On Friday July 12, Lionsgate Entertainment Inc. finally broke its embarrassed silence over the controversy surrounding its upcoming big-budget space epic authored by a homophobe, Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game. As Card's response did earlier in the week, Lionsgate's statement completely missed the mark and demonstrated again that Hollywood is terrified of the financial consequences of doing business with anti-gay hate.
Here is Geeks OUT's official response to Lionsgate:
As proud members of the LGBT community, champions of creative freedom and honest self-expression, and a group at whom the film Ender’s Game is directly marketed, we appreciate Lionsgate’s record of doing good things and its admirable, strongly worded rejection of Ender’s Game author Orson Scott Card’s and the National Organization for Marriage’s anti-gay activism.
The simple fact is that Skip Ender’s Game has never been about the content of the novel or the film Ender’s Game. It’s about money. It’s about the money the company has already paid to Card and the potential millions he and the National Organization for Marriage stand to make off of the success of the film—our money.
A benefit premiere, indeed any outreach to the LGBT community by Lionsgate, ought to be much appreciated. What’s clear is that whether or not they support his views, Lionsgate is standing by their man and their would-be blockbuster. They made the common, perhaps cynical, calculation that audiences wouldn’t connect Ender’s Game with Card’s very public homophobia—or wouldn’t care. Geeks OUT appreciates that most American families work for every dollar and care deeply about where that money goes and what it supports.
Skip Ender's Game is not a threat; it is a reality. Our pledge adds hundreds of signatures every day from sci-fi fans around the world who would rather stay home than support homophobia. We have only just started and Geeks OUT and its allies are prepared to carry on past November 1. Nothing Card nor Lionsgate has said changes the fact that skipping Ender's Game is the easiest way to ensure none of your dollars go to Orson Scott Card's and the National Organization for Marriage's extreme anti-gay agenda.
SIGN THE SKIP ENDER'S GAME PLEDGE HERE AND SHARE WITH YOUR FRIENDS! WE ARE BEING HEARD.
Here's Lionsgate's reluctant statement in its brief entirety.
In case you missed it, here is Orson Scott Card's bizarre response, in which he asks for the tolerance he and his allies at the National Organization for Marriage have never shown LGBT Americans.
Here's Geeks OUT's response to Orson Scott Card, complete with facts.
Officially Geeks OUT!