"Cancel Culture" 3

[BigFatCoward]

3 minutes ago, DMC said:

Wow, what a bizarre story just in general.  But from what I looked up, Domino's was making the offer to people actually named Karen:

 

Yeah, I know, just because you are called karen, doesn't mean you are one. There are decent Karen's out there. A little free pizza is the least they deserve to be shackled with that name forever. 

[sologdin]

or maybe just advise persons lacking critical circumspection to stop sending insipid and simplistic sexist memes and instead do the actual agitational work of confronting racist practices.

[DMC]

9 minutes ago, BigFatCoward said:

Yeah, I know, just because you are called karen, doesn't mean you are one. There are decent Karen's out there. A little free pizza is the least they deserve to be shackled with that name forever. 

Acting like women named Karen are in any way victims seems quite silly to me.  If I meet a dude named Ken I don't think he actually doesn't have a penis.

[Knight Of Winter]

 Read Yglesias's piece - and it left me with less hope then before. While I'm glad that most leftists agree that what happened to Shor was unjust, there seems to be significant majority who believe otherwise. I'm talking about this, for example (bolded parts mine):

Quote

Shor’s tweet, as originally reported by Jonathan Chait, became a topic of discussion on the Progressphiles email list, a widely used networking list for progressive data operatives, and he was soon kicked out of the group. The group’s moderators described Shor’s tweet as “racist” and the criticism he got on Twitter for it as a “much deserved call in.” They also alleged that by arguing with his critics on Twitter, he had “encouraged harassment that led to death threats.” (The list moderators are Madeleine Leader, director of data initiatives at the Center for Popular Democracy and formerly of the DNC; Cristina Sinclair, a senior vice president at Clarity Campaigns; Rachel Hall, the deputy director of data initiatives at Planned Parenthood Action Fund; Herschel Pecker, a project coordinator at UNITE HERE; and Stefanie Hendrick, the director of Data Strategy and targeting at BerlinRosen.)

I obtained a copy of this message, along with the subsequent debate. Some participants took Shor’s side in the argument, but most did not. Jessica Morales Rocketto, currently civic engagement director of the National Domestic Workers Alliance, argued that the problem with his tweet wasn’t that Wasow or his research is bad, but that “it is important to examine the point Shor was making in a larger sense.” In context, she said, his tweet “could be interpreted as intended to denigrate the work of the Movement for Black Lives and pin any election losses on Black lives.”

This left me baffled - not so much the fact that Shor was subject to criticism (everyone should be), but the way that it was done. The people who supported his firing have completely different value system. They don't seek truth or scientific research with aim of finding it, instead they seek to push their ideology in spite of truth. Truth is not something to be aimed at, rather's it's something to be rejected or approved, applied in smaller or greater doses - whatever suits their current goal. If objective reality goes against what they're pushing for, than the objective reality itself (and Shor as it's messenger) must be "racist" or "could be interpreted as intended to denigrate the work of the Movement for Black Lives".

That's stuff right out of Orwellian nightmare. Outright terrifying. 

7 hours ago, Conflicting Thought said:

Can you give some examples of some of the dogmas that can never be questioned that the left (or some on the left)  has?. 

Read four posts above you. Saying that peaceful protests work better than violent ones can get you fired. Here's a more extensive list, linked earlier in this thread: http://www.canceledpeople.com/cancelations

22 minutes ago, DMC said:

I think the criticism of such a weird-ass offer was well warranted.

Depends of the criticism. If you want to criticize the offer on the grounds of it being wierd - sure, go ahead. (heck, I'll join you in criticizing it: the offer IS weird). If you want to criticize in on the grounds that it "promotes privilege" - that, I think, is outright delusional. 
 

[BigFatCoward]

11 minutes ago, DMC said:

Acting like women named Karen are in any way victims seems quite silly to me.  If I meet a dude named Ken I don't think he actually doesn't have a penis.

People with stupid or embarrassing names would probably not be associated with the thing they are associated with.  I wouldnt assume a man called Fred West was a Serial Killer, but everyone would laugh at him, which probably gets old really quickly.

Some people are called Karen

Some of those people called Karen are decent people

Being called Karen is now kind of embarrassing

Have some free pizza on us

The sort of people who get outraged about this sort of thing (not you, clearly you just think it was a bit of a stupid promotion and would have left it at that) are mental, reverse 'Karen's'.  There should be a better name for these sort of people than 'snowflake'.  The right have missed a trick.

