TBogg makes this catch from Colorado:
The owner of a Colorado barbecue restaurant is beginning to feel the heat over plans for a “White Appreciation Day,” where only white customers will receive a 10 percent discount on their orders.
According to KUSA, Edgar Antillon and Miguel Jimenez, owners of Rubbin Buttz BBQ defended the promotion, with Antillon noting that there is already a Black History Month.
“We have a whole month for black history month,” Antillon said. “We have a whole month for Hispanic heritage month, so we thought the least we could do was offer one day to appreciate white Americans.”
The owners, both of whom are Hispanic and who recently purchased the restaurant, said the idea began as a joke, but now it has been scheduled for June 11.
All BBQ matters, just some BBQ matters a little bit more, just by complete coincidence over the course of history.
Open thread.
taylormattd
Ok then.
CONGRATULATIONS!
Gosh, thanks guys! I felt so unappreciated because of my whiteness, but now I don’t.
dubo
He ain’t the first
http://www.rawstory.com/2015/04/new-jersey-deli-owners-online-fundraiser-tanks-after-failed-white-history-month-promotion/
Isn’t it neat how the Randpauls are always telling us it’s not that they’re racist, it’s that we don’t NEED civil rights protections because the free market will put racists out of businesd
And then when that actually happens, all those same total non-racists band together to try to keep the racists in business
Hal
White folks have had a whole millennium or two.
Walker
The real kicker here is that BBQ, like much of Southern cuisine, is one of the most extreme cases of cultural appropriation ever.
scav
Interesting little detail I’m wondering about is do they offer this 10% off the price deal to the Blacks and Hispanics while they’re being “appeciated” or is that little perq reserved for the poooor neglected Whities?
Haydnseek
Hmmmmm…..picture an extremely busy dinner service, with lots of customers whose race and ethnicity isn’t readily apparent. Let’s all just sit back and watch the fun as the waitstaff and management has to make snap decisions regarding who is or isn’t white.
msdc
I can’t believe the owners of Rubbin Buttz BBQ would be so crass!
burnspbesq
The race for the Republican nomination for Governor of Kentucky has really gotten down and dirty. The other night, one candidate referred to another as “the Christian Laettner of Kentucky politics.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2015/05/07/christian-laettner-just-became-an-issue-in-the-kentucky-governors-race/
One of the nice things about being a vegetarian is that it will be easy for me to boycott these clowns when I am in Colorado next week.
Cacti
Does the one drop rule apply to this discount?
jheartney
I take it this place isn’t affluent enough to afford legal advice.
scav
What happens if a multiracial family tries to buy some of that tasty bbq — last person to touch the money at the till, is the discount / appreciation priced then, or does everyone have to buy individually?
Belafon
I’m thinking only blonde hair, blue eyed people should get the discount.
catclub
I don’t see this as very different from Ladies Night at a bar. Is it?
Cacti
@Belafon:
And what about ethnic whites like hispanics or any whose surname ends with a vowel?
Patrick
He really is clueless about history and what took place a few hundred years ago, isn’t he?
Big ole hound
Who gives a shit what some idiots think up over a beer and then use for free advertising. They probably called the TV station who jumped on it because anything with a race factor is big news.
Tone in DC
What The Fuck?
I am dead serious, here.
Teh st00pid is getting stronger and stronger, like the gravity from some supermassive black hole. After reading that paragraph, my IQ dropped 20 points.
These two guys have not been part of the reality based community for a while. After seeing this, I need a drink. And it’s not even past lunch time here.
Cacti
@Patrick:
The day for that has been called 1492 – present.
Chris
Does black history month include black people getting to pay less?
Betty Cracker
These clowns are probably hoping to join the homophobe pizza morans in the wingnut crowdfunding millionaires circle. They’ll never make a go of it otherwise. Rubbin Buttz? Please. I get it — BBQ rub on a Boston butt cut of pork. But it puts one in mind of, well, let’s just not go there.
Somewhat O/T but related to substandard BBQ establishment advertising strategies: There’s a BBQ joint not too far from me with a sign that brags that it serves ribs so tender that “you don’t even need teeth to eat them!” It might be good, but I don’t know because I’ve never been there — who wants to sit around watching toothless gomers gnawing on rib bones?
