Anita Bryant

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Anita Bryant (1940–) is a retired popular American musician and anti-gay activist who managed to place four songs in the Top 40. She is possibly best known for taking a stand against homosexuality in the 1970s, when she fought to repeal a Florida ordinance that disallowed discrimination based on sexual orientation.

History

The coalition that she created to fight against equality for gays was known as Save Our Children. Based in conservative Christian values, their preferred tactic was to trumpet the alleged sinfulness of homosexuality and the imagined propensity of gays to recruit and molest children. Jerry Falwell lent support to the coalition.

The campaign taught Americans a valuable lesson: if you're famous, be careful spouting your beliefs. In response to her actions, homosexuals and their supporters boycotted Florida orange juice, for which Bryant was a spokesperson. She was also publicly pied by LGBT activist Thomas Lawrence Higgins on television; she nigh instantly remarked, "At least it's a fruit pie." She prayed for God to forgive the pie dispenser. Her then-husband later threw a pie at Higgins in retaliation. No record of the flavor was ever made. In any case, she did not press charges against Higgins.

In 1979, because of the boycotts and protests, the Florida Citrus Commission, for whom Bryant was a spokeswoman, allowed her contract to lapse. In 1980, she divorced her husband, Bob Green (1931-2012). Green, a fundamentalist, did not recognize civil divorce and believed Bryant was still his wife in God's eyes. Her divorce caused her to be shunned by some of her more fundamentalist fans, and she was soon without a source of income. Around this time, she started flirting with feminism.

Later in 1980, she remarried and tried to restart her musical career. Her comeback failed, and she and her husband left employees and creditors unpaid. She filed for bankruptcy twice, first in Arkansas in 1997, and again in Tennessee in 2001 and fled without paying bills.

In 1992, she wrote a book about her experiences, A New Day.

For her hometown's 100th anniversary in 2005, a street was named in her honor. Let's hope it has no curves.

When her own granddaughter came out as gay to her in 2021, Bryant reportedly told her that homosexuality is a delusion invented by the devil and if she focused on loving God she would realize she was straight, proving that after all these years, Anita hasn't learned a damn thing.

Quotes

Did somebody not have their orange juice today?

• "If gays are granted rights, next we'll have to give rights to prostitutes and to people who sleep with St. Bernards and to nail biters."
• "All America and all the world will hear what the people have said, and with God's continued help we will prevail in our fight to repeal similar laws throughout the nation."
• "As a mother, I know that homosexuals cannot biologically reproduce children; therefore, they must recruit our children."
• "The church needs to wake up and find some way to cope with divorce and women's problems."

See also

• Phyllis Schlafly — The non-musical original
• Family values
• Homosexual recruitment
• J. K. Rowling — A more modern celebrity who has made anti-LGBTQ bigotry the main focus of her career.

External links

• Bryant's Ministries
• A comedy classic