OPINION: How questioning a simple checkout procedure led to complex questions of racial profiling and ‘pent up anger against whites’ | Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service
Portia Cobb
September 10, 2019
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Portia Cobb, a professor at UWM and a filmmaker, writes about how a $6 purchase at what used to be one of her favorite east side eateries has led her to reassess how she navigates between segregated and privileged communities.
How does a person who hasexperienced racial profiling or profiling of any kind articulate it to othersoutside of that experience? What will make them believe it actuallyhappened-even if they have never experienced it in the spaces they describe asinclusive, safe or liberal?
In my own experience of beingprofiled at an east side eatery last spring, the reality of an isolated momentthat may have been interpreted as a slight has grown into enormousproportions because I talked about it.
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I was recently called out onsocial media by one rogue sympathizer of the aforementioned establishment for“looking for a cause to hate white people” and for holding on to my own “pentup anger against whites.” This person posted that they could call me outbecause they themselves were Native American with drops of African ancestry.They felt I was out of line to presume that my single experience was based onrace at a place where black people held jobs. They felt I was trying to shutdown a perfectly good business over a $6 purchase.
Here is a summary of myexperience:
This all began last May whenI questioned a checkout procedure for me that didn’t apply to a woman ahead ofme in line who happened to be white and was purchasing similar items. I hadbeen a regular customer at this eatery for the nearly 28 years I’ve lived inMilwaukee.
I am familiar that hot itemsrequire a separate process than other retail items. On that day, at the deli, Iordered a hot item, and as I presented the additional retail item, I rememberedthat I would need to pay for it separately at the main cash register. This wasnot the problem.
The young person behind thedeli counter said I had the option to pay for both at the register (I had donethat before.). However, she then said, “Pay for both over there and return hereto me with this stamped chit” and gingerly handed me the chit. My food item wasalready packaged and in a bag. She said she would hold it for me behind thedeli counter to retrieve after I paid. I was confused and annoyed but followedthe protocol.
The woman in front of me atthe general register placed her basket on the counter. Her basket contained amix of items from the retail part of the store and about 10 other hot fooditems that hadn’t yet been paid for. In my mind, an alarm sounded and afamiliar sixth sense of some kind.
When I witnessed thattransaction, I realized that I was being treated differently. Did the deliserver think I would steal a burrito while the lady in front of me had walkedaround the store with her items and didn’t have to follow the same protocol? Ipushed that thought into the recesses of my mind but remained annoyed. I wantedanswers.
I turned to see the deliserver observing me from behind the counter as I stood in line at the generalcheckout area with my chit. I racked my brain, as I didn’t remember thatprocedure being handled in that way in the past. I questioned the “I
will hold your food item here for you until you return with the chit showing
proof of purchase” part.
After I had my chit stampedand returned for my burrito, the young woman behind the counter handed me mypurchase. When I questioned why the woman ahead of me didn’t have to follow thesame protocol, she offered that she didn’t know-but that she, herself, followedstore policy and couldn’t vouch for what others did or didn’t do. She thenbecame agitated and asked if I would like to speak with her manager. I said“sure.”
She marched to the manager’soffice, and I moved toward the end of the deli counter to witness her gesturingtoward me (The office is visible through a window.). The manager stood and cameout to greet me. He began with, “I’m sorry if you feel that you wereprofiled.” I was speechless, as I hadn’t used this verb in my question to herabout the method of the transaction and hadn’t begun to frame a question forhim. So once again an alarm rang in my subconsciousness. Aha! That is what shewas doing!
I explained that I hadwitnessed another customer ahead of me with similar items who didn’t have tofollow policy. He said he didn’t witness that happen and couldn’t speak to itbut offered again his apology for me “feeling” profiled and being made unhappy.I asked about any posted signage about this policy, and he said there wasn’tany, but he realized-in that moment-they would now need to place some signsnear the registers to avoid confusion.
I left with my burrito andone retail item feeling conflicted and preoccupied about what had taken place,replaying the tape in my head.
I went back to my workspaceand stared at the bag with its bright red logo for about an hour before Idecided to write across the top of that logo with a bright red Sharpie marker,“I was racially profiled today @__________.
I stared at the bag, and thewords I had written seemed to validate my experience, not make it a question,but a reality . . . a fact! I shared it on my two socialmedia accounts with a question and statement in my status.
“When you ask yourself why your monetary transactionwas handled differently from another customer who is “white presenting,” butyou don’t describe them as such & you are assured that it is policy…that,“you were not being Profiled!” without you even using the words “white” or“profiled” then you realize, because you are calling into question a
policy that seems only to apply to you by example…Yes! You were profiled!”
A few days after thishappened, and my social media blew up with commentary, one of the owners of theestablishment sent me an email, asking to meet, and I obliged to meet him anywherebut at his store. When we met, he immediately extended a verbal apology andshared his empathy about the experience. He said, “I believe it happened. Noquestion.” I believed him. I believed he was remorseful. This put me at ease,as did his pledge to work with me toward planning a community action toaddress, apologize and train his employees to prevent this from happeningagain.  We framed it around acommunity-involved teach-in/forum/table with trained mediators. This hasn’thappened.
Time got in between, with thestart of summer and following up with him months later. I eventually was sent alukewarm response that said the business was working to resolve these matters internally.
Where are we now?
I was a self-professedloyalist before this occurred. But now? I’m woke.
I’ve kept a promise to myselfthat I would not cross the threshold of that store again. I have not been back.I have also reminded friends, colleagues and associates about my experiencewhen they mention eating or ordering food from there.
When asked by others how theycould support me, I’ve asked folks to stand in solidarity with me-if theybelieved it happened, if they cared that it shouldn’t happen to anyone.In turn, folks have written letters, sent notes and called the business abouttheir disappointment that this occurred there and that no actions have beentaken to resolve or reconcile.
I am asked what I want.
I hold out hope that theowners demonstrate they are intolerant of biased behaviors by their employeesby not framing it as a flaw in their checkout procedure. Furthermore, I wouldlike them to take what has happened seriously-whether on or off Facebook andInstagram. Move the needle, raise the vibration and sustain actions to changeany and all types of biases and gestures leading to discrimination of any kind.
I was born in the mid-50s. Iam no stranger to racial profiling, yet I was caught off-guard, was shockedwhen all the feels were present. I am usually self-aware in spaces where thereis a climate of distrust of otherness; of blackness; of brown-ness. I navigatebetween the Midwest and the South, so I am self-aware of the spaces that areinclusive and those that are not. Before this encounter, I hadn’t felt unwelcomedor distrusted in that space.
That I would need to reframemy experience again and again to persuade skeptics that this happened, that Iwould have to second guess my own intuition about this type of behavior-onethat I have long been familiar with-is profoundly distressing. I am reminded ofmy childhood and of learning to navigate between segregated and privilegedcommunities. What I experienced is not new, is not something I didn’trecognize, is not something I imagined or projected and is not something I willsoon forget. This is NOT something thatshould be dismissed, diminished or made out to be a lie by those who have neverexperienced it.