David Ancell / Thursday March 20, 2008
I went to Geno’s and had a cheesesteak back in February. I remember seeing the sign that “This is America. When ordering, please speak English.” I had heard about the local human rights commission saying that the sign is discriminatory. Thankfully, the commission ruled otherwise. The owner, Joey Vento, even said that they won’t discriminate against people. It’s just that, if they don’t speak English, then they aren’t sure what to serve people.
I like Joey Vento’s quotes on the video accompanying this article on why this sign shouldn’t be offensive to non-English speakers:
If you don’t speak English, what’s the sign say to you. It says nothing!
If you don’t understand the language . . . you can’t speak it; you can’t read it.
Truthfully, I think the whole complaint from the city is silly. Even if Geno’s wants to discriminate, they are the ones who lose the business. If their employees speak English only, then they aren’t going to understand people ordering in other languages. What does the commission expect? You can call this bad business if you want, but it isn’t a human rights violation. I can understand where there would be a problem if this establishment were an essential service like health care, but this is a restaurant.
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