Zandar
@burnspbesq: Laettner’s response
NotMax
@Betty Cracker
“It’s gum lickin’ good!”
burnspbesq
@Zandar:
Christian’s an asshole, but he’s our asshole.
burnspbesq
Good news: Kevin Drum is out of the hospital and continuing his rehab at home.
Amir Khalid
@catclub:
Plenty different, it seems, to go by the reactions here.
Punchy
This is pure grift, yo. They’re looking for Indiana pizzeria scratch, to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars. I give it less than 8 hours before the FundMe account goes live.
James E Powell
It started as a joke? “Hey, let’s do something racist” is a joke? What’s funny about this?
northierthanthou
Among other objections…
Strange how white history month seems to mean discrimination. Do they give discounts only to African Americans in February? How are these dedicated months an excuse to treat people differently? The point is usually to think about issues connected with the population and it’s history, not to provide some exclusive benefit. But not in this case, which is damned telling.
Omnes Omnibus
@catclub: Vastly.
Chris
@Tone in DC:
Fully half the country is not part of the reality based community, and they’re getting worse all the time.
kindness
Isn’t this the same as Dinesh d’Souza hating black people?
No don’t slam me, I know he’s Indian but racists don’t see that as different.
Brachiator
@catclub:
How about a White Ladies Night?
OzarkHillbilly
Every day is White Appreciation Day. Just ask any black.
redoubt
@northierthanthou: I’ve been African American all my life, living mostly in two metro areas with a large number of African Americans, and I’ve never gotten a discount in February.
Quite the opposite in fact; there’s what’s referred to as the “black tax”–an extra 15-20% everything, especially services, costs you.
boatboy_srq
@CONGRATULATIONS!: Still do not understand how it is that these idjits don’t see that White Culture (or is that Kultur?) is visible and celebrated every flipping day.
Gindy51
Sounds like they want some free publicity.
OzarkHillbilly
Blacks get one month to discuss Black contributions to society over the years. Whites get the other eleven and it still isn’t enuf.
Botsplainer
I’ve been in a lollapalooza with Facebook conservatives over a 40+ year old song, Jethro Tull’s Hymn 43.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=1_LF9NFKPlo
I describe it as the national anthem of movement conservatives. The butthurt is intense – I’m apparently just like ISIS.
Tenar Darell
It is so frustrating the very point of Black History Month, which was to bring to the fore the contributions of African Americans to our collective history (since this wasn’t being taught at all) is now used as a cudgel and a fundraising opportunity by the ignorant. African American History is American History FFS! /headdesk
Belafon
@catclub: Do bars justify ladies night by saying that men get a month where they get recognized for doing manly stuff?
It’s the justification that’s frustrating.
Edit: Leave out the justification, and it’s racism. The justification is to excuse the racism.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@burnspbesq: At least you admit that he’s still an asshole.
JustRuss
@boatboy_srq: Yeah, I have a brother-in-law who’s a little wingnutty and he mentioned how oppressed he was by the unfairness of black history having a whole month dedicated to it. I like to think he’s just fucking with me, but I suspect he was serious. I’ve learned just ignore it, this crap is pretty deeply ingrained, it’s like arguing with a two year old.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@Belafon: And isn’t it interesting that the racism that the racism is from a man of an ethnicity that’s GRAW?
Kyle
@Big ole hound:
This.
It’s the rabies right meme of saying contrived “outrageous” things because they feed off attention and get their jollies from pissing people off. Best to ignore it before they escalate to the next stage of flinging poo.
gene108
@kindness:
Racism – in a global context – more than White People versus Black People, as it has been for much of U.S. history and more recently White People versus non-White People.
There are white Latino’s, who do not like their duskier compadres.
There are Asian Indians, who look down on people darker skinned than themselves.
I’m sure there different forms of racism among and between Chinese, Koreans, Vietnamese, etc. (but I would not know, because I cannot tell them apart).
Just because the dominant power structure in the U.S. may look at you askance does not mean you were not part of the dominant power structure somewhere else and are used to looking down on others.
Mike J
@catclub:
Ladies night exists because choose which bar to go to based on how many women are there.
Do you think more black people will go to this BBQ place because they’ve managed to attract more white people?
gene108
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q):
What is GRAW?
