Italian company Barilla pasta is facing intense criticism after its chairperson, Guido Barilla, said in an interview with Italian Radio that he would never feature a gay family in his advertisements and that they can "eat another brand."

Taking it one step further, Barilla even went from homophobic to sexist when he promoted an outdated structure of hegemonic masculinity.

"Ours is a classic family where the woman plays a fundamental role," he said.

Human rights and gay rights activists from around the world called for a boycott of Barilla pasta. Aurielio Mancuso of Equality Italia responded directly to Barilla's offensive comments. "We accept the invitation from the Barilla owner to not eat his pasta," he said.

Rich Ferraro of the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation said his family quickly went from being avid Barilla fans to dumping it all out of their cupboards.

"I was raised on Barilla," Ferraro said. "My mom told me that this morning she looked in her cabinets and they were still filled with Barilla pasta, and after I told her what Mr. Barilla said, she said she was going to be dumping out all those boxes of pasta and switching brands."

According to The Guardian, the Twitter hashtag 'boicotta-barilla' was trending within hours after the news broke.  

The negative PR stemming from the controversy led Barilla to issue an apology of sorts, saying that he apologized "if my words generated misunderstandings . . . or if they offended the sensibilities of some people," but it didn't do much. Gay rights groups such as GLAAD have followed through and organized boycotts.