Hello, my name is Betrayer of Independent Coffee Shops Everywhere and yes, I am a Starbucks-aholic.
My conversion to the dark side did not happen overnight. No, the evil force that is Starbucks snuck up on me gradually – almost innocently. Now, however, this dark pit of corporate pseudo-culture has wrapped itself firmly around my existence like the mind-numbingly horrible disease that it is.
To be fair, I don’t think Starbucks means to be evil. It just is. Or maybe Starbucks itself is not evil. Maybe it is Starbucks customers that are the actual dark force responsible for the death of independent coffeehouses (and coffee house culture) across the nation.
Maybe you agree, maybe you do not – but you are probably wandering what the hell all this has to do with a ‘gay’ post? Let me ‘splain, no, no, is too much, let me sum up.
Starbucks is shiny, glowing example of how complacency is warping our country into a moronic assembly of sheep. Not only sheep, but sheep who walk humbly forward to offer themselves as fuzzy coats and tasty lamb chops with mint sauce. Okay, so maybe the metaphor is a bit thick. Simply put, the people who line up to wait for skinny, half-caf, venti, one Splenda mochas at Starbucks are the same people who let George Bush win the presidency and think protesting the war in Iraq is ‘un-American’ – or at least pretty pointless.
Those clueless toadies who let themselves be abused by baristas in aprons are the same folk who sneer at the poor, insult the less-educated and smile at gay people while declaring them comparable to pedophiles. Or, at the least, they don’t care enough about the poor, less-educated or minority populations to actually do anything about making their lives better.
Starbucks is the anti-Christ of coffee culture. The entire purpose of Starbucks is to move in, drive out any local competition and become the sole coffee god of whatever neighborhood they have taken over. Look at Vancouver. Sadly, they are very good at it. Primarily because Starbucks is an over-inflated corporation with tons of ready capital. However, the second largest reason they can take over, drive indie coffee shops out of business and destroy all vestige of local coffee culture is us – the customer.
Thank goodness when in downtown Saskatoon, We would rather than drive the half-mile down the road to the eclectic Broadway Roastery with eclectic pictures decorating the walls than walk to the nearest corner Starbucks . We would rather be served by the good, clean-cut ‘pretty’ Canadian employees of the Roastery and exchange words with the slightly crazed-looking punk boy with purple hair and a pierced lip.
Mostly, we would rather that our visits to coffee shops be different from everything else – interesting enough to warrant an appearance to pick up your daily caffeine, meet someone new, form an opinion or even step outside of our daily routine for a single second.
Indie coffee shops are places that you go to experience life – even if it is just to sit in a corner and read, write or people-watch. Starbucks shops are dead worlds where you go to work on a ‘business proposal,’ write your term paper or talk about shopping with a group of people who look so much like you that you’d think you’d walked into a cloning lab.
Unfortunately, that seems to be what people want. They want conformity, sameness – the boring old routine every day. People want a comfortable, non-threatening universe where nothing changes except the daily coffee choices (and those not often). They don’t want adventure; they don’t want challenge. Increasingly, our country is becoming more and more a reflection of this attitude.
We don’t challenge our government. Hell, a great majority don’t even know exactly what their government is doing that they should be challenging. Scary people want to ban gays from having equal rights because they don’t think a new flavor should be added to the menu. Things that are different are evil! How many people at Starbucks have ever tried a kiwi fizz cream soda? Not many I’d bet, but I remember an indie coffee shop where people just couldn’t get enough of them. How many conservative right-wingers have ever actually tried to educate themselves about gays? About as few as have tried a kiwi soda I’m betting.
Starbucks is not, in itself, evil – I think. Sadly, I think it is myself – and the many hundreds like me that are the real problem. If I had the cash, I'd go to Starbucks almost daily. Starbucks is about 10 blocks from my apartment. When I have a mocha craving, and I am downtown, it is the easiest thing in the world just to walk over and have a nice, perfectly pretty blond barista serve one up for me. To visit the nearest indie shop would require an extra set of steps, and getting fit in the process and paying more money for a probably pricier, culturally-responsible, small-business-supporting hot chocolate coffee drink. Not to mention, I live in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. The number of indie coffee shops in this city are more visible than the number of gay people you see holding hands downtown – and that part at least is good. That's why we have to try to ignore that Starbucks sign.
So, like all the people who vote for candidates who they’ve seen the most number of times in television commercials – I give the Starbucks my patronage over and over again. It is quick, it is easy and it requires no involvement of my brain whatsoever. It’s very American, but I'm Canadian, eh?
Dear Wizard of OZ,
