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Are we sure this is about racism and not simply poor management? No one is talking about the color of the skin in the video. People are talking about racism because the kids are black, but it would very well might be that what risen the concern was their behaviour, not their skin.
 
The simple fact is that a disproportionate number of crimes are committed by young black males. That's why they're targeted. It's not right but it is understandable.

Let me explain: If it was a fact that a disproportionate number of crimes were committed by young males with blue eyes, would you say it was understandable to target those young males?

If it was a fact that a disproportionate number of crimes were committed by young males who were right-handed, would you say it was understandable to target those young males?

No, you would say that was silly and illogical.

Well the same is true when it comes to the amount of melanin in a person's skin. Black people in a certain location may commit more crimes than white people, but it is nothing to do with their BLACK-ness. It is more likely due to poverty, economic disadvantage. So targeting such people for the amount of melanin in their skin is ludicrous.
 
For people surprised that no order to fire an employee has yet to occur, just remember this is the Tim Cook era, not the Steve Jobs era where he ceremoniously fired people. Tim is more of a behind-the-scenes guy in this regard, but definitely something will be done .
 
Groups of "kids" like these are ever-present in Manhattan Apple stores. They blast rap music from the computers and deliberately make everyone uncomfortable. You all know exactly who the actual racists are.
 
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Groups of "kids" like these are ever-present in Manhattan Apple stores. They blast rap music from the computers and deliberately make everyone uncomfortable. You all know exactly who the actual racists are.

We have them teens (all races) in the UK too. Turn up music to show off in front of their friends to gain validation. They need other people's acknowledgement to survive in life.
 
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I love how everybody jumps aboard the racism train like it's a free, cross-Atlantic service with buffet included.

How do you know those kids weren't messing around outside the store before entering? How do you know that they didn't look shifty in terms of their movements/using bodies to conceal someone in the middle.

Why are they filming it? They're ready to deal with a situation. It's not entirely unclear if they were provocative at all.

Yet MR, the news + Facebook are overloaded with stupid assumptions.
 
I love how everybody jumps aboard the racism train like it's a free, cross-Atlantic service with buffet included.

How do you know those kids weren't messing around outside the store before entering? How do you know that they didn't look shifty in terms of their movements/using bodies to conceal someone in the middle.

Why are they filming it? They're ready to deal with a situation. It's not entirely unclear if they were provocative at all.

Yet MR, the news + Facebook are overloaded with stupid assumptions.

I didn't know that 15 years olds "messing around" outside the store was illegal now?

And I didn't know that being being African constituted "looking shifty" either.
 
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I'm so relieved Apple clarified that it's open. Why, just last week I was thinking to myself "gee, I'll bet that Bay Area company with the homosexual CEO is really closed-minded!"
 
It doesn't have to be illegal. They weren't arrested, they were kicked out. You don't have to break a law to get kicked out of a shop.

They were kicked out for something they might do, not due to something they had done.

If they'd been kicked out "because we've seen you messing about out here and we don't want you messing about in the shop" I highly doubt this topic would even have the need to exist.
 
You mean like Boston marathon bombing? There were people that saw suspicious person, but no one cared about it and then bomb went off.

I'm not saying that this is the case and they look like thieves (at least to me they don't), but different people see differently and i wouldn't be surprised that the guy legitimately was worried about that. Also adding to that they weren't the first ones in the store with dark skin colour i wouldn't have any reason to suspect any racial discrimination. However people seem lose their reasonable mind when it comes to words black, racial, racist and discrimination and they don't see the picture for what it really is.

It's not so much as people saw suspicious person's, but no one cared about it - it's that what they saw didn't raise the threshold of suspicion to act on.
The big question is - based on what they saw what would have raised the threshold for them to act on their suspicion?

My original question still remains unanswered:
What does a thief even look like? Lindsay Lohan? Brittney Spears? Courtney Love? Beth Ditto? Megan Fox (she stole a $7 lipgloss from walmart)? Farrah Fawcett? Winona Ryder?

Does this mean that we should be paying more attention to white females in stores? Do white females shoplift more than blacks, but because everyone is paying attention to black shoppers, they miss the white female shoplifters? Why aren't white female shoppers profiled more than black shoppers - it seems like they should be - especially if they have the ability to purchase merchandise.
 
What does an issue with black teens in American have to do with black African teens in Australia?
Nothing at all.
It's a false equivalency.

The actions of those teens don't represent the actions of EVERY black person in this world. If thats the avenue we are taking, then every white person is schizophrenic and psychotic murderer because Jeffrey Dahmer was white. Seriously - how does Jeffrey Dahmer represent the actions of every white person in this world? If he doesn't then neither do the actions of those black teens who robbed an apple store.
 
Let me explain: If it was a fact that a disproportionate number of crimes were committed by young males with blue eyes, would you say it was understandable to target those young males?

If it was a fact that a disproportionate number of crimes were committed by young males who were right-handed, would you say it was understandable to target those young males?

No, you would say that was silly and illogical.

Well the same is true when it comes to the amount of melanin in a person's skin. Black people in a certain location may commit more crimes than white people, but it is nothing to do with their BLACK-ness. It is more likely due to poverty, economic disadvantage. So targeting such people for the amount of melanin in their skin is ludicrous.

