Holy cow! My first year of university (save for exams and those 2 days of classes) has come to a close! And what better way to end it than to ruminate on the UBC Coordinated Arts Program Conference held yesterday?

So yesterday I arrived at the CAP room with my computer awaiting where I would set up my showcase presentation about Vine as an economic platform and tool for problematic cultural dissemination. Yeah. Admittedly, I was worried no on was going to show up, or be able to hear the videos I was sharing. Well, no one heard the videos, but so many people wanted to hear what I had to say, and that makes it all worth it. I didn’t have the opportunity to scope out many of the other showcases, but I saw posters and videos and art pieces galore. It made me nostalgic for my seventh grade science fair, but with more abstractions. Anyways, I was ecstatic that so many of my fellow Global Citizens and beyond appreciated what I had to say, it meant a lot to me.

Now the panels were quite impressive. I attended Panel A, Race and Globalization, which pertained to social stigmas and large-scale situations of inequity. It was a privilege to witness the research and contributions to the scholarly fields of humanitarian aid, sex work and exoticism done by students, and how they transitioned from paper to powerpoint. And this isn’t just because he’s in my stream, but Colin Kulstad’s “Critical Analysis of English as a ‘Global Language’ with an Emphasis on Post-Secondary Institutions,” on the global adoption of English as a necessary skill for improvement instigated many a critical thought for me, especially considering the implications of presenting such a paper in English, to an English-speaking audience at an English-dominant university, in British Columbia (I have paraphrased how Colin himself explained this irony at the end of his paper).

And despite the fact that this is a blog post under very similar circumstances, the fact that non-English academia, art, science and the like should be valued any less than these anglophone fields. I’ve studied Spanish since I was five years old, and time and time again have I been so grateful, in social, work or school situations, where Spanish not only bridges me to other communities, but the wealth of their culture, society, individuals. Coming from the United States, it is not uncommon for (mostly) white Americans to not speak another language besides English, and to live without any negative speculation about that. Why should the reverse be any different? By disseminating English this way, are we broadening horizons or limiting modes of knowledge and understanding? Hmm.

Admittedly I played audience almost exclusively to the Global Citizens, but only because I knew I’d have a good time. CAP was the best decision I ever made at 7am in the middle of July (remember registration? Yikes.), and if there was a CAP foe second year, you can bet I’d be poised and ready to pick out my timetable.

Sometimes the stars of the Global Citizens stream align so nicely. This is one of those times. This past week in both Art Studies, Sociology and to an extent, Geography, have explored multiple facets of racial discrimination, in literature, news and day-to-day, mundane actions. We see, sociologically speaking the intersectionality of discrimination of race, class and gender. In Art Studies, we’ve read Jiwani ans Young’s Missing and Murdered Women, an article that addresses the lack of social agency and “space” for self-representation given to the female often non-white sex workers of Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside. They explore what many facets of news and cultural media discount, which is “how race, class, and sexuality intersect and interlock to sustain hegemonic power (900).” Which to say, in television programs and movies like Beat, Through a Blue Lens, and their contemporaries, Scared Straight, Beyond Scared Straight, and Intervention fall under similar frames that address addiction and crime isolated from social factors that do not place blame on the addicts, sex workers and criminals themselves.

In Through a Blue Lens, the police force of Vancouver’s Downtown East Side document their relationships with multiple (and some homeless) drug addicts who occupy the area. While it may appear that this film is an outlet for addict representation, the “kind” of addicts represented are quite similar in their compliance with the police officers and their shame about the drugs, two things that serve the “save the kids” agenda of the officers making the film and not the histories of these people. What’s worse, the film fails to address addicts who are not white, and thus suffer an even more complex “moral and racialized economy of representations,” or in this case, none at all.

