[quote name='BudzMcGee']I'm well aware of this, but man it's still hard to give them a completely free pass in my mind sometimes. Mostly cause they do still carry BP gasoline and BP does get paid when you get gas from them... it's one of those you want to show BP you think they messed up the only real way you can (with your wallet) but do you hurt the dude who just got the franchise he could cause people don't want to get gas from "Jim's Gas Station" and prefer BP or Citgo or Mobil, etc.
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They had no control over it though. BP does not own stations anymore, they only supply gas. Maybe you're hurting BP a bit when you drive by a BP station, but as you acknowledge you're hurting the franchise far more.
This could have just as easily happened to any of the other oil companies, and I doubt any of them would have handled it any better than BP.
As someone else pointed out, if you want to make a real statement stop driving (I'll pass on that myself), but just giving your gas money to someone else is the wrong kind of statement to make.