Coffee for stupid kids

benfell

Coffee


Fig. 1. “Starbucks Location in Eagles Landing, 2022.” Photograph by Wikimedia Commons user “Andrepoiy,” December 28, 2022, via Wikimedia Commons, Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International.

When I go to Starbucks, I order tea anyway, because their coffee is appallingly bad, basically stronger Folgers, for people who want to pretend they’re drinking gourmet coffee but haven’t the first clue what it is. It’s a first step down the road of coffee stupidity for stupid kids and, even more appallingly, some of their elders. And of course, it’s because they order bad coffee that they have to drown it in additives to cover up its awfulness.

Some Starbucks workers said they themselves sometimes wonder whether black coffee should include sugar, or room for milk. They ask customers who order their coffee plain whether they also want it sweetened, just to make sure.

“It’s the biggest debate,” said Brooke Cross, a 20-year-old Starbucks barista in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. “What is black coffee?”[1]

It appears that workers at Starbucks’ imitators are similarly confused.[2]

Heather Haddon, “​Ticket for Coffee Shop Frustration: Ordering Black Coffee,” Wall Street Journal, February 26, 2023, https://www.wsj.com/articles/stump-your-barista-order-black-coffee-98d98f63

Work


Fig. 2. Yeah, this is me. The sign says, “If you’re whining about a labor shortage, STOP ignoring my job applications!” And the QR-code leads here. Photograph by author, January 16, 2023.

You know what they say about if you have to ask, you can’t afford it? I’m almost positive that’d be the story with a Law360 subscription. They have notified me that my free trial has now ended.

[U.S. District Judge Nancy Torresen] found that [Gregory] Johnson couldn’t stand up his hostile work environment claim because he didn’t show that he experienced severe or pervasive harassment at work. Stray comments he said he heard from co-workers — the worst of which coming from a supervisor, who said Johnson didn’t look disabled because he had his shoes on the right feet — are not enough to show he was constantly harassed on the job, the judge said, prompting her to ax the claim.[3]

But the judge allowed the majority of the suit to move forward saying a jury would have to decide whether Whole Foods Market fired Gregory Johnson on a pretext of leaving work. Johnson claims that his post traumatic stress disorder had been triggered.

Travis Bland, “NC Strip Club Says Models Can’t Deny It Info On Photos,” Law360, February 22, 2023, https://www.law360.com/consumerprotection/articles/1578843

Spencer Jakab, “Lousy Tippers Are Just Misunderstood,” Wall Street Journal, February 22, 2023, https://www.wsj.com/articles/lousy-tippers-are-just-misunderstood-63094163

Daniel de Visé, “Twenty high-paying jobs that don’t require a college degree,” Hill, February 22, 2023, https://thehill.com/business/3863716-twenty-high-paying-jobs-that-dont-require-a-college-degree/

Tim Ryan, “Judge Drops Nationwide Injunction Against Starbucks,” Law360, February 23, 2023, https://www.law360.com/employment/articles/1579417

Grace Elletson, “Bulk Of Ex-Whole Foods Worker’s ADA Suit Moves Ahead,” Law360, February 24, 2023, https://www.law360.com/employment/articles/1579839

Gilead

Academic repression


Fig. 3. “The Evolution of Intellectual Freedom.” Comic by Jorge Cham, 2011, via Episyllogism[4] fair use.

Some things just make me so sick, I can’t bear to look at them, at least not right away.

[Florida] House Bill 999 takes up almost every bullet-pointed goal that [Governor Ron] DeSantis included for public higher education in a press release last month. It would prohibit public colleges from funding any projects that “espouse diversity, equity, and inclusion or Critical Race Theory rhetoric,” no matter the funding source; allow boards of trustees to conduct a post-tenure review of faculty members at any time for cause; and put faculty hiring into the hands of trustees. It also has new specifics DeSantis hadn’t proposed, such as a ban on gender studies as a major or minor.[5]

Nick Anderson, “Marymount University cuts English, several other majors,” Washington Post, February 24, 2023, https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2023/02/24/marymount-university-humanities-majors-eliminated/

Francie Diep, “‘Never Seen Anything Like It’: New Bill Would Write DeSantis’s Higher-Ed Vision Into Law,” Chronicle of Higher Education, February 24, 2023, https://www.chronicle.com/article/never-seen-anything-like-it-new-bill-would-write-desantiss-higher-ed-vision-into-law

Student loans


Fig. 4. Unattributed and undated image via James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal,[6] fair use.

