If you’re a company like Enterprise Rent-A-Car, you cut ties with the NRA in a very loud and grand fashion.

But the problem is that you aren’t just cutting ties with an organization. You’re cutting ties with what the organization represents, insulting the people who subscribe to those ideas, and punishing them for holding them. They see your move as a sort of virtue signal, by which you used the organization these people align with as a prop. And not only that, the virtue signaling came at the expense of an organization that didn’t even deserve to have all the hate piled onto it that it did.

So it’s no wonder Enterprise Rent-A-Car is seeing something of a PR problem now that their grand separation from the NRA is complete.

According to the Politico/Morning Consult poll, every company that publicly severed its ties with the NRA has seen a dip in public approval, with Enterprise Rent-A-Car seeing the largest at 49 points down to 25.

POLITICO/Morning Consult: “All companies who cut business ties with the NRA last week saw their public opinion decline this week.” Cc: @united pic.twitter.com/W3XrWgMm7s

— Guy Benson (@guypbenson) February 28, 2018

Other companies suffered as well, such as Norton Antivirus, LifeLock, and MetLife, all of which suffered steep approval drops after being informed of the company’s decision to part ways with the NRA.

All of these companies publicly placed the blame on the recent Parkland school shooting squarely on the shoulder of the NRA, which had nothing to do with the shooting that took 17 lives. As it turned out, the fault was primarily with law enforcement agencies like the FBI and Broward County Sheriff’s Department not doing their jobs.

However, these companies chose instead to ride the wave of anti-NRA hysteria in hopes for higher favorability. What they got was a lot of angry people who are wondering why they’re having their ideals insulted by a company they previously did business with.

Let this be a lesson.