Celebration, Jubilation!

Some comments from Pastor Cindy, on the fantastic success of the Taco Bell boycott.

[Brief history: We, along with others across the US, have been boycotting Taco Bell for some time to support the Immokalee tomato pickers who supply YUM!/Taco Bell with tomatoes.

As part of that, last year Jeff Street had the opportunity to receive a "charity check" from YUM! that went to certain social services agencies. In a press release, we handed our check over to the Immokalee workers. Cindy announced clearly, "We don't want your charity, we want your justice!"]

From Cindy:

Andy just called me with the news that Yum Brands gave in to the demands of the farmworkers and then some! Whoohoo! Wisdom and her sister, justice, are dancing in the streets!

Dylan and Jesse and I went to the party last night to celebrate the Immokalee Farm Workers’ win! When I met one of the organizers, I told her my first name. As we talked, and she found that I go to Jeff Street, she said, “Oh, you’re THAT Cindy!” She went on to say how important our statement about “we don’t want your charity, we want your justice,” was. She said that it launched a strategy that resulted in other groups thinking the same way. She mentioned Notre Dame... I found this article this morning:

http://www.nd.edu/~ndmag/su2004/tacobell.html.

Basically, it tells about how the students of Notre Dame did hunger strikes to demand that the Administration refuse an ad contract with between Taco Bell and the athletics department. A kind of a “we don’t want your dirty money” thing. How neat to see that our little loaves and fishes gift was multiplied in ways that we’ll never know!