Now take Intervention, an American documentary program that weekly chronicles the lives of addicts and their eventual “interventions,” as a means of allowing them redemption. Despite varying addictions and circumstances, the formula of each episode does not leave much room for the addict to heal and get sober aside from being sent to the rehabilitation center. And most of them are white, too. It’s unfair. Or Scared Straight and the even more abrasive Beyond Scared Straight, meant to instill fear in children to avoid criminal behaviors while ignoring the various patterns and institutional pillars of discrimination and prejudice that catalyze deviant behavior. In many cases, these become sites of consumption instead of spaces of representation and education. These shows lack the insight, or simply ignore the deeper complexities that disadvantage people and reflect badly on their media identities. If they are not challenged and redefined, if not eradicated, stigmas like these will remain invisible, but undeniably present.

As a class, and to a larger extent as a CAP stream, we’ve been studying the TRC and its effects since the beginning of the school year, when we didn’t even know how to analyze abstractions and mediate scholarly voices. Now six months of study later, it takes on a more complex and interrelated context. Many of you revisited the TRC through the Museum of Anthropology exhibit, making new connections or acknowledging concepts, constraints and ideas you were not aware of before. Chany explored how the TRC can serve as a platform for Aboriginal peoples to override their “victim” identities and instead emphasize “their bravery and perseverance through the bad hand they were dealt.” She also made a valid point about many places, like the United States, continuing to silence and deny these voices.

Upon further examination, much of what our class wrote about had to do with the relationship between an archive or a space of public memory and the archivist. Makoto shed light on the online narrative database StoryCorp, which while claiming universality, is in fact structured to favor the narratives of veterans and more traditional stories. Mana wrote about the cultural importance of historical education, in this case of how Japanese students are denied the knowledge of their nation’s recent past. Even the Olympics, which are not commonly seen as a national archive, or a preserved record of national pride and ability, were related to the silencing of queer voices by Meredith.

What is being reiterated is a heightened awareness of the ethics of representation, and recognition of problematic power dynamics that go into archived memory, events and voices. Niklas had plenty to say about that in his blot concerning last week’s lantern festival. What I also see is a flexibility in thinking of what can be considered an archive, who have the ability to be an archivist, as well as the possibility of deviation from intent.

I find it easiest to write to a personal soundtrack. As I write this, I’m playing Nothing Was the Same, rapper Drake’s latest album from September that was nominated for best rap album at the Grammy’s this past Sunday. I love Drake, and I especially loved Nothing Was the Same, because it was innovative, compassionate, complex and it just sounds sooo good. 

But enough about Drake, I’ll embarrass myself. The other nominees for Best Rap Album are mostly established, successful rappers, e.g. Kanye West (Yeezus), Jay-Z (Magna Carter Holy Grail), Macklemore & Ryan Lewis (The Heist) and new kid on the block, Kendrick Lamar (good kid, m.A.A.d city). The competition here, for those of us partial to rap and hip hop, was stiff as a board (mostly). Yeezus, Magna Carta, and NWTS were ambitious endeavors by the (commercial) creme of the rap industry crop, good kid, m.A.A.d city was a breakout album that blew a lot of people (myself included) away. The Heist was an album of party music and appropriation, amidst four albums that tackled a variety of socioeconomic issues the black community grapple with daily in a discriminatory racialized world (but let’s just focus on North America right now.)

Guess which album won that night?

If you watched the Grammy’s or googled the results (as I did, come on now), you’d know. If you didn’t, I’ll give you three white privileged, gentrifying and overall underwhelming guesses.

“But wait!” “Macklemore is cool!” “He wrote ‘Same Love!'” “He married people, I saw!”

Sure he did, and in doing so took his little privileged behind another peg up on my problematic-o-meter. Macklemore (and the mute Ryan Lewis?) is a straight white man interjecting himself not only in a music industry that was born out of little socioeconomic wiggle room and a desire for an outlet with which to deal with this inflexibility, but also the lives of queer couples, is so weird and problematic and frankly pretty stupid. Why should Macklemore be rewarded for occupying the same socioeconomic space hundreds of young men and women are striving and struggling to achieve, when his music has no struggle to speak for? Yes, he’s independent and that’s great in its own right, but not when he is simultaneously silencing the artistic and social ventures of marginalized people.

He actually has a song called “White Privilege” and details how his success may come at the expense of others, and doesn’t see how this Grammy win (of FOUR) would ruffle a few feathers?

