Corporate Discrimination And Hatred

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XHendrix24 said:


Well, the question "how did they know they were Jewish?" is pretty irrelevant in the first place, because the couple was, indeed, Jewish.

Also, I don't think I'm being stereotypical by inferring that a large amount of the people with Jewish ethnicity have large noses and the like. I'm not saying that all Jewish people have big noses, I'm just inferring that it's a coomon trait. A large amount of Irish people have red hair, so I often connect red hair with being of Irish descent. Does that mean that I'm somehow perpetuating steroetypes by doing so? :huh:

Like I said, the waitress assumed- the fact that they really are Jewish is irrelevant to the discussion of what is and what isn't appropriate. Perhaps I'm just very sensitive about people saying "big noses'' regarding Jewish people, just personally I find it unnecessary and that we should move away from talking about people that way. You'd have to ask Jewish people here and elsewhere if they're offended by that. It's just my personal sensibility, I don't mean to personally attack you for it.

I am certainly not assuming anything about you, I want to make that clear.
 
BonoVoxSupastar said:

If she knew their name prior to seating them, then why not put 'the Steins' on the ticket?

Ah, my mistake. In hindsight, I heavily doubt that she would have known the names of the couple before seating them. So she must have just been going on how they looked.

And I still don't see how appearing Jewish would be particularly offensive to anyone. Especially since the people were Jewish and you're arguing hypotheticals that I don't think are particularly relevant to the subject at hand in the first place.
 
XHendrix24 said:


Well, the question "how did they know they were Jewish?" is pretty irrelevant in the first place, because the couple was, indeed, Jewish.

Also, I don't think I'm being stereotypical by inferring that a large amount of the people with Jewish ethnicity have large noses and the like. I'm not saying that all Jewish people have big noses, I'm just inferring that it's a coomon trait. A large amount of Irish people have red hair, so I often connect red hair with being of Irish descent. Does that mean that I'm somehow perpetuating steroetypes by doing so? :huh:

My God you're missing the point by a mile.

Red hair is just a hair color, and yes red hair is usually connected to Irish descent. Hair color, skin color etc can be used to connect people with certain ethnicities.

But to use the term 'big nose' to connect someone with an ethnicity is just wrong. The term 'big nose' is implying that somehow their nose is bigger than "normal". So you're calling them out as having abnormalities and using those to connect them with their ethnicity.
 
BonoVoxSupastar said:


But to use the term 'big nose' to connect someone with an ethnicity is just wrong. The term 'big nose' is implying that somehow their nose is bigger than "normal". So you're calling them out as having abnormalities and using those to connect them with their ethnicity.

I have to agree w/ that, as usual you explained it much better than I can.

How is it different from saying African Americans have certain physical characteristics, that is usually considered rather racist, is it not?
 
DrTeeth said:
Every time I visit FYM, I seem to lose a few IQ points. :|

:lol: I don't know about IQ points, but I'm sure a few of my brain cells quit in protest at some of the threads here. :wink: (This comment is not directed specifically at this thread, just a general observation.)
 
BonoVoxSupastar said:


My God you're missing the point by a mile.

Thanks for the condescending tone there. I knew something was missing from this discussion thusfar. :wink:

BonoVoxSupastar said:
Red hair is just a hair color, and yes red hair is usually connected to Irish descent. Hair color, skin color etc can be used to connect people with certain ethnicities.

But to use the term 'big nose' to connect someone with an ethnicity is just wrong. The term 'big nose' is implying that somehow their nose is bigger than "normal". So you're calling them out as having abnormalities and using those to connect them with their ethnicity.

Alright then, forget hair color or skin color then. Say I had really hairy arms, and someone identified that as an Italian trait. The term "hairy arms" would imply that my arms were hairier than a "normal" man's arms. Or maybe someone noticing that my hair can get a bit oily at times might let on the fact that I'm of Italian descent. That would, of course, be implying that my "greasy hair" is greasier than that of a "normal" man.

And I don't find any of that offensive. Just because people tend to be a bit different doesn't make them somehow inferior. I don't think that implying someone has a "big nose" or "hairy arms" is a negative trait (or an "abnormality," as you put it). I think of them as identifying traits. (Unless they're obviously being intended as offensive - "you greasy Italian," "you big-nosed Jew," "you big-lipped darkie," etc.)

