A NEWS STORY: TO EAT STEAK OR NOT?*

Susannah Park, a Korean American, was eating lunch with some friends. They struck up a conversation about current events and her friend mentioned a restaurant in Wissinoming, PA, called “Chink’s.” Opened in 1949 by the late Samuel “Chink” Sherman, the steak shop has become a neighborhood legend. Chink’s Steaks was voted Best of Philly for cheesesteaks by Philly Magazine in 2002. Joseph Groh is the current owner of Chink’s Steaks.

Susannah Park, however, was horrified. She called the restaurant owner and requested that he consider changing the name of the shop because “having a restaurant with that name ... is telling the world that ‘chink’ is an appropriate term and that it’s not a racial slur,” Park said. Joseph Groh refused. “The restaurant has been here 55 years and no one has ever questioned it,” said Groh. “Besides, everybody is welcome here! I know there are lots of racist people in the world, but I’m not one of them.”

Sam Sherman’s widow, Mildred Sherman, says that Sam got the nickname “Chink” when he was 6, because of his slanty eyes. Many people didn’t learn of his real name until they attended his funeral in 1997. Sherman said the nickname is etched on her husband’s gravestone. She called the controversy “ridiculous.” “We are Jewish people. We are far from racists. We have Chinese customers!” Sherman claimed. “My husband was well-loved by everybody in this town.”

Park thinks that the restaurant name hasn’t become a controversy because it is in a neighborhood that is largely white and because the Asian community is not very outspoken. She hopes bringing attention to this will help educate people. The restaurant name is just “another reminder of how much cultural insensitivity there still is around us,” she said.

What should Susannah Park do?

*Source: Adapted from a news story written by Myung Oak Kim (2004, January 9). Contact her at kimm@phillynews.com.

INTERACTIVE PROBES
(Ask yourself and probe your classmates’ reactions)
(NOTE: See “Chapter 9 Class Handouts” for a printable form containing these questions.)

1. Can you understand why Park was upset about a restaurant named “Chink’s”?

2. Can you understand why both Groh and Sherman were upset about Park’s request?

3. Select a number on a scale from 1 to 10, with 1 = strongly disagree and 10 = strongly agree, to indicate whether you believe that Groh should change his restaurant’s name.

4. If the Philly steakhouse was given a new name such as “Honky’s,” “Jew Boy’s,” “Dyke’s,” “Faggot’s,” “Nigger’s,” “Wetback’s,” or “Redskin’s” would you have any objections to the use of any of the terms? Would you still eat steak there?

FURTHER APPLICATION PROBES

Let’s apply some concepts from Chapter 9 to the scenario.

1. Which of the following “communicative distances” do the owners in the scenario reflect?
    a. Distance of indifference
    b. Distance of avoidance
    c. Distance of disparagement

2. Which of the following types of discrimination does the scenario reflect?
    a. Isolate
    b. Small-group
    c. Indirect institutional
    d. Direct institutional

4. To reduce prejudice and discrimination, which should Park do?
    a. Realize that we are all works in progress and wait for change.
    b. Speak up assertively.