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Disney Communications Executive Geoff Morrell, who helped craft response to Florida's 'Don't Say Gay' law, leaves company after just three months on the job
CNBC ^ | 04/30/2022 | Alex Sherman

Posted on 04/30/2022 8:27:05 AM PDT by SeekAndFind

Geoff Morrell, the chief corporate affairs officer who helped architect Disney’s public response to Florida’s so-called “Don’t Say Gay” legislation, has decided to leave the company.

“After three months in this new role, it has become clear to me that for a number of reasons it is not the right fit,” Morrell said in a letter to his team that CNBC has obtained. “After talking this over with [Disney CEO] Bob [Chapek], I have decided to leave the company to pursue other opportunities.”

Kristina Schake, who Disney hired earlier this month, will lead Disney’s communications efforts and report directly to Chapek. Schake will have “oversight for corporate and segment communications and continue to be our chief spokesperson,” Chapek said in a note to Disney staff obatined by CNBC.

Morrell’s three-month tenure has been rocky. He took the job after years as the chief spokesman for oil and energy giant BP. Prior to that, he was a White House correspondent at ABC News and chief spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Defense under Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama.

According to people who worked with him, Morrell set out to be more transparent with Disney’s communication than his predecessor, Zenia Mucha, who was known to closely guard Disney’s image.

After starting his job Jan. 24, Morrell guided Disney and Chapek to publicly explain why it hadn’t taken a public stand on Florida’s controversial “Don’t Say Gay” legislation, which barred some elementary school instruction of sexual orientation and gender identity. Chapek wrote a letter to staff on March 7 explaining why Disney hadn’t publicly made a statement condemning the legislation.

(Excerpt) Read more at cnbc.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Culture/Society; News/Current Events; US: Florida
KEYWORDS: agentprovocateur; bobchapek; cnbc; disney; espn; florida; gay; genderdysphoria; geoffmorrell; homosexualagenda; kristinaschake; msnbc; nbc; nobrainscollectively; rondesantis; woke; wrecker; zeniamucha
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To: JonPreston

For you, and everyone else who didn’t bother to read the article, he was right when he suggested Disney stay out of politics.


21 posted on 04/30/2022 8:51:37 AM PDT by Mr. K (No consequence of repealing obamacare is worse than obamacare itself)
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To: Extremely Extreme Extremist
All Disney had to do was issue a statement saying that they don't get involved in politics

I agree completely. I've thought since the beginning of this woke crap that all a company has to do is issue a simple statement saying, "We don't get involved in politics. We make cars." -- or TVs, or shoes, or whatever.

The VAST majority of the public would respect a statement like that.

22 posted on 04/30/2022 8:51:47 AM PDT by JennysCool ("It's easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled." - Mark Twain)
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To: SeekAndFind
"Stepping down to pursue other opportunities."


23 posted on 04/30/2022 8:52:38 AM PDT by RoosterRedux
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To: SeekAndFind

Good...now fire Chapek as well.


24 posted on 04/30/2022 8:53:51 AM PDT by mac_truck (aide toi et dieu t'aidera )
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To: Libloather

“Not gay enough?”

Possibly. But “not right fit” is code for being asked to leave.


25 posted on 04/30/2022 8:54:09 AM PDT by TexasGator (UF)
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To: EEGator

Did you bother to read the article?

He was right, and he told Disney to stay out of the issue


26 posted on 04/30/2022 8:54:17 AM PDT by Mr. K (No consequence of repealing obamacare is worse than obamacare itself)
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To: Mr. K

Why are you posting to me?


27 posted on 04/30/2022 8:54:58 AM PDT by EEGator
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To: RoosterRedux

Hitman?


28 posted on 04/30/2022 8:55:26 AM PDT by EEGator
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To: SeekAndFind

Reading the headline, I thought this was a good sign, that Disney was weeding out what isn’t working.
No. They appear to be doubling down in the wrong direction. Too bad. Stockholders may wish to purchase a few Short Sales in order to profit if the price goes down during this quarter.


29 posted on 04/30/2022 8:59:17 AM PDT by lee martell
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To: SeekAndFind

“Morrell’s strategy opened up the company to months of protest that could have been avoided. Disney employees have held walkouts and run social media campaigns with the hashtag “FireChapek” after the company’s dithering response.”

That’s how the left can bring a huge corporation to its knees.

Gather a few rabid activists to loudly march and protest at the company’s headquarters, make the life of the CEO miserable, get the media to cover it and make it seem like it’s millions marching, take the moral high ground by painting the opposition as haters... and voila, you now “own” the company.

This playbook has been used hundreds, if not thousands, of times and has become so effective that most corporations fold at the mere threat by these leftist “activists”.

It’s basically come down to, that, to get a company to see things your way you have to be the one that causes them the most pain. Or you have to take on those activists with your activists. But what makes leftist activism so effective is the support of the media, which magnifies any tiny protest into a flood and paints it as morally superior. And the useful idiots buy it lock stock and barrel.


