Nancy Rommelmann is either someone who can’t help shooting herself (and her husband’s business) in the foot—or is purposefully doing so.
The wife of Ristretto Roasters owner Din Johnson, Rommelmann has attracted a lot of attention for her YouTube series #MeNeither (which is also a podcast) that casts doubt on the experiences of sexual assault victims. After Ristretto employees publicly called Rommelmann out for the series, adding that her involvement with the coffee company made workers feel unsafe, Rommelmann, who originally tried to sell the notion that she wasn’t involved with Ristretto, suddenly had access to the company’s Twitter account and used the platform to lambaste a former employee who had spoken out against her.
Because of Rommelmann’s actions, Ristretto has taken a serious hit. They’ve lost employees, vendors, a Northwest location suddenly shuttered (Rommelmann says their lease ran out, the building’s owner seems to be indicating otherwise), and according to the Oregonian, the coffee roaster is now soliciting donations for their for-profit company on their website.
At this point, most people—if they were truly concerned about saving their family business—would attempt to make some sort of amends, or at the very least, keep their heads down until the scandal blew over. Instead, Rommelmann doubled tripled down and wrote an outraged op-ed for the Los Angeles Times about “outrage culture” in which she blames everyone in the world (except herself, of course) for her troubles.
In the op-ed, which was given the panic-stricken title “Outrage Culture Is Out of Control,” Rommelmann offers up a rather one-sided explanation of how she put herself in her current predicament, and then says:
This is the current pitch of outrage culture, where voicing an opinion someone says she sees as a threat qualifies you for instant annihilation, no questions asked. Why ask questions, when it’s more expedient, maybe more kickass, to turn anything you might disagree with into an emergency?
And…
Being in a constant state of emergency — a condition in which people notoriously make terrible decisions — is like having a fire raging inside the body, one that needs to be fed. It needs new fuel, and so we seek new enemies.
Meanwhile some of us are watching from the sidelines, trying to stay out of the way, hoping not to be next. (Good luck with that.)
Poor Nancy Rommelmann, guys! Innocently standing on the sidelines (spewing thoughtless bile about people who actually know something about suffering) and then getting viciously pummeled by those daring to have a different opinion. But I’m not here to explain why Rommelmann’s intellectually dishonest opinions hurt people—the city has responded, and the dire straits of Ristretto are testament to that. And I’m also not here to argue that Rommelmann appears to be willfully destroying her husband’s business with her fame-seeking actions—they can work that out in therapy. (As Rommelmann says, “Good luck with that.”)
My beef is not with Rommelmann’s “outrage culture.” It’s with “Wah-Wah, Why Are You Being Mean to My Shitty Opinions?” culture.
What Rommelmann doesn’t seem to comprehend is that—and let’s say it loud for the back section—no one is trying to stop her from having shitty opinions. (I have a few shitty opinions myself, including that the Beatles are highly overrated and we should stop playing their songs for 100 years.)
At the risk of “newspaperman-splaining,” I have been issuing shitty opinions and getting raked over the coals for over 25 years. Are my feelings hurt when people disagree with me? Yep! Do I think I deserve their vitriol? Nope! (At least most of the time.) But rarely, if ever, do I cry like a baby and lash out at the people who criticize me. Why? Because it’s not fucking fair. I’m wildly fortunate to have a forum in which I can express shitty opinions, so I refuse to abuse it by denying my readers a chance to respond. I’m free to say what I want, they’re free to respond, I accept their response (without necessarily agreeing), and we all move on with our lives.
In short: If your opinions are shitty, don’t blame the people who call you out. Sorry, but there’s no such thing as an “outrage culture”—but there certainly is an “entitled, thin-skinned, cry-baby culture” especially among those who create their own problems, actively try to make the world a shittier place, and then expect people to shut up and quietly ignore them.
Thanks to the internet and social media, we’ve all got a voice now. Please join me in using yours responsibly—and if you can’t do that, at least be brave enough to own your shit.
“Meanwhile some of us are watching from the sidelines, trying to stay out of the way, hoping not to be next.” So where in the L.A. Times, Penthouse vlogs, Reason.com, the Ristretto Twitter feed, and Andy Ngo’s House of Idiocy do “the sidelines” exist? Please, do tell use which ghouls are plucking you from your place on “the sidelines” and forcing you to keep yourself in the spotlight and keep the heat on Din’s company?
Some people just don’t know when to shut the fuck up.
Gosh, yes! “Outrage Culture” is so out of line! It’s getting so a person can’t start a blog to smear sexual assault survivors they’ve never met anymore!
So, in effect, these are rightwingers with a business problem trying to socialize it by asking people to give them money?
Rommelmann certainly does enjoy condescension: “I have been asked whether I hate the people who started this. The answer is I don’t. I see them as afraid of the ideas of others.”
I thought you were going to provide an example of a shitty opinion in your parenthetical, but then you didn’t.