[DMC]

8 minutes ago, Knight Of Winter said:

Depends of the criticism. If you want to criticize the offer on the grounds of it being wierd - sure, go ahead. (heck, I'll join you in criticizing it: the offer IS weird). If you want to criticize in on the grounds that it "promotes privilege" - that, I think, is outright delusional. 

7 minutes ago, BigFatCoward said:

The sort of people who get outraged about this sort of thing (not you, clearly you just think it was a bit of a stupid promotion and would have left it at that) are mental, reverse 'Karen's'.  There should be a better name for these sort of people than 'snowflake'.  The right have missed a trick.

Yeah my main thing is it's a really dumb idea if you're the marketing officer of a major corporation to wade into such dicey terrain - on either or any side.  But also, the implication of such an offer seems to be that the "Karen" meme victimizes middle-aged white women who tend to be bigoted.  That's just ass backwards on who should be deserving of free pizza. 

[Varysblackfyre321]

On 7/27/2020 at 2:06 PM, sologdin said:

not just star wars and comic books films.  disney has long churned rightwing rage. but also last temptation of christ. all the actors who opposed the iraq war.

but not just cinema, right?  it's also gamergate. and the sad/rabid puppy things. target and nordstroms.  the NFL. keurig.  beyonce. kelloggs. amazon. starbucks.

this is standard market participant conduct. and people can lose work because of a diminishment of demand.  am not really crediting the objections, unless they go to the heart of the matter.

Yeah, things should be included in discussions of Cancel Culture.

But often the left, and liberals follies in terms pushing social justice are presented as the issue.

And yes there are follies.

But conservative internet mobs that advocates boycotts and harassment are absent in much of the discussion. 
Like it’s not hard to find such groups fuming and calling for boycotts of media that dare show an lgbt character for instance.
Hell a lot the James Gunn scandal was pushed by right-wing but who worked for Infowars.

[TrackerNeil]

11 hours ago, Conflicting Thought said:

Can you give some examples of some of the dogmas that can never be questioned that the left (or some on the left)  has?. 

"Believe women" is one such dogma. Identitarian deference is another. 

What makes conversations of this type so irritating is that the above-mentioned are, in general, good rules of thumb that often lead to good results. I don't want people to go back to thinking it's OK to treat women as liars, or that white people can tell black folks about racism. What I want is for us to treat these as good advice, and not shackles on thought or discourse. Again, that's the way conservatives behave, and I ain't conservative.

[Heartofice]

21 minutes ago, TrackerNeil said:

"Believe women" is one such dogma. Identitarian deference is another. 

What makes conversations of this type so irritating is that the above-mentioned are, in general, good rules of thumb that often lead to good results. I don't want people to go back to thinking it's OK to treat women as liars, or that white people can tell black folks about racism. What I want is for us to treat these as good advice, and not shackles on thought or discourse. Again, that's the way conservatives behave, and I ain't conservative.

That reminds me where the period of MeToo led to a few instances of celebrities who attempted to give a slightly more nuanced view of the situation and immediately realised that is simply not something that is worthwhile attempting. Many of whom apologised for speaking or totally back tracked. Far better to just shut your mouth on pretty much all subjects.

However that is really a product of the media that is desperate to create news, and to make every word out of someone’s mouth explode in controversy.

 

[TrackerNeil]

1 minute ago, Heartofice said:

That reminds me where the period of MeToo led to a few instances of celebrities who attempted to give a slightly more nuanced view of the situation and immediately realised that is simply not something that is worthwhile attempting. Many of whom apologised for speaking or totally back tracked. Far better to just shut your mouth on pretty much all subjects.

However that is really a product of the media that is desperate to create news, and to make every word out of someone’s mouth explode in controversy.

I think blaming media is an inadequate explanation. Yes, the media do salivate over conflict of all sorts, real or imagined, but we liberals are more than capable of ginning up a bunch of stupid outrage and backbiting on our own. 

[Heartofice]

1 minute ago, TrackerNeil said:

I think blaming media is an inadequate explanation. Yes, the media do salivate over conflict of all sorts, real or imagined, but we liberals are more than capable of ginning up a bunch of stupid outrage and backbiting on our own. 

Oh for sure, I think it’s both. The media has to take its fair share of blame for pouncing on any small amount of backlash and amplifying it though 

[TrackerNeil]

18 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

Oh for sure, I think it’s both. The media has to take its fair share of blame for pouncing on any small amount of backlash and amplifying it though 

What bothers me even more than that is the "both sides" view that every issue can be viewed in only two ways, and that both of those opinions are equally valid. Like one side says, "I question the value of throwing children into cages on the border" and the other replies, "More cages!", and the media say, "Well, we're stumped."

