'I don't know what a cop is thinking when he looks at me.'

Followed by -

'I know he'd probably kick me out of wherever I'm sleeping for the night.'

Open your eyes flaming hypocrite. There are 10 places to lay around drunk and hate cops for every 1 officer on the street in this town.

Woah, a Hello Kitty tattoo! This story is now twice as interesting as it was before.

Good for them. I don't see why everyone gets so excited about a group that wants to make their cafe feel right for them. Blogtown. Gawker. CNN Today! Will your next expose be on clubs with dress codes or bouncers? Uniformed cops and notebook-wielding reporters are a definite mood-changer, even if you've never been harassed by them before.

What I want to know is, why is all vegan kidney bean chili so salty? And bring back the apple cake.

So who *is* allowed at this fucking place?

There are a lot of good cops out there. Just cause some of them get trigger happy is no excuse to treat all cops you see like shit. Kicking that guy out of the cafe was rude.

"The flannel-clad environmental anarchist told me he was a writer of poetry and mysticism (though he rejects money and thus does not have a job or a house)."
PRICELESS!!!
Hahaha!
Then did he ask you for a spare ciggarette?
because anything 'Spare' doesn't cost a thing!

Your Loss diner people! maybe you would have found out that "they" are just like you and most times when there is a confrontation they are there only because they are answering a call. Or maybe you just don't want to hear about how the drunk husband who beat the crap out of his wife and then launched on the cop. Or how about the time I went to a shooting on Xmas eve where two were dead and four others were shot by the X boyfriend. I'm not saying all cops are good but to many people use the "BAD" brush to paint all of us. As i Used to say to my "Problem people", I would rather tell a couple of jokes with you than to go toe to toe with you

I support Red and Black, many of their clientale consist of activists that have had negative run ins with the police through their political work and activism and would feel intimidated by their presence. I also wonder how the police officer ended up there when there's plenty of other coffee places and cafes in that area.

It doesn't matter if he made people uncomfortable. Can you kick an Israeli out of a Lebanese restaurant? Can you kick a White person of a Soul Food restaurant? Its discrimination any way you spin it. Whenever I walk into a restaurant, I shouldn't have to think about whether the clientèle/staff there finds me acceptable when I'm just trying to get a damn drink.

These comparisons of what happened to actual bigotry are pretty offensive. Being a police officer is not the same as being black or anything else that you have no control over. People choose to be police officers and can choose not to be. Langley was quoted as saying that if the cop had come in not in uniform he wouldn't have batted an eye. You can't take your skin off. Moreover just as much as a police officer might remind *you* of that time you saw them help someone it will remind someone else of that time they we're harrassed or falsely arrested. Not to mention all the unjust laws that police selectively enforce -- mostly against people with less money and power -- just in the course of their job and regardless of whether they are nice or mean people. Let's also not forget all those cops wearing "I am Chris Humphreys" shirts. Wait wasn't Chris Humphreys one of the cops who beat that homeless guy James Chasse to death for urinating in public?

This whole scenario is weird to me. I worked in coffee shops a couple of years and it became pretty widely known that cops are extremely selective about where they buy coffee (for fear of having something slipped in their food/drink). The fact that a cop would go into the Red and Black at all seems like he was trying to instigate something. I guess he was successful. I guess my only point - regardless of the "appropriateness" of the R&B - is that the choice of the cop to patronize the R&B seems suspect to me.

Yeah, I'm with Will here. After reading all the reports on the incident I could find it really sounds like the cop walked up and a couple of Portland's neo-hippie, anti-establishment types immediately felt threatened, before the cop had time to do anything to justify the obvious antipathy.

Even the posts that obviously try to sensationalize it against the cop are only vaguely able to make it sound like he was giving off heavy "I'm a hardass with a boner for arresting hippies" vibe through his poorly described body language.

This is equivalent to a young black dude walking into a bar in South Carolina and having a middle aged white manager tell him to leave because his dreads and baggy pants make the redneck regulars in the bar uncomfortable.

"These comparisons of what happened to actual bigotry are pretty offensive. Being a police officer is not the same as being black or anything else that you have no control over. People choose to be police officers and can choose not to be. Langley was quoted as saying that if the cop had come in not in uniform he wouldn't have batted an eye."