But, as I believe this thread has proved, it all comes down to offense being a relative thing.

Originally posted by MrsSpringsteen
I am certainly not assuming anything about you, I want to make that clear.

Thank you. I appreciate that. :)
 
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XHendrix24 said:


Thanks for the condescending tone there. I knew something was missing from this discussion thusfar. :wink:
I wasn't trying to be condescending it was just that you kept talking around the subject.

XHendrix24 said:


But, as I believe this thread has proved, it all comes down to offense being a relative thing.



Well yes offense is a relative thing, I mean you can call me anything in the book and I probably won't get offended but you talk about my friend and that's another story.

But you also have to look at context. And in context relating big noses with Jewish people, big lips with black people, etc have been used in racial and ethnic slurs and caricatures throughout history.

What it comes down to is I'm not going to label someone the 'the Jew couple' because I happen to see two people walk in with big noses. I know lot of people that have what you would probably consider a big nose that aren't Jewish and come to think of it my closest Jewish friends don't have anything close to a big nose.

White, black, male, female, short, tall, etc these are obvious labels. But I'm not going to label someone the stoner couple just because they wear Grateful Dead T-shirts, I'm not going to label someone the Fundie couple because I notice they're wearing a cross and they choose not to drink with dinner; because these are assumptions based on appearances. And my momma taught me that appearances can be decieving. I may be right with the assumptions above, but I could be horribly wrong. They may just like GD music but have never touched a joint in their life and the other couple could possibly more liberal than I and just didn't feel like having a drink with dinner that night.

It's just common courtesy not to reduce people down to appearances.
 
BonoVoxSupastar said:
It's just common courtesy not to reduce people down to appearances.

That I can pretty much agree on. The waitress in question could of probably used some other way to identify the people, that's true. And it's simply not polite to refer to someone purely by their ethnicity, so in that sense, the waitress erred.

However, considering the circumstances, I think it's fairly obvious that the waitress did not label them 'the Jew couple' with malicious intent, which is why I don't see it as such a big deal. Was it sort of rude to refer to them as 'the Jew couple'? Yes, it probably could of been interpreted that way by some people. But I don't think that it was 'discrimination' or 'hatred', and I don't think that it warranted an article in a publication. That's where my problem with the article lies. I think it's unnecessarily being shown as a bigger deal than it actually is.
 
XHendrix24 said:


However, considering the circumstances, I think it's fairly obvious that the waitress did not label them 'the Jew couple' with malicious intent, which is why I don't see it as such a big deal.

I have to disagree with that, I don't think there's anything obvious. This could have easily been a matter of inconsiderate labeling or she really could have a problem with Jewish people, we don't know either way.


XHendrix24 said:

and I don't think that it warranted an article in a publication. That's where my problem with the article lies. I think it's unnecessarily being shown as a bigger deal than it actually is.

I think it warranted an article because honestly she should have removed the label on their ticket, the woman is a moron. Discrimination, who knows? I could see where the couple saw it that way. I mean if I got a ticket like that, and no one else has ever gotten a ticket like that, I'd be like WTF? I've never heard of anyone recieving a label on their ticket, so when one does come up and it separates you like this, it will make you wonder...
 
All I want to know is why the restaurant doesn't just adopt the incredibly simple policy of having numbers for its tables so the waiting staff aren't compelled to devise inventive names for their customers.
 
the racial politics of waiting is interesting ... i've never been a waiter, but my best friend has, and there are code words for ethnic "groups" who don't have good tipping reputations, namely African-Americans and Europeans. (am not advocating such a stereotype; just saying that it exists)

Europeans are known as "tourists" and African-Americans are known as "Canadians."

just tossing that out there ... might there be some connections?
 
My guess is that Mr. Stein was wearing a yarmulke or kipah.

I think the bottom line regarding this incident is that allowing waitstaff to fill in their own, off-the-cuff descriptions of customers rather than using table numbers to designate bills is an absurdly stupid policy to begin with, and a customer service nightmare waiting to happen. To that extent, I find it hard to feel sorry for the restaurant owners. Regarding the waitress, IF she was fired solely because of this incident, then there may have been some unjust scapegoating involved--but none of us know enough to reach that conclusion.

If this had happened to me, I would probably have asked for the manager and simply explained the above, rather than heading to the Attorney General's office to file racial slur charges.

