Link: AFB's Blog Home.
Last week, the NYT published an article where a restaurant owner, Gabrielle Hamilton, interviews a blind man for a cooking position. Now, I don't know if you've ever had any interaction with many blind people, but with the right tools around them, they can accomplish some pretty amazing stuff. At GM Asset Management, there's a Canadian bond trader that is blind. (Can you imagine all those quotes wizzing by on braille! Amazing!)
Anyway, so it seemed like this applicant had some trouble in these surroundings... The article rips the guy apart with stuff like "His eyes wandered around in their sockets like tropical fish in the aquarium of a cheap hotel lobby..."?
I mean... how do people get away with stuff like that? The whole piece is basically making fun of this visually impaired job applicant. How do you run a customer facing business with that kind of attitude? I don't think would stand for an article like that if the owner was making fun of the applicant's race or even if the applicant was in a wheelchair. How would Gabrielle feel if we made fun of a smaller female chef who couldn't carry a heavy item?
The article is here.
Gabrielle's restaurant is called Prune. You know what's really ironic? I checked out some reviews and I found these two:
From Dine.com... "Prune Restaurant & Bar...
opened it's doors to the discriminatingly hip east village crowd
one year ago." Yes... definitely discriminating.
From Gayot.com... "Prune may
not be the most appealing name for a restaurant (it’s for the owner’s
childhood nickname, not the fruit), but once inside any prejudice
disappears." Obviously hasn't been there lately...
If anyone knows Gabrielle Hamilton, I'd say they should urge her to write a public apology.
