmental catastrophe for their own gain.
Exploiters range from multimillionaire energy-wasters like Lady GaGa & Justin Bieber to has-beens like Korn & The Backstreet Boys.
Shameless opportunist celebrities and their teams of publicists are all too willing to toss hardworking franchise owners under their gas-guzzling tour buses for easy headlines and a little more attention from their moronic fans.
BOYCOTT STUPIDITY! SUPPORT BP FRANCHISE OWNERS WITH YOUR PATRONAGE… AND A COMMENT BELOW!
Photo credits:
BP Pirate protester by Infrogmation. License: Creative Commons
NY BP station (World Naked Bike Ride) by bitchcakesny. License: Creative Commons
Aside from hurting the wrong people, boycotting BP is just plain misguided. Does anyone really think this was any less likely to happen at a rig with any other oil company’s name on it? Either boycott them all, or just shut up… We need to focus on mitigating those risks in the future, and cleaning up the mess when those risks turn to losses. BP’s far from innocent, but let’s first stop the leak, clean up the beaches, and then figure out what went wrong, rather than just getting all pissy about it.
Not to be insensitive, but let’s face it… these franchise owners hooked their wagons to the BP star and now they’ve got to face the consequences. They benefitted from the name recognition of the brand and their BS “we care about the environment” ad campaigns for years and now they suffer the consequences. They could have gone with other options, including being an independent gas station. Maybe theres a warning here for people to think twice before they tie themselves to a careless, greedy corporation.
Boycotts might make people feel good and pretend they are doing something without requiring actual effort but they rarely have the intended effect on the intended target. Business just isn’t that simplistic.
A boycott might hurt BP a little, and everyone else down the line a lot more. These businesses employ a lot of “regular” people, like convenience store clerks, stockboys, etc.–who could lose their jobs and also affect suppliers like candy, snack and soda companies that could also lay off people
You’re right that people should think things through. Like a lot of 401ks are invested in oil company stock. This could negatively impact a lot of non-BP people’s retirements, pension plans, etc. It would be interesting to see the reactions of protesters when they lose money in their retirement accounts not even realizing they themselves are BP investors.
This has the potencial to bankrupt BP and where will the victums of the spill be than? People need to wake up and look at the total picture here and stop the boycott before it does more damage to our economy.
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I do agree that the franchisees are getting unduly hurt with a boycot and will even go further to say it is really the fault of the rig operations subcontractor (evidence is pointing in that direction). Sure, it’s really easy to poke fun at the “freaky-hippy-people” protesting (and they are funny), but all of this is a distraction.
The real problem still comes down to “we need to find another source of energy.” Oil has served us well, but we’ve been resting on our laurels, so to speak. When it’s getting to the point that we risk the environment to get at a depleting source of energy, we’re just robbing Peter to pay Paul.
This country is spectacular at invention! Surely someone can find a newer “renewable” (I hate buzzwords) source of energy. On both sides- shut up and stop pointing fingers! Fix the current crises, then solve the problem by finding a cheap, portable energy source to replace oil altogether!
I understand the concern for the poor people that have BP franchises but there is another way to support them without buying the gas. Go into their station store and buy your bread, milk, whatever. They make an actual profit on these items and you are supporting the franchise owner without helping out the blood suckers.
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