XHendrix24 said:
If someone mistakenly identified me as of Hispanic descent (I'm fairly tan and have brown hair - I'm actually Italian/Irish), I wouldn't be offended, I'd just correct them and then forget about it.

The difference is that, clearly, you feel you have nothing to fear from being singled out as Hispanic.

I am Jewish, but frequently assumed to be "Irish" because of my red hair and green eyes. If a stranger came up to me in public and demanded, "Are you Irish?" I might feel nonplussed, annoyed, or even amused. If a stranger came up to me in public and demanded, "Are you Jewish?" I would probably feel the same things, but also some fear and intimidation. Why are they zeroing in on that? How does this person feel towards Jews? Will anyone come to my defense if they start harassing me? This response may be visceral but it is not paranoid, any more than would be the same response towards someone demanding, "Are you gay?" It is not the words that "offend" (or more aptly, frighten) but the history of menace behind them.

From personal experience I can say that the more singled out you feel and the less familiar the social environment, the worse that fear is. I grew up in rural Mississippi in the '70s, and heard "Christ-killer" probably more times by the time I turned 14 than most American Jews today will hear their whole lives. It never stopped us from wearing yarmulkes or putting menorot in the window or mezuzah on the doorposts, or anything else that told the world we were Jewish. So I am not thin-skinned or lily-livered about racial slurs in the slightest. I would have to be an idiot to have no fear at all, though.
 
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yolland said:
The difference is that, clearly, you feel you have nothing to fear from being singled out as Hispanic.

I am Jewish, but frequently assumed to be "Irish" because of my red hair and green eyes. If a stranger came up to me in public and demanded, "Are you Irish?" I might feel nonplussed, annoyed, or even amused. If a stranger came up to me in public and demanded, "Are you Jewish?" I would probably feel the same things, but also some fear and intimidation. [/i]Why are they zeroing in on that? How does this person feel towards Jews? Will anyone come to my defense if they start harassing me?[/i] This response may be visceral but it is not paranoid, any more than would be the same response towards someone demanding, "Are you gay?" It is not the words that "offend" (or more aptly, frighten) but the history of menace behind them.



absolutely correct.

if someone were to come up to me in a restaurant and ask me if i were gay, i'm not 100% sure how i would respond.

there are times and there are places where it is dangerous to be jewish, or gay, or some other identity where you can generally "pass" -- but your identity, if revealed, might cause you some trouble. the person's intentions might be entirely benign, or they might be curious, or they might actually have a problem. you simply don't know, and for someone to call you out so directly, as yolland says, your defenses perk up. i felt the same way in Europe -- people would come up to me in bars and ask me if i was American. particularly given the current administration, just how do you answer? might your answer get you into, at the least, a discussion you don't want to have, or at the worst, leave you with a bloody nose and an empty wallet?

in any event, just trying to show how the phrase "jew couple" -- while i feel nearly certain it was a stupid mistake on the part of the waitress ... it is new jersey, after all -- might cause someone to take offense. when you're a member of a group that's been consistently persecuted for 5,000 years (jews) or the last remaining minority group towards which it is socially acceptable to despise (gays), such comments cannot be so easily brushed off.
 
yolland said:
I think the bottom line regarding this incident is that allowing waitstaff to fill in their own, off-the-cuff descriptions of customers rather than using table numbers to designate bills is an absurdly stupid policy to begin with, and a customer service nightmare waiting to happen. To that extent, I find it hard to feel sorry for the restaurant owners. Regarding the waitress, IF she was fired solely because of this incident, then there may have been some unjust scapegoating involved--but none of us know enough to reach that conclusion.

If this had happened to me, I would probably have asked for the manager and simply explained the above, rather than heading to the Attorney General's office to file racial slur charges.

Well put. I agree with pretty much everything said here.

Also, I hadn't thought much about the aspect of fear concerning the term "Jew," (even though as I've said before, the waitress didn't seem to have any malicious intent). So thank you for your input on that. That's definitely another factor that could be considered. And I'm sorry to hear that you had to put up with all of those slurs. Living where I live, I'm very familiar with intolerance and name-calling (though it's not usually directed towards Jewish people). I hate hearing how people have to go through that kind of thing and I sympathize deeply. :tsk:
 
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XHendrix24 said:


Well put. I agree with pretty much everything said here.