You're right. Being a cop is not the same as being Hindu or black or Mexican or a leopard or whatever. At least not in the grand scheme.

HOWEVER, in this case, it's damn near perfectly analogous because the cop's uniform essentially functions as his skin. The moment it was seen by the Red & Black patrons and employees, it metaphorically grafted itself to his body, making it impossible for him to change his public persona in the eyes of all assembled to anything but "cop."

Argue that he could have gone into the place sans uniform if you'd like, but I doubt his superiors would approve of his changing into civvies just to (presumably) get a cup of coffee -- and that's even assuming that he would have the foresight (or wild paranoid assumption abilities) to know that the Red & Black would be full of people whose life experience has left them diametrically opposed to him (statistically speaking, most likely through no fault of his own) to the point where they refuse to even share a room with him or anyone of his ilk for a few moments.

I'm sure Langley would not have batted an eye had the cop walked in wearing jeans and a t-shirt, but only because he would have had no idea that the guy was a cop. Say the man had accidentally dropped his badge on the counter when going through his pockets to find his wallet. What then? Would Langley still be so magnanimous or would the cop suddenly find himself being booted?

But then, you're arguing against the cries of hypocrisy by quoting the accused after the fact using concepts and possible actions whose basis in reality is truly known only to him. Given the current public backlash he faces, he could not really have said much else.

Thus, using what Langley says may make you feel better about your own personal stake in this thing, but it hardly stands as a valid counterpoint.

(Post Script: Wow. I typed SO much more than I'd planned to. Normally I'm as anti-establishment as any Portlander (though I bathe daily and never smell of patchouli), but countering police brutality by acting like passive aggressive cuntweasels is only going to make things worse.

And that's even forgetting to mention how embarrassed I am that a group of self-important neo-hippy fucks (at least one of whom no doubt sports the base fucking defilement of popular culture known as "white guy dreads") is suddenly representative of our fair city's angry, antiestablishment population! I don't know about you all, but when people in New York City or London or Bangkok or Reykjavik think about Portlanders standing up against the plague of police brutality that has left corpses dotting our landscape like Jackson Pollock's alternate reality, post-stigmata mural work I'd rather we not all be imagined as trust fund bums only angry about this issue because some girl who claims to be 1/16 Kickapoo (and who has been using the nom de stupidity of She Who Walks With Butterflies On Her Ankle (aka Helen Goldstein)) told us it was "like so hot when a guy stands up for what he believes in!")

(Post Script 2: See what sleep deprivation does? Rambling screeds against people you probably know. I'm now off to bed. Fight the power. I guess.)

Discriminating against someone, not for who they are, but who you think they are doesn't sound "sweet," nor "soft-hearted."

Col Summers City Park, high Noon, march to R&B, and throw rocks through their windows. That’ll show them. /irony

Yeah, cops do fucked up shit sometimes. Sometimes it’s justified like in the case of Keaton Otis. Sometimes it’s not; Chasse/Campbell. And sometimes it’s just fucked up; Collins. That’s an unfortunate part of their job, and I don’t think the bulk of our police force want to have that experience.

I understand that this makes people uncomfortable. It should. But as a group of people the police shouldn’t be discriminated against for their profession.

If Crooker had, in any way, personally harmed or harassed R&B patrons I would understand Langley’s decision. But I’ve heard no evidence to support that. Throwing out a uniformed cop for getting a cup of coffee at your establishment is bigoted.

"So who *is* allowed at this fucking place?"

Bums. Except not real bums. "Environmental anarchists" who will transition easily back to the middle class when they're done playing class war.

If he "rejects money" is it safe to assume he's not begging for handouts downtown? Who pays for his coffee? I'd be willing to bet it goes on Mommy's Gold Card.

They only call it class war when we fight back.
(Sorry, I couldn't resist.)

Also, it takes real guts to stand up to police!
Comparing it to racially and religiously discriminating against some powerless person is funny. Well, not really 'funny'... more like predictable and ignorant and exactly what I'd expect from the Peanut Gallery here.

Red and Black... you're awesome! Way to go!
Only in the PNW.

