North Carolina’s HB2 legislation (AKA the Bathroom Bill) has sparked heated debate this year. The bill, among other things, allows businesses to discriminate based on sexual orientation. Despite pressures applied to the state to revoke the law, it remains.
Comedy to the rescue?
On Oct. 4 The Huffington Post shared The Daily Show segment in which a food truck set up shop and refused to serve people they thought might be gay, to see how they’d react. Bone Brother’s Flamin’ BBQ customers, and those in my network whom I shared the story with, were, not surprisingly, shocked and angry. We also all agreed that the video effectively illustrates the absurdity and arbitrariness of the law, and that this format is an effective attention-getting tool.
I relayed this story verbally to a parent and a colleague, following up with the video link in an email. To my brother and another colleague, I sent the article with video link directly, and followed up with conversation. My point of view and introduction to the story was fairly uniform across all four, and certainly held personal bias. In one case I also had a more in depth conversation about The Daily Show itself, because that person was not familiar with the show.
If I were to rewrite this story, I’d mirror the approach taken by Huff Po; keep the story brief and let the video speak for itself since this proved effective with multiple audiences.
Who’s hungry for BBQ?
Strategically Communicating 
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