"Speak English" sign in Philly restaurant

[Boozy]

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php...show_article=1

A restaurant owner posts a sign in his restaurant saying, "This is America: When ordering, speak English."

While I understand that language barriers can be an issue when conducting business, I think the store owner is just being a dick.

- The "This is America" part of the sign is ridiculous and inflammatory. Like it or not, the US has no official language, and English does not become the official language just because some asshole with a restaurant in Philly says it is.

- I don't believe that the mostly Asian and Hispanic immigrants walk up to this guy and start yapping at him in Cantonese or Spanish. Why would either group assume that he can speak their language when he appears to be neither Asian nor Hispanic? Perhaps it has happened once or twice - but often enough to post a sign?

- The neighbourhood was originally founded by Italian immigrants, and the restaurant owner is of Italian ancestry himself. Only a few generations ago, Italian immigrants were being treated as poorly and with as much suspicion as the Hispanics are now. I can only assume that, not long ago, it was common to hear voices speaking in Italian - not English - in that neighbourhood. I guess irony is completely lost on this guy.


This sign was obviously posted to discourage Asians and Hispanics from coming into the restaurant at all. I don't think the sign should be illegal, and I agree with the court's decision to allow it. Free speech is important, and he is not denying service to these people.

I just think he's a dick. I hope he loses a lot of business over this, although I fear he won't.

[crazylegs]

I've seen a sign in my local KFC which is aimed at the staff (it can only be seen in the kitchen from a certain angle) which says something similar, not too sure how that works, if your in the kitchen and its easier to communicate in a nother language to prevent accidents, whats the problem?

Unless of course you have about three/four languages running around then I can imagine it being quite difficult to keep track.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Well, I guess he could just let people speak anything they wanted to up to and including Klingon, but if nobody in the place speaks anything but English, they aren't likely to be too happy with the service.

He probably could have been a little nicer with the wording, but he might be kind of tired of people coming in and getting mad because nobody speaks anything but English. And ya'll know that some people expect all kinds of impossible things when they are customers...such as English-only clerks being able to only understand English.

I'm mostly Italian myself. When my family moved to this country, my grandfather forbade any language but English spoken by his family, even at home. He even Americanized everyone's name. The reason was because there is a stigma in Italian-American culture that anyone who refuses to assimilate when they move to the US is lazy "greaser" and a disgrace. I'm not saying I share this line of thinking, just stating that it's not that unusual for an Italian immigrant to have a very low tolerance of people lacking basic English skills. Especially if this is an older man.

[Norton]

I completely support his right to post such a sign at his business, but I think it's a bad move. If the area his business is in has a lot of immigrants, it would be wise to try to cater to them instead of putting them off with a potentially offensive sign.

At my last job, most of the employees were hispanic immigrants. In order to help our communication, I learned a lot of job-related Spanish from them. In time, we had a decent-sized hispanic customer base as well. If I served a hispanic customer and realized they were struggling with their English, I'd serve them in Spanish instead. They were pleased that I made the effort, and I gained some repeat customers that way.

Supposedly, he won't refuse to serve non-English speakers, but I still think the sign will drive them away.

[Seshat]

I like the airline industry's trick of flight attendants having language flags on their name tags. I think it's a good way to let people know which languages they can speak to CS staff in.

Even in businesses which don't have name tags, language-flag tags might not be a bad idea. CS staff who know languages other than the dominant language of the area may choose to (or not to) wear such tags.

If there are no CS staff bearing the flag signifying a language, the customer knows that to get good service, they need to speak English. (Or French, Italian, Cantonese, Tagalog - whatever the dominant language of the culture is.)

Yes, I know there are managers who'd abuse such a system. Without the abuse, I think it's a good idea. Abused, any good idea becomes a bad one.

[AFPheonix]

To be fair, ordering in a non-standard language is pretty much guaranteed to get you something weird from the kitchen.
However, the sign he put up is not particularly diplomatic. I don't know that it will affect his business much one way or another, since he'll probably attract some pretty closed-minded dimwits to go eat there even as he drives away non-fluent english speakers and their sympathizers.

Our chain will give you a little addendum to your name tag if you speak another language. I pulled off my spanish one, as I'm not super fluent and sometimes their english is better than my spanish.

[Greenday]

I understand where he is coming from. Honestly, nearly all hispanic people that have I have served try to speak to me in Spanish. And a good majority of them get pissed at me because I won't speak Spanish.

As far as there being no official language for the US, well, there was a previous thread about it, and as I stated there, English is spoken more than all the other languages put together. Spanish isn't even close. Gives it a pretty good reasoning for making it the official language.