In the archives, Carter would likely call this, the situation of Macklemore at the Grammy’s, as an example of unintentional silences and domination of the marginalized voice by the voice in social power. Rap music is characterized by its calling attention to the injustices faced by the rapper, how that rapper acts against them, and makes use of consumptive lyrics to express all the great things that come with financial stability and success. A running theme in Yeezus is West’s explicit discontent with the way media and the music industry mechanism is not on his side, or on the side of black artists like him (see “New Slaves,” “I Am a God, “Black Skinhead”). Magna Carta extrapolates on how hard Jay-Z has worked to get where he is, and he is very, very successful. Both Drake and Lamar, young as they are, rap about where they are versus where they were, and what they hope to achieve in a horribly classist, racist and money-orientated society, among other personal problems.

In short, these albums are an archive of the rapper, of his success, contempt, turmoil, etc. These are drawn in most cases from personal experiences, a musical means of giving voice to their communities that are not as lucky as them. Rap music archives, one could argue, the problems mainstream white America is refusing to acknowledge.

But they do acknowledge Macklemore. “Same Love” is such a stupid, self-indulgent song. It does not help in the agency of queer people, it does not further the career of a queer artist, it does not make money for the queer community. “Same Love” is a song for allies. Queer people do not actually reap any immediate benefits from it if they don’t like the song, and don’t believe Macklemore is helping them.

(He isn’t.)

“White Privilege” is a song for who? What does a song like “Thrift Shop” do for racial equality or economic equity? How does an album that stays clear of sociopolitical claims beat out the fervent musings of his competitors? How does he get away with winning not one, but FOUR Grammy’s as the only white guy in his categories?

I sure don’t know, but check out here and here if you felt like I was relying on my bias (which admittedly I partially did).

Hello again everyone! New year, new blog, new identity, right? Did anyone make resolutions? I don’t usually, but I made one for this year, and granted it’s a bit precious and seemingly simple: I resolved to never go near the application Vine ever again. This sounds simplistic and a bit lame, but I am sure now that Vine is going to set society (the society privileged enough to have access to Vine, that is) back at least a couple decades.

Vine, that hip 6-second video app, has been around for less than 2 years but has already proved itself a relevant medium for social interaction, hierarchy and popular culture tastes: just today my friend referenced a Vine satirizing Beyoncé Knowles new song “Drunk in Love.” Many young celebrities popular on Twitter and Instagram have also taken up “Vining” their day to day lives, or, as my Art Studies class has come to understand it, archiving.

Vine is an archive! Vine is an enormous collection of personal videos, comedy shorts, visual stimulation, the list goes on. I myself had a Vine in early 2012, before the application had any real clout in the social media world. The only way to find a video was through the user’s profile or organizational tags. In short, everyone’s video archive was their own to construct and share with the world. But within the year vine added the ability to add others’ video to one’s profile, and so the popularity contests began. Almost all of the most well-known and followed Vine users are amateur comedians, and their humor has shaped the way new users seek popularity. Where this becomes problematic is the way certain archives compromise, or to borrow a term from Rodney G.S. Carter, “silence” the voices and contributions of others.

The two most popular Viners are both male, the first being KingBach, the second Nash Grier. Both have well over a million followers, and have considerable clout on other platforms (both have Youtube channels and twitters, link attached). Their humor now plays to an audience of millions. But what are they saying? What is it about their videos that stick, that get circulated around the world and on a large scale, the most valuable “fonds” in the archive of Vine as a whole. These collections reflect how we as a society decide and define the ‘funny,” the “popular,” the “now.”

The thing is, a lot of these famous people have really awful senses of humor. KingBach’s videos constantly utilize racist and sexist tropes, especially when it comes to objectifying women and featuring racist caricatures of minorities. Nash Grier recently migrated to Youtube, and one of his first videos was focused on his personal and generalized expectations for girls when wishing to gain the attention and approval of boys and men.

They are both utterly nauseating and indefinitely powerful.

