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Angry little Trumpkins barrage JP restaurant Facebook page with bogus reviews; neighbors, other restaurant owners fight back
By adamg on Wed, 08/03/2016 - 3:07pm
One of the owners of the Centre Street Cafe and two other restaurants in Jamaica Plain has spent the day trying to get Facebook to remove a string of bogus hostile reviews sparked by an anti-Trump video an employee posted on his own personal page.
Keith Harmon says one-star ratings on the Centre Street Cafe's Facebook review page started last night. At first, he said, he began responding to them because he takes criticism seriously. Then he noticed the people attaching negative "reviews" to their ratings, including one alleging an employee had offered sexual acts to the supposed reviewer in the men's room. As he was reading that one, he said, another one came in:
Place was full of liberals. Trying to kick out trump supporters. I was spit at and stuff thrown at me for my political choices. One specific employee ... was swearing at me and even threw a drink at me because I didn't support his choice in gay marriage.
Harmon pieced together that the employee in question had posted a link to an anti-Trump video - on his own personal Facebook page - and that Trump supporters followed a link from there to Centre Street Cafe, which he listed as his workplace.
"Honestly, it was a terrible night," Harmon said.
This morning, Harmon posted a note on his personal Facebook page about "today's unexpected challenge as a small restaurant."
People who actually know where Jamaica Plain is and who go to the Centre Street Cafe - or Tres Gatos or Casa Verde - and people who own other Boston-area restaurants have risen up in defense, flooding the restaurant reviews page with five-star reviews, such as this one by Chris Lin, the owner of Seven Star Street Bistro in Roslindale:
An amazing neighborhood cafe with craveable pastas and service that reflects the ownership and staff's longtime dedication to service. Love having CSC just around the corner in JP!
"I'm almost stunned at how many people came out of the woodwork who are JP people and restaurant people," Harmon said.
Harmon said the employee faces no trouble at work because of his post. "As a business, we have no right to tell people what to do outside the workplace," he said, continuing, however, that on a personal level, he suggested to the employee he lay low for a while, because the sort of people who write the things they did "tend to be fairly dangerous." In fact, he said, managers at the restaurants will pay special attention to customers leaving tonight, to make sure they get out safely. And he said he will contact police at District E-13 for advice.
Harmon acknowledges that, personally, he agrees with his worker on Trump, but that he would never use his business to express that view - and "I certainly never thought it was something that would affect our business or the people I know."
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Comments
Oy.
Mr. Harmon is handling this all admirably, and I love that the restaurant community is showing up to support him. I hope his customers do, too.
Somewhat like the Streisand Effect.
The publicity will probably do his business some good.
The business will continue to do well regardless of the
publicity surrounding this attack because it's a very good restaurant: excellent food and solid service.
What's beneficial about this ugly incident is that it further exposes Trump's most loathsome supporters as willing to resort to illegal defamation against a business as a means of retaliating against a private citizen that criticized their political views.
Sometimes the fascism label really sticks to Trumpies, and this case is a perfect example of it.
Then he's got nothing to worry about.
Hey, I think it's a lousy thing to do to a restaurant. Will he survive? Well, I bet if AG went there tonight, he could report on the line in the street. My point is not so much about the politics of it, it's about the reactions by different people.
Growing up
... is hard to do when you are fact averse, paranoid, and hatefully entitled.
Imagine making up lies,
Imagine making up lies, trying to get someone fired and hurting another persons business(who had nothing to do with this) just because you disagree with a persons political views? These Trump nuts are desperate and callous and their actions show it.
This happens a lot
From every crevasse of politics, typically facebook and/or yelp will shut down the page and delete spam postings.
I know where my wife and I
I know where my wife and I are dining on Friday.
He would never use his business to condemn Trump?
I think he just did. Never heard of the place and don't condone fake reviews but I think the owner might want to advise the staff (and himself) to keep their politics to themselves or quit the job. Politics, abortion, religion etc. best left unsaid when catering to the general public.
Wait...
So, now, anyone who owns a business or has a job is forbidden from expressing political opinion? Even on their own personal Facebook page or when directly asked in an interview?
Is that what you're saying? If so, please clarify who exactly *is* allowed to have a political opinion. If not, please clarify what you did mean to say. Because it certainly sounds like you're saying anyone who wants to express an opinion should quit their job.
Also: Why? Are you simply incapable of coexisting and doing business with someone who holds different views? Is it that hard? When you were a kid on the playground, did you pack up your toys and go home whenever another kid had a different favorite Power Ranger than you?
Sorry for all the questions, I'm just deeply intrigued by your rationale.
It's Fish. Every rhetorical
It's Fish. Every rhetorical question after your "why?" is answered by an "eff yeah, whatcha gonna do, fight about it?"
Do not engage. As someone once artfully put it, a certain subset of America would happily live in a box under an overpass, roasting pigeons on a clothes hanger over a garbage fire, as long as their neighbors had neither box nor pigeon nor hanger nor fire.