We already know we have an ideological U.S. Supreme Court which picks and chooses principles, as particularly seen with its ruling in favor of folks who confuse their guns with their penises,[7] to serve predetermined ends.[8]

It’s fairly clear that in a pair of cases on Joe Biden’s student loan relief plan reaching the U.S. Supreme Court that opponents of the plan have strained to claim standing even to sue. Nonetheless, conservative courts have ruled against Biden’s plan.[9] It’s also fairly clear that the plain text of the applicable law allows the plan.[10]

But this is a white Christian nationalist Supreme Court so there’s significant reason to suspect it will rule against the plan.

George Miller, “Can Biden legally cancel student debt? There’s no question,” Washington Post, February 22, 2023, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/02/22/student-debt-cancellation-congress-heroes-act/

Jimmy Hoover,“Up Next At High Court: Biden’s Debt Plan In Crosshairs,” Law360, February 24, 2023, https://www.law360.com/employment/articles/1579803

Robert Barnes and Danielle Douglas-Gabriel, “Biden’s student loan forgiveness program comes before Supreme Court,” Washington Post, February 26, 2023, https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2023/02/26/biden-student-debt-supreme-court/

  1. [1]Heather Haddon, “​Ticket for Coffee Shop Frustration: Ordering Black Coffee,” Wall Street Journal, February 26, 2023, https://www.wsj.com/articles/stump-your-barista-order-black-coffee-98d98f63↩
  2. [2]Heather Haddon, “​Ticket for Coffee Shop Frustration: Ordering Black Coffee,” Wall Street Journal, February 26, 2023, https://www.wsj.com/articles/stump-your-barista-order-black-coffee-98d98f63↩
  3. [3]Grace Elletson, “Bulk Of Ex-Whole Foods Worker’s ADA Suit Moves Ahead,” Law360, February 24, 2023, https://www.law360.com/employment/articles/1579839↩
  4. [4]Bob Lane, “Academic Freedom,” Episyllogism, November 3, 2016, https://boblane.com/2016/11/03/academic-freedom/↩
  5. [5]Francie Diep, “‘Never Seen Anything Like It’: New Bill Would Write DeSantis’s Higher-Ed Vision Into Law,” Chronicle of Higher Education, February 24, 2023, https://www.chronicle.com/article/never-seen-anything-like-it-new-bill-would-write-desantiss-higher-ed-vision-into-law↩
  6. [6]Richard K. Vedder, “Eliminate or Radically Restructure Federal Student Loans,” James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal, September 16, 2020, https://www.jamesgmartin.center/2020/09/eliminate-or-radically-restructure-federal-student-loans/↩
  7. [7]Saul Cornell, “Clarence Thomas’ Latest Guns Decision Is Ahistorical and Anti-Originalist,” Slate, June 24, 2022, https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/06/clarence-thomas-gun-decision-bruen-anti-originalist.html; David G. Savage, “Supreme Court bolsters gun owners’ right to carry a weapon in public,” Los Angeles Times, June 23, 2022, https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2022-06-23/supreme-court-gun-owners-right-to-carry-a-weapon-in-public; Mark Joseph Stern, “Clarence Thomas’ Maximalist Second Amendment Ruling Is a Nightmare for Gun Control,” Slate, June 23, 2022, https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/06/supreme-court-new-york-concealed-carry-law-gun-control-bruen.html; Ariane de Vogue, “Samuel Alito lashes out at liberals in guns case as tensions boil over at SCOTUS,” CNN, June 23, 2022, https://www.cnn.com/2022/06/23/politics/samuel-alito-stephen-breyer-guns/index.html↩
  8. [8]David Benfell, “The white Christian nationalist Supreme Court,” Not Housebroken, September 18, 2022, https://disunitedstates.org/2022/09/18/the-white-christian-nationalist-supreme-court/↩
  9. [9]Robert Barnes and Danielle Douglas-Gabriel, “Biden’s student loan forgiveness program comes before Supreme Court,” Washington Post, February 26, 2023, https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2023/02/26/biden-student-debt-supreme-court/; Jimmy Hoover,“Up Next At High Court: Biden’s Debt Plan In Crosshairs,” Law360, February 24, 2023, https://www.law360.com/employment/articles/1579803↩
  10. [10]George Miller, “Can Biden legally cancel student debt? There’s no question,” Washington Post, February 22, 2023, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/02/22/student-debt-cancellation-congress-heroes-act/↩

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