The media are filled with the news that North Carolina is "losing" 400 potential PayPal jobs because of its new religious freedom law, which protects women and girls from seeing men in their restrooms and locker facilities.
A CNN headline said the state's "bathroom bill" "just cost the state 400 future jobs."
Reuters said the online payment processing company that openly advocates for and lobbies for the LGBT agenda canceled plans to "invest $3.6 million in the area."
But the reports pointedly didn't mention what it would cost the company to change course, how much it already had invested in planning and preparation and whether its investors would tolerate the additional expense.
That indicates, according to a coalition of Houston pastors who defeated a similar ordinance in their city, most of the corporate "boycott" threats against such religious freedom laws are no more than that – threats.
Rev. Dave Welch, executive director of the Houston Area Pastors Council, thanked North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory for signing the bill into law, March 23, which requires people to use the bathroom that corresponds to their "anatomy," not their "perceived gender." The law was a response to a Charlotte ordinance cast as a transgender anti-discrimination measure.
"On behalf of the 'Houston Five' pastors who were subpoenaed for seventeen categories of information including sermon materials by our former mayor for opposing her 'Bathroom Ordinance,' as well as hundreds of pastors throughout Texas of every racial and denominational background," Welch wrote, "I want to thank you for your courageous, principled leadership as well as to encourage you to stay the course."
Welch said the "threats via what we call 'corporate terrorism' by these amoral business interests like PayPal to inflict economic harm against those of us defending our basic freedom, public safety and our religious liberty fell short in Houston and will do likewise in North Carolina."
The fight in Houston raged for two years before voters, on the instructions of the state Supreme Court and against the wishes of lesbian Mayor Annise Parker, voted on her soundly rejected her "open bathrooms" plan.
See the complete catalogue of "same-sex marriage" violations of faith, compiled by WND.
The Houston pastors' coalition later volunteered to help in a similar battle in Dallas.
Parker's plan Equal Rights Ordinance would have allowed men who perceive themselves to be women to use women's restrooms, locker rooms and other gender-specific facilities in the city. Anyone opposing or obstructing them could have been fined $5,000.
Welch at the time condemned the Dallas ordinance as an attack on society's foundation.
"There are many issues that our city governments should be focused on to improve the city, and this ordinance patently rejects cornerstones of our civilization that family is built upon the covenant of marriage between a man and a woman, that our sex is embedded in our chromosomes, and this beautiful created order is a gift from God."
Welch added, "A bad tree cannot produce good fruit and a law based on elevating gender confusion to being a protected class equal with race can only produce harm, not good."
The Dallas plan protecting "gender identity and expression" said the places of public accommodation that must grant a man who defines his gender as female full access to women's facilities are any inn, hotel, temporary lodging, restaurant, cafeteria, lunchroom, soda facility, motion picture house, theater, concert hall, and retail or wholesale establishment selling goods or services.
The measure, Welch said, is a "bottomless Pandora's Box."
In his letter to McCrory on corporate blackmail, Welch continued: "As you know, the Final Four of the NCAA was just held in Houston and although the final result was a heartbreaker for your great state, the radical LGBT movement's threat to get this event, the Super Bowl, conferences and corporate bases out of Houston was shown to be a paper tiger and the raw use of intimidation. The churches and concerned citizens by the thousands refused to bow to the god of political correctness, the terrible ordinance was defeated overwhelmingly by the people and Houston continues to grow.
"First and foremost, the economic blessings we enjoy and work toward are only possible in a society that honors God, basic moral virtues which produce strong families raising children who thrive in a safe home, safe community and public facilities free from predators. Your and the North Carolina legislature's actions will preserve and protect the innocent rather than catering to a tiny segment of the population who need healing from their confusion. Thank you!"
The issue is freedom itself, he said.
"These greedy, self-serving corporations and professional sports organizations who threaten you do not have the right to dictate the values of the citizens in the communities or states in which they do business. As they continue to attempt to bully 'We the People,' it is more important than ever that we have leaders like you who will do what is right versus what is expedient. May the Lord bless and honor you along with all who stand with you!"
The threats from the LGBT-advocating corporations have become routine.
When Georgia lawmakers adopted a plan similar to North Carolina's, which later was vetoed by the Gov. Nathan Deal, the Atlanta Convention and Visitors Bureau said it was told a convention, which it would not identify, would be moved out of the city if the plan became law.