They used to make me angry. I'm all out of anger. I don't even have enough faith in humanity left to call them trolls. At least trolls are disingenuous. This... This is just too sad.
He meant to specify "if you have liberal opinions"
Then you should be forced to keep them to yourself. Conservative opinions, of course, are a different story. The hell with this logic.
Its kinda like when that
Its kinda like when that bakery refused to bake a wedding cake for a gay couples wedding due to their religious beliefs. Same with the Indiana pizza shop. Remember that? Their business was essentially forced to shut down as they got death threats reviews, slandered and on and on...
I despise Trump in every aspect but this is one of many reasons he is, sadly, the Republican nominee. People are sick of the liberal/Political correctness double standard. It appears to be a one way street for liberals and progs.
Cue the outrage in 3...2...1!...
Except
those aren't even faintly analogous. Those shop owners made a public spectacle of their own crappy behavior, and they got called out on it. They chose to bring political matters to their own businesses, and they discovered what the repercussions of that are. I 100% repudiate the threats of violence made against them, and I don't think you'll find many progressive types who condone it. I do, however, completely support the boycotts against them. People can say whatever the hell they want, they just need to be ready to face the consequences for it.
In this case, an employee on his own time made a statement in his own circle of friends, and a bunch of asshats tracked down his employer to try to get him in trouble for it. It is in the process of backfiring spectacularly.
Not the same at all
The Bakery owners also pocketed the deposit for the cake, cancelled at the last minute, and then published the names and addresses of the people they denied service to in order to get them threatened, attacked, and barraged with hate.
THAT is why they were SUED BLUE and LOST.
An employee posted something on his own personal Facebook
page, and these cowardly assholes tracked him down to his job and started posting defamatory fake reviews on his employer's business Facebook page. The owner did not use his business Facebook page to express any political point of view, but was answering a reporter's questions.
You can stop blithering now.
But
that's pretty much all he does...
like a nonsensical blither-shark, he can't stop or he'll die.
This isn't like the bakery; this is like ganging up on Quinn...
...to destroy her work & income, drive her out of her house, scare the crap out of her.
These are bullies who are so intellectually weak and cowardly that they gang up to harass a stranger anonymously, a waiter at a small cafe, who poses exactly zero threat to them.
This is a group of asshats who only feel worth when they're part of an angry mob.
Good for everyone helping Keith & the waiter.
"and these cowardly assholes tracked him down to his job"
Yup.
They didn't have to track very hard.
Facebook is as open as you let it be.
The internet contains a whole damn planet of people.
Not everyone is nice.
So you're defending their behavior?
You approve of people going after a small business with fake, defamatory reviews because they don't like one of their employee's opinions that were expressed outside of work?
Nice friends you got there.
Not what I said at all.
I don't condone it at all.
But, it's as predictable as a sunrise.
So your response is, "Eh, what can you do?", instead
of, "These hateful thugs using illegal means to stifle political dissent should be condemned in the strongest terms possible"?
Good to see you have your priorities straight there.
Let me get this straight
Facebook is public.
UHub is public.
Not everyone is nice.
But, hey, okay for trumpster fires to attack a small restaurant, but not okay for someone to point out to a person who has publicly identified his former employer and who has publicly said "what's the big deal" how it would go if someone did the same to him.
Faux outrage is sooooo cute.
No, he didn't and I doubt you thought either
Good thing we never gave you a gun and asked you to defend our rights...
Illustrative Counterexample
Many of us dislike the things that you post here.
Many people know that you are a retired cop.
What these Trumpards did is equivalent to this: Say someone took one of your Obama is Kenyan screeds personally, and proceeded to spam the twitter feed and the Facebook page for the Quincy Police Department. Stuff like how a certain former employee used to force young boys to have sex with him or be arrested. Stuff about how said former cop used to plant drugs on black people. Or, maybe, kept a Swastika and Hitler picture inside his uniform. That sort of thing.
Okay by you? I mean, you run your keyboard here all the time, isn't it just "fair" to slander you and your employer because you expressed your opinion privately???
Illustrative Counterexample
No, it ain't.
Sorry.
As I might have already said, the FB page was public. Not private. As is AG's blog here.
I didn't know fish was a retired Quincy cop. I still don't know. I assumed he's police but that's about it.
See swirl, what you did there is borderline 'doxxing'. It's a classic intimidation tactic of 'progressives' and lefties all over the internet. You had no need to use that information to make the comparison between Fish and someone that posted their info, voluntarily, on a damn facebook page for all to see.
I've been here a while, don't know who he work(ed) for or if he's still active.
You are living proof that intelligence cannot buy class.
Doxxing a left-wing tactic? What, as used by
famous liberals like Donald Trump, Curt Schilling, and the Reddit assholes that incorrectly identified Sunil Tripathi as one of the Marathon bombers, an innocent kid who later committed suicide?