Sounds like she’s 100% correct, based on the reaction. cc:Dissenter
I completely agree with you. You do have shitty opinions.
I agree about the Beatles. I have a prepared statement that I’m always ready to deliver.
Everyone reading this Merc piece should also take a minute or two to read Rommelmans Op-Ed. I did and I came away w a different opinion.
She maybe an idiot for not realizing that the bad PR could affect her husband’s business – especially in one of the most liberal cities in the country- but she is right about the culture of outrage. In her Op-Ed she gives the example of the MAGA hat kid in DC. We all know how that went.
And someone called the vendors to say the company “promotes rape culture”. WTF. That seems pretty out of bounds.
“Everyone reading this Merc piece should also take a minute or two to read Rommelmans Op-Ed. I did and I came away w a different opinion.” — No, Ed, no they don’t. She’s sounded off on no fewer than five different platforms and isn’t owed anything.
“She maybe [sic] an idiot for not realizing that the bad PR could affect her husband’s business – especially in one of the most liberal cities in the country-” There is no “may” about this.
“but she is right about the culture of outrage. In her Op-Ed she gives the example of the MAGA hat kid in DC. We all know how that went.” I mean, there are people in Vancouver who regularly come here to express how outraged they are that Portland exists. Outrage happens.
“And someone called the vendors to say the company…” Yes, Ed, that’s how a boycott works. It isn’t “out of bounds,” it’s 100% the point of that action. And, yes, if you blame rape victims, you promote rape culture. New Seasons and MOC made up their own minds, now go buy a pound of coffee for the cause or be done with it.
What was the culture like at the company? Did it treat its employees fairly? Was there a culture of harassment there?
Or did the Merc just use its bully pulpit to destroy an innocent small business?
Ed, Nancy has used her own bully pulpit on a HALF DOZEN SEPARATE OCCASIONS to bring down her own husband’s company. All the Merc has done is give her yet another avenue to do so. Thank you for weighing in from the Intellectually Dim Web, “Ed.”
Let’s go over the places where Nancy has friends: Nancy goes trolling protests with Andy Ngo one day and ends up in Quillette the next. Nancy pals around with Matt Welch at Reason and writes a few pieces, so she’s naturally allowed editorial space there. Nancy wrote for the L.A. Times and got chummy with Sue Horton, so the op-ed section is all hers. Nancy did some work for Mark Zusman at the WW, so naturally she’ll get treated with kid gloves there. Oh, and then there’s Penthouse, where this whole mess began. Remind us again how the media has roughed up Nancy Rommelmann — or why Nancy should, in any way, be treated like an objective journalist without favor or access.
Unable to edit or delete comments so…Apologies to the Merc for bully pulpit comment. And Doug Fer is correct in his last comment.
Re#15. He wrote 16 while I was writing. Not knowledgeable enough to comment on that.
And with that, I’m going to quit while I’m behind…
Ed Fuller is cc’ing dissenter because nothing says “against outrage culture” like needing your own special message board for like minded people everywhere you go on the internet.
Wait, I mean, NO, don’t cc dissenter! Your posting on a comment board only people with a plug-in can see (when working) will totally own us libs! It’s worse than posting to Gab! WE’RE SO PWNED!
meant Dean Fuller, not Ed Fuller. Sorry for the self-pwn
Dean, Ed… whatever. I’m sure it’s the same QA in different wrapping.
“Or did the Merc just use its bully pulpit to destroy an innocent small business?”
Ed, that’s not what bully pulpit means (it has nothing to do with bullying) – I hope people like you don’t change the definition through incorrect over usage.
Nice article by a crybaby crying about a crybaby crying about crybaby culture.
“But rarely, if ever, do I cry like a baby and lash out at the people who criticize me. Why? Because it’s not fucking fair. I’m wildly fortunate to have a forum in which I can express shitty opinions, so I refuse to abuse it by denying my readers a chance to respond.”
So you believe those same readers, upon reading something they dislike that you wrote, are also morally entitled to find your spouse or significant other, and then target harassment against them?
25 FTW
PC cashman -. She is the boss. Maybe not on paper but defacto she was there all the time. She was part of creating a culture of her being in power over the employees. The underpaid need every help to even power out as possible. Not everyone can just quit a job easily, so they feel trapped and must keep their mouths shut when her politics effected those work place. She publicly called out a previous employee who criticized her. Then she used the company account to dig her grave deeper. No one sought out retribution on her family. She brought it upon herself. I don’t know why or how her husband cannot or could not have stopped this activity of hers.
I would like to hear more from the former and current employees to see how the company treated them.
@28: “Maybe not on paper”? You mean actually, legally, and in the only way that matters?
As for “evening out the power” it’s not equal nor is it intended to be. One side pays the bill’s, the other is a bill. That’s not equal because the investment and risk are not the same.