Do marketing guru, Miss USA California stray off message?

John Tantillo, a branding and marketing consultant who goes by the name the "Marketing Doctor," has waded into the kerfuffle over Miss California's recent gay-bashing at a nationwide beauty pageant. She's the one who told celebrity gossip maven Perez Hilton she doesn't approve of gay marriage and later cut a spot for the National Organization for Marriage, an anti-gay rights lobby.

Tantillo's remarks came in his "Winner and Loser of The Week" column in The Marketing Doctor, his eponymous blog. The winner: Apple Corp. The loser: Miss California.

Basically, Miss [Carrie] Prejean earns this week’s Brand Loser title because she showed that she was not Miss USA material —her brand characteristics simply did not match the job description.

It wasn’t that she spoke her mind or answered honestly and that this was wrong. Right and wrong have nothing to do with it.

It was the way she said what she said that disqualified her from consideration for the crown.

By taking a stand on a controversial issue without considering her audience, Prejean forgot her role as a representative of the Miss USA organization, and the "diplomacy and leadership" that go with it, according to Tantillo. In a word, she should have pulled her punches.

On Fox News, Tantillo elaborated on his point. He said she should resign her crown as Miss California if she wants to do political advocacy:

Now, Miss Prejean is using the Miss California platform to promote her own beliefs and her own brand –not the state she is supposed to be representing. As a result she is not upholding the responsibilities of her crown. She is, after all, Miss California, a representative of a state and a people that are many things but unanimously anti-gay marriage is not one of them.

That garnered him 261 responses (as of Saturday afternoon). A sampling:

A woman doesn’t loose her right to freedom of speech because she wins a beauty contest. We all know Miss California didn’t win because of PC BS, and it makes many of us hate liberals more than ever. Think about that PR.

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Well said. Her answer lacked tact.

By being Miss California, she is taking on a role no longer as an individual citizen but more like that of a public figure that is representative of a diverse group of people. She is supposed to be a leader and role model. ...

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is Obama narrow-minded and ignorant?
His opinion is the same as Miss Ca.

Why does everyone not know this?

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what a load of disguised PC hogwash ! I may or may not agree with her views but she shows some backbone….

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Miss California represents the majority as voted on the gay marriage stand in the State of California and probably in most, if not all states in the USA. Seems to me the real haters are those that burned and vandalized churches as a protest of the vote. Miss California was asked the question and she answered it honestly, without the malice of the article writer or many of the posters.

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who are you to opine? Marketing department of America? Give me a break - you are just another snake like Specter.

Let me give you a reason why I think you qualify for coward or enabler ….that’s a person that makes excuses for other people’s unhealthy behavioral problems.

don’t agree…think about it - what do you think a man marrying a man does? do you not know about the diseases that stem from this union? why shouldn’t we speak out against it?

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Wow - judging by the hateful comments on this board, I’d say the Republican party is swirling down the drain, only supported by a small wacko fringe.

You jokers don’t have a clue, do you? You’re not even thinking about the article, just bleating about your hatred of ‘liberals’.

Stereotypical jagoffs.

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Wow John! You really blew this one. Uh what happened to the pagent asked the question and she responded openly, honestly and with diplomacy. You are way off base here John.

To as honest and diplomatic as possible: I will never read your articles again. Your true colors are a’shinin’ as we say here in the right-winged, gun-toting, conspiritorial South.

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John Tantillo doesn’t seem to understand that Miss California was not on stage to sell a product. Her response was about character - her OWN character - and she did not “sell” herself in any way by telling the truth, though Tantillo clearly thinks she should have compromised her own values when asked this question. She responded honestly, bravely and respectfully to a question that should not have been asked if there was only one “correct” viewpoint, and this is why her miscreant detractors will never truly be successful in diminishing her. I am proud of Miss Prejean. She should have won the pageant. We should have many more like her on capital hill.

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So President Obama who is supposedly a diplomat and a leader provided the same answer as Miss California, but she is not Miss USA material. I suppose that means that Obama is not president material either.

Fair enough, I guess. But I don't think President Obama is Miss USA material, either. Nor am I sure that Tantillo was on message any more than Miss USA California.