Sincerely, I think your detractors should move to Austin. Or Amarillo. Or just about anywhere else in the U.S. You'll love it there and everyone will be happier. Lord knows you probably have the money to move. Maybe build your second home there...let us keep Portland.

For some reason this Monty Python clip keeps coming to mind every time I read about the R&B cop-snubbing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Xd_zkMEgkI

"I support Red and Black, many of their clientele consist of {good white folks} that have had negative run ins with the {coloreds} through their {slave owning} and {sharecropping} and would feel intimidated by their presence. I also wonder how the {colored boy} ended up there when there's plenty of other coffee places and cafes in that area."

Seriously guys. It's fucking discrimination. Apparently, anarchists don't consider hypocrisy as the root of all hubris.

Saint Waldo, it's interesting comparison to make. Did you know that orgins and original role of the police in this country was capturing runaway slaves?

I'm sure there were some good people who wore Nazi uniforms, too. Seriously, Red and Black, it's not cool to judge people based on the institutions they voluntarily choose to join.

An un-hip conservative Jesus freak mom, who works for a desperate and faltering conservative local newspaper, takes her daughter to a hip liberal cafe. In walks a cop, in a town where the cops hate the locals and, consequently, the locals don't think much of the cops. The two unlikely patrons get together, get into it with a worker, and create a national media sensation with it.

This didn't happen by accident, it was a staged media event.

Anarchists should take "personal responsibility" for the windows they break. CEOs and stockholders don't sweep up that glass and replace the windows.

A cop in uniform is a symbol of oppression for almost anybody who comes into contact with them.
It happens to be common knowledge for those informed that anything you say to law enforcement will never be used to aid you, so why is disliking the presence of someone who cannot be trusted, offensive?
It is because you are line toeing fawns, not people who truly embrace freedom, especially if you live in the culture of constant war, the good ol boy United states of america

Be careful about tossing the term bigot around. The dictionary defines bigot as "a person who is intolerant of opinions, lifestyles, or identities differing from his or her own." So while you are tossing the term "bigot" around, remember that you just fit definition yourself.

Many businesses will as a person to leave if their appearance or behavior interferes with their business. It isn't illegal. It isn't racism, in spite of what that cop said.

I'm a square middle-class white guy but I'm going to go out of my way to patronize the Red and Black now, after reading all these stupid stupid comments comparing the cop-snubbing incident to racism against black people. WTF?? I hate when I'm trying to enjoy a cup of coffee in peace and a cop swaggers in like he owns the joint, his belt bristling with weapons, eyeing everyone suspiciously and condescendingly asserting his steroid-pumped alpha maleness over the whole room. Fuck that shit.

Really, John is right. Cops shouldn't be allowed to eat in restaurants. Especially the male cops.

I really don't understand why this is considered a news story. I will say that the sensationalistic comparisons to race discrimination are mind boggling. There is really no comparison between a person who is systemically oppressed for traits beyond their control and someone who chooses to join a force that is endowed by government and society with a great power and authority (and who is armed).

My (late life adopted) daughter, who is Black, who hates cops because they have arrested her on many occasions, finds this incident sickening. HER words were "that's discrimination and just not okay." I, an ultra-liberal, ex-vegetarian (for health reasons) am also apalled and disgusted by this incident. We live in Seattle where there have been similar excessive force issues with the police. I get why people take issue with them. But I have needed the police on several occasions when I have been attacked by drug-crazed or in-the-throes-of-a-psychotic-break foster kids I take care of. (I take care of very special needs kids.) If it weren't for the threat of jail, my daughter would not be home right now.

Being a cop is a thankless job. They are shot at and killed in the line of duty far more often than any of us are. They are attacked and assaulted and abused. They have to enter incredibly dangerous situations. Many of them do get off on the power but many of them do it because they want to serve. Until you are ready and willing to face down a gunwielding psycho on your own, you have no right to judge someone for joining the police force, something that is needed. Someone has to do the job. No, it's not the same as racism but discrimination is discrimination and completely uncool. You cannot justify bigotry by saying some kinds are worse than others. As a woman and a sexual minority and a disabled person, I still say this is completely unacceptable and am not offended by the comparison to the discrimination I have experienced. It is not about the cop or his feelings, it is about what is right and what is wrong.