As for Fish's identity being "revealed", are you new here? He's been going on about himself on uHub for years.
At the end of the day, you are effectively defending the indefensible: Trumpie douches attacking a business, one that is explicitly apolitical in its social media presence, by posting fake, defamatory reviews because an employee criticized them on his personal page outside of work.
Find some better friends. The people you're hanging with online are unspeakable.
Heh
"identified Sunil Tripathi as one of the Marathon bombers, an innocent kid who later committed suicide?"
He went missing in March. Poor kid might have been dead a while when the Marathon bombing happened.
I hang here...LOL...
Congratulations on all being too cowardly
To really own your opinions. Is this a positive thing? How so? I wonder what the founders would think.
?
Huh?
Not Doxxing
If he's outed himself numerous times.
Also, consider this, dimwit: your discomfort with this should be telling you that what these Trumpnutters did is WRONG ... but you went the other way with it.
Go kiss your best friends ... urm ... guns and hug them tight!
Wow!
Think you could have worked any harder to miss the point?
In fact, you pretty much demonstrated the point: if one can take PUBLIC information posted on a PUBLIC forum and only that PUBLIC information and use it like this, and fishy is okay with that, then would he be okay with it happening to him?
If I wanted to doxx Fishy, I could do it. No problem. I have far better things to do with my time. I merely referred to the information that he has posted on UHub in the last year. Not the same dear, not the same as doxxing - nowhere near. Just publicly posted information. Like posting your employer on FB, posting your former employer on UHub is public.
This is a public forum and what is posted here is public. Need I remind you that again?
Citation please
Show me where fish told us he was a retired Quincy cop. I missed it.
Dear, fish could probably doxx you quite nicely.
Me? I don't have a facebook page or a twitter, so I fly under the radar for your google mad skiilz.
Not Quincy PD
State Police. I don't know anything about him other than what he's posted here, but I know he was a state trooper because, yes, he's posted in the past about being one. Pointing you to specific examples would require more time with Google than I think it's worth, so I'm not going to do it, but the UHub search engine is Google under the covers - if you want to spend the time, go for it.
Because they went here, idjit
He made a statement in response to a campaign attacking his business by a bunch of room-temperature-IQ limbots who picked a stupid and needless fight. They went there; he responded. When you throw mud, you're standing in the swamp, not the moral high ground.
What r they worried about? I
What r they worried about? I think almost of their customers are anti-Trump anyway.
Yes, the fact that JP has a lot of liberal residents makes it
a-okay for a bunch of hateful Trump supporters to post malicious, defamatory fake reviews on the business Facebook page of small independent restaurant that lives and dies by its reputation.
If you're trying to make a joke, you failed.
I hate total war politics
Who cares what this employee's political beliefs are? Even if the owner felt this way and posted on his own MySpace page (or whatever) things against Trump, Clinton, Johnson, Stein, Warren, Baker, or whoever, the only thing I care about from a business is that they treat me respectfully and provide a good or service consummate with the costs.
This is yet another example of why I hate politics more and more every day (and this feeling predates this current election cycle, but this cycle is much worse.)
Completely agree but this is
Completely agree but this is when you have a culture(for the sake of political correctness) perpetuated by a corrupt and disingenuous media who MAKES everything political. It didnt used to be that way.
yup
And they also didn't serve blacks at many businesses, and openly discriminated against gay patrons, in less "politically correct" times. God forbid a culture becomes more inclusive and less hateful.
What do you expect?
CCD thinks that posting something at home on a private facebook page = denying service to gay patrons and making sure they are attacked and harassed.
Trumpies have threatened a Boston business with fake negative
reviews before: https://twitter.com/unlikelywords/status/748358325646008320 One can imagine them smashing the windows of businesses they don't like, too.
Nawww
That would be too much like actual work.
I have a feeling the
I have a feeling the restaurant will be able to handle this, since a neighborhood place like this has plenty of regular customers and personal goodwill, rather than depending on anonymous online reviews to attract business.
My point wasn't meant to be political
To simplify matters, my point (obviously missed) was that it's probably an unwise fiduciary decision for anyone catering to the public to openly advocate for or against a candidate or controversial position. It's certainly their right to express their views but perhaps it's their responsibility to the business to appear neutral. I think those being laid off by the Globe and Macy's might agree with me.
And the point you are still missing is that the restaurant's
social media policy is to be explicitly apolitical in its business presence: no political opinions are expressed on its business Facebook page.
Once again, a private citizen expressed a political opinion on his own personal Facebook page. Those Trump fuckwits scoured his personal page to figure out where he worked and retaliated against him by posting bogus reviews on his employer's business Facebook page.
I think the co-owner is correct in saying, "What our employees post on their personal pages is not for us to censor". These craven, mostly anonymous bullies are committing defamation (libel) by posting bogus negative reviews to harm this employee, and looking like brownshirts in using such tactics to stifle dissent. The fascist label sticks to these human turds.