rainbow capitalism hate account

welcome to rainbow capitalism! here we believe in exploiting pride for money! Or at least that's what corporations think. At this blog, we believe in the opposite - fuck corporations and support your local queer owned businesses and artists.

Here's some posts to look through to get to know the blog and get started!

- intro and about me :)

- what is rainbow capitalism (and why should I care)?

- got content to share? find out how here

last year, I made a long post about Target’s pride collection (here). As I’m sure you might have seen, they have another pride collection. 

Notable in this year’s collection is their collaboration with TomboyX which includes selling binders/compression tops in store. This does help increase accessibility for those who perhaps don’t have access to buy online. They’ve also teamed up with Humankind, a gender inclusive swimwear brand. 

Last year, Target donated $100,000 to GLSEN and is on their website as a “senior donor.” It’s not entirely clear what amount corresponds to which level, but higher level of “valedictorian” has only one partner, Hollister, which made a $250,000 donation last year (2021, see my post from last year’s collection).

For the fiscal year ending in April 2022, target had an annual net income of $6.9B, which was a 59% increase over 2021. CEO Brian Cornell was paid over $19.7M, and the median salary of a target employee is around $24.5k. Remember that median is the middle of the set of data and is different from the average. Before I get into teaching a math lesson on tumblr dot com let me just link you to somewhere that explains the difference between median and mean/average. 

Now for the fun part: me looking at products and telling you which ones I don’t like

First choice: the lesbian flag dress. I just think it’s a little bit ugly? The design is not great. Also, the creator of the sunset lesbian flag, Emily Gwen, has asked people to support her own store rather than purchasing from big corporations who have taken her design. 

[image description: A long dress that has color blocks in the colors of the lesbian pride flag. From top top bottom it is dark orange, lighter orange, white, and pink. The sections are on a slight angle rather than horizontal.]

Second choice: the pronouns shirt. I just don’t get why it has “us” on there tbh. Community I guess but when I think of pronouns in the context of pride and queerness, “us” does not make the list.

From Enrique Anarte via Openly

one from the archives (aka a link I sent myself when I saw the article and then forgot about it because I got busy)

I’m gonna be real with yall I know very little about crypto and honestly don’t care to learn more so I can write a more detailed post. From MariCoin’s website, it is “the first cryptocurrency created by and for the LGBTQ+ community. A means of payment that materializes the value and the struggle of the collective. A Social, Ethical, Transparent and Transversal currency.” This is just my opinion, but I don’t believe that crypto can be ethical, especially given the environmental impacts during the climate crisis. On top of this, creating a literal currency for the queer community is the definition of rainbow capitalism lol 

If you need to look at more rainbow capitalism, I recommend pink news. So far, I have found an interesting array in Morphe and Michael Kors when it’s covered. However, I think Morphe might have an “ok I’ll allow it” considering how it was marketed. But I could be missing something to which I am open to learning more about. Just thought I’d throw it out there. ✔️

[image description: a tweet from TD (Canada), @TD_Canada from June 3, 2021. It reads “TD is proud to introduce the first-ever, half-ounce Pride Silver Round. The coin features a colorized design of the Pride rainbow encircling the inscription of ‘Forever Proud’. TD will be donating 100% of the net proceeds to @RainbowRailroad go.td.com/3yY7qJV “. Below the text is a picture of the coin. On the left side is the back of the coin which has the TD logo and the words “1/2 ounce fine silver .999″ on it. Slightly overlapping this is the front of the coin, which has a rainbow around the outside and on the silver center says “Forever Proud” and “Toujours Fiers” (forever proud in French).]

(source)

TD bank is kind of an interesting case, because this is from TD Canada, while TD USA has a completely different pride campaign, that is a far cry from what they do here. I followed the link to the coin and was slightly surprised by the cost, although I’m not entirely sure what I expected because it is a precious metal. For bank members, the coin costs $35.95, and for non-members, it’s $37.03. The money goes to Rainbow Railroad, which is a good and (unfortunately) much needed organization that helps LGBTQ+ people escape violence and persecution in their home countries. One thing of note on the coin webpage is the ending that says “the 1/2 oz. TD Pride Silver Round makes the perfect gift to give or can be a special keepsake to celebrate as an ally or member of the LGBTQ2+ community. Order yours today!” Now I’m not at all interested in things like collector coins and maybe if you were, this would be a good gift or something you want to buy. But since I’m not, I would much rather someone donated that amount directly to the charity because then they’d get the full amount without having to take out production costs, or buying something from a small artist or local shop to commemorate pride. 

This blog post outlines TD’s history of supporting pride, which at least they’ve been consistent about. TD was the first bank in North America to offer spousal benefits for same sex couples in 1994, which they describe as a major business risk. They were the first (major) Canadian bank to sponsor a pride festival, noted with the fact that it was with their logo plastered on pride flags. I’m not quite old enough to remember this but growing up, TD was always called “TD Canada Trust” because of the merger in 2000- I wonder how much of this pre-y2k support was from Canada Trust that TD now takes credit for, and how much was actually TD? They’re definitely a major sponsor of pride parades and festivals, I believe I have a pair of sunglasses from them that I got at pride in 2016. But of course, they’re a bank. I personally don’t think the future of pride is signing up for a credit card that has a rainbow on it, or being ‘corporate friendly’. 

[image description: a screenshot of a tweet from Edmonton Police, @edmontonpolice. It reads "Happy #Pride2021🏳‍🌈, Edmonton! As a sign of acknowledgement and respect for our Indigenous communities, we will raise the Pride flag at EPS locations later this month. Visit our website to learn more about how we are proudly working with the 2SLGBTQ+ community: epsinput.ca/lgbtq2s". Below the text is a photo of a person holding a rainbow paper heart in the air.]

(source)

Just as a note from this tweet, the delay of raising the pride flag is because EPS had lowered their flags to half-mast to mourn the 215 children who were killed at the Kamloops Residential School. The police’s involvement in this and other colonial violence is a massive topic that would be far too long for one post, and deserves its own posts, not just a footnote in this one.

I would think that many police forces have similar posts, I've just only seen this one because it's local. EPS in particular has quite the history of oppression and violence against the local queer community, notable events including the theatre scandal in 1942, and the Pisces bathhouse raid in 1981 which just crossed its 40 year anniversary this year. Other local events (that may not necessarily involve police) can be found nicely written out on a timeline.

EPS has a page on 2SLGBTQ+ reconciliation, including their current steps, next steps, and apology that was given in 2019 to the community for harm done.