[SirPentor]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14406528/

Quote:

ATLANTA - Civil rights leader Andrew Young, who was hired to help Wal-Mart Stores Inc. improve its public image, said early Friday he was stepping down from his position as head of an outside support group amid criticism for remarks seen as racially offensive. "I think I was on the verge of becoming part of the controversy, and I didn't want to become a distraction from the main issues, so I thought I ought to step down," Young, a former Atlanta mayor and U.N. ambassador, told The Associated Press. Young, once a close associate of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., said his decision to step down followed a report in the weekly Los Angeles Sentinel, which he said was misread and misinterpreted.

Here are the offensive remarks themselves:

Quote:

In the Sentinel interview, Young was asked about whether he was concerned Wal-Mart causes smaller, mom-and-pop stores to close. "Well, I think they should; they ran the `mom and pop' stores out of my neighborhood," the paper quoted Young as saying. "But you see, those are the people who have been overcharging us selling us stale bread and bad meat and wilted vegetables. And they sold out and moved to Florida. I think they've ripped off our communities enough. First it was Jews, then it was Koreans and now it's Arabs; very few black people own these stores."

It's important to note that he said this just before biting into a delicious filet-of-child sandwich.

 

[artgoddess]

How were those comments mis-interpreted?

 

[chersolly]

Quote:

But you see, those are the people who have been overcharging us selling us stale bread and bad meat and wilted vegetables.

Isn't Wal-Mart doing the same exact thing?

 

[Danelle78]

 

[cielle]

Grocery stores in poor neighborhoods are notorious for selling crappy food and having a bad selection. It sounds like he was trying to relate an anecdote about his own experience, it's too bad he had to turn to racial generalizations.

And using anger between minorities to turn a profit seems pretty horrible.

 

[SirPentor]

Quote:

Originally Posted by chersolly Isn't Wal-Mart doing the same exact thing?

My (very limitted) experience at Wal-Mart is that they tend to sell consistently B+ grade items. Not the best, but certainly better than crappy local places.
Good local places, of course, are different. And I've even heard that they exist.

 

[MillingNome]

Sheese, how do comment on this one without stepping in a pile of doo-doo!??!

 

[Peepsqueak]

Quote:

Originally Posted by cielle Grocery stores in poor neighborhoods are notorious for selling crappy food and having a bad selection. It sounds like he was trying to relate an anecdote about his own experience, it's too bad he had to turn to racial generalizations. And using anger between minorities to turn a profit seems pretty horrible.

This was true, and blacks were the ones who had to patronize these stores that other people ran because they had no other resources and choices. Blacks were exploited by everybody else having the opportunity to run businesses and this put a sore spot in the black community. There is still resistance to others coming in the community to set up business and the businesses are scrutinized substancially now, by the community.

Blacks could not set up slipshod businesses in anybody else's community, and last but not least not any businesses in their own community. Others got loans, business opportunities blacks could not get. This is what causes the riff.