On the internet it comes up as Ghost Recon Advanced Fighter, but I do not think that is what you are referring to.
burnspbesq
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q):
I don’t think I ever disputed that Laettner is an arrogant smart-ass. However, he has the resume to back it up.
different-church-lady
Oh, so blacks get 10% off at that joint the entire month of February? Cool!
Mayur
@gene108: Generally Recognized As White.
Bobby Thomson
@burnspbesq: that’s really stomping below the belt.
James E Powell
@boatboy_srq:
Fish, water, etc.
Marc
This sounds like a very, very fast way to generate a mountain of trouble. Hey, let’s give white folks a discount – there’s no way that charging a black or brown person more money for the same thing can possibly go wrong! And somehow I doubt that they give minorities discounts during black history month.
I’m sure that no one will think to get a few cameras rolling, have people make some orders, document the racial bias, leave, lawsuit.
MomSense
@burnspbesq:
That Laettner thing happened 23 years ago? And I thought Boston fans held a grudge.
Randy P
@catclub: Actually, the concept of Ladies Night has had some issues.
Many years ago (being a curmudgeon means I remember this like yesterday’s news), when I lived in Maryland, the popular Woodside Deli had a Ladies Night. A group of customers complained and the owner ended up changing it to “Wear a Dress Night” or something like that. You got a discount or wearing a dress, regardless of gender.
Can’t find an article on the actual incident, but it’s mentioned in this obit.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A241-2004Dec14.html?nav=E8
I’m appalled to see that it happened in the 80s, probably before most of the BJ readership was born.
gvg
@catclub: It is different than Ladies night. The point for bars having ladies night is that if guys know there will be lots of ladies that night, more of them will make a point of coming in that night to meet the ladies. The bar owner profits. They are trying to attract MORE males, not exclude them. It works too, which is why you can’t sue based on it.
trollhattan
And in the blind-pig-discovers-delicious-acorn category: Geraldo compares Pam Geller to Aryan Nation and KKK. On Fox, to boot; not to disappoint, the others disagreed with him.
.
VincentN
@catclub:
To be fair, there have been people who have sued over the concept of Ladies Night as a form of sex discrimination. And one can make a reasonable argument for that. As for your statement as to how a White Appreciation Day is any different from that… well, Ladies Nights are done rightly or wrongly as a way to drum up more business overall with both men and women through alcohol sales and while this restaurant stunt will mainly drive up business by bigots.
Tree With Water
That’s like a waiter pointedly “joking” about food poisoning as he shows you to a table. I’ve got a feeling they’re going to lose money on this restaurant gamble.
Randy P
@Mike J: That wouldn’t be a selling point for me but you never know how some people think.
Long ago on my first trip to California (Monterey) it struck me that this would be a good opportunity to experience real Mexican food. So I asked the lady at the desk to recommend a Mexican restaurant. She sadly said there was no good restaurant within 15-20 miles and directed me to a couple. In Carmel, I think.
I got back to my room and saw a few of the maids taking a break (this was midday). I asked them the same question and got the response that they didn’t speak English. Repeating my question in Spanish, they immediately brightened up and started telling me about places. Oh yeah, there are many! There are three great restaurants right around here they said. There’s one right across the street! Good food, cheap prices, great family place.
The maids were right of course. But I always wondered what the desk clerk considered a “good Mexican restaurant” and why she didn’t think to tell me about Jose’s across the street. Probably because it was popular with, you know, Mexicans.
I had the same trouble some years later in San Diego trying to talk some of my colleagues into having lunch with me at the burrito shack I’d discovered in the neighborhood bordering the Naval Base. Some days I had three meals there. But I never got another gringo to accompany me.
Paul in KY
@burnspbesq: Mr. Comer had to admit he recieived (and liked) a book by Sen. Lowell Weicker of Connecticut. For your Republican primary voter, that’s about like getting a book by V.I. Lenin or Eleanor Roosevelt!.
catclub
@trollhattan:
Rotten Mangoes (h/t Sadly, No!)
Paul in KY
@Botsplainer: Pretty apropos, I’d say.
Germy Shoemangler
@JustRuss: To make him feel better, tell him it’s the SHORTEST month.
Germy Shoemangler
@gene108: Doesn’t it boil down to how close your ancestors were to the equator?
What is it with the equator? Folks who come from far away from it feel superior to folks who come from close to it.
Paul in KY
@Randy P: You woulda got me!
