Starbucks Offends Armenian-Americans With New Ad — Shows Armenian Women Under The Symbol Of Turkey
If there is any United States company recognized for supporting liberal views more so than any other, it is easily going to be Starbucks. The Inquisitr has reported numerous times on Starbucks, and how they’ve centralized their working ethic of a progressive stance. The prominent coffee chain is one of the few businesses outside of tattoo studios that allow their employees to show off their tattoos. They also refuse to welcome anyone at their coffee shops who have guns on them, legal or not.
However, when Starbucks tried to honor people ethnically from the Middle East, they instead offended them, specifically the Armenians with their latest ad.
According to Daily Mail, Starbucks tried to utilize a new ad to appeal to Middle Easterners with posters displaying Armenian women in traditional clothing under the crescent and star of the Turkish flag.
Many Armenian-Americans found the ad to be offensive because of what Turkey did to them in between 1915 and 1918. About 1.5 million Armenians were killed by the hands of Turkish Ottoman forces. The Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA) posted a photo of the ad on their official Facebook page, inquiring why Starbucks would use such an image.
“Why is Starbucks selling coffee using an image of women, dressed in traditional Armenian costumes, celebrating a Turkish state that systematically victimized Armenian women during the Armenian genocide, and that still denies this crime against all humanity?”
Presently, Starbucks has taken down the poster seen in the Woodland Hills shop, the one reportedly seen online. Starbucks also made an official apology through a response to the ANCA on their Facebook page.
“Serving as a place for the community to connect is core to our business and we strive to be locally relevant in all of our stores. We missed the mark here and we apologize for upsetting our customers and the community.”
According to another article by The Guardian, several people on social media have claimed they saw the posters up at other places around Los Angeles, a city that is home to 446,000 people of full or partial Armenian ethnicity. Even the ANCA are preparing for possible backlash from the community for the ads.”
“It became very clear very quickly that this was a very serious issue for the entire community, because we started getting a flood of concern.”
The reason why there is such concern is because this year marks the 100th year anniversary of the tragedy, which is recognized as genocide in 43 of the 50 states here in the U.S., and in more than twenty countries, including Germany and Russia. Therefore, this year’s commemoration will be far more important than previous years. Yet, despite the “flood of concern,” ANCA did go on record to state that Starbucks responded to the situation “very appropriately.”
[Post Image via Armenian National Committee of America]