Within the world of Vine, which has been gaining ground in the social media sphere for more than a year now, these are elite and respected comedians. Their self-editing and refinement (what they intend to show and not show of themselves to the public) is accepted as an example for what Vine represents to its entire community. These are the voices dictating others, shaping the culture of Vine humor and taste. When these kinds of opinions become a standard, what is preventing other forms of entertainment from being seen and heard. The trivialization of social issues not only inhibits their progress, it now cops cultural identity as commodity, as a joke, as something to be examined not for its judicial values, but for what is going to be a hit.

So, I really dislike Vine. Its original intent has been totally skewed and it no longer serves as an individual archive, but a reflection of the hybridity of personal and social taste. This would not be such an issue if social taste, at least as far as Vine was concerned, was not dictated by misogyny and racial elitism. If you don’t make any of those jokes in person, there’s no reason they should find an audience on the internet.

I am indescribably excited for American Thanksgiving for two reasons:

1. I’m American and from what I gathered from my Canadian classmates is that Canadian Thanksgiving is a much smaller deal than American Thanksgiving, which just might second fourth of July in terms of American patriotism.

2. My family is coming! All five members of my immediate family are coming for me to celebrate together. I am ecstatic. But naturally, keeping in mind the teachings from this semester on collective narrative and dominant voice/projection, I thought it might be fun to explore how Thanksgiving, as a hypothetical cultural site, is a form of life narrative, and as I can only talk to the system of American holidays and methods of celebration, I’ll start there.

Americans really love Independence Day. We really, really love the United States, and despite all of its corruption and ineffective, meddlesome policies, it’s nice to have one day where we let that go and revel in all the glory that we were brought up to believe our country has. If any non-Americans are confused, Independence Day has little to do with the Declaration of Independence (at least in all the circles I’ve celebrated with) and a lot to do with red, white, and blue, fireworks and barbecue. The same could be said for Thanksgiving. I was raised knowing Thanksgiving as a day of cooking and eating and appreciating my family, no historical context to speak of.

What I learned about national holidays and national pride came with the constraint of my family’s values and own experiences, not collective, consolidated historical fact. Most of what I learned about the traditions and expectations for American national holidays was from school, and as I get older many learned, unquestioned prejudices present themselves when it comes to holidays in relationship to national pride and collective identity.

In elementary school I learned what Columbus Day is. Actually, I learned it as Indigenous People’s Day. Does this distinction matter? Yes. My US History class starts with Columbus. My World History class spent six weeks on the colonial period alone and only a month on non-Western countries’ histories and accomplishments. Columbus Day and Thanksgiving are extensions of this narrowed history. If Thanksgiving is a day of thanks and celebration, it denies the colonial implications of the Pilgrims and Native Americans. If Columbus Day is framed as a feat of human intervention, it denies the slaughtering and extinction of thousands of Native Americans and their empires. In short, historical truths and respects are severed.

Holidays are about remembering and recounting, a national closure, celebration or mere acknowledgement of the past. Just like narratives, these largely unstructured occasions can be misconstrued, manipulated and demonized. They can also reflect the interests of the people engaging with them. Seems like holidays are a lot like life narratives hmm? Interesting.

In closing, I am very homesick, and a large association I have with home is my family and how my family collectively celebrates holidays like Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving is my site of witnessing, for my family, my gratitude, my country. But like narratives, individual action during the holidays is unpredictable, and that person has the power to determine what is right and wrong in this collective memory. The macro comes from the micro, remember.

Happy Holidays!

This week my Political Science course has taken a focus on the political issues and obstacles regarding slums. More information on what defines the problems of a slum can be found here, on the UN-HABITAT website, but in essence a slum is a dwelling without secured tenure, secure access to basic resources like water and sanitation, and is overcrowded. Not the prettiest picture. We have also discussed where slums occur (cores and fringes of cities) and how their booming populations will be addressed in the future (time will tell). Today in my discussion period we watched a documentary about slum communities in India, aptly (or perhaps not so aptly) titled Welcome to India. It is a part of a three-part series by the BBC, so I cannot speak for its entirety, but I can say that it exemplified a lot of humanity and objectivity that was not present in God Grew Tired of Us.

