Schultz says Starbucks manager showed own ‘unconscious bias’
I think you have to say in looking at the tape that she demonstrated her own level of unconscious bias. And in looking at the tape, you ask yourself whether or not that in fact was racial profiling.
THE WHITE Starbucks manager who called 911 on two AfricanAmerican men last week is no longer with the company, with Starbucks’ executive chairman saying the manager likely acted on her own “unconscious bias” when she decided to involve the police.
Howard Schultz told Gayle King of “CBS This Morning” that he spent time with the manager and that she “recognises that perhaps that call should not have been made.” Schultz said that when the manager called the police, she probably thought they would come to her location in Center City in Philadelphia and talk to the men about why they were there.
The men were waiting for a third man to arrive for a business meeting when the manager called 911. One or both of the men had asked to use the restroom but were told no because they had not bought anything.
“I think you have to say in looking at the tape that she demonstrated her own level of unconscious bias,” Schultz told King.
“And in looking at the tape, you ask yourself whether or not that in fact was racial profiling.”
Starbucks chief executive
Howard Schultz, Starbucks’ executive chairman
Kevin Johnson appeared on Fox Business Network’s “Mornings With Maria” on Wednesday and talked about meeting with the men who were arrested.
“I had the opportunity to apologise to those two gentlemen for what happened to them,” he said. “They didn’t deserve that.”
Johnson also met with Philadelphia’s mayor, the police commissioner and other community leaders. He described “very constructive discussions” as part of the process to ensure that “this doesn’t happen again.”
Johnson did not directly answer a question from anchor Cheryl Casone about whether Starbucks would consider changing its “policy that customers have to buy something if they come into a store.” He said the company is looking “at all aspects of this,” from training to company policy.
When asked what the company’s policy is about making purchases, a Starbucks spokesperson said: “In this particular store, the guidelines were that partners must ask unpaying customers to leave the store, and police were to be called if they refused.” “In this situation,” the spokesperson said, “the police should never have been called. And we know we have to review the practices and guidelines to help ensure it never happens again.”
Johnson, Schultz and other Starbucks executives met with about 40 local clergy and lay leaders on Wednesday. One attendee, Hugh Taft-Morales, leader of the Philadelphia Ethical Society of the American Ethical Union, a humanist organisation, said he was struck by how the executives “didn’t grandstand” or try to dictate the conversation.
Taft-Morales said he felt the executives truly listened, and noted that they stopped short of swiftly promising a laundry list of new policies, saying that “frankly, that would have been suspicious if they did.”
Yet when asked whether he felt hopeful that the meeting would bring a solution to lasting change, Taft-Morales said “yes and no.”
“The conversation is going to continue,” Taft-Morales said. “Hope is a difficult word. What made me feel better is I think I saw a level of listening that I think is pretty unique. And they are upping the ante on themselves. They are saying things publicly and transparently about how this was a reprehensible situation and how the responsibility is on them, not the manager.” — Bloomberg