After a reader I'm calling Kris told me about her
experience at her local big box office supply store, I found myself
double-checking the store's online site to see if what Kris reported could
possibly be true. While having copies made at the store, Kris noticed a display
of items intended for use on an office desk. One of the items was one of those
wooden blocks about a foot long and four or five inches high that have an
inspirational word or quote on them.
But Kris found nothing inspirational about the saying on
this block. Instead, there were words designed to capture an ethnic dialect in
what presumably was deemed to be an amusing desk accoutrement. The deliberately
exaggerated dialogue reminded Kris of the kinds of taunts schoolyard bullies
would use against those kids who were somehow different from them.
"I was surprised that any place would carry such an
item," writes Kris. Once her copying order was completed, Kris paid for it
and left the store. But she couldn't get that sign out of her mind. "What
should I have done?"
After Kris told me of her experience, I searched for
items with that saying on the office supply store's website. I didn't find the
block, but I did find a coffee mug with the same saying on it. A further search
online turned up a sign similar to the one Kris had described available at a
well-known discount department store. Still further searches found all sorts of
imprinted wearables available with the same saying.
Kris was right to be upset. I wrestled with whether or
not to repeat the saying in print, but ultimately decided that putting a phrase
that struck both Kris and me as insensitive and racist in print was
inappropriate.
When she was at the store, Kris could have asked to speak
with a manager to express her concern. It's doubtful that the individual store
manager has control over the entire chain's inventory, but he or she does have
the power to shepherd concerns of customers to those who might do something to
address them. But Kris has already left the store.
If she is truly troubled by the sign and she indicates
that she is, the right thing to do is to articulate that concern to the
corporate offices of the chain. If she snapped a photo with her smartphone of
the item, all the better to send it to the company. If that yields no response,
she might consider enlisting the help of friends and others equally offended to
write the company. If she still receives no response from the company, then
Kris might consider taking her concern to the local press.
Calling people out on racist actions is the right thing
to do. Calling out the people at companies who make decisions that can be
deemed to be racist is also the right thing to do. Having had my attention
drawn to these items by Kris, I plan to make some calls myself. There's no
excuse for items promoting racist tropes to be peddled to the public nor for
the rest of us to condone them.
Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of The Right Thing: Conscience, Profit and Personal Responsibility in Today's Business and The Good, the Bad, and Your Business: Choosing Right When Ethical Dilemmas Pull You Apart, is a lecturer in public policy and director of the communications program at Harvard's Kennedy School.
Follow him on Twitter: @jseglin
Do you have ethical questions that you need answered? Send them to rightthing@comcast.net.
Do you have ethical questions that you need answered? Send them to rightthing@comcast.net.
(c) 2019 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.
No comments:
Post a Comment