Anita Bryant, the once ubiquitous singer and television entertainer, passed away last week in Edmond, Oklahoma, at age 84.
Ms. Bryant, a former beauty pageant queen and guest on the shows of Dick Clark, Ed Sullivan, Perry Como and Jack Paar released 27 albums and had a number of radio hits, including “Paper Roses.” She had performed on tours with Bob Hope and Billy Graham, sang at the 1971 Super Bowl and co-hosted the televised Orange Bowl parade for nine years.
She also appeared in successful advertising campaigns for Coca-Cola, Phillips 66 and Tupperware. Ms. Bryant greatest commercial success was likely her Florida Citrus Commission commercials that drew people to the state in the 1970s, singing “Come to the Florida Sunshine Tree” and proclaiming, “Breakfast without orange juice is like a day without sunshine.”
However, that commercial success was brought crashing down by her outspoken advocacy of her Christian values and her opposition to normalizing the radical homosexual agenda.
Ms. Bryant's foray into politics began when she founded the Save Our Children coalition — later changed to Protect America’s Children — and led a successful 1977 campaign to overturn a Miami- Dade County ordinance prohibiting “discrimination” against homosexuals.
Moral Majority founder and televangelist Jerry Falwell was a Bryant supporter who joined her in Miami for the campaign. She was also supported by Miami Archbishop Coleman Carroll, who urged Catholics to vote to repeal the ordinance. “Vote for repeal of Metro’s gay blunder,” read one of the Save Our Children flyers, referring to the Metro Commission, now the County Commission. “Yes, Anita! I want to help you bring America back to God and morality,” read a fundraising card.
Ms. Bryant’s campaign centered on what she perceived as imperilment of Christian values.
“What these people really want, hidden behind obscure legal phrases, is the legal right to propose to our children that theirs is an acceptable alternate way of life,” she said. “I will lead such a crusade to stop it as this country has not seen before. With God’s continued help, we will prevail in our fight to repeal similar laws throughout the nation.”
After a successful petition drive to put the ordinance on the ballot and a six-month campaign, in June 1977 69 percent of Miami-Dade County voters repealed the law. Bryant declared a landslide victory.
But her stunning victory was also the beginning of the campaign to cancel Ms. Bryant.
The Far Left and radical homosexuals began a campaign of boycotts, hate and demonization that saw her physically attacked and drove Ms. Bryant and her family from their spacious Miami Beach home and ultimately destroyed her career. She was twice forced into bankruptcy and her once popular music virtually disappeared from the airwaves.
In the face of being cancelled Ms. Bryant and her husband focused on their Christian faith, founding Anita Bryant Ministries International and touring Evangelical Christian churches and venues.
Looking back on her career as an advocate for conservative values, Bryant was “ahead of her time,” and a forerunner of Moms for Liberty and their campaign to keep age-inappropriate books out of school libraries, anti-abortion groups’ support of laws requiring parental notification and consent for abortions, and the participation of trans athletes in women’s sports.
“She was blacklisted and got a raw deal, but like her or not, she stuck to her convictions,” Anthony Verdugo, founder and executive director of the Christian Family Coalition Florida said. “She always said she hated the sin, not the sinner, because our faith teaches us to love. If you disagree with someone, that doesn’t mean you hate them.” “She had a huge impact and will be remembered not as anti-anything but as pro family, pro children, pro parent, pro home,” concluded Mr. Verdugo.
This article relies heavily on the profile of Anita Bryant by Linda Robertson and Devoun Cetoute of the Miami Herald, we urge you to use the link to read their article in its entirety.
Anita Bryant
social conservatives
Florida citrus
cancel culture
Homosexual agenda
Save Our Children Coalition
LGBTQ agenda
Jerry Falwell
Christian values
censorship
Moms for Liberty
abortion parental consent