A boycott against Starbucks over its
support for gay marriage appears to be decelerating despite a new
global push.
A week after the National Organization
for Marriage (NOM), the nation's most vociferous opponent of gay
marriage, took its “Dump Starbucks” campaign abroad, the number
of new people pledging to avoid Starbucks shops and its retail
products has barely increased.
Approximately 2,000 new pledges, or
less than 300 per day, were recorded on the group's website since it
expanded its online ad campaign to the Middle East, Indonesia and
China. The campaign gathered 30,000 pledges during its initial U.S.
only phase, or roughly 1,500 pledges per day.
Earlier
this month, Starbucks officials were presented with a giant
“thank you” card signed by over 640,000 people. The campaign,
organized by the groups SumOfUs.org
and Washington United for Marriage, delivered the card to Starbucks'
Seattle headquarters.
Speaking to National
Public Radio (NPR), Thomas Peters, who blogs for NOM, said the
group wanted to take the campaign to “countries that have very
traditional views on marriage.”
“So we think that people in these
countries should be aware that Starbucks isn't just coffee, it's
coffee with an agenda,” Peters said.