Update 2:49 PM Monday: I walked down to the Green Bean. Nobody was waiting outside the door.  There seemed to be a normal-sized crowd within. I ate a piece of cake and read a flyer folded into four pages, with owner Katie Southard pictured on the front and back, along with large-text verbiage about "The New Jim Crow," "White Supremacists," and calls for a boycott; inside was a mix of relatively thoughtful words about racism and more harsh words for Southard.

I complained to the counter crew that there were no demonstrators, and was directed to three people standing just north of the building. I went outside and listened as Jorge Cornell and two women spoke with a third woman about setting up mediation. When they were done I introduced myself and was greeted warmly.

There was  a description of the incident from Cornell's perspective: A guy bumped a woman who was with the group, Jorge and some other guys approached the bumper and said you should apologize, the guy apologized, all seemed well. Then Southard said harshly that Cornell and crew were intimidating her customers and had to leave. Cops were called. Cornell felt ill-used and discriminated against.

He told me there was no intent to intimidate. I asked if he would not feel that vibe if he was alone and three guys came up to him. He laughed, said it was more like four or five guys, and acknowledged the possibility. I asked how the conciliatory tone of the conversation about mediation could be aligned with the brutal rhetoric of the leaflet. He said he was not responsible for the leaflet.

A guy yelled "race-baiters" and walked into the coffee shop.

A woman who was with Cornell gave a long answer about what a bad boss and unpleasant person Southard is. She said this is also a labor issue.  The leaflet was said to reflect feelings of the moment. Jorge said no more would be printed.

Mediation is planned for this afternoon. Jorge asked me to ask online commenters to dial back their tone.

Good advice all around.

UPDATE 8:34 AM Monday 10/31: There's some back and forth in the comments at the link below here, with Cornell denying the allegations and claiming the whole thing is motivated by racisim, and Calabria sticking to her story; I've contacted Cornell for comment but have not heard back from him.

Looks like a bad situation at the Green Bean, where supporters of Jorge Cornell are picketing after reportedly being asked to stop harassing customers.

Comments

[A.C.]

You should have seen what his entourage did at the Pyramids center off E. Cone two weeks ago. If you think the Latin Kings are a "social organization," you're off your rocker. That guy belongs behind bars.

[Ian McDowell]

For those who can't see the Facebook link, here's a summation of what my friend Christina Calabria (who went out in her Halloween cat suit and got in Jorge Cornell's face to give him a piece of her mind) and Katie, the owner of the Green Bean, have been posting.

Katie had been letting them have their political meetings at the Green Bean. A couple of days ago, she say she had to ask them to stop "intimidating" other customers (a friend who works at Natty Greene's says that another customer had accidentally bumped into a Latin King, the other customer had apologized, but the offended party had not accepted the apology and tried to start a fight). When she did this, they took umbrage and told her the would "fuck up her business." She kicked them out and called the cops.

They've been protesting ever since, trying to intimidate customers going in, and handing out badly written leaflets calling Katie a "racist slut."

I urge everybody who may be going near downtown to go in the Green Bean and buy something. Even a cookie or an Orangina soda or a PBR, if you don't want a typical coffeshop coffee drink. And yes, even conservatives who have no use for the liberal politics of typical coffeeshop "hipsters" should do this. (Seriously, I'd do it if a conservative-friendly establishment like, I dunno, the Coliseum Cafe was receiving this kind of bullshit intimidation).

[A.C.]

"I urge everybody who may be going near downtown to go in the Green Bean and buy something. Even a cookie or an Orangina soda or a PBR, if you don't want a typical coffeshop coffee drink. And yes, even conservatives who have no use for the liberal politics of typical coffeeshop "hipsters" should do this. (Seriously, I'd do it if a conservative-friendly establishment like, I dunno, the Coliseum Cafe was receiving this kind of bullshit intimidation)."