Germy Shoemangler
@gvg: Heh heh… imagine that? Sorry dude… this is ladies night. You can’t come in.
boatboy_srq
@gene108: The Asians get very granular. I once had two colleagues who were terminal unfriends because one decided to strike up a conversation (in Mandarin) with the other, and by doing so mortally offended the other one (who spoke Cantonese). As Fierstein would say, “way beyond ‘oops.'”
@Randy P: Patronized by, run by, whatever. It’s amazing how that works. I keep trying to tell friends going to SFO to skip Chinatown: the best Asian food is in the Richmond and Sunset, and the prices are better (they’re catering to the locals and not soaking the tourists).
raven
@boatboy_srq: My buddy and his Chinese-American wife took os to the Koi Palace in Daly City, awesome!
Citizen Alan
@gene108:
I’ve always been struck by the extent to which Mexican telenovelas are dominated by what appear to be white people with good tans. A lot of them look like Germans who speak excellent Spanish. Invariably, the ones who appear “Mexican” as racist whites would identify them (i.e. the ones whose ancestry includes some black and indigenous heritage as well as Spanish) are either the villains or the servants,
raven
@Citizen Alan: The Ricans and Mexicans in the Army hated each other. . . and the Cubans!
Zinsky
Maybe they can show Birth of a Nation or some home movies of lynchings.
Doug r
@Chris: no it’s more like 29% you know the same amount that approved of President Voldemort.
germy shoemangler
I’ve always maintained that what the human race needs is an invasion by giant extra-terrestrial insects. Then all people of the earth could put aside our petty differences as we fight them with flame throwers.
Gravenstone
@Randy P:
I know you’re not new here, but you do realize that a very large contingent of this joint is in the 50-75 cadre?
catclub
@germy shoemangler: Read about the Fermi paradox. You will really not want that invasion.
(Any race that can travel across space will treat us as vermin/food/speedbump. or worst of all – competition.)
What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?
@Betty Cracker: That should be an interesting case study – is the urge to celebrate oppressed whiteness stronger than the urge to hate on Hispanic immigrants? It’s kind of a catch-22 for the racist elements of the right wing.
Randy P
@Gravenstone:
I’m aware of that and debated replacing the word “most” with “many”. But on reflection I decided to gamble that “most” might still be true, and went with it for dramatic effect.
Do we actually have any idea of the demographic breakdown?
Germy Shoemangler
@catclub: Well, it would at least unite the human race for a few brief days before our total annihilation.
Perhaps the insects could be sickened by the sight of Ted Cruz. Or shrivel at the sound of Carly Fiorina
Work with me here, I’m trying to come up with some happy ending scenarios.
Waysel
https://www.facebook.com/eantillon
http://edgarantillon.com Romney campaign hispanic outreach leader. Gun fetishist. Log cabin republican fan. Ran for office as republican. Yeah, could be a grift. Sho enuff getting lots of PR for the new restaurant.
Germy Shoemangler
Like this:
Citizen Alan
@Germy Shoemangler:
I don’t remember if it was in the Cornerstone Speech or the Mississippi Articles of Secession, but there was a specific reference in one of them basically claiming that peoples indigenous to equatorial regions were uniquely suited for picking cotton in the American South and therefore were clearly intended by God for that purpose.
Citizen Alan
@germy shoemangler:
I was just commenting last night that I refused to see The Watchmen when I found out that Zach Snyder left out the Giant Alien Squid. To me, the whole point of the story was the idea that we won’t ever be able to let go of our bigotries against each other until we have a common (alien) enemy.
Gravenstone
@Citizen Alan: You should see it. Extremely faithful to the graphic novels, aside from the squid. Snyder substituted another “external” threat intended to force the nations to work together. I thought it all worked quite well together.
And Jackie Earle Haley was great as Rorschach.
Germy Shoemangler
@Citizen Alan: Yes, I saw that on a civil war documentary a few days ago. They basically said the negro had no problem with the harsh tropical climate and so it was not cruel to have them work in it.
Insane.
Gravenstone
Oh Australia, whatever will we do with you? Aussie PM’s adviser claims global warming is a hoax intended to allow the UN to implement the New World Order.
Sounds just like your common American conspiracy theorist.
Germy Shoemangler
@Gravenstone: And now Snyder is getting BATMAN V SUPERMAN ready for release next year.
