BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee's inclusion of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender business owners in a push for supplier diversity is generating fire and brimstone from a conservative Christian advocacy group headed by former state Sen. David Fowler.... and Andy Sher has the story.
In an email, the one-time Signal Mountain attorney who is now president of the Family Action Council of Tennessee accuses the Chattanooga-based insurer of having "officially joined the 'culture wars' with a quiet little move."
"Appears that the insurer is trading in its traditional blue for a rainbow of colors," jabbed Fowler, alluding to the color blue BlueCross uses in promotions and the multicolored gay-pride flag.
He cites an Aug. 24 letter BlueCross sent to company suppliers. In it, BlueCross states the company, through its Supplier Diversity Team, is "passionately adopting the spirit of diversity within its supplier business relationships," including lesbian-, gay-, bisexual- and transgender-owned businesses.
Fowler said that if BlueCross is "so passionate" about the issue, "where were the press releases? Maybe they didn't want to be too 'loud' about it because they didn't want all their conservative, pro-family premium payers to realize that their premium dollars were going to support the advancement and cultural acceptance of homosexual conduct."
...BlueCross spokeswoman Mary Danielson said diversity outreach is nothing new for the nonprofit insurers, which has private pay customers but also extensive state and federal government contracts.
"BlueCross is committed to supplier diversity as a good business practice," Danielson said by email. "As part of that effort we regularly mail a supplier self certification form to our 3,000 vendors. We mail this form to update their business classification records in our system. Those classifications, provided by the federal government, cover a range of groups.
"Additionally," Danielson said, "maintaining accurate vendor record information is a federal requirement when serving as a government contractor."
..(Fowler) speculated that BlueCross' move may stem from what he says was a backlash from national gay organizations this spring after the Republican-controlled General Assembly passed a Fowler-generated bill that banned cities from enacting ordinances banning anti-gay discrimination by local government-contractors.
Posted by Tom Humphrey on September 8, 2011 at 9:15 AM | 
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Source: http://blogs.knoxnews.com/knx/humphrey/2011/09/fowler-attacks-blue-cross-for.html
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