More information about Starbucks “Color Brave” training as come out.

For some reason, the British press has been covering this much better than the American media.

One of the things we learned is that the rapper/activist Common was one of the people featured in the training video as a “guide.”

If that name sounds vaguely familiar to you, it’s because Common caused a stir when he was invited to the Obama White House by the First Lady because of his anti-police and black supremacist attitude and lyrics.

Common is friends with Starbucks CEO, Howard Schultz, and was invited to be part the Starbucks reeducation video.   Birds of the progressive feather, flock together.

The training was a day in a Starbucks run Room 101.

‘Becoming color brave’ was listed in Starbucks’ agenda, as was ‘seeing difference as a positive’ and ‘reflecting on what belonging feels like’.

This actually sounds horrifying.  This is “diversity is our strength” on steroids.  Diversity is not our strength.  Diversity has led to violence all over the world.  Unity in a common idea – liberty and justice for all – is our strength.  This flips that on its head.

‘We want to uplift others, we exist to inspire and nurture the human spirit – one person, one cup, one neighborhood at a time,’ Starbucks said in a new mission statement.

I just want a cup of coffee, not proselytizing from a progressive cult.

Staff watched a number of videos featuring talks from Schultz, Johnson as well as rapper Common and Starbucks EVP Rossann Williams among others.

They were also asked to watch the a video by filmmaker Stanley Nelson about the history of access to public spaces for African Americans.

Was any Starbucks employee who was forced to take this training alive when Jim Crow was enforced?  My dad was 11 years old when Jim Crow laws were abolished by the Civil Rights Act.  There is a good chance most of these Starbucks employees are two generations away from that (i.e., their parents weren’t born when Jim Crow was abolished).

This seems more like America bashing and progressive guilt than a useful exercise.

Staff also listened to a slew of scenarios about real customers and asked if they would have done anything different in the situation.

Scenarios included a woman in dirty sweatpants lingering near the retail cups, a woman with a dirty cup asking for a refill, confusion about a customer’s gender, and dealing with a customer with a thick accent.

I need more details.  I used to work security.  Details are critical.  “Profiling” gets a bad rap, but it’s a good thing if it’s based on experience and not bigotry.

What does “dirty sweatpants” mean.  An athlete on her way home from a hard workout?  A homeless person?  Somebody who had just shoveled snow or done other yard work?  I need contextual details.  This is why I would have failed that training.

“Welcome to Starbucks, may I take your order?” is pretty gender neutral.  Is that sufficient or must I call myself a cis-shit?

Will I get fired if I say “I’m sorry, I can you please repeat your order?”  Is that no longer the polite thing to do?

Why do I have a feeling that common sense and common courtesy are not Woke enough for Starbucks?

At one point during the training, Williams gave an example of how the company now wanted staff to deal with disruptive customers.

Williams specifically referenced Starbucks’ new ‘Third Place Policy’, in which anyone can stay in the store or use the restroom – even if they don’t purchase anything.

The EVP said she had observed a barista that approached a customer who was using uncomfortable language at a store last week.

‘You are in our store every day, and we love that this is your third place, but from one human to another human, the language that you are using is making other customers uncomfortable,’ Williams said the barista told the customer.

‘So either you have to change your behavior, and stay and be a part of our third place, or I’m going to have to ask you to leave, and you can come back at a later time, when you feel like you can be a part of our third place.’

‘And in fact if you want to go have a seat, I’ll bring you over a cup of water, just to make sure that it’s a great rest of your day.’

Oh great, bad behavior is now rewarded.  Just how much of a shit does a person have to be to get a free cup of coffee?

If I take a dump on the floor will I get a croissant?  Probably not, because I’m white.

This was followed by some naval gazing.

Employees were also given a ‘personal notebook’ during the training, which the company wanted them to use to help address implicit biases.

‘Biases are not always easy to identify. They make us feel exposed. Maybe even critical of ourselves. But they’re worth reflecting on,’ one page reads.

‘Reflection is the crucial first step to navigating the differences we see and feel around certain people.’

Here are the questions to reflect on.  According to the rules, if a scenario doesn’t apply to you, leave it blank.

1. Noticed your racial identity.
2. Noticed how your race affected your beauty standards.
3. Felt your accent impacted people’s perception of your intelligence or competence.
4. Altered your communication style to avoid playing into stereotypes.
5. Had a friend of a different race that regularly visited your home.
6. Felt distracted at work because of external events related to race.
7. Had a senior role model in your organization with a similar racial identity as your own.
8. Went to work with your natural hair without comments or questions from others.
9. Felt your race affected your ability to build a rapport with your manager.