Oh, and the police were not created to capture runaway slaves. That's ridiculous. You think Boston established their constabulary to capture slaves to send back south? Give me a break.

My (late life adopted) daughter, who is Black, who hates cops because they have arrested her on many occasions, finds this incident sickening. HER words were "that's discrimination and just not okay." I, an ultra-liberal, ex-vegetarian (for health reasons) am also apalled and disgusted by this incident. We live in Seattle where there have been similar excessive force issues with the police. I get why people take issue with them. But I have needed the police on several occasions when I have been attacked by drug-crazed or in-the-throes-of-a-psychotic-break foster kids I take care of. (I take care of very special needs kids.) If it weren't for the threat of jail, my daughter would not be home right now.

The Portland Police Department have earned the mistrust and suspicion of many, many Portlanders over the years. This reflects the situation we're in. We just don't like our police force and they don't make us feel safe, they make us feel threatened and in harm's way.

They don't live in our community, they're from out of town and don't seem to share our values. The police should make the citizens feel safe and when the citizens feel threatened by their own civil servants a change needs to be made with the police NOT the citizens.

I'm sick and tired of showing tolerance to the police when it really should be the other way around. Face it... On that day, that cop WAS Chris Humphreys, so deal with it.

@ serendipity:

"Saint Waldo, it's interesting comparison to make. Did you know that orgins and original role of the police in this country was capturing runaway slaves?"

WHAT THE SHIT?!?! I just spit crackers all over my keyboard. Big, wet saltines. Cupertino is gonna be pissed.

Okay, I'm going to call bullshit on this until you offer some kind of salient evidence. Hell, I'd even accept Wikipedia for this insane-o concept that somehow the "police" of America specifically developed to combat the scourge of runaway slaves (as opposed to the way the "police" developed in, say, every other culture throughout the entirety of human history in which the group was designed to combat a wide range of societal ills).

I couldn't even type your part of the above statement without the logical part of my brain screaming at the rest of me for momentarily perpetuating the notion that such a concept for the development of a law enforcement entity actually holds purchase in the minds of adult peoples here in the year 2010. If, for no other reason, than that it is completely, disgustingly inefficient.

Even assuming everyone in early America lived in abject fear of turning to stone if they saw a runaway slave (as history teaches us is almost always the result), I can't see anyone in a snappy powdered wig thinking that this idea is anything but a revolting waste of resources on par with the $40,000 toilets that the residents of what would become Washington, D.C. would fortunately never live long enough to witness in the government they helped build.

Damn! Plantfood beat me to my decrying serendipity's whacked out "America's police forces were created specifically to combat the runaway slave menace."

I was baffled that I would actually be the first/only person to be totally stunned by that statement. Nice to see there's more than one of us reading these comments with a terrified grimace and a keyboard full of wet cracker chunks.

Propers plantfood. Propers.

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Anarchists-L…

How can workers of the world unite if certain worker groups discriminate against others? The true power of the working class is in solidarity. We must work to better understand each other so that we can progress towards a more just community. How can this happen if specific groups of the working class can't even buy a cup of coffee in a setting where this type of discussion should be occurring?
Pay a visit or call and demand that The Red and Black Cafe change their anti-workers' rights policies and hypocritical behavior. 503-231-3899
In solidarity,
disappointed and disheartened vegans, activists, anarchists, and socialists...

I'm really happy I live in the city where this happened. It's entertaining, it stirs things up, and it's how people should behave -- with complete honesty. I have definitely turned away from a cafe or two in the past because cops were inside. Not because I was doing anything illegal, but because I can't stand being around cops. I'm 41 years old, and they have consistently been condescending, threatening, rude and disrespectful to me my whole life. I'm generally nice to everyone, including cops, but it's really a delight to see this juxtaposition.

I eat at the Red & Black sometimes for lunch; it's close to my work. I'm vegan, they have delicious kale, etc.

I didn't expect to come down on the cops' side on this one. But I do.

The workers at the Red & Black are always utter and complete assholes to me, and my only offense is NOT looking obviously crusto-anarchist. I am polite and civil and don't make audible remarks about the lousy service and dirty fingernails, but something about my appearance must just scream 'middle management employee'. They can smell the oppressor on me, too, I suppose?