Oh, and horserace coverage of the presidential race really annoys me, too.

[sologdin]

Quote

Truth is not something to be aimed at, rather's it's something to be rejected or approved, applied in smaller or greater doses - whatever suits their current goal. If objective reality goes against what they're pushing for, than the objective reality itself 

an unwarranted conclusion, which leads to a bit of self-reflexive applicability.  good times.

 

Quote

 should be included in discussions of Cancel Culture.

sure. but the point was rather that 'cancel culture' is just a snide euphemistic manner of discussing regular market participation, going back at least to gosson, stubbe, and prynne,  regarding the proto-capitalist london theatre, as i detailed in an earlier iteration of this thread.  objections to any particular boycott are simply not serious unless they go to the heart of the matter, the mode of production itself. cancellation is not exceptional; it is the rule. these boycotts, to be agambenian about it, are the late capitalist instancing of a particular eidos zoe.

[Horza]

39 minutes ago, sologdin said:

an unwarranted conclusion, which leads to a bit of self-reflexive applicability.  good times.

 

sure. but the point was rather that 'cancel culture' is just a snide euphemistic manner of discussing regular market participation, going back at least to gosson, stubbe, and prynne,  regarding the proto-capitalist london theatre, as i detailed in an earlier iteration of this thread.  objections to any particular boycott are simply not serious unless they go to the heart of the matter, the mode of production itself. cancellation is not exceptional; it is the rule. these boycotts, to be agambenian about it, are the late capitalist instancing of a particular eidos zoe.

yeah, definitely. especially the bit about zoe. 
 

I’ve missed you, dude

[DanteGabriel]

15 hours ago, Knight Of Winter said:

 

Read four posts above you. Saying that peaceful protests work better than violent ones can get you fired. Here's a more extensive list, linked earlier in this thread: http://www.canceledpeople.com/cancelations

Okay, I would like to re-engage with this site. As a preface, I've said before that I don't doubt some innocent people do suffer and I do think Twitter mobs can exercise poor judgment and go after people who don't deserve it, or people making fairly innocuous mistakes lose their jobs. I get it. It's bad, I wish it wouldn't happen, and certainly I don't think people should get death threats or hounded out of their homes or made to feel unsafe for mistakes, even pretty major mistakes. (But also people have been getting death threats by right-leaning mobs for a long-ass time too, like what happened to the Dixie Chicks.)

Anyway, I looked at that site. I am not familiar with all the cases. Some cases, like David Shor, I agree were unjust. But some of these cases are being manipulated by the site's author, based on what I already knew about the topic from my own perusal of the Internet. There are some big enough "edits" by this site to make me wonder at its overall accuracy.

The site's own descriptions:

James Bennet: Ran controversial Op-Ed by Senator Tom Cotton to bring in troops to restore order during riots.

James Bennett ran an op-ed advocating for the use of our own military against American citizens on American soil. He didn't bother to read it before letting it get published. He had been under fire for years from the public and his colleagues alike. This is not a remarkable or unjust firing. A guy pissed off his public and his co-workers and had a major professional lapse that damaged the reputation of his employer.

 

Mike S. Adams: Tweeted: 'Rioters don’t care about social issues. They are thugs looking for an opportunity to break the law with impunity' and called NC a 'slave state' for COVID restrictions in another tweet. Forced into retirement and subsequently found dead.

It's sad he killed himself. But he didn't just get canned for one tweet, and this description elides the fact that he said, "Massa Coopa, let my people go!" Which is pretty fucking offensive for a guy being asked to wear a mask and avoid indoor restaurant service to avoid the spread of a once-in-a-century pandemic. Of course, like the Bennett case, this description also fails to mention the rest of Adams' behavior, his history of crude, racist, and sexist tweets, and he'd sued the school years ago over his rights to say whatever he wants. There were accusations of bullying his students. Again, like Bennett, this was not an isolated case. I feel bad that he killed himself. But I don't think he deserves any professional pity. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes, as they say.

 

Majdi Wadi: Daughter made anti-semetic social media posts 6-10 years ago that were discovered. Nearly all of his business partners canceled their contracts, landlord terminated the bakery’s lease.

