Toronto expat has Brooklyn in uproar
Marketing pitch for restaurant Summerhill sparks protests over its negative depiction of largely Black neighbourhood
A controversial New York restaurant opened by a Toronto expat has provoked protests in Brooklyn.
In late June, Torontonian Becca Brennan opened the upscale restaurant Summerhill in Crown Heights, a predominantly Black neighbourhood. But longtime locals have pushed back against what they see as aggressive gentrification and selling the illusion of slumming it in their neighbourhood.
Brennan’s marketing for the restaurant, which is named for the affluent Toronto area where she grew up, promoted a “bullet hole” in the wall and drinking wine out of 40s in brown paper bags. Cocktails at the restaurant are $12 and one of the dishes bears the hipster-friendly name “Keep Austin Weird.”
The “bullet hole” in the wall is likely due to moving and construction, reports the New York City blog Gothamist.
Rally organizers criticized Brennan as out of touch with the neighbourhood and its history.
AFacebook statement posted by protest co-organizer Justine Stephens said Brennan was “profiting by perpetuating violent and ridiculous stereotypes, all while disrespecting and appropriating a history that does not belong to the owner of this bar.”
Up to 200 people protested outside the restaurant Saturday, where they carried signs and chanted “Bye-bye, Becky.”
Brennan declined to do an interview with Metro, but in an emailed statement she offered an apology.
“I deeply apologize for any offence that my recent comments might have caused. I did not intend to be insensitive to anyone in the neighbourhood, and I am sorry that my words have caused pain,” she wrote.
Brennan also wrote that she would reach out to community organizations such as the Crown Heights Tenant Union, whose members were involved in the protests. “I recognize that I have more work to do to continue healing relationships with my neighbours,” she added.
Rally organizers made several demands of Brennan, including that she apologize, remove the “bullet-holed” wall and hire local people of colour at living wages. of opacity that require Herculean efforts to dent.
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None of this means there aren’t noble individual police officers who are good human beings, highly skilled and perseverant in the pursuit of justice.
What the last few years have shown, however, is the institution of police is not a good system with a few bad apples. It’s a rotten system with a few good eggs.
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