So it's my totally uninformed opinion that they took this arbitrary, entitled penchant for judging people by appearance to its limit; and now, they're getting sh*t tons of flack and negative press over it, which they deserve.

That said, they're total dicks and I'm excited to spend my vegan dollars at Sweet Pea and Hungry Tiger Too.

""He walked in with a bit of a swagger. I was standing outside and he was like 'How's the coffee?' and I was like 'Really?' I think he wanted to be a bully in a passive-aggressive way."

Me thinks there's a fair bit of projection here.

Why'd you delete the communist dude's comment?

nevermind I found it.

A lot of the modern police force was based from southern slave patrols. The South Carolina slave patrol was established in 1704 to find and capture fugitive slaves. Howard Zinn also alludes to this in his writings. Groups of white men organized into slave patrols in the southern colonies. They were responsible for controlling, returning, and punishing runaway slaves. These patrols served to maintain the economic order in the southern colonies. These are generally considered to be the first "modern" police organizations in this country. The police serve to enforce oppression. They're not the ones being oppressed. Other authors on this subject or Sally Haden and Michael Hindus.

Would the owner of this cafe kicked out black police officer if they walked in ?

What I want to know is would the owner have kicked out a black Officer, hispanic Officer or a female Officer?

I'm an anarchist and think this incident is bloody stupid - hippies drive me nuts, especially the 'live on benches and hate civilisation' type - you're not even anarchists (ya' know, the old working class tradition). However i'm sure the paper made sure to use quotes from this idiot over some of the more sensible people there just to sensationalise.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-CkV9JWQIJk

It's on like Donkey Kong:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-CkV9JWQIJk

I know this is late to the game, and I wonder if the "anarchists" at the cafe would even care, but it's worth pointing out that discriminating against the cop, based on his employment as a cop, is illegal in Portland.

Portland prohibits discrimination in places of public accommodation based on "source of income." http://www.portlandonline.com/auditor/inde…

"Source of income" is "the means by which a person supports himself or herself and his or her dependents, including but not limited to money and property from any occupation, profession or activity..."

http://www.portlandonline.com/auditor/inde…

So it's against the law to say, "You earn your money as a cop and therefore you aren't welcome here." Not that the officer would likely want to file suit or a complaint, but he'd be well within his rights to.

"'How's the coffee?', well I knew what He really meant." Fuck that paranoid homeless retard for opening his stupid face. Fuck that dumb-shit cop for strolling around like an arrogant prick, perpetuating irrational fear. And Fuck that dumb stoned ass vegan shop owner for bringing her weed to work and getting all "sketched out". And shame on everyone here for giving credence to every self-righteous loud-mouth prick that should have been aborted. Everyone just leave everyone else alone. Stop squabbling and we’ll all get through this little life.

Guess the *anarchist * did not mind taking the cops money...hypocrites and now that they make over $1,000 a day I guess the "true" anarchists will stop eating there, right?
The cafe owner is now a true capitalist - where will the anarchists go now???

Wow. I had no idea that so called "liberal Portland" and the Mercury readership was so full of Right-wing douche bags. You all know what you can do to yourselves. It's not the police officer as a person (I've met a few who were quite nice) but it is the police officer as a representative of "authority" that they (rightfully) asked to leave. Don't you Right-wing wank jobs support a business exercising its right to eject someone who is making others feel POLITICALLY unsafe? This is not based on the color of someones skin or beliefs. This is based on the fact that this guy came in with his badge and his gun. These are fairly menacing items for many people. I have also had a number of encounters with the police in which they were not so friendly (read: total authoritarian assholes) for no good reason. A police officer with half a mind and a real interest in connecting with the Red & Black would have made the initial connection without the uniform. That's diplomacy 101, dipshits! Maybe then things would have been different. But fucking tell me that this guy didn't know the extent or the effects of his actions. If he didn't, then maybe he could use some more de-escalation training. What this officer did stinks of provocation and intimidation. I know it, you knuckle-heads know it, and I fucking hope this officer would know it!

Is it ironic that "anarchists" would even recognize the authority of a uniformed officer? I'm also confused how the cafe can preach equality while simultaneously discriminate. Are people so insecure that just the presence of a uniform makes them tinkle (just a little)? Well, Keep Portland Weird (and hypocritical at times).