Tuesday, March 29, 2005

Try the Machiavelli Mochciatto Venti. Or a Jonah G.... Try the Machiavelli Mochciatto Venti. Or a Jonah Goldberg, small. St Petersburg Times Some conservatives are angered by opinionated quotes that Starbucks puts on its cups. The Seattle coffee chain has raised some eyebrows over its "The Way I See It" campaign, which prints quotes from thinkers, authors, athletes and entertainers on the side of your morning machiatto. The goal, according to the company, is to foster philosophical debate in its 9,000-plus coffeehouses. The quotes aren't all that inflammatory, though several mirror Starbucks' hallmark tall-grande-venti pretentiousness. Take this one from film critic Roger Ebert: "A movie is not about what it is about. It is about how it is about it." The problem, critics say, is the company's list of overwhelmingly liberal contributors, including Al Franken, Melissa Etheridge, Quincy Jones, Chuck D. Of the 31 contributors listed on Starbucks' Web site, only one, National Review editor Jonah Goldberg, offers a conservative viewpoint. Considering Starbucks sells millions of cups of coffee each day - some specialty drinks at $4 and up - it's no surprise some customers have complained to Starbucks' Web site, labeling the campaign "offensive" and the company a proponent of "the destruction of family values and virtues." "I want to enjoy your product without having Earth Day Network propaganda thrust at me," wrote Malachi Salcido of East Wenatchee, Wash ... Seth Hoffman, president of the Tampa Bay Young Republicans and an occasional Starbucks drinker, said he tries to avoid buying some "liberal" products, like Ben & Jerry's ice cream. He said Starbucks should consider using more conservative voices, but if they don't, he's unlikely to stay away. "I know about what the company does; I know what my money's going to," said Hoffman, 32. "For me, with Starbucks, it's not what's on the cup, but what's in the cup." Seth! You blasphemer! Burn the witch! Poor man. He's quite comfortable tacitly supporting eco-terrorist hippie anti-capitalist worldviews like this (from the SBUX comments section)... Thank you for “The Way I See Itâ€� campaign. You are such an impressive company for facilitating meaningful conversation in this way. In addition, I am really impressed with the following things that you do: paying $9/hour starting wage, paying benefits to part-time employees, donating money to charity, offering coffee grounds for people's yards. Keep up the socially responsible and empowering behaviors! --Jennifer Gootnick, San Francisco CA These folks, however, have no doubts about what coffee shops' mission should be. For what it’s worth, I do not enjoy reading the new quotes on the side of my coffee. I want to enjoy your product without having Earth Day Network propaganda thrust at me. Please stop putting quotes on your coffee cups. Let’s keep them cups and an advertising vehicle for your product, not a views billboard. --Malachi Salcido, East Wenatchee WA The way I see it, Starbucks is now pushing ever more than before toward the left and becoming more outspoken. It is making it clearer every day that it is increasingly for the destruction of family values and virtues. I am glad that I now have other choices in coffee shops in my neighborhood so I don’t have to concern myself with supporting Starbucks agenda. Now that Starbucks is declaring itself a moral and political spokesperson, it can get its money from liberals. Signing off, a former Starbucks customer. -- Marty Mallet, North Richland Hills, TX Ahh, Texas. And I thought caffeine only made me jittery and irrational. Or is it alert and fleet of mind? I forget. Finally, there's this... This is a fantastic idea! It’s high time cafes once again become a central site for fundamental conversations concerning the arts, sciences, and politics. I applaud your ingenuity and the intelligence of the contributions, and hope you will find even more ways to further the lively discussions you’ve started. Java forever! --Gray Kochhar-Lindgren, Clinton WA Now, when Starbucks asked ex-Visa CEO Dee Hock to contribute, he said "Sure." I don't know if he counts as a conservative, but he's damn sure a dues paying member of the "establishment" which means about the same thing. Guys like Ken Burns or Yvon Chouinard say and do and create many things that mainstreamers sniff at, shake their heads over, then discretely (or not so discretely) copy once they get back to their edit suites or boardrooms and notice the cashflow that seditious thinking generates. But Gray Kochhar-Lindgren, now there's a, ahem, connoiseur. Maybe he knows that coffee houses and similar establishments have proud places in the roiling development of commerce, arts and politics. Maybe he knows that 17th and 18th century trade with Asia and the new colonies of America was negotiated, audited and managed over a pipe and a stiff Arabica in the Starbuckses of the age from Amsterdam to Aintree to New Amsterdam. Maybe he knows that the anti-family values of their time, abolitionism and--gadzooks!--women's suffrage, were fomented over steaming coffee grounds and steeping tea leaves. He might even know that Washington, Jefferson, Patrick Henry, George Wythe et al plotted the last moves of 1775 pre-revolution in Colonial Williamsburg's Raleigh Tavern over Java and birch beer. Maybe he's read this: Nestle: Lloyds of London was originally a Coffee Shop called “Edward Lloyds Coffee Houseâ€�. London coffee houses were nicknamed “Penny Universitiesâ€� because for the price of a cup of coffee you could sit and join in the stimulating conversation with the great thinkers of the day. Jonathon’s Coffee House in Change Alley was frequented by entrepreneurs and merchant venturers, and was the beginning of the London Stock Exchange. By 1675 there were nearly 3,000 coffee houses in England. King Charles II tried to denounce them as seditious meeting places and issued a proclamation rescinding their licences - it created such opposition it was hurriedly withdrawn. Seditious meeting places. Where anti-status quo SO/HO warriors and corporate truants congregate and escape. And plot. Everything new is old. It's a common refrain around here. Marty and his modern-day Luddism crushes coffee cups not looms. Fresh coffee and a freeze-dried America for them. The exchange of ideas, the challenging of assumptions--hell, interesting conversation or a truly decent office meeting--are just too unpredictable and damn hard work. Unfamiliar ideas--those not ones own, or, probably, those not given to one--give one the willies. So spaketh King Charles II. Keep it up, Starbucks. Toss in some quotes from David Bernstein, Barry Goldwater, George Barna and Bill Buckley for fun. Marty and Malachi might find they're not really conservative but rather plain old impatient authoritarians who didn't read the manual. But hey, SBUX, if you lose Marty and Malachi, add the cost of their Jonah Goldberg-small to my Indonesian venti. [St Pete Times link via Taegan Goddard] By null. [∞Fouroboros] 8:14:08 PM    comment []

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