Mike in NC
Reading idiotic stories like this prompted me to send off for Martin Mull’s “History of White People in America”. Hope to start it soon.
Gravenstone
@Germy Shoemangler: Saw the trailer, looks like they’re trying to play off the big confrontation in Miller’s “Dark Knight Rises”. (Which he’s now apparently working on a third volume of now. Can’t imagine the train wreck this one will be after the second one a few years back). I’m not hopeful. And what the fuck is with the “Batman” growl? Seriously, just get Kevin Conroy to do the voiceover and be done with it.
Germy Shoemangler
@Mike in NC: I remember Martin Mull playing the blues on a ukulele. He dedicated a song to his grandfather who had “done quite well” in real estate. He said his name was “Blind Lemon Pledge.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVGpYSXi97A
Germy Shoemangler
@Gravenstone: The guy who wrote “Argo” was brought in by Batman to re-write the script. It might be good.
I try not to expect too much.
Jerry
Couldn’t they have at least waited until Juneteenth for this promotion? I mean, if you’re gonna be an asshole about things, go all out and *be* an asshole. Buncha cowards.
The Gray Adder
Something like this could be seriously tongue-in-cheek fun. I think Martin Mull once did a bit like that, but it would still be taken in the wrong way. Pity.
burnspbesq
@Bobby Thomson:
My kitteh is named Laettner. I’ve been trying for years, without success, to find an Aminu Timberlake doll for her to ritually destroy.
Brachiator
@Citizen Alan:
But this is a kinda dumb idea, and not original. It’s been played out in a lot of SF in the last, what 50 years or so.
And when you think about it, it’s not really solving a problem, but just pushing it off on ETs, who begin the new enemy that can be misunderstood and hated.
@Germy Shoemangler:
Heaven help us all. I didn’t hate “Man of Steel,” but I was decidedly underwhelmed. This movie should be almost a no-brainer hit (Batman, Superman, maybe Wonder Woman in a movie together), but so of the stuff that has been leaked and hinted at so far is bland. On the other hand, “Avengers: Age of Ultron” is not as good as it might have been, and this may reset expectations and give Snyder some room to knock it out of the ballpark.
Mayken
@Tenar Darell: Yes, this! So much this!
SWMBO
@Germy Shoemangler: Feed the Republicans to them. It will inflame their natural paranoia that they are being exploited, being persecuted as Christians and their need to follow in lockstep with each other. WIN for everyone else!
Germy Shoemangler
@SWMBO: Best idea yet.
Steeplejack
@Germy Shoemangler:
I saw Mull do that in concert back in the ’70s, before he got (semi-)big on Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman. He used a baby bottle to do a bit of slide uke. Awesome.
CONGRATULATIONS!
@gene108: Like you would not believe. I’m not Asian but worked with almost all of the Asian nationalities for a couple of decades (and the term “Asian” as a catch-all pisses them off, because they really think you’re lying about not being able to tell them apart) and yeah, there is a pecking order, some psychotic racism that you would not believe, and just all kinds of fun stuff. The only thing any of them agree on is that Japan, due to some actions committed by that nation a few decades ago, are a bunch of assholes.
ETA: Except, of course, for the Japanese, who think they are the master race. And I’m not joking about that.
Brachiator
@CONGRATULATIONS!:
Not lying, honky round eye. Just stupid.
Would this be WW II, or a particularly sloppy tea ceremony?
Felonius Monk
Does that make these guys “Uncle Tomas’s”?
Ruckus
@boatboy_srq:
Brought a new house once, had next door neighbors from India. Very nice folks. A family from Pakistan wanted to purchase the house next to them but when they found out where the first family was from they refused to purchase the house and bought one a couple doors down. They could live in the same neighborhood just not that close. Bigotry is world wide. Preconceived notions about groups of people is a learned experience, just learned at an early age. We won’t get over this to any great extent for a long time. And we won’t stop fighting wars over it any time soon either. Look how much people around here debase the south, like our racism comes from there.
JustRuss
@germy shoemangler: You had me at “flamethrowers”.
Will Reks
@Randy P: Yep, I went through something similar a couple of years ago. I found the best Mexican food in nearby Seaside and Marina. Also some great Vietnamese food. I stayed away from Carmel for the most part.