XPost: alt.society.labor-unions, alt.politics.homosexuality, talk.politics.guns XPost: alt.business

Coffee giant Starbucks is caught up in a row with a labor union over
claims that workers at some of its stores in the US have been told they
cannot put up Pride decorations this year.

The dispute comes as a rightwing backlash against many American businesses sweeps across the US, with conservative activists and consumers attacking expressions of support for LGBTQ+ Americans. Some of the biggest corporate names in the US – such as retailer Target and beer giant Anheuser-Busch –
have been hit by boycotts.

It also comes as a wave of legislation has been passed in many Republican-
run states eroding the rights of the LGBTQ+ community, especially around
the teaching of gay or trans rights issues in schools. According to the
Human Rights Campaign, over 520 anti-LGBTQ+ bills have been introduced in
state legislatures in the US so far in 2023, a record high, including a
record passage of 74 of the bills.

The Starbucks dispute erupted after a petition on Coworker.org, a labor organizing website, was launched in the beginning of June that claimed Starbucks managers have told workers they cannot put up Pride decorations
this year.

A Starbucks worker in Virginia at a non-unionized store who started the petition, but requested to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation, said
they came into work in the beginning of June and noticed all of their
store’s Pride and other decorations had been taken down. The petition is directed at their regional manager.

“I was told that they had just implemented a new no-decorations policy.
And I was like, ‘Right before Pride?’ That’s really suspicious and kind of weird. I was pretty sure it wasn’t just our store, because our store
managers are very supportive of LGBT stuff, most of our employees are LGBT community members, and I was told that it was the regional manager’s
decision,” the worker said.

“This is so ridiculous, because it’s just a little quality of life thing
that we can do, it doesn’t have any impact on corporate, it doesn’t reduce their profits – even the customers like it. We get a lot of compliments on decorations and lots of our customers are also LGBT community members, and
I found that really frustrating and, honestly, pointless.”

The worker criticized Starbucks’s initial denial that Pride decorations
were being removed in stores and claimed the company was circumventing the claims by citing the decoration removals weren’t part of any corporate
policy change because it was a regional management decision that affected
their store.

Starbucks Workers United, the union representing Starbucks workers at more
than 300 locations in the US, also posted a thread on Twitter on 13 June claiming that workers in at least 21 states, including at unionized
stores, have reported their store management banning Pride decorations.

The union has also pushed back on Starbucks’s denials, citing numerous
reports on social media and TikTok videos from workers of the removal of
Pride decorations at their stores.

Starbucks has denied any corporate policy changes, claiming it is not
aware of any corporate store that has banned decorations related to Pride month. It said it is waiting to hear back from the regional manager
mentioned in the petition on what disconnect exists between workers and management on decoration policies.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/starbucks-pride-decorations-removed- because-090009016.html

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