The film chronicles the lives of slum-dwellers in Kolkata, from a young man panning for gold in the street to a family raising their children on the beach. The narrator speaks English but his accent suggests he is Indian. The subjects of the film are given use of the cameras and not just followed. While the film was largely examining the obstacles Upon finishing the film, a classmate of mine brought up a point about his expectations about slum-dwellers and what and who was represented. The husband of the family who lived on the beach came from an educated family, had a fairly lucrative job, and spoke English. He had moved to the slum after marrying the love of his life, because she was of a lower class and his family disowned him for it. My classmate admitted this was not what he anticipated, that his image of a slum-dweller was that of a person born into poverty, not given the choice.

I will not pretend that the “educated” man in the slums did not surprise me. While documentaries like these are premeditated and their stories selected for public interest, as we have discussed in class with Whitlock and the concept of Western expectations of narratives by Non-Westerners, particularly those produced in times and situations of trauma. BBC UK produced the film, but in sharp contrast to GGTU, there is no obnoxious narration guiding how we’re meant to see these people and understand their situation. We don’t understand, and this fact is a large obstacle in effectively objective filmmaking and general narrative media when a Western and/or privileged agent projects the story of someone less fortunate.

Relatively, Welcome to India is a “good” documentary. While slums are not glamorous, they are not universally inhabited by impoverished, miserable people. The family on the hut had jobs, and sent their son to school, and had many plans to send their infant daughter to medical school. This post is less about the innerworkings of slums and more about how audiences from a place of privilege tend to dehumanize and marginalize the lives and intricacies of the poor. While not every slum dweller may laugh along with their many roommates or remain inspired to keep working by the prospects of their children’s future, the slums of Kolkata are far from economically, socially and politically stagnant. As with consumable print books, media is susceptible to corruption, but also capable of education when put in the hands of the right people. I have talked extensively on this topic, but as a kind of part two, I wanted to share an example where aided narrative can be engaging without relying on dramatic, exaggerated tropes to sell a story.

I love documentaries. I love checking Netflix’s documentary section weekly, hoping some new exposé on an important issue has been visualized. Documentaries have taught me many things, about the corruption of Wal-Mart, about killer whales, about McDonalds, and now today, about how a select few of the Lost Boys of Sudan have resettled to the United States and what they face being in a new country, with new responsibilities, but as they reiterate throughout the film, the same priorities.

I liked God Grew Tired of Us. I enjoyed the humor of Daniel, John and Panther, their goals, their opinions. I cried when John was reunited with his mother as 17 years of separation. I was excited for Panther to return to Kakuma to marry his girlfriend. I was so happy that these boys were making way in what they wanted: finding their families, helping their friends, preparing themselves for a return to Sudan when the war was over.

What I absolutely did not like was Nicole Kidman’s obnoxious voice narrating what I wrote down was ” a racist/exotifying presentation” of a sociopolitical situation utterly irrelevant to her privileged life as an Australian movie star. And then I remembered that all the people behind the camera were not Sudanese. I do not want to assume, but the producers’ names in the credits seemed awfully Western, awfully white. And now that I think about it, who is supposed to be watching this documentary? It chronicles the lives of three Sudanese boys in particular from the Kenyan refugee camp in Kakuma to various cities in the United States. Why would a Lost Boy watch a documentary about what he may already be familiar with? This documentary was made for Americans, and that’s what is problematic and infuriating.

Americans, and other white Western countries have a habit of acting on our “white savior complex.” If you’re not familiar with what it entails, the short version is that white people feel guilty for their privilege and attempt to compensate by looking to other, less fortunate countries and attempt to fix their problems. Remember Kony 2012? I do. I remember watching the video (linked!) and thinking “Oh no! Poor Ugandan children being forced into the army! I’m so glad I didn’t scroll past this video! I feel so enlightened!” I fell for it. I believed that Invisible Children, the for-profit charity that was supposed to free all these children, was a good investment. I never did contribute money, but I lied and said I would when it was brought up in class, which is probably worse. Facebook blew up with it. Everyone wanted to stop Kony, because apparently the Ugandan government and army were incapable, so who better than middle class American teenagers pouring their money into this great charity?

