Foreign racial slur used as bakery name on Lordship lane

[TheCat]

Their replies have been a constant repeat of the racist cake story no one below the age of 70 has heard of in Greece, now widely known as chocolate cake or the below, where we're repeatedly invited for a tour of the bakery or provided with alternatives for the slur. No acknowledgement, no thought nor reassurance that the matter will be addressed or even discussed internally. Unfortunately I don't perceive this as a professional enough response when members of the community you do business in inform your of the offence your name causes.

 

So you have a grievance...fair enough. The target of that grievance has offered to meet and engage. And you refuse to engage until they basically cede to your demands? (top tip: negotiation usually comes BEFORE resolution, not the other way around)

Representative of the depressing world we live in... Where engagement, dialogue nuance and compromise has been replaced only by indignant, inflexible outrage....

[Dogkennelhillbilly]

How much "dialogue nuance" [sic] is a person who uses a slur entitled to?

"Who are you gonna believe? Me or your own eyes?"

[TheCat]

Guess it just depends on whether one wants to feel perpetually outraged and indignant on the Internet, while achieving absolutely nothing. Or whether one wants to engage with a person that they may personally find objectionable, and perhaps end up actually getting some change/improvement....

Whatever floats your boat I guess....

[yeknomyeknom]

The word is a known racist slur, this is clear and indisputable. The owner's opinion is irrelevant to this fact. Cakes and coffee to not fix this fact, they appease an individual at best, but do not address the racism. Racist slurs should not be used as names for businesses or anything else. If the owner denies the slur or refuses to address it, there is something wrong. How anyone can argue anything other and then say they are not a racist is baffling to me.

To the original poster, thank you for pointing this out. I am sorry you are having to deal with this. I am sorry you are being questioned on this matter when your view point is clear and justified. I have written to our local MP and councillors to complain and will not be a customer of this business again. Best wishes.

[TheCat]

@yeknomyeknom

THE word 'monkey' is also a well know racial slur. Yet you use it twice in your forum name. Albeit backwards. I'm guessing you might argue that you are not using it in a racist context.

I don't speak Greek. So I'm not trying to argue about the bakery name one way or the other. Just making the point that perhaps sometimes things aren't so black and white (no pun intended).

[Flux capacitor]

Thank you for drawing attention to this heinous slur; I, for one, will not support this establishment because it is grotesque and should not be tolerated. Turning a blind eye to such behaviour sends the message that this type of language is acceptable, which it is not.

[Dogkennelhillbilly]

I don't speak Greek. So I'm not trying to argue about the bakery name

Yet you seem to have managed to argue about it with someone who does speak Greek and tell them what to do...

[TheCat]

I encouraged one Greek speaker who thinks one thing to talk to another Greek speaker who thinks another...

For people who don't speak Greek... On what basis should we automatically side with one Greek speaker and not the other?

[Fassianos]

@TheCat

As I mentioned we wont engage with a business who's trying to use the equivalent of it's not "nword-er its nword-a" in Greek as an excuse to continue to use a racial slur as their brand name. We've left that to the relevant officials.

If you require more information you can use google translate. I attach the exact result it gives.

Lastly as Amberob mentioned on a an earlier post I am not the first Greek person to spot this and apparently not the first to reach out to the business either.

Edited March 12, 2023 by Fassianos

[Pocahontas1980]

Thanks for bringing this to our attention.

I must admit I’ve been in there a few times and I recently spoke to the server about how nice one of their cakes were and got a not so friendly response. It actually put me off going back so I definitely will not be going back after this.

[Froglander]

Has anything further happened regarding this chain of bakeries?  I’ve never been inside one.