At a time when our government is denying the existence of trans people, erasing trans rights, and generally undoing the progress made toward LGBTQ+ equality in the U.S., boycotts are an outlet for collective anger and a means of fighting bigotry. 

LGBTQ+ history is filled with powerful stories of queer and trans people advocating for our rights by using every tool available, whether it’s seeking justice through the legal system or pushing back against police violence—yes at Stonewall, but also at Compton’s Cafeteria and the hundreds of other, lesser-known protests that came before.

And yet, boycotts haven’t played as central a role in LGBTQ+ liberation as they did during the civil rights movement. “We’re ultimately a fairly small group,” says Eli Erlick, activist and author of Before Gender: Lost Stories from Trans History, 1850–1950. And since companies haven’t historically valued queer consumers, the impact of a boycott is diluted. 

Still, boycotts have been an important tool for liberation. “Queer communities have used boycotts to amplify voices when mainstream media and politics ignored them,” says Jay Santana, an LGBTQ+ historian and activist. “These actions created not just pressure, but visibility.” 

LGBTQ+ Boycotts Build Coalitions and Acceptance

In the 1970s, the LGBTQ community and the labor movement united to protest discriminatory labor practices at Coors, where employees were disqualified from being hired if they were gay or pro-union. At that time, homophobia was widespread in the labor movement, but labor leaders also recognized  the organizing power within the LGBTQ+ community, and the organizing talents of Harvey Milk and other LGBTQ+ leaders. Bay Area gay bars refused to stock Coors—to this day, many still don’t carry it—and bartenders ceremoniously poured out beer in the streets. The Coors boycott helped broker an alliance between LGBTQ+ people and union workers.

In 1977, Miami-Dade County, Florida, passed an ordinance that prohibited discrimination against LGBTQ+ people. Christian singer Anita Bryant, who was a spokesperson for the Florida Citrus Commission, instantly began campaigning for its repeal by claiming that LGBTQ+ people groomed children. 

In response, LGBTQ+ leaders organized a boycott of Florida oranges and orange juice. Bartenders poured orange juice out in the streets. Protestors wore cheeky merch. The boycott earned more than 50,000 newspaper mentions and made gay rights a mainstream conversation topic.

Though Bryant won the battle and the nondiscrimination ordinance was repealed, she lost the war. “The universal anger directed at Anita Bryant was so strong that others joined the struggle and Anita was fired and the LGBTQ+ community had an important victory post Stonewall,” says Robert Kesten, president and CEO of Stonewall National Museum, Archives & Library.

In the years after the Florida orange juice boycott, HIV/AIDS spread through the gay community. We spent our collective energy caring for one another and organizing to demand the callously indifferent Reagan administration respond to the public health crisis. Things were pretty quiet until the same-sex marriage debates. 

When Chick-fil-A’s CEO spoke out against same-sex marriage, in 2012, public outrage was shift. College students organized to protest Chick-fil-A opening locations on their campuses. Local officials in Boston, San Francisco, and Washington, D.C. vowed to prevent Chick-fil-A from opening or expanding in their market. 

In the short-term, sales increased as sympathetic conservatives bought chicken sandwiches in droves. However, the backlash forced Chick-fil-A to publicly apologize. While the company quit funding anti-LGBTQ causes in 2019, they’re still perceived as anti-queer, which has cost Chick-fil-A opportunities to expand. 

When North Carolina passed the first anti-trans bathroom bill in the U.S. in 2016, the ensuing mass boycott felt like a sea change. PayPal and Deutsche Bank nixed plans to expand into North Carolina, costing the state 650 new jobs. Musicians including Bruce Springsteen, Pearl Jam, and Demi Lovato canceled appearances. The NCAA and NBA relocated events to more inclusive states. 

The anti-trans bill cost North Carolina between $450 million and $630 million, according to Politifact. Though that was only around 0.1% of the state’s overall GDP, it was enough for the state’s politicians to nix HB2 in 2017. 

In its place, the state’s legislators passed HB142, which kept many of the anti-LGBTQ+ elements of the hated bathroom bill. Most crucially, HB142 prevented local communities from passing LGBTQ+ non-discrimination ordinances for three years. These subtleties were seemingly overlooked as public opinion celebrated what seemed to be a victory. 

I traveled to Asheville, North Carolina, when HB2 was in effect. While Asheville is a progressive city, I dreaded using public restrooms and being misgendered. The broad support for the boycott was comforting. It was one of a few times I’ve felt like my country was on my side. 

Boycotts Document Our Refusal to Be Erased

Anti-trans measures have only grown in the years since HB2’s repeal. “It’s alarming when [anti-trans sentiment] is so widespread that it becomes normalized and impossible to enact boycotts,” says Erlick.

With Donald Trump back in office and committed to using executive orders to erase trans rights—not to mention the very word “transgender”—a collective fury has spurred a resurgence of calls to boycott corporations that abandoned DEI. 

Take Target, which lost $12.4 billion in market value earlier this year, as consumers have used an economic boycott to protest the company’s decision to cancel DEI initiatives. Jamal H. Bryant, the senior pastor at New Birth Missionary Baptist Church, subsequently called for a 40-day boycott of Target that was timed to coincide with Lent. LGBTQ+ consumers, still angry about the retailer’s prior waffling on whether to sell Pride merch, joined in. Now the boycott’s indefinite, foot traffic hasn’t recovered, and Target’s reputation is in tatters. 

“Target could have made a very different decision,” says Santana, pointing to the success of retailers like Costco, which stood by DEI and saw double-digit growth in response. Erlick agrees, noting, “Corporations are ultimately not that supportive of our communities outside of superficial initiatives.” 

The hollowness of brand promises can be painful to realize. But once we come to terms with the shallowness of corporate pledges, queer and trans people can seek ways to leverage our collective power. Santana points to the Tesla Takedown protests, a series of decentralized protests held at Tesla dealerships nationwide earlier this year, as Americans registered their discontent with government cuts proposed by Tesla CEO Elon Musk in his role as adviser to Trump, as an example of what’s possible now. 

Tesla Takedown protests have brought joy and hope in dark times and, more crucially, caused a leadership crisis and plummeting stock prices for Tesla. When claims of homophobia or transphobia are dismissed as individual sensitivity or snowflake behavior, or minimized with labels like “culture war,” Santana says boycotts name the harm, which helps LGBTQ+ people to heal. 

Increasingly, travelers to the United States—and entire countries—are also refusing to cosign our nation’s bigotry with their tourist dollars. The most vocal critic has been Canada, whose citizens are seemingly furious with the U.S. over tariffs, broad anti-immigrant and anti-LGBTQ+ sentiment, and calls to annex Canada and make it the 51st state. In response, Canadians have begun canceling their vacations to the U.S. and dumping bourbon and other imported products. 

Close allies like Germany, Finland, and the United Kingdom, have warned LGBTQ+ citizens against visiting the U.S., amplifying the persecution of trans Americans and validating our outrage. U.S.-based trans journalist Erin Reed maintains a risk assessment map for trans Americans, color-coded to reflect threat levels. Reed has flagged Texas and Florida as “Do Not Travel” states for the severity of their anti-trans laws, and she warns foreign citizens who are trans against traveling to the U.S. at all. 

The pressure comes with a hefty price tag: Goldman Sachs estimated the U.S. could lose $90 billion from decreased travel and trade. 

“Boycotts document our refusal to fund our own erasure,” says Santana. So while the government publicly erases the words “queer” and “transgender”’ from the Stonewall National Monument’s website and replaces LGBTQ+ with “LGB,” boycotts remain an effective means of tapping into our collective power and recommitting to queer liberation.