[Seshat]

I understand where he is coming from. Honestly, nearly all hispanic people that have I have served try to speak to me in Spanish. And a good majority of them get pissed at me because I won't speak Spanish.

That's unreasonable behaviour on their part. They have no right to be angry that a random clerk in the USA doesn't speak Spanish. Just as I have no right to be angry that a random clerk in Brazil might speak only Portugese - and the Brazilian dialect of Portugese at that.

[Dorath]

Colorado had something similar a few years ago. The court found that it wasn't discrimination to hire or not hire based on language, if the majority of customers spoke a particular language.

[CancelMyService]

Reminds me of all the (usually old) morons who call in complaining our IVR system has the "press 1 for English, press 2 for Spanish" thing. "AH SHOULDNT HAFF TO PRESS WOOOON TO HEAR ENGLISH, THIS IS AMURKA".

What a silly thing to be upset about, is pressing "1" that much of a goddamned inconveinence?

Besides, the places were Spanish is spoken the most in the US (Florida, Texas, California) were speaking it before English came around anyway.

[Amethyst Hunter]

As far as there being no official language for the US, well, there was a previous thread about it, and as I stated there, English is spoken more than all the other languages put together. Spanish isn't even close. Gives it a pretty good reasoning for making it the official language.

But then what do you do with all the other languages? Do we punish people for speaking anything other than accepted English (and who would determine what "acceptable" English would be?)? I'd bet serious donuts that those who would ram this kind of law into being would go straight down that route, eventually if not right away. English is already the de facto language of the land and isn't going to die out anytime soon (not counting those who lament the state of our public schools, heh); carping about it just makes people look like dicks. (Mind you, I'm not saying that you can't get annoyed when you're losing at verbal checkers, but seriously, aren't there more important problems in the world to worry over other than a McDonald's worker who only speaks limited English (if any)? )

[Boozy]

Honestly, nearly all hispanic people that have I have served try to speak to me in Spanish. And a good majority of them get pissed at me because I won't speak Spanish.

I have seriously never heard of such ludicrous behaviour. Why would a Hispanic person walk up to someone who doesn't look Hispanic and start flapping their gums in Spanish? And then get angry when they don't speak your language? And you say this happens "the majority" of the time?

I live in an area with a huge Chinese population, and have served hundreds of Cantonese speakers. No one has ever spoken to me in Cantonese.

I'm baffled by this. I wouldn't have thought that the majority of Spanish speakers are completely unreasonable people.

[Greenday]

Alls I know is, this is my experience with hispanic people in my area back home. I know not all Hispanic people are like that. But after dealing with it a lot, I can just understand where he is coming from. Honestly, I have no idea why someone would get upset that I couldn't speak a second language. Other than out of my own interest, I have no need of learning another language to the point of mastering it. But I don't expect to go to a place like France or Germany, go to a random small suburb and expect them to know English.

Amethyst, I seriously doubt it would ever go that far. Most countries have national languages and none of them persecute people for speaking a different language. While it always would be a possibility for that kind of abuse, it is highly improbable.

[DesignFox]

I have seriously never heard of such ludicrous behaviour. Why would a Hispanic person walk up to someone who doesn't look Hispanic and start flapping their gums in Spanish? And then get angry when they don't speak your language? And you say this happens "the majority" of the time?
<snip>
I'm baffled by this. I wouldn't have thought that the majority of Spanish speakers are completely unreasonable people.

I'm not saying it happens a majority of the time...but it does happen. My store gets a fair amount of Spanish speakers coming through. And yes, I'm lily white with no accent, yet I get people who get frustrated or angry with me because I only speak English.

While the restaurant owner could certainly have worded his sign a little more nicely, I see nothing wrong with requesting his customers to order in English. While it may not be the official language of the US, it is the majority language.

Lazy asses should try to learn it. I'm not gonna move to Mexico and refuse to speak Spanish, eh?

[Rapscallion]

I had to think about this one. In many ways, it's just like a store policy regarding returns. "This is the way this company does business". I would only get upset if it was racist.

Is it impossible for a non-white to speak English? No. Ergo it's not a racial matter. However, the upshot of this is that the store in question is likely to lose trade from those who do not speak English. If there's a huge percentage of non-English speakers in the region then the shop will lose out hugely, and it would make more commercial sense to ensure that a reasonable number of staff were able to speak the locally dominant language. If it's just a couple of people, then the store doesn't really have to worry.

Anyone know the demographics of the region where that place is? All the article says is that there are an increasing number of immigrants.

Actually, I recollect a film I saw recently referring to Italian immigrants and the cultural drive towards learning the locally dominant language. If that's not just put in the script for show, then that would also be an interesting factor.

Rapscallion