Well as it turns out, Kony hadn’t been in Uganda for years. And he was probably dead already. But why give the people and forces of Uganda their deserved credit when we can give it to some white guys who care sooo much? Invisible Children didn’t “get” Kony, because he wasn’t there to “get” in the first place. In fact, the funds supposedly raised to help the child soldiers actually went to the heads of the charity, and the money given to Uganda was given to the army to arm them. Cool.

Oh, and the head of the charity was caught masturbating naked on the highway because he was so “stressed” about all the attention his inane video got him. Come on.

So God Grew Tired of Us has wonderful subjects in John, Daniel and Panther, and horrible producers. Remember Whitlock’s “Word Made Flesh” introduction, and her advisement to read “peri-text” carefully? Watch this documentary carefully. These men can easily be perceived as victims, as refugees, without agency, hope or a future. These men are far from the emaciated shots of children overlaid Nicole Kidman’s idiotic narration of the trek across Sudan to Ethiopia and Kenya. These men are not in America because they are helpless, nor because their lifelong dreams of becoming Americans are coming true. They are Sudanese, they are proud of it. They are hardworking and lonely, and like Valentino, they are aching to go home. That is what I took away from the film, that they can’t go home, they can’t be where they desire to be most. America is not their solution. America is a stepping stone so they may train in skills to bring home, to Sudan, to their families, to their friends.

I cried on a couple occasions throughout the film, but it doesn’t matter. The producers want your tears. I will not pretend an 80 minute film taught me exactly what John, Daniel and Panther want.

I think it can be said this weekend was a testament to how much young people  (we are young, I promise) love Halloween. Granted, we’re not that young, and on a college campus there certainly isn’t an excess of houses for trick-or-treating, and you’re likely to be wearing about half the costume you did when you were 11. Am I wrong? I’d say no.

I love halloween. I love candy (who doesn’t?) and how far people will go with their decorations and spending hours considering my options and eventually having my costume come into reality. I went costume shopping yesterday and was fairly disappointed  by what I saw. The store had no shortage of short skirts and “minimalist” get-ups, all designed for females. I’m sure this is nothing to new to most of you reading this, as it is not new to me either. In Political Science we have, despite a palpable hesitation, breached the topic of “feminism” in politics and political thought, and a large part of that is recognizing and actively rejecting sexism and its prescribed norms. See bell hooks’ Feminism is for Everyone if you feel this is unimportant.

In class last week, we examined how magazine articles cater to what they perceive as the engendered needs of men and women, but also work less explicitly to create the needs themselves. For instance, the Men’s Health website displays all manners of fast cars, fit guys, and articles that help you, as the reader, get there too. Now just a click away is the Esquire website, a women’s magazine that appears to focus more on pop culture, media, clothes, all things women are interested in, right?

Eeehhhhh. Not quite. Who says I can’t like fast cars or protein shakes? Who’s to say a “man” can’t enjoy advice about winter jackets or the Sexiest Woman Alive? Good question.

Now you’ve likely disregarded these differences until they were brought to classroom light because they correspond with a lot of your interests anyway, and because you likely assumed that a magazine for the opposite sex is irrelevant to those interests. I’ve never read a full Men’s Health GQ article either but what’s stopping me? MY OWN PRESCRIPTION OF GENDER RULES. I let myself believe I as a reader am disinterested with GQ while they simultaneously believe I as a female consumer would not be interested. This is a stretch, and very much based on my own tastes and experiences, please feel free to disagree. But to use magazines, there are differences that certain media outlets use to most effectively market their products based on sex.

Sorry I think this post was about Halloween costumes? It is. So I was browsing and ultimately came up empty because I don’t want to be a scantily-clad knockoff of a male superhero or immobilized by what the costume encourages I wear with it. It’s not news that revealing Halloween costumes are popular. I have no problem with them or the people who choose to wear them, why should I? That’s their business. What angers me is when I can’t connote Halloween as a young woman without the images of a sexy cat, or sexy bacon, or in this case, a sexy eating disorder.

