Creating Change (Dot Org)? Blogging Network Prompts $100k Donation to LGBT Groups
BY Nancy Scola | Monday, July 13 2009
There's an interesting yet somewhat below-the-radar case of bloggers creating change through public pressure and a bit of behind the scenes negotiation. In this case, that change comes in the form of a $100,000 check.
The deal is thus. Michael Jones is the lead blogger for the gay rights section on Change.org, the blogging activist network we've discussed in the past in the context of wondering how Change.org's blogging-plus-cash model was going to go about affecting change. Here's one way, it seems. The background is that Jones blogged on his Change.org site and the LGBT site Bilerico Project about the connections between Rockstar Energy drink and right-wing radio host Michael Savage. (If you're unfamiliar with Rockstar, think Red Bull but with fewer angel spokes-cartoons and more scantily-clad models and Marilyn Manson concerts.) As for Savage, he's had some pretty extreme things to say about gay people in the past; here's a taste from Campus Progress. Among the connections between Savage and Rockstar is that his son is the CEO of the company and his wife CFO. Jones detailed other connections between the host and the company. The company reacted by sending in the lawyers.
But Change.org reports that the blogging network, along with some allies, has gotten Rockstar to commit to donating $100,000 to LGBT causes, half of which will go to the LGBT center in Southern Nevada, where Rockstar is based.
Now, whether a $100,000 contribution represents much of a social commitment or cultural reformation is one question. (That figure works out to be the purchase price of about 33,000 16 oz. cans of Rockstar's flagship energy drink, which the company sells millions of each year.) And some are arguing that gay groups shouldn't accept money from the likes of the company, as it more likely represents the buying of a bit of political cover than it does a commitment to gay rights. That said, $12,500 of Rockstar's contribution will go to sponsoring the National LGBT Blogger & Citizen Journalist Initiative -- funding their own watchdogs, it seems.