Doug Jones says boycotting Alabama will only make it harder on those who don’t agree with the abortion law. Georgia too, and Georgia is about to lose a number of very lucrative conventions.

OTOH there are people who say that of the good people of Alabama want to participate in the modern world they need to change their voting patterns.

Waddaya think?

Depends on your intention in boycotting. If it's to get Alabama to change, i have my doubts a boycott will achieve that.

If it's because you don't want to give your business or the gift of your presence to a place whose politics are despicable, it's a fair form of self expression.

Personally I would never want to set foot in any place where people think like that. I've got enough loonies to deal with right here at home.

So what's Doug Jones' solution? Meh.

"...the good people of Alabama..." I was going to write something snarky but I think I'll skip it.

Alabama and Georgia are two states that I would never set foot in regardless their latest idiocy, so I've effectively been boycotting them a good long while.

Boycott them, and boycott them good. Money talks. Just ask Doug Jones', whose rational for more military spending is that it is good for Alabama's economy.

quote:

Originally posted by piqué:
Depends on your intention in boycotting. If it's to get Alabama to change, i have my doubts a boycott will achieve that.

Dunno. The good people of Tennessee managed to modify their idiot bathroom legislation when they figured out that the rest of the country wouldn’t tolerate it. Conventions are being cancelled in Georgia left and right. No one schedules conventions in AL, despite plenty of natural beauty. They may be immune from national pressure.

The sad part? Nobody cares.

Arizona had a boycott going after our idiot governor Meacham decided to remove MLK day from our list of state holidays. That lasted about 2 years, and cost them many conventions and a Super Bowl. That was enough to get the MLK Day placed on the ballot, where reinstatement passed by a large majority. IMO, state legislators are highly sensitive to input from the business community. If there's money that's being lost, a boycott can be highly effective. But, you'll note, it took a ballot initiative to reverse idiot Meacham's decision.

quote:

Originally posted by Steve Miller:

quote:

Originally posted by piqué:
Depends on your intention in boycotting. If it's to get Alabama to change, i have my doubts a boycott will achieve that.

Dunno. The good people of Tennessee managed to modify their idiot bathroom legislation when they figured out that the rest of the country wouldn’t tolerate it. Conventions are being cancelled in Georgia left and right. No one schedules conventions in AL, despite plenty of natural beauty. They may be immune from national pressure.

The sad part? Nobody cares.

I've attended a very small creative writing convention in Fairhope, Alabama, a beautiful little town on Mobile Bay. It's held at a community college. We just needed a few meeting rooms and a room for headquarters, so we are not talking about an economy-changer, but I'm now considering whether to go back.

There are also two small conferences in Birmingham and Wetumpka, Alabama, that I've enjoyed attending. Same thing--small venue, fifty or a hundred people, a few hotel rooms, some restaurant meals. It's not a lot of money, but I'll have to mull over whether I'll attend in the future.

Big conferences I've attended in the South have been in Dallas, San Antonio, New Orleans, Orlando, Tampa, and Atlanta. Some of those are big enough to leave a real hole in some people's businesses.

I don’t. It always seems a little arbitrary and inconsistent. I mean, am I really going to boycott Georgia then go to Brazil which has stricter laws? Or any number of other countries?

Also, I don’t actually think the pro-life position is evil, even though I’ve always been pro choice myself.

quote:

Originally posted by jon-nyc:
I don’t. It always seems a little arbitrary and inconsistent. I mean, am I really going to boycott Georgia then go to Brazil which has stricter laws? Or any number of other countries?

Also, I don’t actually think the pro-life position is evil, even though I’ve always been pro choice myself.

I don't know that it's evil per se. If you begin at a certain starting assumption, it's even understandable.

Nevertheless, in practice, it has evil consequences, and that makes it evil in practice, if not evil in intention.

As far as the boycott goes, I think a total boycott is impractical (for me). I mean, if you were serious about boycotting those states, you couldn't even drive to Florida. You have to set foot in either Alabama or Georgia to drive to Florida. And Hartsfield is the busiest airport in the world; if you're not going to fly through Hartsfield, your travel plans are majorly restricted. But I'll certainly avoid them when possible, and definitely no tourism for the time being.

I was discussing this last week with some friends of mine whose politics are very liberal and who are feeling that, for many reasons, they no longer want to spend money in states with regressive policies. And yet we would like to vacation together in places where we could tool civil rights historical sites.

(Quirt does not know this yet. Hey, Quirt! Want to go tour civil rights museums with veterans of the civil rights movement? Not soon, because I've got to write a book this summer, and not all at once, but in theory sometime...)

These sites are not in states to whom they want to give money. I see their point, but I thought about it for a while. My money would support those museums, which are doing important work. And it would take very little effort to find black-owned restaurants and, with a little more effort, hotels and B&Bs. That would suit this trip, and there are probably other lefty ways to spend one's money. As I told them, it would be like a reverse Green Book.

So maybe I don't have to boycott New Orleans, which I love, love, love, love, love...

It’s well within the realm of possibility that Oklahoma passes a similar bill to GA, AL, etc.

quote:

Originally posted by jon-nyc:
It’s well within the realm of possibility that Oklahoma passes a similar bill to GA, AL, etc.

None of this actually worries people who are liberal and have money. As Mary Anna reminds me, Susan Sarandon and other Bernie supporters live in California. California isn't going to eliminate abortion rights within the state. Oregon just passed expanded abortion rights. My family will be able to travel.

And then I ask Mary Anna what we'll all do when a Republican Congress passes a nationwide abortion ban ...

Thank you Bernie and Bernie supporters!

The worst part for me is, I've been saying this since 2015. I saw this train coming down the tracks.

My point was about the idea of boycotting. Kind of hard to boycott your home state, and I can't imagine you moving over it.

i think being pro-life actually is evil. denying someone's civil rights is evil.

quote:

Originally posted by QuirtEvans:
And then I ask Mary Anna what we'll all do when a Republican Congress passes a nationwide abortion ban ...

I don't think this is likely, but I have given thought to what the GOP version of Roe V Wade would look like. Surely there are people who might find a right to life in the penumbra of the constitution...

quote:

Originally posted by jon-nyc:
My point was about the idea of boycotting. Kind of hard to boycott your home state, and I can't imagine you moving over it.

I've already said that I can't really boycott Alabama and Georgia because that would make it impossible to drive to Florida ... well, boycotting the state in which I currently live would be logarithmically more difficult, so no, I think it's pretty obvious I wouldn't be prepared to do that.