CA gas station sign triggers backlash: "No Gypsy women in long shoplifting skirts allowed..."

[Demovictory9]

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-09-25/gas-station-bans-romani-women-rowland-heights-california-chevron

L.A. County gas station signs banned Romani women. Community lashes back over racism

The signs came down almost as fast as they went up: plain white sheets of paper, plastered to a Rowland Heights gas station door, prohibiting Romani women from entering.

“No Gypsy women in long shoplifting skirts allowed in the store,” the signs read, using a term the Romani community widely regards as a slur. One sign concluded in bright red font: “Nici un tigan” — “Not a single Gypsy” in the Romanian language. Once pictures of the signs surfaced online, backlash from Romani activists across the world came swiftly, prompting a response from Chevron and pledges to investigate from government officials.

For many Romani Americans, it’s the first time the American public is waking up to rampant discrimination against the community.

“Everybody was really upset and frankly shocked to see that from the Los Angeles area, it’s one of the areas that people view as diverse, accepting and a melting pot,” said Anya Redgewell, 46, a Romani woman who lives in Hemet. “If it had been directed at any other diaspora, someone would’ve tried to burn the building down.”

Seven signs dotted the entrances, exits and cash register of the Chevron gas station at Colima Road and South Nogales Street last week. They referred to a dozen people featured in photos as “drive off bandits” and one as a “graffiti tagger.” The papers referring to Romani people had been taken down. But at the cash register, a sign remained featuring pictures of three women wearing long skirts — a feature of traditional Romani clothing — under the heading “thieves.”

_________


A sign posted by a Chevron gas station in Rowland Heights banned women from a particular ethnic background from entering, claiming that many of them were thieves. Nicole Comstock reports.

[Effete Snob]

1. A "shoplifting skirt"?

Does that come with a matching bank robbery blouse?

[msfiddlestix]

9. LOL!

[Effete Snob]

10. I found one... see below

[Firestorm49]

2. Not to sound discriminatory, but........

My wife and I owned a business for thirty six years. When the “gypsies” would come to the area, our police personnel would come to the store to make us aware that they were in the neighborhood. The “Romani” would usually set up camp in a local county park. Most of the time we were vigilant, observing, and yes, suspicious of teams of women who would come in to the store. Unfortunately that didn’t stop us from getting fleeced. I know that it happened at least once.

Their reputations only confirmed their intent.

[obamanut2012]

3. Why are you using a slur, and why is "Romani" in scare quotes?

Their reputations only confirmed their intent.

Oh brother. Seriously?

[ExWhoDoesntCare]

4. Anyone surprised at racist displays in LA

Hasn't been there long enough. I heard more openly racist remarks and more outright racist acts from people in LA than during my USAF days at Biloxi, MS. I also wasn't nearly as afraid of cops in Biloxi as I was in LA.

I was on a TDY assignment to SoCal with a white guy from Minnesota. Before we went to the original Tommy's, I warned him, "LAPD are often getting a meal here. Put all the space you can between you and them, even if it means getting out of the queue. Don't look at them. Don't talk to them. They're dangerous...and evil. Especially around here."

He thought I was exaggerating. Until he saw them, the menacing way they carried themselves and pushed people around, the way they snarled at brown people--they were obvious on-edge and itching for anyone to give them reason to get rough with them.

The guy told me when we were in our car again that he was shocked at how scary they really were, and, even though he was a big, buff guy, he didn't feel safe around them.

Welcome to LA.

I'd warned him about that location, for a reason. Our visit was around the time that rumours were flying about the Rampart pigs being the worst gang in the area. As if that were anything new in LA. People outside of the city didn't believe me that the rumours were likely true...

Until the arrests came.

https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/lapd/scandal/cron.html

The racism in LA is for real. Rodney King's beating didn't happen in a vacuum, and the riots in response to the not guilty verdict didn't, either.

[Demovictory9]

6. Yes there is racism in LA..majority brown/ immigrant city so often racism between minority groups

[LeftinOH]

5. Anecdote: I worked in a family-owned drugstore in the 1980s..

small town Ohio. Occasionally, Romani women would come in - several at a time, all wearing voluminous full-length dresses. One or two of them would create an intentional "commotion" that would require the full attention of the 1 or 2 clerks on duty. The other women quietly went about their "shopping." They were shoplifting; the huge dresses can hide a lot of merchandise. It's absolutely a thing - and for a small business it's beyond aggravating, as there are never enough clerks on the floor to monitor what they're up to.

I've also worked plenty of big-box retail. Bulky winter coats serve the same purpose.

However, I'm sure that the owner/manager of this business certainly could have handled this differently.

[Demovictory9]

7. Stores say " no large bags"..not sure " no long skirts" wont offend

[Effete Snob]

8. A dress code does not define a class of people

There are establishments which ban the wearing of all sorts of things or require the wearing of all sorts of things.

There is a bar near me that bans "motorcycle club colors" whatever those might be. I would have no idea whether my outfit includes such colors, but "offending people" and illegal discrimination against a class are two different things.

If it were, say, a ban on hijabs, yarmulkes, turbans or other headgear required by the various gods, that could be an issue. Long skirts, meh.

But, since nobody answered my question about a "shoplifting skirt", I found some impressive videos:

I have no idea what might be the ethnic background of the folks in these videos which purport to be from somewhere in Latin America, but I'm puzzled by what sort of rig she's got under there.

The obvious solution is simply to go back to the old model of retail in which the store is not operated as a warehouse in which customers retrieve their own items and take them to the counter, but in which store employees bring merchandise from the back warehouse to the counter at the order of the customer.