This is a very misleading description. Yes, his daughter made anti-Semitic posts. She also made jokes that hated on black people, Somalis, fat people, gay people. Really awful stuff too. Sometimes the jokes were racist and homophobic at the same time! Not 6-10 years ago, but in 2012 and 2016, so far as we know. And she tagged her posts with stuff like #shitwesayinmyfamily (that was the post that hated black people and gay people) and tagged her uncle in some of the offensive ones, and said something like "at least we're not n****s" and said that's stuff her dad and their workers said. Oh yes, their workers, because she's not just his daughter, she was his catering director. Don't you think that's an important fact if you're telling the story of a man whose business suffered for something a family member did? It's not that his daughter said anti-Semitic stuff 6-10 years ago, it's that his catering director published a post in 2016 where she called an actual monkey "my n*****."

The stories I've read say that this guy was a good businessman, did good stuff for his community, and was a Palestinian immigrant who reached out to Jews. I don't condemn him for what his daughter posted. But he didn't lose his business, as this cancelledculture site claims. He lost one location when the site owners terminated his lease. Some distributors dropped him. But he's still got his business, as far as I know.

So look, these are three cases just that I know of without doing extra research where the site is misleading and omits glaring facts. They seem to paint a lot of these cases as one mistake and you're dead. But in at least two of these cases, getting canned was the end of a long antagonistic relationship with the audience and the employer. I don't think a grave injustice occurred in any of these three and I question the good faith of this site. Some of this shit reads like HoI wrote it.

[TrackerNeil]

31 minutes ago, DanteGabriel said:

James Bennet: Ran controversial Op-Ed by Senator Tom Cotton to bring in troops to restore order during riots.

James Bennett ran an op-ed advocating for the use of our own military against American citizens on American soil. He didn't bother to read it before letting it get published. He had been under fire for years from the public and his colleagues alike. This is not a remarkable or unjust firing. A guy pissed off his public and his co-workers and had a major professional lapse that damaged the reputation of his employer.

And I will go further. When a US senator writes a piece advocating the use of military force against civilians, a good editor subjects that work to the strictest scrutiny, with the first criterion being Is This Just Crazy. That editor then asks if the Times has to publish an opinion just because a senator holds it. The fact that someone important has a notion doesn't mean that notion is worthy of introduction to the public discourse. If Rand Paul had written against the Civil Rights Act, would the NYT publish that, too?

Oh, wait...Paul totally supports the CRA now. I forgot. 

[Martell Spy]

1 hour ago, DanteGabriel said:

Okay, I would like to re-engage with this site. As a preface, I've said before that I don't doubt some innocent people do suffer and I do think Twitter mobs can exercise poor judgment and go after people who don't deserve it, or people making fairly innocuous mistakes lose their jobs. I get it. It's bad, I wish it wouldn't happen, and certainly I don't think people should get death threats or hounded out of their homes or made to feel unsafe for mistakes, even pretty major mistakes. (But also people have been getting death threats by right-leaning mobs for a long-ass time too, like what happened to the Dixie Chicks.)

Anyway, I looked at that site. I am not familiar with all the cases. Some cases, like David Shor, I agree were unjust. But some of these cases are being manipulated by the site's author, based on what I already knew about the topic from my own perusal of the Internet. There are some big enough "edits" by this site to make me wonder at its overall accuracy.

The site's own descriptions:

James Bennet: Ran controversial Op-Ed by Senator Tom Cotton to bring in troops to restore order during riots.

James Bennett ran an op-ed advocating for the use of our own military against American citizens on American soil. He didn't bother to read it before letting it get published. He had been under fire for years from the public and his colleagues alike. This is not a remarkable or unjust firing. A guy pissed off his public and his co-workers and had a major professional lapse that damaged the reputation of his employer.

 

Mike S. Adams: Tweeted: 'Rioters don’t care about social issues. They are thugs looking for an opportunity to break the law with impunity' and called NC a 'slave state' for COVID restrictions in another tweet. Forced into retirement and subsequently found dead.

It's sad he killed himself. But he didn't just get canned for one tweet, and this description elides the fact that he said, "Massa Coopa, let my people go!" Which is pretty fucking offensive for a guy being asked to wear a mask and avoid indoor restaurant service to avoid the spread of a once-in-a-century pandemic. Of course, like the Bennett case, this description also fails to mention the rest of Adams' behavior, his history of crude, racist, and sexist tweets, and he'd sued the school years ago over his rights to say whatever he wants. There were accusations of bullying his students. Again, like Bennett, this was not an isolated case. I feel bad that he killed himself. But I don't think he deserves any professional pity. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes, as they say.

 

Majdi Wadi: Daughter made anti-semetic social media posts 6-10 years ago that were discovered. Nearly all of his business partners canceled their contracts, landlord terminated the bakery’s lease.