OK, that's all fine and well and I do get juice from the Green Bean, but you depict a pretty hostile scene, no? Why would I want to get within a mile of there? Perhaps the proprietors of The Green Bean thought different of the Latin Kings and slowly discovered that they were a bunch of uneducated thugs? Remember, some of Cornell's biggest supporters are local college students who do, frequent The Green Bean. SLYGSASISOI.

[Ian McDowell]

Ian McDowell

Because we should all have the courage not to let this kind of crap go on. Even if a local business owner had been foolish enough to to allow Nazi Skinheads to use his or her establishment, then come to his or her senses and thrown them out, and the Nazis were picketing, I'd make it a point to cross their damn picket line (as I've already done at the Green Bean, several times, since this nonsense began).

Lots of businesses allow patrons to have political meetings without endorsing those politics. Campus Libertarians and Campus Republicans have both been allowed to have regular meetings at Tate Street Coffee, where the owner is neither Libertarian or Republican (although a former employee of his, who now co-owns and runs Coffeeology, is a Libertarian). I suspect the Latin Kings chose the Green Bean because of its proximity to downtown, and that the ownership was hard-pressed to refuse, possibly out of concern that something like this might happen.

I also suspect -- and hope -- that some of the neighboring business owners will step up if this nonsense continues. A lot of people have voiced some version of "Joey Medaloni would never have allowed this to get this far."

When I first arrived at UNCG to attend grad school, the original owners of New York Pizza had just recruited dojo owner Vic Coffin and a bunch of other Vietnam vets to roust the Hells Angels, who'd taken over the patio at King Arthur's (complaints to the police were allegedly being ignored, supposedly because the SBI was observing from one of the second floor apartments on Tate Street and was more interested in photographing who the Angels were selling drugs to). It's unlikely that something like that will happen here, but I wouldn't mind if it did.

[A.C.]

"Campus Libertarians and Campus Republicans have both been allowed to have regular meetings at Tate Street Coffee, where the owner is neither Libertarian or Republican (although a former employee of his, who now co-owns and runs Coffeeology, is a Libertarian)." Uh, yeah, far different than the "Latin Kings." They're garbage and should be treated as such. People who consider them a "social movement" or "freedom fighters" are lolz.

[Steve Harrison]

Respect gained through fear and intimidation is easy, but it has no lasting value. Respect gained solely on the quality of your ideas is extremely difficult to obtain, but every tiny bit of that is priceless.

[Hugh]

Part of the 99% that is a drain on society.

[Billy Jones]

Ian McDowell,
I don't even like The Green Bean but this member of the 99% will be more than happy to buy a cup of coffee there tomorrow.

[Rick Roll]

No one ever threatened to "fuck up her business" and nowhere in the leaflet does the phrase "racist slut" appear. Counterbalancing facts with slander is a great tactic to maintain white supremacy; it's worked wonders in the past.

[Over 9000]

If I had a penny for every lie I told to the internet to get my point across, I'd be ankle deep in lincoln chins.

[It's Not Lupus]

First!

[Garth Algar]

The secret to not winning an election is to not be a racist. 50 years of Greensboro city politics has the track record to prove it.

[The Body]

Why can't Katie just apologize and be done with this whole ordeal?

[Ed Cone]

For the record, the preceding five comments all came from the same IP address. That doesn't mean they're all from one person, but the timing and the address suggest a coordinated effort.

[JC]

Apologize for what? She has a right to ask a customer to leave for any reason. You as a patron have a right not to come back. But if she felt her business and customers were being treated inappropriatley she has every right to ask this group to leave.

[Jack Harkness]

@Ian McDowell

I can say first hand that the fliers do not say anything about a "racist slut" on them, because I got one of them. Is that what Katie is alleging?

Thanks!

[Ed Cone]

Jack, can you scan, transcribe, or quote at length one of the fliers?

[Ian McDowell]

"Jack" would have to be a real person to do that, rather than a time-traveling bisexual from the future (for those who don't watch DOCTOR WHO, that's the name of a popular character who was created on that program and then featured in the BBC/STARZ spin-off TORCHWOOD).