Also, I hadn't thought much about the aspect of fear concerning the term "Jew," (even though as I've said before, the waitress didn't seem to have any malicious intent). So thank you for your input on that. That's definitely another factor that could be considered. And I'm sorry to hear that you had to put up with all of those slurs. Living where I live, I'm very familiar with intolerance and name-calling (though it's not usually directed towards Jewish people). I hate hearing how people have to go through that kind of thing and I sympathize deeply. :tsk:



and i just want to say that i agree with both of you.

chances are, it was all a misunderstanding, and it would have been best, i think, for the couple to simply to have ignored it or to have given the waitress the benefit of the doubt (as i would like to think i would have ... if i'd had "gay couple" that might have been cute; "fag couple" would be something else).

but there is history to deal with.

sucks, that.
 
Angela Harlem said:
Writing in caps is annoying and sometimes seen as rude, Jeff.

It is annoying to you Anna. And this case (you did say "sometimes" it was not rude. It was used for emphasis, Anna.

Angela Harlem said:
Staff in service represent the company they work for. I dont see much point in sparing some faceless organisation regardles of how large, when the staff they hired fucked up. Age and especially when talking about someone as old as 17 (or potentially, as this is unknown and you have just thrown this in randomly) again makes no excuses. Sensitivity is not an issue in this either. People with disabilities cannot be excluded from public places. End of story. Doesnt matter how nicely you ask, or how old the requester is. It's just simply wrong. Or WRONG, if you will.

I am not saying that it was right for the manager of the Cineplex to try and exclude the boy with cerebral palsy from watching the movie.

Anna...tell me about the last time you were in a multiplex in North America? Have you seen the staff at the multiplexes in North America?

Let me carry-on a little further, Anna. IF you want to blame the faceless corporations who hired these individuals, lets also blame society and the US economy, as well as generations of people that have come before us. Why?

Well, in all three of these cases, the individuals (yes, individuals) who actually wronged consumers are in low-skill jobs with little education needed. They are also low paying jobs. If our society was better (or communist), we would have better educated individuals, and the jobs would all pay better. Right?

OK..I am done with that rant. But two more left.

Personal responsibility: I see a lack of this more and more everyday. People do not want to take personal responsibility for their actions. The three businesses involved all responded. But the individuals did not THINK before they acted...and since have lost their job (all though, we do not know of the outcome of the cineplex "manager").

Finally...I cannot stand the media's over-dramatization of EVERYTHING.

Oh, shoot, Anna. I almost got through this post without annoying you with words in caps (or what I consider my "online outside at the airport voice").
 
Last names and looks aren't always indicative of someone's ethnicity. I have a very Jewish last name-Kaufman-yet, I was raised Catholic. And with my red hair, fair skin, and blue eyes I look very Irish yet, I have no Irish blood in me.
 
Palestinian Bomber' offer irks recipient
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

CORONA, Calif. - The address was his, but the name on the credit-card offer took Sami Habbas by surprise: "Palestinian Bomber."

"I thought it was a joke or something," said Habbas, 54, a Palestinian American who served in the U.S. Army.

Habbas opened the letter, and the salutation read "Dear Palestinian Bomber."

When he called the company, JPMorgan Chase & Co., provided his ZIP code and invitation number, two operators said to him: "Yes, Mr. Bomber, what can we do for you?"

"It's very upsetting," Habbas said. "I'm not what they are saying, a Palestinian bomber. That's uncalled for. I have a name. My name is Sami Habbas."

The information came from a list Chase purchased from a vendor, said Kelly J. Presta, Chase Card Services executive vice president. Chase Card Services, the Delaware-based credit card line of JPMorgan Chase & Co., said it doesn't know how that name was attached to Habbas' address, but it is investigating.

"Although no Chase employee was involved in creating this information, we are embarrassed by this incident and regret that our automatic screening procedures did not catch this erroneous information," Presta said.

Habbas, a grocer who has lived in the United States since age 3, doesn't know why he would be singled out or how anyone would even know he has Palestinian heritage.

"It just hurt me to think I am discriminated against in my own back yard," he said.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations in Washington, D.C., has asked Chase for a formal apology.

"The most important thing is to make sure this doesn't happen again, to any American, regardless of their race or religion," said Sabiha Khan, spokeswoman for the Muslim civil liberties group in Southern California.
 
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