30 posted on 04/30/2022 8:59:55 AM PDT by aquila48 (Do not let them make you "care" ! Guilting you is how they control you. )
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To: SeekAndFind

Translated: Chapek needs scapegoat. Fires Morrell but tells him if he will post a resignation letter he (Chapek) will be nice.

I predict this is the first round of firings by Disney in an effort to rectify the horrible PR position they are in now which could become existential.


31 posted on 04/30/2022 9:01:58 AM PDT by Cen-Tejas
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To: SeekAndFind

But by explaining Disney’s decision not to take a stand on “Don’t Say Gay,” rather than simply not taking a public position, Morrell’s strategy opened up the company to months of protest that could have been avoided. Disney employees have held walkouts and run social media campaigns with the hashtag “FireChapek” after the company’s dithering response.

Guy was fired for not being woke enough. Disney is going to be destroyed from within by the woke-ass employee faction.


32 posted on 04/30/2022 9:05:25 AM PDT by Flick Lives (The CDC. Brought to you by Pfizer)
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To: Libloather

Scapegoat.


33 posted on 04/30/2022 9:07:32 AM PDT by mewzilla (We need to repeal RCV wherever it's in use and go back to dumb voting machines.)
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To: Cen-Tejas

The institutional ownership is calling the shots.

What they want hasn’t changed.


34 posted on 04/30/2022 9:08:14 AM PDT by mewzilla (We need to repeal RCV wherever it's in use and go back to dumb voting machines.)
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To: Extremely Extreme Extremist

Those would be good crisis management actions, indeed. But they seem to be incapable of that.

Their misreading of their market is breathtaking. They arrogantly thought traditional, conventional nuclear families would take whatever woke crap they dished out, no matter how offensive, and there would be no limit to how much they could abuse their traditional customer base.

Did they REALLY think that LGBTXYZ “families” would make up for the loss of their traditional family base?

It’s the biggest corporate bone-headed blunder I have ever seen. If Harvard Business School isn’t too far gone, this would become a classic business case.


35 posted on 04/30/2022 9:08:23 AM PDT by ProtectOurFreedom (Instead of criminalizing guns, we need to criminalize criminals.)
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To: PeterPrinciple

“Saying nothing was not going to work. It was the employees that demanded a “correct” response.”

I worked for a Fortune 500 company. Our Diversity instructor was a former communist guerilla from El Salvadore. According to him, if you didn’t immediately confront another employee who had said something “politically incorrect” that made you a “condoner.” This was actually different and worse than someone who had made the initial statement. This was an immediately fireable offense.

I watched an interview with a woman who had lived under the Nazis and the Soviets. She preferred the Nazis because they told you what to do, or not do and as long as you complied, they left you alone. But the Soviets wanted you to think a certain way and they could decide that you didn’t and kill you for it.


36 posted on 04/30/2022 9:09:30 AM PDT by Gen.Blather (Wait! I said that out loud. Sorry.)
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To: SeekAndFind; PeterPrinciple

“I think Morrell has been made a scapegoat. He actually wanted Disney to dissociate itself from making any public political stance.”

Thanks for highlighting this.

So this resignation is not really a win for our side, but I’m sure most freepers who can’t be bothered to read beyond the headline Wil be foolishly gloating.

If anything it sounds like Disney is doubling down considering who they’re replacing him with.


37 posted on 04/30/2022 9:09:46 AM PDT by aquila48 (Do not let them make you "care" ! Guilting you is how they control you. )
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To: JennysCool

What has puzzled me all along on this, is that this law doesn’t even affect the “LGBT” and other gender confused people at all.

This law only applies to schools, and even there, only applies to the youngest students in school.

Yes, for whatever reason, the liberals decided to do their meltdown routine over this law. They decided that this was the hill to die on, so to speak.

Even the liberal comedians at the Academy Awards bashed this law, as if Hollywood idiots really need to prove that they are liberal anyway.

This law doesn’t affect “gay rights”, it isn’t “turning back the clock”, it isn’t “putting gays in the closet”, it isn’t “harming all the LGBT youth” (as if there are so many transgender 2nd graders anyway).


38 posted on 04/30/2022 9:11:18 AM PDT by Dilbert San Diego
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To: SeekAndFind

Funny how these articles adopt the Pejorative term used by anti bill activists rather than the refer to the bill by its official title. Use of “don’t say gay” which doesn’t accurately describe the contents of the bill is tantamount to propaganda which the “media” claims it doesn’t engage in. Fake news /s


39 posted on 04/30/2022 9:13:14 AM PDT by newzjunkey (“We Did It Joe!” -The Taliban / “Thanks Joe!” -Putin)
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To: Cen-Tejas

You can only guess how HOT the swithboard at Disney has been with a multitude of park hotel reservation cancellations.

The blowback is just beginning......


40 posted on 04/30/2022 9:16:12 AM PDT by blackberry1
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