Racism at Starbucks

Source: Pixabay

Racism is still a problem in America, and it seemed to show itself again in the high-profile Starbucks story from Philadelphia.

On April 12, a white manager at Starbucks asked two black men to leave after they asked to use the restroom despite not having bought anything. When they refused to leave, the manager called the police, who ended up arresting the two men. The apparent charge was trespassing, but Starbucks ultimately did not press charges.

In the spirit of my slowing-down blog post, I tried not to jump to the conclusion of clear-cut racism. Initial reporting is notorious for sometimes leaving out relevant facts.

But as more information came out, it seemed to become more and more clear.

There was the viral smart-phone video of the whole event. The manager called the police within two minutes of the black men’s arrival. There was at least one white individual at a nearby table who had not bought anything but was not asked to leave.

The higher-up Starbucks management has apologized, made reference to skin color affecting perceptions, and planned an anti-bias training for their employees across the nation. The training is scheduled for May 29 and will focus on implicit bias.

Implicit bias refers to bias or prejudice that we’re not aware we hold against a group. But it can still affect how we act toward the group, like if a store manager sees trouble in black patrons’ behavior but not the same behavior in white patrons. Or perhaps like on April 30 when a woman in a white neighborhood called the police when three black people exited a home they had rented on Airbnb (Victor, 2018).

Source: Pixabay

More subtle is research that showed non-black participants were more likely to misidentify hand tools as guns when first shown a quick flash of a black face compared to a white face (Payne, 2001).

Though these may be cases of implicit racial bias, is implicit-bias training the best remedy?

It’s probably better than nothing, but not necessarily.

I am not the first author by far to raise such questions about the Starbucks response. Atlantic, NBC News, New York Times, Slate, Wall Street Journal, and even ThinkProgress have published pieces expressing doubt that implicit-bias training is enough or is even a good first step. And many of these authors cited research to justify their concern. Not that it isn’t a good sign that Starbucks is trying to address the problem.

One issue is the lack of research-based evidence that implicit-bias training reduces bias. In fact, some research suggests that the training can even increase bias depending on how it’s conducted (Lilienfeld, 2017). It turns out that telling people who are forced to attend that they’re secretly racist can sometimes backfire or contribute to backlash.

Carefully designing effective training that can overcome these risks takes time. And some experts have expressed doubt that Starbucks has enough time before May 29.

Even Anthony Greenwald, one of the creators of the famous Implicit Association Test (IAT), has conveyed concern. The IAT is often part of implicit-bias training, and Greenwald trusts the IAT to detect implicit bias. But he said that implicit-bias training “has not been shown to be effective, and it can even be counterproductive” (Mak, 2018).

Based on some research, the IAT may not even be that accurate or reliable for all participants. Nor does it clearly do a great job at predicting racist behavior. A Harvard website that administers the IAT has a disclaimer section that basically says as much (Stalder, 2016).

So what do we do?

I’m optimistic that the Starbucks training will at least make participants more aware of the existence of bias and the possibility of bias in themselves. And that may be an important first step.

To offset the potential resistance or backlash from some participants, I would recommend sharing the Harvard disclaimer or something like it. That might allow participants to more openly consider what’s being discussed without feeling personally accused.

We also need to slow down our judgments. Implicit bias is more likely to affect decisions when we make decisions quickly or under stress. Calling the police within two minutes might be too fast (not that I think restaurant managers have an easy job).

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While waiting to judge, we can look for possible situational factors to explain seemingly suspicious behaviors, like maybe these two men were waiting to have a business meeting with someone (which they were).

Source: rawpixel

The most promising suggestion that I found from some articles was that local managers be given less autonomy in making such quick judgment calls. It’s like creating a rubric or a set of rules when grading a paper, or when looking for someone to hire, and then sticking to those rules. A more structured and consistently applied evaluation process can reduce the inclination, unconscious or otherwise, to use a person’s skin color, gender, etc. to evaluate them.