I’m gonna make this one short. Starbucks has this campaign that they’re calling “Race Together.” Basically, the idea is that the baristas will write “race together” on cups in order to spark a discussion on race that will contribute to healing the racial divide in this country.
Terrible idea.
Terrible, terrible, terrible idea.
One major reason why is that many non-minority people are not conscious on issues of race. Just the facts. Your average barista is not going to engage in a discussion on race with the respect and sensitivity necessary to heal the divide. But the biggest reason is that, in general, white people don’t take minority experiences of racism seriously. They will say racism is a problem, but not particular instances of it, by and large. And I’m not making this up. Americans tend to think blacks are more racist than whites. They think racism against whites is worse than racism against blacks. But this is clearly not the case. Every study done in the history of the United States, that I’m aware of, shows that blacks bear the brunt of consequences from racism, in medical care, employment, social environments, law enforcement, the education system, the justice system, and literally every single part of US society. [youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GQdMgtncpoE[/youtube]
Here’s the Washington Post:
Two-thirds of blacks think that African Americans earn make less money than whites, a view in line with official statistics. But just 37 percent of whites believe that blacks make less money than whites, and a narrow majority think black and white’ incomes are about the same. Also, although many objective health measures suggest blacks are in worse overall health than whites, a majority of whites think blacks and whites are equally healthy.
Here is CNN:
Professors at the University of Chicago and MIT sent 5,000 fictitious resumes in response to 1,300 help wanted ads. Each resume listed identical qualifications except for one variation — some applicants had Anglo-sounding names such as “Brendan,” while others had black-sounding names such as “Jamal.” Applicants with Anglo-sounding names were 50% more likely to get calls for interviews than their black-sounding counterparts.
Most of the people who didn’t call “Jamal” were probably unaware that their decision was motivated by racial bias, says Daniel L. Ames, a UCLA researcher who has studied and written about bias.
So to say that white people in the United States are out of touch on this issue is an understatement. Most Americans don’t know what they’re talking about when it comes to race, and this will result in a system in which black stories of racism are routinely rejected, in which white individuals can claim racism is worse against them than the facts bear out, in which the black person behind the counter who tells her heartfelt story will have her experience invalidated. The CNN article correctly points out that one-on-one talks about particular instances of racism won’t go anywhere — although many white people think they will:
When some whites talk about racism, they think it’s only personal — what one person says or does to another. But many minorities and people who study race say racism can be impersonal, calculating, devoid of malice — such as Michael Corleone’s approach to power.
“The first thing we must stop doing is making racism a personal thing and understand that it is a system of advantage based on race,” says Doreen E. Loury, director of the Pan African Studies program at Arcadia University, near Philadelphia.
Exactly. Race is systematic. Individual instances can be explained away — and usually are by people who match anecdotes with anecdotes. But the larger picture is clear — race bias is a major problem that disproportionately and systematically hurts blacks as opposed to whites in every segment of society we’ve measured. And white people, according to surveys (and personal experience) usually want to deny this is the case.
And the CNN article got it right — many white people (like Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz) think racism is only something personal, but not systemic. But many black people who have been shut down by white people when telling their stories of racism know that individual stories don’t really go far and are a losing game.
Especially, historically, at Starbucks.
That’s right. What makes this more infuriating is that Starbucks itself doesn’t even take the stories of discrimination seriously. For example:
Starbucks agreed in April to pay a former lead network engineer in Seattle $120,000 plus a mediator’s fee to settle a lawsuit that alleges racial discrimination and retaliation “so severe that it required him to take a medical leave of absence.”
Victor Washington of Shoreline, who is African-American and worked for Starbucks from September 2006 until May 2008, alleges in the July 2008 lawsuit that a white co-worker made racist comments to him such as repeatedly telling him to “fetch” the co-worker’s umbrella and tie his shoes for him. In the lawsuit, Washington says he complained to his supervisor and to Starbucks’ human resources department, and that they took no action, although the supervisor increased his workload and gave him undesirable assignments.
Starbucks said in a written statement that it investigated Washington’s allegations while he worked there and found them without merit, and that it settled the case to avoid further legal costs.The company wrote Washington a check for $120,000, which it says in a court filing was “compensation for emotional distress and attorneys’ fees.” But Washington has not cashed it, and Starbucks last week asked the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington to enforce the settlement.
So a black man said, “I’m being discriminated against — here’s my story. It was so bad I had to take a medical leave of absence.” And Starbucks said, “No, you’re weren’t. Here’s $120,000 to get you to shut up.” And he was like, “That’s bullshit. I’m not cashing the check.” And they said, “Oh yes you are. We’re going to take you to court and enforce the settlement.”
This is the company that wants to encourage minorities to tell their stories about racism. Right.
And, on top of that, the Vice President of Communications, Corey deBrowa, reiterated the hesitance to discuss racism whenhe shut down his Twitter account on Monday, after blocking several people, because he didn’t want to discuss concerns about the project with minorities. That’s right. The Head of the Communications Department shut down a conversation on a project he was encouraging its entry-level employees to spearhead.
Lest someone think this was some kind of technical difficulty, he came back on Twitter on Tuesday and said the following:
Last night, around midnight, I deleted my Twitter account. I also blocked a handful of Twitter users — given the hostile nature of what I was seeing, it felt like the right thing to do. I’ve been a dedicated — some might say obsessive — Twitter user for nearly seven years and as a professional communicator, Twitter has proven to be a valuable tool for me to interact with my professional community, with media, on behalf of Starbucks, as well as “on behalf of me.”But last night I felt personally attacked in a cascade of negativity. I got overwhelmed by the volume and tenor of the discussion, and I reacted. Most of all, I was concerned about becoming a distraction from the respectful conversation around Race Together that we have been trying to create.
However, instead of appreciating the dialogue and answering the concerns presented, he presented this as an arduous process and seems to set several controls on the discussion. He goes on to say he wants “meaningful, civil, thoughtful, respectful open conversation ” — which is a bit of an oxymoron. Because “open” conversation, given his and Starbucks’s track record, seems unlikely to be deemed by them as “meaningful, civil, and respectful” — those three words seem to be ways to control the conversation and preclude openness.
If HE is having trouble with a few Twitter followers, how the hell does he expect the baristas — who are of many different races and backgrounds — to field conversations with hundreds of customers while serving coffee? And besides that, Starbucks certainly seems royally unqualified to train or prep its employees for, in the VP’s words, this “difficult” conversation, given their own embarrassing track record. This is a rather extreme, disconcerting look at white male executive naiveté…I feel so sorry for the baristas. This. Is. A. Terrible. Idea.
A much, much better statement would be to set stronger guidelines and fight race discrimination in aE much-publicized initiative regarding practices in the company, to make things fair and to set an example that discourages racism in other companies. That would go much farther in combatting racism. Because we already know, most of us minorities and sociology experts, that racism against minorities is a serious problem in this country. Instead of pretending that this is open for conversation, let’s take steps to change the culture by getting serious about the discrimination we know exists. Starbucks, here’s a chance to set an example of taking minority grievances seriously, instead of leaving it to us to somehow take things more seriously than you did. We’re not just interested in talk; we want action.