Chick-Fil-A PR Bears False Witness, Lies About Muppet Toys and Creates Fake Supporters

“Christian company” Chick-Fil-A has become somewhat of a battleground lately over their bold stance against gay marriage, the ensuing PR nightmare and a debate over what Jesus truly wanted for humanity’s treatment of one another — but for a company that snuggles the Bible so closely, it seems they may not have too much of a problem with bearing false witness.

While Chick-Fil-A seems to think that discrimination is perfectly in line with Christ’s teachings, a recent sign allegedly posted at a Texas Chick-Fil-A outlet that has been making the internet rounds suggests the company may have skipped passages that denounce bearing false witness, and the company’s apparent handling of the situation didn’t show any Christian-style honesty and ‘fessing up.

It all began with a Chick-Fil-A sign posted to the site Reddit that announced the removal of Muppet toys from kids’ meals at the restaurant as a “voluntary” move (in actuality, Muppets CEO Lisa Henson yanked the toys specifically due to the company’s homophobia), and what’s more, the sign said that “safety issues” prompted the removal.

The sign, if real, indicated that the Muppets toys were “recalled” after reports of children’s fingers getting stuck in the toys’ holes. So not only did Chick-Fil-A possibly lie about why the toys were removed, but also cast the Muppets licensed items in an unfairly negative light as being unsafe.

Naturally, social media was not happy about this development, least of all because people hate when companies lie about easily provable things. But when confronted about the deception on its Facebook wall, a funny thing happened. A red-haired girl named Abby stepped up to defend the company, claiming that the Muppet toys disappeared from Chick-Fil-A weeks ago, and that a friend of hers reported being unable to get them after the recall due to supposed Facebook issues.

Corporations are people, my friends. RT @DeekyMD: Chick-fil-A Got Caught Pretending to Be a Teenage Girl on Facebook gizmodo.com/5928926/chick+…

— Jeff Fecke (@jkfecke) July 25, 2012

An eagle-eyed Facebooker noticed that Abby had just joined Facebook, and that further, the image she was using as a profile pic was actually a widely available stock photo. Which, while not conclusive, seems to suggest Abby was a Chick-Fil-A PR invention to plant anecdotal stories of the recall existing earlier than the very public split with the Muppets.

And following on from that, the exchange also hints that the PR line was not limited to the one branch in Texas, but a larger PR move by Chick-Fil-A to reframe the situation as a safety recall and not what we all know to be true — that the Muppets broke with Chick-Fil-A specifically due to their anti-gay stance.

Do you think Chick-Fil-A’s apparent lying is a terrible display of so-called Christian values?