This is a very misleading description. Yes, his daughter made anti-Semitic posts. She also made jokes that hated on black people, Somalis, fat people, gay people. Really awful stuff too. Sometimes the jokes were racist and homophobic at the same time! Not 6-10 years ago, but in 2012 and 2016, so far as we know. And she tagged her posts with stuff like #shitwesayinmyfamily (that was the post that hated black people and gay people) and tagged her uncle in some of the offensive ones, and said something like "at least we're not n****s" and said that's stuff her dad and their workers said. Oh yes, their workers, because she's not just his daughter, she was his catering director. Don't you think that's an important fact if you're telling the story of a man whose business suffered for something a family member did? It's not that his daughter said anti-Semitic stuff 6-10 years ago, it's that his catering director published a post in 2016 where she called an actual monkey "my n*****."

The stories I've read say that this guy was a good businessman, did good stuff for his community, and was a Palestinian immigrant who reached out to Jews. I don't condemn him for what his daughter posted. But he didn't lose his business, as this cancelledculture site claims. He lost one location when the site owners terminated his lease. Some distributors dropped him. But he's still got his business, as far as I know.

So look, these are three cases just that I know of without doing extra research where the site is misleading and omits glaring facts. They seem to paint a lot of these cases as one mistake and you're dead. But in at least two of these cases, getting canned was the end of a long antagonistic relationship with the audience and the employer. I don't think a grave injustice occurred in any of these three and I question the good faith of this site. Some of this shit reads like HoI wrote it.

It's almost like conservatives are discussing "Cancel Culture" in bad faith.

[Fury Resurrected]

3 hours ago, DanteGabriel said:

Okay, I would like to re-engage with this site. As a preface, I've said before that I don't doubt some innocent people do suffer and I do think Twitter mobs can exercise poor judgment and go after people who don't deserve it, or people making fairly innocuous mistakes lose their jobs. I get it. It's bad, I wish it wouldn't happen, and certainly I don't think people should get death threats or hounded out of their homes or made to feel unsafe for mistakes, even pretty major mistakes. (But also people have been getting death threats by right-leaning mobs for a long-ass time too, like what happened to the Dixie Chicks.)

Anyway, I looked at that site. I am not familiar with all the cases. Some cases, like David Shor, I agree were unjust. But some of these cases are being manipulated by the site's author, based on what I already knew about the topic from my own perusal of the Internet. There are some big enough "edits" by this site to make me wonder at its overall accuracy.

The site's own descriptions:

James Bennet: Ran controversial Op-Ed by Senator Tom Cotton to bring in troops to restore order during riots.

James Bennett ran an op-ed advocating for the use of our own military against American citizens on American soil. He didn't bother to read it before letting it get published. He had been under fire for years from the public and his colleagues alike. This is not a remarkable or unjust firing. A guy pissed off his public and his co-workers and had a major professional lapse that damaged the reputation of his employer.

 

Mike S. Adams: Tweeted: 'Rioters don’t care about social issues. They are thugs looking for an opportunity to break the law with impunity' and called NC a 'slave state' for COVID restrictions in another tweet. Forced into retirement and subsequently found dead.

It's sad he killed himself. But he didn't just get canned for one tweet, and this description elides the fact that he said, "Massa Coopa, let my people go!" Which is pretty fucking offensive for a guy being asked to wear a mask and avoid indoor restaurant service to avoid the spread of a once-in-a-century pandemic. Of course, like the Bennett case, this description also fails to mention the rest of Adams' behavior, his history of crude, racist, and sexist tweets, and he'd sued the school years ago over his rights to say whatever he wants. There were accusations of bullying his students. Again, like Bennett, this was not an isolated case. I feel bad that he killed himself. But I don't think he deserves any professional pity. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes, as they say.

 

Majdi Wadi: Daughter made anti-semetic social media posts 6-10 years ago that were discovered. Nearly all of his business partners canceled their contracts, landlord terminated the bakery’s lease.

This is a very misleading description. Yes, his daughter made anti-Semitic posts. She also made jokes that hated on black people, Somalis, fat people, gay people. Really awful stuff too. Sometimes the jokes were racist and homophobic at the same time! Not 6-10 years ago, but in 2012 and 2016, so far as we know. And she tagged her posts with stuff like #shitwesayinmyfamily (that was the post that hated black people and gay people) and tagged her uncle in some of the offensive ones, and said something like "at least we're not n****s" and said that's stuff her dad and their workers said. Oh yes, their workers, because she's not just his daughter, she was his catering director. Don't you think that's an important fact if you're telling the story of a man whose business suffered for something a family member did? It's not that his daughter said anti-Semitic stuff 6-10 years ago, it's that his catering director published a post in 2016 where she called an actual monkey "my n*****."

