On Pointless Boycotts

Cinemark's CEO Alan Stock donated $9,999 ($1 below the $10K reporting threshold, fishy, yes...) to ProtectMarriage.com . Now, the NO on 8 people are calling for a boycott of Cinemark Theatres, especially for Milk.

While I agree with the No on 8, There are financial reasons why a boycott is not effective in ousting Alan Stock.

- In just the specific case of Milk...the direct effect that the movie's expected revenue would have on Cinemark is....minimal, with or without a boycott. (I point to the screaming teenage girls packing the midnight showings of Twilight...). Plus the studio takes around 50% of the box office gross, so the figure 1,000 tickets x $10 a ticket = $10,000 really only amounts to around $4,000 to $5,000 in revenue...and thats pennies to the company, and what, if any of that, filters up to Mr. Stock is probably the quivalent to low end toilet paper.

- While it is contradictory for the CEO of Cinemark to benefit from showing a movie about a gay supervisor....realize that it isn't the CEO'S choice which movies are played at what theatre...

- In terms of a general overall boycott...Alan Stock will still get his pay regardless of whether or not he is fired by the company. And, he probably has so much that would be unaffected by a job loss in any case. An effective boycott (and, sorry, I point to Twilight, and say that this hasn't happened, yet) only affects the ground level workers, most of whom, probably agree with the No on 8 campaign. The lack of business brought on by an effective boycott means less budget, less hours, less need for there to be workers at the theatres. The ground level workers are the people who really need the money in the first place.

- So you ask...why don't the workers just...not work there? In this economy, if you have a job, you hang onto it for dear life, unless its absolutely horrible.

- Alan Stock doesn't have to directly deal with the e-mails and the calls, its everyone else in the company that has to "clean it up".

- You're taking on a large, global, corporation. The reason why the boycott worked in Sacramento is because it was smaller, with one source of income, not thousands of screens worth of income.

- I don't know what a direct answer would be to Mr. Stock's donations, or even if there should be, except to continue the fight to make gay marriage constitutional, once again. I just believe a boycott against a company of this size unintentionally affect the wrong people.