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Sunday, July 08, 2007

Inquiring minds want to know



Did the Triangle's Mellow Mushroom restaurants really have Independent Weekly racks removed from their locations because of the cover pictured above?

That can't be a good business decision in Durham, and it's a pretty stupid approach to life in general anywhere, if that's the case.

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posted by Barry at 9:52 PM Digg this

15 Comments:

  • Maybe it was the eyerollingly insulting subhead: "Transgender folks are a lot of things--including normal." The Independent staff obviously have a very low opinion of their readership to hit us with that one. "OK, children, transgender people are people too ..." It's sad how completely out-of-touch the Indy is ... although I must say that headline did its job by getting me to actually look at a publication I usually ignore, if only to assure myself that they really are that pathetic.

    Than said, I must note that the Mellow Mushroom is one of the most horribly overrated restaurants around. It's not that their pizza is bad--it's perfectly OK. It's that their staff are often snotty, slow, and inept, which has ruined all three of my visits (and this gouse for both the Raleigh and Durham locations).

    By Blogger Lisa B., at 8:49 AM  

  • i think for a lot of people, the "normal" field consists of people who look, think, and act the way they themselves do, and allows for only slight degrees of variation.

    Witness, for example, the number of US states in which majorities have voted to deny the basic human right of choosing your partner to large numbers of people for no rational reason other than that their "behavior" is not "normal."

    So i didn't see the Indy's cover as offensive in that sense. And clearly, if MM did kick the Indy out because they thought the cover would bother their patrons, the meme that transgender people are not "normal" is in circulation.

    So now i'm curious on another level. Not only would i like to know if MM did in fact kick the Indy out of their restaurants, but i'd also like to know how other readers viewed the cover. Is Lisa's point a good one? Is the Indy really that pathetic?

    By Blogger Barry, at 9:10 AM  

  • I don't feel that the Indy is pathetic, but I did balk at the title. (Still picked it up and read it, though.)

    MM is entirely overrated, IMO because of the food as much as the staff. This is the first I've heard of their refusal to display something b/c of LGBT-related imagery... I'll be keeping my eye out. DE please update us if you learn more.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 9:34 AM  

  • the headlines were lame, but that photograph is pretty awesome. i have always considered the indy to be out of the cultural pace of most indie papers, so i actually teared up at the cover.

    i don't know anything about mellow mushroom other than how much it caters to pothead fratboy demographics. hopefully this is just a rumor, but i wouldn't be shocked if it ain't.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 2:09 PM  

  • OK, so what is your source for the rumour? and do you have confirmation yet? inquiring Durham queers want to know, BEFORE we order pizza.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 3:24 PM  

  • I deleted my previous comment because i think it revealed more information than my sources would be comfortable with.

    i have more than one source.

    By Blogger Barry, at 4:05 PM  

  • lisa b. points out EXACTLY what I find frustrating about the INdyPENdent. The writing, can at times, make you feel like a complete idiot.

    Or a child waiting to be spoonfed.

    And the funny thing is, I AGREE with most of the political/cultural positions staked out by our venerable free weekly. I just end up feeling so lame for doing so. All it would take is better writing, the kind that reflects how we talk to each other every day.

    You know, sometimes I think the a**hole nature of despicable propagandists like A** C**lter, their success, is in part to the "taboo" nature of their writings. Fascists gain a toe-hold whenever progressives become bored to hear themselves think?

    I have not had any negative experiences at the Durham MM and will probably still go there from time to time. It's just a restaurant.

    By Blogger Tony, at 7:21 PM  

  • i think the latest "we get a lot of calls" editorial @ the beginning of last week's indy issue with the american flag/liberty lady cover proves this rumor is true.

    huff.

    By Blogger libby, at 11:07 AM  

  • I forgot to mention a censorship incident that affected me in Durham many, many years ago in the early 90's.

    At the time I was one of the resident music critics at The Spectator. At the time the paper was published by Bernie Reeves, who tended to go off on right-wing rants with some regularity. This was at odds with the rest of the publication, which was a little more middle-of-the-road than him to sometimes even "liberal."

    Apparently Bernie wrote the last straw for the owners of The Regulator on 9th Street in Durham. The owner of that store, which is a private business like MM, pulled the Spectator rack out. Didn't give a darn about the other writers in that publication, just pulled the rack out. Like people can't figure out Bernie had some anger issues. I also wondered if anyone at the Regulator owned a part of the Indy, which I guess would constitute a "conflict of interest"?

    This peeved me greatly. I confronted someone at the store about abridging my access to my readers and got little satisfaction out of the "discussion". I didn't feel I had a "right" to be in his store, I just wanted to know how it worked that while edgy, anti-social "art" publications could sit on his rack, what the hell was so awful about another Bernie rant? It would be about 5 years before I felt comfortable walking back into that bookstore.

    So it's kind of hard for me to get worked up over some pizza joint pitching the Indy. This is the age of the internet and people have way more reading options than they did 15 years ago.

    Ya know, if you already think MM sucks, then don't, please don't drape it with some politically correct "support" of some group. Support that group with real actions and real feelings, not some lame boycott of a lame restaurant.

    Actually, I like their salad dressing.

    By Blogger Tony, at 8:56 PM  

  • i never meant to imply that MM, or any vendor for that matter, didn't have the right to display or not display whatever third party information they want. It's certainly not censorship to not have an Indy rack in your restaurant.

    That said, if a business makes a decision to not display the Indy on the basis of the particular cover story under discussion, that restaurant's patrons certainly are entitled to know about it, as are the rest of the community's citizens. What people decide to do with that information is up to them.

    By Blogger Barry, at 11:05 PM  

  • hey, now. only 80 percent of the servers at the mellow mushroom suck.
    i should know, i've been working for them over 2 years, and honestly, i bust my butt. and i always do it with a smile on my face. and even when customers say they ordered something and i know damn well they didn't, i keep that snotty attitude reserved for the other servers :)

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 9:05 PM  

  • See––only 80% of the servers suck.

    If you get the house salad dressing, bring in your own copy of the IN-dy and get lucky with the other 20%, then everyone's happy-happy.

    By Blogger Tony, at 8:59 AM  

  • I work at MM and have been for a while. I'm not slow, snotty or inept and I try my hardest to make my customers happy. Don't get me wrong some people just aren't cut out to be servers and we've had our share of bad ones. Sorry you had bad experiences at the MM but we're not all bad. And if the service was so bad the first time, and the pizza was just okay, why did you come back a second and a third time? Just curious..

    A comment about the Independent. I agree with Barry. If the MM took the Independent out because of the cover then that wasn't a good move for buisness.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 11:41 PM  

  • I love the way rumors start about things. Remember playing the telephone game when you were in grade school?? Maybe we should all keep this in mind when making opinions about things ie: restaurants, before even stepping foot in the door. Let's be realistic now, 90% of servers suck wherever you go!! We are expecting them to suck and surprised if they don't. We all know this, so the Mellow Mushroom should not be held responsible for the poor waitstaff in all of the food industry, because that is what sounds like is happening here.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 5:19 PM  

  • i'm not sure which rumor you're talking about - the MM removing the Indy on the basis of the cover in question (which i think by this point in time has been pretty much confirmed, as well as a second Durham restaurant, Hog Heaven, doing the same) - or the quality of the service at MM.

    I've also been told there's a third Durham establishment that also had the Indy racks removed from their business, but since i haven't confirmed that with a second source, i haven't posted it yet.

    Some of the most critical comments about MM service have come from MM servers, so i think we'll let them stand on their own.

    And as always, your mileage may vary.

    By Blogger Barry, at 5:54 PM  

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