The Best Offense Is a Good Defense

Jan Brewer, Arizona's Governor, vetoed the legislation that would allow businesses to legally discriminate. I'm happy that the Governor made the right choice, but I wonder if she would have made such a choice if many powerful companies and organizations, including the NFL, had not put her on notice that signing this bill could bring economic consequences for her state.

Unfortunately, the fight is not over. As of right now, this is the current situation regarding legalized discrimination in America:

Now that the Arizona bill has been vetoed, the lobbyists and legislators writing these bills are going to try other methods like changing the wording to make the bills sound less threatening in order to legalize discrimination. This is why it's more important than ever that companies and organizations, including the NFL, continue to speak out against these laws.

This isn't about one state. This is about caring people of the United States coming together and saying, "We don't want this in our country and we will not support it." We have to keep telling the companies who provide us with goods, services, and entertainment that we want to know that the companies we support, invest in, and donate to, stand against discrimination.

Right now in Arizona, even though this bill was vetoed, there are still people facing bigotry and discrimination. Some of them might be so hurt by these attitudes and actions that they consider hurting themselves. Right now, in other states, people are worried that discrimination laws will be passed there. They are worried how it is going to affect them and the people they love.

Every time someone uses their voice to speak up against discrimination and bigotry, it can give them a little hope. Every time a large company or organization speaks up, it has the power to give them a lot of hope. When people see someone being strong, it helps them find their own strength. When people see powerful organizations standing up, it can help them find enough strength to speak out themselves.

I'm proud of the NFL for using their strength to help the people of Arizona. Now I hope they will use that same strength to let lawmakers in other states know that discrimination is not playing fair and that there will be consequences if their states discriminate.

As of this moment, there are 870 signatures on this petition.
http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/pledge-not-to-bring-the

That's a lot of strength. Together, we can make a difference and I believe the NFL will do the right thing and speak out against discrimination laws in all 50 states.