I know, I know, take a minute. Who in their right mind would make such a purchase? I can’t imagine, but the fact that it exists speaks to the existence, or the perceived existence, of a desire to dress up like an implosive eating and mental illness. I don’t see any guy dressing up like obesity to match. I am horrified. Now it seems, that not only can I objectify myself, but I can trivialize, mock even, a disease that has taken the lives and happiness of people who are (I assume) exposed to the same engendered, objectifying media outlets that I am. No one person said this costume was OK by ANY means, but a collective figured they could get away with it because people would think it was funny, I think? I find nothing funny and everything sickening.

I’ll leave you with something to consider. Would you ever search a store, much less engage with the internet to find a costume so abrasively offensive and tasteless as this? Did you know it’s sold out?

When was the last time you had a coffee? When was the last time it was from Starbucks? I had one yesterday, and it was pretty good. Starbucks in general is pretty good. I’ve probably averaged a drink a week for the last couple years, and I know people who think that’s little. and besides serving up those delicious seasonal beverages, they also make sure that you they’re fair trade and environmentally conscious. Oh and CEO Howard Schultz is pro marriage equality. Starbucks can do no wrong, can’t they?

Wrong. Very wrong. And I’m very sorry classmates, but I am trying to make you feel the slightest bit guilty about your pumpkin spice lattes (I love them too).

Working at Starbucks seems to be a fairly good gig, doesn’t it? They preach good wages, good insurance, good hours, and good working conditions. However, defining “good” doesn’t appear to be up to the employees. According to the Organic Consumers Association, Starbucks has poorer insurance policies than Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart. They are also anti-Union, with spotty hours and availability commitments that inhibit many employees from seeking additional employment. And if $6.25 sounds like a livable wage to you, I’d like to live where you live. That’s not so peachy now, is it?

Now to take a little trip from the Starbucks around the corner to the coffee plantations in Ethiopia, one of the largest sources of Starbucks’ beans. Fair Trade as a business practice is meant to adequately pay farmers and producers of a number foods and goods from around the world, coffee being one of them. If you’ve walked into a Starbucks, you’ve seen how often they insert “fair trade” into their store landscape. They even sell Ethos water which is supposedly to fund construction of wells and water resources to those in need. The latte you just bought? The farmer who harvested those beans is getting pennies for it. The water you got to help build a well? Ethos the business gets over 90% of those profits. 

Now I could go on, but the links provided shed light on these issues better than I. The point is that despite how delicious and accessible Starbucks is, it’s globally damaging. As a company it is incredibly wasteful, unethical in practice, and a horizontally integrating monopolizer. Back home in San Francisco, there was a local chain of French-inspired cafe/eateries called La Boulange. The food was incredible and the fact it was the business of a local San Franciscan family made it even cooler. Starbucks bought them for $100 million dollars this year.

But now, if you’re still reading, how does such an omnipotent corporation like Starbucks get to where it’s at with little so little flack from the young people that buy all their paninis and macchiatos? They know how to frame themselves. They sweep these worker violations under their “Fair Trade,” “ethical” rugs, and we as consumers are content to believe that as face value. Teenagers can be passive. I would know. I’ve known Starbucks was unethical since 2011 and yet you could catch me walking to class with one of those infamous white and green cups; it’s hard to consider how my morning pick me up is depriving a both barista and a farmer of appropriate compensation.

Please do not be passive. The last time you went into Starbucks, or even the next time, consider who your fellow consumers are. How many people lined up are your age? Don’t be afraid of being invisible or irrelevant or unimportant. Starbucks is destructive, and you empower them. How does Starbucks keep growing? We keep spending our money. The same goes for any corporation: we gave ourselves to them. This is all very dramatic, I know, but so few young people realize the reality of their agency. Lead by example, and people will follow.

I disagree with Starbucks’ business practices, so I have stopped supporting them. I’m not going to be offended if you keep drinking their coffee. This post is to shed a little light on the unsaid, on the accepted, and how we can change that. Why start tomorrow what you could do today, or not do, in the case of buying a Starbucks. Do your research, empower yourself.