One report said another 15 corporations, also unidentified, were saying they "may move" their convention business out of Atlanta.
In 2015, when Indiana moved to protect women and girls, NASCAR pitchman Nick Offerman canceled a scheduled appearance there in protest of the law. Also, the rock band Wilco failed to appear at one of its scheduled events in Indiana.
One of the maneuvers used repeatedly by LGBT-agenda supporters is to ban state- or city-funded travel to areas that adopt such protections for women and children.
WND reported California's attempt to "bully" other states into joining the LGBT campaign after a California state legislator introduced a bill that would ban travel by state employees to any state that has a religious-liberty law viewed as "discriminatory."
See the complete catalogue of "same-sex marriage" violations of faith, compiled by WND.
Assembly Bill 1887 was introduced Feb. 11 by Assemblyman Evan Low, D-Silicon Valley. Low said he introduced a "package" of bills meant to stop state funds from flowing to any person or entity that uses the First Amendment's religious-liberty clause to "discriminate" against the LGBT community.
Another bill in his arsenal is AB 1888, which would cut off student financial aid for private colleges and universities, particularly religious ones, that are not perceived to be LGBT friendly.
But WND reported Low apparently did not think through his legislation before placing it in the hopper.
WND contacted his staff and was told that the bill is in the process of being rewritten to accommodate some powerful state officials who have complained that it would prevent them from traveling out of state to conduct necessary business.
And the athletic teams in the University of California system, for instance, including powerhouse football teams at UCLA and USC that rake in millions in profits for the university system, would not be allowed to travel to Illinois, Florida, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Texas, Virginia and the other 21 states that have religious liberty laws.
Would they have to forfeit those games to their opponents?
"We're addressing this issue right now, because we're getting calls right now from different entities that travel outside the state," said Melissa Apuya, a legislative aide for Low. "The intent of the bill was to ban employee travel but (as written) it could affect even those at the constitutional level that travel. The insurance commissioner, for example, who travels to different states to attend conferences. So we're talking now to our staff and our legal counsel to figure out what changes may be needed."
Critics of the revenge boycott practices say the moves reveal a complete lack of tolerance toward people of faith and religious institutions.
Brad Dacus, president of the Pacific Justice Institute, said his group opposes AB 1887 and AB 1888 because the state would be in the position of favoring the rights of one group over another – in this case the perceived right of LGBTs to buy wedding flowers or photography services from Christian businesses over the right of Christians to freely exercise their religious faith as enshrined in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
"AB 1887 is hypocritical, elitist and out of step with our First Freedom, religious liberty," Dacus said in a statement. "While we all would like to see less wasteful travel at taxpayer expense—particularly by members of the Legislature—this is not the way to do it."
It's another example of the radical “gay agenda” re-packaged as an issue of "fairness," said Carl Gallups, a Christian author, radio host and Baptist minister based in Florida. "While touting equality for the LGBT community, apparently they are more than willing to trample upon and completely redefine the First Amendment liberties of other groups."
Breitbart reported the group Texas Values has identified Disney, Apple, Intel and the NCAA as among the "corporate bullies" who want to dictate to states their "open bathroom" laws.
The group's president, Jonathan Saenz, said: "It's clear that corporate giants like Apple, Disney, NCAA, Intel have finally come out of the closet and declared public war on the religious freedom of clergy and religious schools, as was the protection in Georgia's very modest HB 757 that they worked to bring down. It's sad that Apple, Disney, the NCAA and others won't even allow pastors to have religious freedom protections on marriage in Georgia."
When North Carolina's law was adopted, composer Stephen Schwartz said he would ban theaters in the state from performing his works.
Fox News' commentator Todd Starnes wrote that Schwartz "seems to believe that any state that refuses to let a man use the bathroom with a little girl should be punished."
When Mississippi adopted the standards, to which LGBT-promoting companies such as Toyota, Nissan, AT&T, IBM and Levi Strauss expressed opposition, the homosexual advocacy organization went public with the claim that now women could be fired for "wearing pants."
But Family Research Council President Tony Perkins said it's just discrimination.
"Big business and Hollywood have engaged in economic blackmail in Mississippi just like they have in Indiana, Georgia, North Carolina and Texas to try to force government discrimination of those who support natural marriage."