‘Sheer cloudy vagueness’ cost one worker his job
Former Academy employee says he got angry at a customer who wouldn’t wear a mask. Then he says he was fired for it.
Steven Suarez worked the door at Academy Sports on U.S. 59 near Kirby, so it was his job to enforce mask rules. He took it seriously. He felt that he was protecting customers’ and coworkers’ lives.
Maybe, if he’d taken it less seriously, Academy wouldn’t have fired him Monday.
Elise Hasbrook, Academy Sports + Outdoors’ vice president for communication, said that as a matter of policy, Academy won’t comment on personnel matters. But here, according to Suarez, is how it went down.
‘1984’
On Friday, a man and a young boy walked into the
Academy store on 59 at Kirby. The man was wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with George Orwell’s face and “1984” — symbols popular lately with the groups driven off Twitter and Facebook for spreading misinformation and popularizing violence.
More important, to Suarez, was what the man wasn’t wearing: a mask.
City and county ordinances require masks inside buildings, with very few exceptions for adults. Academy’s own policy, posted on its corporate website, included “requiring masks be worn at all times while in the stores.”
But still, Suarez says, people refused to wear them all the time.
Suarez followed the usual protocol: “Do you have a mask?” he asked.
“No,” said the customer.
Suarez offered him a freebie. The man refused it.
Suarez pointed to the sign in the vestibule that lists city and county mask ordinances. “Sir,” he said, “to come in the store, you’ll have to wear a mask.”
“I have asthma,” he said. “I can’t wear a mask.”
Suarez didn’t believe him. He thought the guy was grandstanding. And the Orwell T-shirt irritated him. He’s read “1984.” It doesn’t mean what antimaskers think it means, he said.
But fine. Suarez followed protocol, consulting with his manager, who said to let the maskless man shop. That, says Suarez, was what his managers always said in that situation, “100 percent of the time.”
Suarez asked the man not to put other people at risk — to get his business done quickly, and to keep his distance from other people. Instead, the man dawdled conspicuously, staying within 15 feet of Suarez to play the arcade game near the firearms section.
That, Suarez admits, is when he broke protocol. He muttered to a co-worker, “That guy’s being an a-----.”
‘Propaganda’
Eventually, the man bought a knife. On his way out out of the store, he stopped at Suarez. “What’s your name?” he demanded, standing close.
Suarez refused to say. The man drew closer. “My son heard you call me an a- - - - - -,” he said, breathing in Suarez’s face. “If you ever do that again, I’m going to break your f- - - - - back.”
The man yelled something about an amendment, Suarez says — the 13th? Or the 16th? And he definitely yelled something about “propaganda.”
Suarez stared at a pair of scissors nearby. He wondered whether, if he had to, he could defend himself with them.
A co-worker got between Suarez and the man and told them to calm down. Managers came. The man left the store, and Suarez walked away to cool off.
On Monday, Suarez got to work early, hoping to talk with his bosses. He wasn’t proud of his comment, and he expected a disciplinary writeup.
Instead, the store director called the manager. They said that the man had repeatedly called corporate to complain. Academy was firing him.
Suarez begged them not to. Academy was his fulltime gig, the one he depended on to pay his rent. But the thing was done.
That afternoon, he called his manager at Cactus Music, his side gig, the place he worked Sundays
to pick up a little extra cash. He asked his manager, Cristina Acuna, if he could pick up extra shifts. Explaining why he needed them, he broke into tears.
Acuna was furious. Using Cactus’ account, she tweeted about the incident. “That,” she concluded, “is some corporate (BS).”
‘Prevention measures’
Tuesday afternoon, at Academy’s corporate headquarters in Katy, Hasbrook said she couldn’t comment on the specifics of the case. Asked about the chain’s general policy, she offered an official statement:
“Academy Sports + Outdoors works to maintain the prevention measures recommended by the CDC and local authorities, including supporting proper distancing requirements with posted floor markers and signs, professional cleaning, disinfecting cart and hand basket handles, and providing hand sanitizer in the store. We also have notices posted at the front of the store requiring masks in accordance with local and state requirements. We work to communicate these policies to customers with courtesy and clarity.”
Hasbrook also referred me to Academy’s corporate website. There, a page headlined “Covid-19 Safety” doesn’t just refer to posting notices. It says plainly that the chain’s prevention measures include “requiring masks be worn at all times while in the stores.”
But what if a customer refuses to wear a mask or says that they can’t? What’s Academy’s protocol then? Do you ask people to leave or do you let them shop?
“We’re not looking to create confrontations with any customers,” Hasbrook said.
I read that carefully worded sentence back to her, and she approved it: a statement notable mainly for what it doesn’t say.
To be fair, it’s the kind of non-statement statement that I’d expect from almost any corporate spokesperson. Companies and politicians use that kind of language all the time to couch uncomfortable truths.
It’s what George Orwell, the author of “1984,” would have called “question-begging and sheer cloudy vagueness.”
“I have asthma. I can’t wear a mask.” What an Academy customer said to Steve Suarez, who later was fired after their confrontation