It's true that I've not seen a flyer, and was passing on a précis of what Christina Calabria and Katie Southland were saying on Facebook, since Ed's initial link didn't work if you weren't logged in. The last time I went down there, several burly (and frankly, rather gabacho looking and sounding)guys were telling passers-by that the Green Bean "hates people of color and gay people" (a risible claim, considering their clientele), but nobody handed me a flyer.

It would be helpful if the people who claim to have more accurate information would post under their own names. Sock puppets and anonymice arouse suspicion.

[SS]

Intimidation is in no way civil and utterly unacceptable by anyone or any group. The ONLY time intimidation by numbers and threats is acceptable is in a life or death situation...like in a dark alley or in warfare. The Green Bean is a public venue open to all patrons but, it is within Katie's right and it is socially advisable and acceptable for her to evict badly behaved people in her civilized establishment. I would have done the same. Her credibility and integrity are without question to the hundreds of patrons that frequent her Cafe weekly and daily. Any person who was there at the time of the event will agree I am sure that she is blameless and racism plays no role here.

[Capt. Jack Harkness]

http://imgur.com/YxvO9

[Ian McDowell]

Posting the link to the actual flyer is helpful, although I still fail to understand the motivation for doing so while taking the name of a TV character. My usual distaste for anonymous or pseudonymous posts aside, it strikes me as a particularly inappropriate strategy when there's so much talk going on of intimidation.

But yes, the poster who took the name of John Barrowman's character is correct, the flyer doesn't call anyone a slut and maintains a surface tone of respectability.

It also strikes me as sloganeering grandstanding. It makes completely unsubstantiated claims about Katie Southard's alleged "history" while only citing this one dispute. Would a person with a "history of being racist towards her patrons" have ever allowed the Latin Kings to use her establishment to begin with? Many owners and managers of many establishments are "rude" and "egotistical" -- how does this conflate with "racism" and being "delusional"? Is asking members of any particular social group to leave one's establishment after a dispute over their behavior ipso facto an act of "racism"?

And look at the vague language. "This in response to someone accidentally getting bumped into, asking for an apology, getting an apology, and walking away."

Who was accidentally bumped into? A member of Mr. Cornell's entourage? If it was an accident, how was the apology "asked" for and why was it necessary to "ask" it? When someone accidentally bumps into me, I may glare at them if they don't apologize, but I don't waste my time getting in that person's face and demanding an apology. That's what Katie says happened, and nothing in the flyer's account actually contradicts that.

I interceded in two different incidents at a former workplace, both involving one customer bumping into a second one and the second one demanding an apology. In the first case, a customer from Côte d'Ivoire bumped into a customer from Ghana and the latter accused the former, and Ivorians in general, of having no manners, while loudly demanding an apology. I asked the Ghanaian customer to leave because he was being needlessly confrontational and escalating the situation. Similarly, when an Korean man accidentally bumped into a white skinhead and the skinhead started demanding an apology, I called the cops on the skinhead.

Nothing in this flier actually contradicts Katie's claim that a similar situation occurred here.

[Ed Cone]

The flyer I received today was much harsher; see update at the top of the post.

[Ron]

You know what would be funny? If Jorge Cornell actually beat Trudy Wade.

[kr]

A peaceful resolution has occurred, now let's move on to helping our city and it's people be the best that we can be! Let's create green jobs and put people back to work in Greensboro, united we can do it.

[JC]

Yeah Ron, hysterical...

[greensboro transplant]

"The flyer I received today was much harsher; see update at the top of the post."

is there a link to it?

[Ed Cone]

No, my scanner is down.

I hope my description, including the images of Southard above the absurdly overstated language, give some sense of how unfair and inaccurate the document was.

[VoterThomas]

At least the Bean is locally owned where you can actually meet the owner. Try doing that at StarBucks.