Titleist Bans “Let’s Go Brandon” From Golf Balls While Happily Printing Violent Anti-Trump Slogans
Titleist has been a leading producer of golf equipment and merchandise for many decades. The company has joined the pile of “woke” corporations throwing themselves into the ongoing political culture war by banning customers from personalizing golf balls purchased from the company with the “Let’s Go Brandon” slogan.
Titleist allows customers to custom order golf balls with a printed message but rejects “Let’s Go Brandon” as being “inconsistent” with the company’s “values and brand identity.” The viral saying originated at Talladega Superspeedway back in October when an NBC reporter re-cast chanting from the crowd of “F*** Joe Biden” as cheers of support for NASCAR driver Brandon Brown.
The miscue immediately made its way into all parts of American pop culture, with “Let’s Go Brandon” turning up on merchandise of all kinds and even as lyrics in top-ranked hip-hop songs on iTunes.
Social media strategist Caleb Hull ordered some golf balls from Titleist online and requested they be personalized with “Let’s Go Brandon!” printed along the center of the balls. Titleist did not fulfill the order and emailed Hull telling him the company would not make the balls as reque sted. The company said that if Hull would choose different customization, they could update his order for further processing.
Now, if anyone attempts to place a custom order with the offending message, the system issues a notification that “one or more words chosen” may not be used in an order. The page directs users to consult the terms and conditions page rather than to read about what Titleist will allow. That page says that the company reserves the right to reject imprint orders that are “negative in nature,” advocate violence or illegal acts, or are “slurs, hateful, threatening, libelous, defamatory, vulgar, obscene or lewd.”
Fox News observed that it is unclear which part of the terms and conditions “Let’s Go Brandon” could violate in its reporting. Fox News also tested several other imprint requests on the website that did not produce the automatic rejection notice. The page did not immediately turn down “F Trump,” “Kill Cops,” or “Kill Trump.”
Sports and culture media outlet Outkick noted that Titleist’s decision could prove costly as it rejects a massive part of its golf customer demographic that is not into politically correct speech-shaming.