It's back, y'all!
So, this ex-Marine has made a career in the past 20 or so years from resurrecting failing hotels.
Okay, fine.
He purchases a run-down hotel in Taos, New Mexico and proceeds to overhaul the place with new rules.
Hispanic workers (of which, I imagine in New Mexico, there are many) were immediately ordered to never speak Spanish in his presence. You know, for fear they were talking about him.
Okay, I can see how that would inspire paranoia in new management. Especially management that doesn't understand Spanish. Suspecting your new employees of insubordination by speaking their native language in front of you, I get it. I don't agree with it, but I get it.
But then he decides that's not enough.
He tells his employees that he's changing their names. He is Anglicizing their first names.
Whitten says it's a routine practice at his hotels to change first names of employees who work the front desk phones or deal directly with guests if their names are difficult to understand or pronounce.
Here's his quote about this: "It has nothing to do with racism. I'm not doing it for any reason other than for the satisfaction of my guests, because people calling from all over America don't know the Spanish accents or the Spanish culture or Spanish anything," Whitten says.
You mean, like, you? You who has spent 40 years in the hotel business, 26 years in Texas and does not understand a word of Spanish? People like that? *eyerolling ensues*
I don't suppose it occured to Mr. Bunker, I mean Whitten, that perhaps there might be tourists of the Spanish persuasion coming to visit New Mexico, wanting to stay in his hotel.
I mean, it's not like Hispanic or Chicano people would be interested in attending things like the Mariachi conference or Dia de los Muertos celebrations or revel in the Spanish, Mexican or Native American culture all over the state. No, that's ridiculous.
And by the way, unless your employees are under contract with MGM from, you know 60 years ago, you cannot force them to change their names. Pretty sure that's discrimination.
And yeah. Being quoted in subsequent interviews, referring to the locals as "mountain people" and "potheads who escaped society..." while you're in the midst of a public relations nightmare? Not the direction I'd go, but then I don't own a hotel. Ain't but 5,000 people in the whole damn town. Do you really think pissing off the entire place is a good game plan? Really?
You could try something crazy like, getting to know the area around you and making sure your hotel respects and reveres the surrounding environment and the people that inhabit it. If the entire town is such a unique place, maybe you should work WITH that.
A protester and activist with Los Brown Berets de Nuevo Mexico, I think, said it best: "I do feel he's a racist, but he's a racist out of ignorance. He doesn't know that what he's doing is wrong." I make no excuses for his actions, but yes, ignorance abounds in this scenario.
It's only Monday and already we've got a 5-star rated Dumbass.
The news is going to make my head hurt this week. I can feel it.
Okay, fine.
He purchases a run-down hotel in Taos, New Mexico and proceeds to overhaul the place with new rules.
Hispanic workers (of which, I imagine in New Mexico, there are many) were immediately ordered to never speak Spanish in his presence. You know, for fear they were talking about him.
Okay, I can see how that would inspire paranoia in new management. Especially management that doesn't understand Spanish. Suspecting your new employees of insubordination by speaking their native language in front of you, I get it. I don't agree with it, but I get it.
But then he decides that's not enough.
He tells his employees that he's changing their names. He is Anglicizing their first names.
Whitten says it's a routine practice at his hotels to change first names of employees who work the front desk phones or deal directly with guests if their names are difficult to understand or pronounce.
Here's his quote about this: "It has nothing to do with racism. I'm not doing it for any reason other than for the satisfaction of my guests, because people calling from all over America don't know the Spanish accents or the Spanish culture or Spanish anything," Whitten says.
You mean, like, you? You who has spent 40 years in the hotel business, 26 years in Texas and does not understand a word of Spanish? People like that? *eyerolling ensues*
I don't suppose it occured to Mr. Bunker, I mean Whitten, that perhaps there might be tourists of the Spanish persuasion coming to visit New Mexico, wanting to stay in his hotel.
I mean, it's not like Hispanic or Chicano people would be interested in attending things like the Mariachi conference or Dia de los Muertos celebrations or revel in the Spanish, Mexican or Native American culture all over the state. No, that's ridiculous.
And by the way, unless your employees are under contract with MGM from, you know 60 years ago, you cannot force them to change their names. Pretty sure that's discrimination.
And yeah. Being quoted in subsequent interviews, referring to the locals as "mountain people" and "potheads who escaped society..." while you're in the midst of a public relations nightmare? Not the direction I'd go, but then I don't own a hotel. Ain't but 5,000 people in the whole damn town. Do you really think pissing off the entire place is a good game plan? Really?
You could try something crazy like, getting to know the area around you and making sure your hotel respects and reveres the surrounding environment and the people that inhabit it. If the entire town is such a unique place, maybe you should work WITH that.
A protester and activist with Los Brown Berets de Nuevo Mexico, I think, said it best: "I do feel he's a racist, but he's a racist out of ignorance. He doesn't know that what he's doing is wrong." I make no excuses for his actions, but yes, ignorance abounds in this scenario.
It's only Monday and already we've got a 5-star rated Dumbass.
The news is going to make my head hurt this week. I can feel it.