Easy there Poncho - you're actually making sense. And I don't like it! In fact I hate it. Because you are challenging my belief that blackness determines whether someone is a criminal or not, and whether they need to be profiled.

It is my staunch belief, that if 1 black person steals they are all thieves. I also believe that if a white person steals, it's an anomaly and doesn't represent the normal actions of other white people. I know that's a bias - but it's hard for me to change.

/sarcasm
 
I am usually not on the PC bandwagon, but the video was clear and someone really needs to be fired over that incident. PERIOD.

no the video wasn't clear. Especially about it being a race issue. At no time did the staffer bring up their race. Everyone is just assuming that because 'well I'm not racist but black folks steal things a lot so when they said that the worry was that they might steal something of course they meant because they are black'

there are comments on other places like reddit that the video is not the whole story. Allegedly, they were creating a disturbance, yelled at the staff when they were asked to quiet down, have been in the store before and it was discovered that things had been lifted.

the manager or who ever he was didn't handle it well by bringing up the word steal but it doesn't equal to it being a race thing
 
Nothing at all.
It's a false equivalency.

The actions of those teens don't represent the actions of EVERY black person in this world. If thats the avenue we are taking, then every white person is schizophrenic and psychotic murderer because Jeffrey Dahmer was white. Seriously - how does Jeffrey Dahmer represent the actions of every white person in this world? If he doesn't then neither do the actions of those black teens who robbed an apple store.

That was my point. But I wanted to know why the poster felt it was relevant ;)
 
Let me explain: If it was a fact that a disproportionate number of crimes were committed by young males with blue eyes, would you say it was understandable to target those young males?

If it was a fact that a disproportionate number of crimes were committed by young males who were right-handed, would you say it was understandable to target those young males?

No, you would say that was silly and illogical.

Well the same is true when it comes to the amount of melanin in a person's skin. Black people in a certain location may commit more crimes than white people, but it is nothing to do with their BLACK-ness. It is more likely due to poverty, economic disadvantage. So targeting such people for the amount of melanin in their skin is ludicrous.
It's not ridiculous. If you see a random person in public, you only know his appearance, from which you might know his race. You don't know the person's economic status or education level. You estimate (usually subconsciously) the probability that this person is a criminal, based on what you know about the person: his appearance. Whatever combination is perceived as the most likely to commit crimes is going to have the highest probability. So maybe you choose to walk on the side of the street with the person you perceive as safer.

A coin toss is an analogy for this. What actually determines the outcome of a coin toss is how exactly you move your hand when you toss it, how the mass is distributed across the coin, and other things. You don't know those things, so your best guess is 1/2 probability of heads.

I'm not saying that this is what society should do, but from the self-centered standpoint, it's the most logical. That's part of the problem; it sucks for the non-criminal members of that group.
 
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lol@this video and people actually trying to defend it.. "They're just worried that you're going to steal something"

The kids asked them to name the instance that brought store management to that decision.. the answer.."You're going to have to leave now" Utterly ridiculous!!

Only for this thread, I sooo wish this will happen to group of same-aged white girls or white boys and lets see the defense then.

But this will never ever happen.

People around here defend nonsense and try to defend glaring inequality. Surely if they did something to bring on the decision other than a "look", the management would have been MORE THAN HAPPY to name it and promptly tell them to leave but they couldn't/wouldn't even answer the question.

In my opinion, Apple didn't do enough; just applied a bandaid until the next instance.

In management, the culture of the environment relies of their shoulders. If they allow nonsense of this nature, it hasn't gone away because Apple released an apology statement and memorandum to it's employees. This is a pre-determined mentality of the manager in the store and there's NO MEMORANDUM that will fix that.

Apple if you want all of your stores to embrace and promote equality for all, you need to ensure your management shares your vision. That is handled in the hiring process, not in a memorandum!
 
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gone viral, eh? I haven't seen anything in my Inbox...or on any major newsite...nor is there a link to the *viral video* of this atrocity even in this article!

I'm not sure the author(s) of this article know what a viral video is....maybe I should point them to a Princess Bride reference.
 
I see no problem with what the employee did.

He identified the group of children with backpacks as a threat to the Apple Store, and decided to eliminate that threat by asking for them to leave. Any group of people that moves as a pack is a potential threat, and tends to be intimidating to other customers. There will have been several factors that led to the request, not least, the presence of several large backpacks.

Just as Apple, under Tim Cook, exercise their right to search the bags of employees without restriction, so they exercise their right to remove members of the public from the store. Tim should be proud that his employee did the right thing, and the employee should be rewarded with a pay rise or bonus.

Here's the problem with your logic. Apple employees aren't trained to "police the store and their customers" It's simply not their job. The most they're expected to do is approach all customers and ask them if they need any assistance. Hopefully the fact that the customer knows that the Apple employees are aware of them in their store reduces the chances of that customer trying to steal something. So that Apple employee doing what he did does not deserve a raise because he went against what Apple wanted him to do in the first place.
 
Here's the problem with your logic. Apple employees aren't trained to "police the store and their customers" It's simply not their job. The most they're expected to do is approach all customers and ask them if they need any assistance. Hopefully the fact that the customer knows that the Apple employees are aware of them in their store reduces the chances of that customer trying to steal something. So that Apple employee doing what he did does not deserve a raise because he went against what Apple wanted him to do in the first place.

It's not their job to police the store? Really? That's just ridiculous.
 
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