The stories I've read say that this guy was a good businessman, did good stuff for his community, and was a Palestinian immigrant who reached out to Jews. I don't condemn him for what his daughter posted. But he didn't lose his business, as this cancelledculture site claims. He lost one location when the site owners terminated his lease. Some distributors dropped him. But he's still got his business, as far as I know.

So look, these are three cases just that I know of without doing extra research where the site is misleading and omits glaring facts. They seem to paint a lot of these cases as one mistake and you're dead. But in at least two of these cases, getting canned was the end of a long antagonistic relationship with the audience and the employer. I don't think a grave injustice occurred in any of these three and I question the good faith of this site. Some of this shit reads like HoI wrote it.

On Wadi I can confirm that the Holy Land deli in Northeast Minneapolis is still there. Their lease was terminated at their stall in Midtown Global Market and a few local food co-ops that carried their branded hummus dropped it. They also still have their extremely coveted stall at the Minnesota state fair, it’s just that there will be no fair this summer due to COVID. 
 

The reason their lease at Midtown Global Market was terminated is because midtown global market is at the corner of Lake and Chicago. Also at the corner of Lake and Chicago is -pretty much NOTHING- because it was all fucking burned. Midtown Global Market didn’t want their building (above which are apartments) set on fire because Wadi raised some edgelord kids and they are a convenient 8 blocks from 38th and Chicago where the city still holds vigil for George Floyd and exactly at the epicenter of burning Lake Street down. There was no way they could keep Holy Land there without possibly risking hundreds of lives and their building, and all the other businesses inside the Midtown Building.

[DanteGabriel]

8 hours ago, Martell Spy said:

It's almost like conservatives are discussing "Cancel Culture" in bad faith.

Well, like I said, once in a while someone gets "cancelled" for one bad thing. Maybe the guy who was tricked into making that white power sign in his truck and then got fired counts. But a lot of these cases, these people would have been in trouble without some nefarious army of offense-taking leftists prowling Twitter.

I just came across another case, the white burrito ladies who were accused of cultural appropriation, shamed, and closed their business. They literally went to Mexico and tried to get little old Mexican grandmas to reveal the secrets of their tortilla making techniques. When the abuelas started to become uncomfortable or refused to show them, they resorted (by their own words) to industrial espionage.

Quote

"I picked the brains of every tortilla lady there in the worst broken Spanish ever, and they showed me a little of what they did," Connelly says. "They told us the basic ingredients, and we saw them moving and stretching the dough similar to how pizza makers do before rolling it out with rolling pins. They wouldn't tell us too much about technique, but we were peeking into the windows of every kitchen, totally fascinated by how easy they made it look. We learned quickly it isn't quite that easy."

https://www.wweek.com/uncategorized/2017/05/16/kooks-serves-pop-up-breakfast-burritos-with-handmade-tortillas-out-of-a-food-cart-on-cesar-chavez/

There is a valid debate to be had, I think, about cultural appropriation in general. I love Rick Bayless's sopa azteca recipe so maybe that's hypocritical of me. But conning little old ladies into showing you their techniques and then spying on them so you can take this knowledge and profit selling their tortillas to white people in a twee little Portland market is a step too far for me. It's certainly more than that website's claim that it was just "accusations" of cultural appropriation.

My favorite taco stand in LA (grew up a mile away from it) has been run for decades by a Mexican woman whose children and grandchildren have gotten to live "the American dream." Her daughter went to the same Ivy League school as me and they opened a larger restaurant in a fancy part of Los Angeles. That's who I'd like to see making money off authentic Mexican recipes.

[Ran]

The fuck? Because tortilla makers down in Mexico were preparing to move up to Portland and a weekend-only, breakfast-only pop upruined their plans? And because there's room for no more than one Mexican restaurant that makes good tortillas? There's well over 150 Mexican restaurants in Portland after filtering out chains, per Tripadvisor, one place more or less doesn't matter.

"Industrial espionage"?! "Conning"?! 

This is insane. Here's chefs talking about it and lets say they have a really different perspective on this. 

Did Portlandia have a sketch about this, I wonder? It sounds like the complete stereotype.

I honestly feel dumber for having learned about this Kooks situation.