Starbucks Gay Coffee Cups Removed

Coffee cups featuring a quote by a gay author about growing up homosexual have been pulled from Baylor University's on-campus Starbucks.
Aramark, which as the contractor for Baylor dining services oversees the coffee outlet, pulled cups from the campus store earlier this month after a university staff member sent out an e-mail complaining about the appropriateness of the quote at a Baptist university, Baylor officials said.
The e-mail was sent on to Baylor dining services, which consulted with Starbucks' district office, which said it fully supported a decision to take the cup out of circulation to avoid offending others, Baylor officials said Monday.
“My understanding is it was a decision made by Baylor dining services staff, and I've not yet been able to trace it back to any Baylor administrators telling them point-blank to pull the cup,” Baylor spokesman Larry Brumley said.
He added, “I think they were trying to be sensitive. Obviously, Baylor is a Baptist-affiliated institution, and Baptists as a denomination have been pretty outspoken on the record about the denomination's views about the homosexual lifestyle.”
The action was spurred by the fact that some of the store's coffee cups contained a quote from novelist Armistead Maupin. He is best known for a six-book series titled Tales of the City, which is about life in San Francisco in the 1970s and 1980s.
The quote on the cup reads:
“My only regret about being gay is that I repressed it for so long. I surrendered my youth to the people I feared when I could have been out there loving someone. Don't make that mistake yourself. Life's too damn short.”
The cup is No. 43 in a series of cups being used chainwide by the Seattle-based coffee giant. The cups are part of a campaign called “The Way I See It,” which features quotes from a variety of notable figures. They range from the musings of electronic musician Moby to the thoughts of figure skater Michelle Kwan.
Sanja Gould, a spokeswoman with Starbucks' corporate office, said the company sees the program “as an extension of the coffeehouse culture – a way to promote open, respectful conversation among a wide variety of individuals.”
Gould said cups with the Maupin quote has been in circulation since July. She said the cups were placed randomly in the cases shipped to the store, and store employees would have to remove the cups manually.
“As far as I know, there weren't many of the cups,” Gould said.
Officials at other Waco-area Starbucks said they are still using the cups.
Linda Ricks, marketing program manager for Baylor Dining Services, said she could not comment on the cups, and referred calls to Aramark's corporate offices, which could not be reached for comment Monday.
At least one other group has expressed its dissatisfaction with the Maupin cup.
Concerned Women for America, a national Christian women's organization, says Starbucks is promoting a homosexual agenda with the cup. The group also has expressed concern about the campaign as a whole, saying most of the quotes are liberal, according to a report in the Seattle Times.
Members of the local gay community said they are disappointed by the cups' removal.
Cade Hammond, president of the board of directors for the Gay and Lesbian Alliance of Central Texas, said he sees pulling the cups as unnecessarily restrictive. He said the situation reminds him of people who burn books because they don't like what they say.
“You can't restrict information like that,” Hammond said. “It just seems a little backwards.” Valerie Fallas, president of the Waco chapter of Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays, called the action “unnecessary.”
“It's a shame that anybody would do this,” Fallas said. “Whatever you feel, whatever you think about something, discussion is the number one thing to do to educate yourself on an issue.”
from WacoTrib.com