Conservatives Call for Another Boycott, This Time Against Skittles for LGBT Packaging

Skittles, the candy known for its “Taste the Rainbow” slogan, is facing threats to receive the “Bud Light treatment” for marketing campaigns promoting LGBT pride.

The Skittles 2023 “Pride Pack” promotion features colorful designs by five LGBT artists over a gray background.

The gray is a callback to the candy’s first pride promotion in 2020. Skittles’ parent company, Mars Inc., announced in May 2020 that during the month of June, which is also recognized as Pride Month, Skittles would be sold in gray packages because “during Pride, only #OneRainbow matters.”

The traditionally colorful candies inside were also gray.

Conservatives who oppose the marketing strategy say it’s because the company is targeting children.

The Skittles campaigns recently came under fire as other major brands and companies, including Bud Light and Target, have been the subject of boycotts over similar campaigns promoting LGBT ideology.

Conservative talk show host Joe Pagliarulo congratulated Skittles on social media on Aug. 14, saying, “You just guaranteed the vast majority of people will NEVER buy your product again. Nobody wants gender identity nor sexual orientation preached by a candy,” he asserted. “You’re freaking candy!!! Dumb move.”

Dr. Robert Malone also called out Mars online for its marketing campaign “aimed at children.”

Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton agreed, saying the promotion “targets children with transgender extremist sex propaganda” and “puts ‘Black Trans Lives Matter’ on its packaging!”

Chaya Raichik, the woman who runs Libs of TikTok, said “@Skittles is trying to turn your kids into BLM & LGBTQ+ activists,” adding that “Skittles have gone completely woke.”

In response, Robby Starbuck, a former Republican congressional candidate from Tennessee, said on social media that “We should transition Skittles to broke.”

Others suggested that all Mars products should be on the chopping block.

LGBT Response

On Aug. 14, Daniel Villarreal of LGBTQ Nation criticized “right-wingers”—who have already waged successful and financially painful boycotts against Bud Light and Target—for adding Skittles to the boycott list.

“The candy has been celebrating Pride for years,” he wrote. “The haters apparently just found out.”

Mr. Villarreal also defended one of the package designers, saying her art “allowed her to explore her pains and trauma through illustration” and that “by drawing cartoons of herself confronting her fears, she has felt braver in real life.”

Skittles partnered with GLAAD, the world’s leading LGBT advocacy group, and donated $1 from every pack sold, up to $100,000, during the campaigns.

Hank Izzo, vice president of marketing at Mars Wrigley U.S., said in the announcement for the original 2020 campaign that “We believe that giving up our rainbow means so much more than just removing the colors from our Skittles packs and we’re excited to do our part in making a difference for the LGBTQ+ community through our partnership with GLAAD, not only in June, but all year long.”

Skittles continued the campaign in 2023 with five new pride designs by LGBT artists.

Symone Salib is a gay Philadelphia-based Cuban/Egyptian street artist. Her mural at “GALAEI”—a “radical social justice” organization that “provides services, support, and advocacy for all queers, trans, black, indigenous and people of color”—honors the late LGBT leader Gloria Casarez.

She told Rolling Out in 2022 that she hoped her partnership with General Motors would “ignite social change.”

Artist Shanée Benjamin, a black woman who identifies as a lesbian, partnered with Old Navy in 2021 for “Project WE,” a collection of T-shirts celebrating “Black History Month, International Women’s Day, Pride, Juneteenth, and LatinX Heritage Month.”

Mady G, a transgender artist who uses the preferred pronoun of “they,” partnered with Jill Soloway, creator of the television series “Transparent,” in 2019 to make an animated video explaining why some transgender people use the pronoun “they” when referring to themselves, ctpost reported.

Zipeng Zhu, a New York-based animator and self-described “queer immigrant artist,” has clients including Apple, Adidas, Adobe, Coca-Cola, and Microsoft.

Bianca Xunise, a Chicago-based cartoonist, was the first black member of a rotating team of female artists who produce a syndicated comic strip called “Six Chix.” Ms. Xunise, who identifies as nonbinary, is the artist defended by Mr. Villarreal. Her Skittles design includes the words “Black Trans Lives Matter.”

Other Controversy

This is not the first time Ms. Xunise’s work has stirred anger.

On Aug. 3, 2020, NBC reported that Ms. Xunise had one of her submissions pulled from several publications after it generated thousands of angry responses from readers.

The cartoon in question featured a young black female and an older white female standing in line at a grocery store. The black female was wearing a COVID-19 mask and a T-shirt that said, “I can’t breathe.” The older white female said, “If you can’t breathe, then take that silly mask off!”

One paper posted an apology in the space the cartoon once occupied, saying the publication dropped “Six Chix” and requested an apology from the collaborative. Ms. Xunise issued her response on X, then known as Twitter.

“So apparently the angry responses got my comic dropped from some newspapers and an apology that I did not approve of is running in its place,” she posted on July 28, 2020. “For the record I do not apologize for this comic and this is censorship.”