A Texas Starbucks clientele says she and her culture were the target of an “offensive” joke written on the cover of her drink by one of the store employees.
Blanca Lopez, who is Hispanic, commanded a Horchata Latte during a trip with her two daughters at the Starbucks inside the Target Irving store, Texas, June 23, CBS Texas reported.
One of Lopez’s girls noticed that their mother cut had a scratchy message in a black marker through the clear cover, an anomaly for a company known for writing customer names on the side of its products.
“What do you call a sick eagle?” The cup asked, according to a photo obtained by the exit.
“Illegal,” replied the enigma.
Lopez was left in shock by the joke written on his order.
“It is essentially a question of saying that we are sick illegal individuals who do not belong to this country,” she told The Outlet.
Lopez recalled her confusion when she saw the message for the first time, not knowing if the note was a light joke or an attack on her identity.
“When I read it, I’m like, ok. Was I supposed to laugh or what should I do? She said at the exit.
“Why did they call me like this?” Why do they ask me if I have papers or no papers? Why did she write this? She added. “For me, like, it’s offensive.”
Lopez said the joke had struck near her her because she had friends and parents expelled because they were in the country illegally.
In January, 84 illegal immigrants were arrested during an ice raid in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, According to Fox 4.
The indignant customer reported the joke to the store manager, who told him that there would be a team meeting to make sure that this would not happen again, CBS Texas reported.
Lopez called for the dismissal of the unidentified barista on the comment.
“I work as a manager. If someone in my team was doing something like that, I would receive it immediately, “she said.
Community activists quickly heard of history and started planning a gathering at the store to meet “the author of the offensive joke,” wrote Dallas demonstrators Carlos Quintanilla, on Facebook.
Quintanilla provided that other demonstrators arrive at the shopping center at 10 a.m. on June 28.
An hour later, he canceled the rally after no one presented himself.
However, he has always entered the target, in difficulty for his Facebook subscribers, looking for the Starbucks, but was arrested by an employee of the store who told him to leave the building because he recorded inside.
“It is not easy to organize our community to raise their voice, I understand that the protest is already very difficult but that the theater is quite simple. Even Starbucks and Target responded to our insistence to clarify their position on offensive advertising” illegal “”, wrote Quintanilla. “Let us deny our protest in forgiveness and protests in silence!”
The position contacted Starbucks and Target.
Quintanilla defended illegal immigrants living in his community as he outside the store.
“It’s not just inappropriate, it’s disturbing,” he told CBS Texas. “Especially at the moment, when the story thrown into the mass media is if you are illegal, you are a criminal, and if you are a criminal, you are illegal.”