Holy shit, some of those questions.  What the fuck world does Starbucks live in?

1. Am I a white guy or a Jew?  I don’t know which intersectional progressives hate me more for.  Either way, I don’t like having to think about it.
2. As in how I look or who I think is hot?
3. I got nothing
4. What stereotypes?
5. I grew up in Miami.  I was the white kid in my group of friends.  I never stopped to think of it until Starbucks made me.  Thanks you racist assholes.
6. You mean like how the media has been covering the Gaza attacks?
7. Does this matter?  Seriously?  “I failed because I never had a role model that looked like me” is a shitty fucking excuse.  They don’t make movies about people like that.  They make them about people like Jackie Robinson.
8. I’ll get to this.
9. This should be totally irrelevant.  If there is discrimination, report it.

This “color brave” shit is insane.  I much prefer the color blind.  Everything is “focus on race.”  I don’t want to.

In a second set of questions employees were asked to imagine different situations in which they were meeting, for the first time, someone new who was their race or of a different race.

Why the fuck does it matter at all?  It doesn’t.

They were then asked to rank on a five-point scale how easy or hard they would find each situation with both the person who was their race and the person who was a different race.

“How much of a bigot are you on a 1-5 scale?”  Again, it shouldn’t matter but Starbucks is going to make me think about it.

Situations included talking about race without making ‘the other person feel threatened’, voicing dissatisfaction without being told you are ‘too angry’, or talking about childhood and not expecting others to assume you ‘grew up in poverty’.

Jesus… Starbucks management is filled with bigots.

Starbucks concluded by saying the training day was a ‘start’ and ‘not perfect – because we are all human. And we are all learning.’

This was far from perfect.  In fact, it sucked.  This is a fucking disaster.  If they do it again, Starbucks is not learning shit.

So this brings me to a point.

Black Hair.

Apparently black hair is way fucking political.

Black Hair, Still Tangled in Politics.

Black Panther, black women, and the politics of black hair.  Black Panther is not only a good movie but a celebration of black women, and black hair.

The Politics of Black Hair.

This Now has entire web series on black hair.

I can’t speak for all white people, but I want to make this point crystal clear.

I cannot explain just how little, as a white person, I care about your hair.  I don’t give a fuck about it.  It grows out of the top of your head.  Done.

Every time I hear the hair thing, I just want to say “not this shit again.”

Here are the conditions in which I care about your hair, and this is universal (it goes for people of all races):

1. You work around rotating machinery or flame/heat sources and your hair can get caught in something (I’ve seen that, it rips out scalp) or can catch on fire (I’ve seen that too, hair goes up fast).
2. You are required to wear PPE, e.g. a hard hat or respirator, and your hair interferes with it.  As a Jew, I’m supposed to wear a beard.  When I had to seal a SCBA mask because I worked in a refinery, I shaved.
3. You have to wear cleanliness and/or sterility coverings, e.g. work in a clean room, food prep, surgical theater, and your hair cannot be properly covered to prevent contamination.

That’s it.  If your grooming standards are a safety and/or hygiene risk, comply or leave.  Other than that I don’t fucking care.

Same goes for dress codes.  Skin tight clothes do not protect you from spills, heat, or sharp objects.  Overly baggy stuff can get snagged.  I don’t want to have you wash you out of my machinery because your clothes got caught in a press.

If you don’t work in an environment like that, your hair is none of my business.

When I read or see or hear another “the statement my hair is making…” article I just want to say “you and your hair can shut the fuck up.”

Do your job, do it well, do it safely.  That’s all I ask.

I do not want to care, or even think, about your race.  I mean that sincerely.

Steel doesn’t give a shit about the color of my skin.  The hardness or toughness it attains is a result of the heat treat I specify, not the way I wear my hair.

If the material doesn’t meet spec it’s not good, regardless of my skin tone.

Rockwell hardness isn’t racist.

That’s the standard I want to hold people to.  On time, on budget, to spec.

Starbucks is going to make me care about race.  I don’t want to, for the love of God, can this bullshit die already?

In not, that Starbucks will have to.  Maybe a billion dollar business going belly up on its own progressive bigotry will teach them this lesson.  The problem is, I’m afraid it won’t.