by Alan Beatts
Right now there are so many people behaving wonderfully that the ones that behave badly and deceptively are especially irritating. Which is why I really feel the need to mention that our State Senator, Scott Wiener, said something in his April Newsletter that was deliberately misleading. And it was about Borderlands.
In his newsletter he said, in part. "I know I'm biased, but I think that San Francisco has the best small businesses in the world. Some, like my personal favorite dim sum restaurant Mama Ji's, are still open for takeout. Others, like one of my favorite bookstores, Borderlands Books — a fantasy and sci-fi bookstore in the Mission -- have closed for now. "
Nice, huh? Except I dunno why we would be one of his favorite bookstore since I'm absolutely certain that he's only set foot in the shop once. It was back in 2015 and the occasion was to talk with me about some highly critical things that I had said. I hadn't appreciated his position on the minimum wage increase that almost put us out of business and the cavalier way that he had dismissed a reporter's question about our closure by saying words to the effect of -- I love Borderlands but we knew that there would be some negative consequences from the wage increase.
At the time of his comment to the reporter, I asked all the staff if they had ever seen him in the shop. They were all sure that they hadn't. For some people, that recollection might not be authoritative but -- Scott Wiener is over six and a half feet tall, has red hair, and is even scrawnier than I am. He's not a person you can miss.
That conclusion was further supported by his one (and, I'm pretty damn sure) only visit to the shop. He walked in and looked around in exactly the same way I've seen thousands of people do; the first time they come in. He came to the counter and we had the following conversation.
Him, "Hi. I'm Scott Wiener."
Me, "Yup."
Him, "I'm sorry to hear that you're closing."
Me, "Yeah, me too."
Him, " . . . . "
And then he left.
Not what I would say is the best possible example of reaching out to your constituents (at the time, Wiener was a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors and represented the district that both the store and my home are located in). But, to be fair, I've been told that I can be a bit intimidating, especially if I'm not in a very good mood.
Since 2015, as far as I know, he's never set foot inside the shop again. He's also not one of our mail-order customers (I checked). Amusingly enough, we do have a sponsor named Scott Wiener, but it's not the same guy (I also checked).
So, why are we one of his favorite bookstores? I truly don't know. Unless it's because he likes being able to tie himself, as a supporter, to a business that enjoys a huge amount of support. Perhaps he thinks that he'll get the people who support us to support him? As I said, I dunno and I don't really care. But, I'm not going to let him act like he cares a bit about us when, at the time we needed help, all he could say was that -- there would be some negative consequences -- and then run away when he was face to face with the person who was suffering that consequence.
(Oh, and of course, he also said we were closed on April 3rd when, at the time, we had begun doing mail-orders again.)
No comments:
Post a Comment