Cleric Urges Boycott in ‘Murphy Brown’ Flap

When television’s fictional Murphy Brown had a child out of wedlock last spring, it was too much for Vice President Dan Quayle. And when the show’s co-creator decided to attack Quayle recently, it was too much for the Rev. Donald Wildmon of the American Family Assn.

As a result, sponsors of the “Murphy Brown” series on CBS have become the latest boycott targets of Wildmon and his association based in Tupelo, Miss.

Wildmon, a United Methodist minister, announced Tuesday that “Americans who are tired of having their values ridiculed by Murphy Brown” should boycott advertisers on the program.

Quayle stirred a national debate in May when he accused the fictional Brown of betraying family values by having a child out of wedlock. She was, he said, “mocking the importance of fathers by bearing a child alone and calling it just another ‘lifestyle choice.’ ”

Wildmon decided to jump into the fray after two people associated with the program aroused his ire.

First, Diane English, the co-creator of the series, announced that the first new episode of the situation comedy in the fall will make reference to Quayle’s comments. She declined to reveal specifics.

Next, Jeff Sagansky, president of CBS Entertainment, said he considered Quayle’s criticism of Murphy Brown to have been politically motivated.

In a telephone interview Tuesday, Wildmon said he was calling for a boycott of the program’s sponsors because of the “arrogance” of both English and Sagansky.

In a news release announcing the boycott, Wildmon said the sponsors of the “Murphy Brown” program are “providing funds to help presidential candidate Bill Clinton.” Asked for specifics, Wildmon said, “They’re using the program to belittle a candidate for office, and that would help promote the other candidate. It’s not providing funds to the campaign.”

The sponsors of “Murphy Brown” join a long list of companies on Wildmon’s blacklist. Since 1977, when he founded the association’s predecessor group, the National Federation for Decency, he has called for numerous boycotts. Among the most recent, he urged a boycott of one firm for its decision to cut off contributions to the Boy Scouts of America, based on that organization’s rule against allowing practicing homosexuals to serve as Scoutmasters.

He has also called for the abolition of the National Endowment for the Arts because of its grants to artists who create works with homosexual themes.

One of the targets of the new boycott was also attacked by Wildmon in 1989 for using rock singer Madonna in a television ad campaign. After Wildmon and Roman Catholic Bishop Rene Gracida of Corpus Christi, Tex., protested the commercials because of what they considered Madonna’s anti-Christian image, the firm canceled the ad campaign.