Club hatin'

[Tonchi]

Originally Posted by LabRat

Any links would be appreciated. My sister in laws family owns several in the Wisconsin area.

I first heard about this hidden agenda by reading the Ethics Questions column in my local paper. Since I was looking for a health club to join I researched it, and discovered it was even worse than I thought.

http://www.cbn.com/700club/guests/in...in_080403.aspx

http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/arc...es/02local.htm

http://www.snopes.com/business/alliance/curves.asp

Excerpt from the above link: The statements made by Carroll in those three short paragraphs about Gary Heavin, the founder and CEO of Curves, hold water for the most part. Heavin (pronounced "Haven"), is a born-again Christian who is strongly pro-life and, according to an article on Operation Save America's web site (a pro-life group of a more radical orientation than Operation Rescue, and one that asserts there is a connection between abortion and increased risk of breast cancer), is one of their supporters:

We then contacted Mr. Gary Heavin, Founder and CEO of Curves International. Mr. Heavin is a wealthy man who is a committed Pro-life Christian. He is the premier customer of the bank that sponsors Komen. He graciously returned our phone call and promised to use his influence to convince the bank to give some of the funding to Carenet, so they could take care of the women, instead of Planned Parenthood.

Several months passed and, lo and behold, on Tuesday, September 23rd, in the year of our Lord 2003, Carenet, our local CPC, held their annual banquet. It was the most attended, and as far as I was concerned, the best one to date. At the end, a major announcement and press statement was issued for Central Texas. Gary Heavin made a five million dollar grant to Family Practice, Carenet, and McCap. These groups and ministries would receive one million dollars a year for the next five years.


You can find a lot more by googling.

I notice in a previous post that the supporters of Curves' founder are trying to distance themselves from the embarrassing publicity by using the legal ploy "It is not the corporation 'Curves' which does this stuff...." In lawyerese that means that even if all of the money which goes to the founder as his cut is used for radical evangelistic-types of organizations and causes, you can't accuse Curves-the-corporation of doing the same. That is totally blowing smoke, and they are getting away with it because papers like the SF Chronicle do not want to go to court with them.

Originally Posted by breakingnews

This political correctness shit has gotten out of hand. (This is primarily a U.S. phenomenon, no?)

These kinds of situations keep nipping people in the ass is because, well, relatively few people give a shit. The world is racist and there's nothing that can be done about it. We all discriminate in our own little ways. No amount of education or experience could overturn our inherent social behaviorial patterns.

What do you think would happen if the courts refused to hear discrimination cases?

You always hear about these "landmark" court cases ... but many of those cases affect such a small population. They fade from the spotlight and poof, who cares.

Like the guy who sued Hooters for hiring only women. The guy who sued Curves. Shannon Faulkner, the girl who sued to get into the Citadel.

All individuals wanting to make a point. Sure, from a technical/legal/constitutional perspective, it may be ... educational ... to highlight these situations. But why do these people want to put themselves in those situations? Would it be possible for us to simply accept that there are exceptions and not waste time/money arguing cases that benefit only 0.005% of the population?

I do not want to work at Hooters. I do not want to join your club. But I do recognize that not having the choice to do so goes against democratic ideals. Still, do we have to be so damn attentive to everyone's bitching and moaning?

A private club has nothing to do with "democratic ideals"... anyway, America is a Republic.